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| - FINALLY, he's hit his stride!
I've seen this show maybe 10 times because I've watched this guy work his way from a really small lounge in the the Gold Nugget to a showroom on the Strip, and I gotta tell you, it's well deserved.
I happened to see the show on the night that they did a live taping that will be aired within the next month. Having seen the show so many times, I can tell you that if you have seen it BEFORE February 11th, 2014...you should see it again.
The show initially was a cleaned up lounge show, which wasn't a bad thing in that it was about talented musicians, friends and music. Qualities that, quite honestly, I'd never seen in a Vegas lounge show before. He seemed to have little interest in flash, pomp or circumstance.
Now, however, he seems to have listened to his audiences feedback and used this venue to let his show evolve into a proper SHOWROOM SHOW.
Just so you know:
There are 10 people in the show and EVERYONE on that stage is REALLY talented, and they give it 100%.
The evening is comprised of about 95% original music, written by Frankie Moreno and his brothers (one of whom plays bass onstage with him).
Frankie is ridiculously talented and distractingly handsome. He never seems to rely on his looks nor does he even seem to take himself that seriously, but CLEARLY he is VERY serious about his music. He is a classically trained pianist with a penchant for rock music. Knowing that helps contextualize his approach. He is, in no way, trying to emulate nor pay homage to Vegas "greats" that preceded him, nor is he discounting their value or appeal, but it is clear that he knows and understands what it takes to be a great entertainer, and how to entertain a Vegas audience. It occurs to me that he is creating his OWN place in the tapestry and history of Vegas.
If you want an old school type Vegas show, this ain't it, because Frankie Moreno is born of a different generation, one that has been influenced and inspired by bygone eras, but not LIMITED by them.
He is not ONLY an accomplished singer like a Sinatra or Sammy Davis, Jr., he is also a musician: adept at playing many instruments with amazing proficiency. Instead of trying to recreate what people already know of Las Vegas shows he is creating a possibility for a whole new type of Vegas audience to emerge.
This iteration of the Frankie Moreno Show is FAR more polished than any I'd seen of him prior to this. The show is now cleverly staged so that the band members are all integral pieces to the evening. Every member of the band has a featured moment of some sort and each one is really quite dynamic.
Of particular note are the drum feature (a Gene Krupa-esque treatment of "I Wanna Be Like You" from Jungle book) and a chilling violin solo that precedes his rendition of "Eleanor Rigby", (which he recorded with Josh Bell).
Though the night is predominantly original music, what Frankie is good at is making the music that you're hearing VERY accessible. It reminds me that, at one time, the old greats introduced brand new, beautiful songs that only now, many years later, are they regarded as classics. At one time those "classics" were unknown songs to the people listening to them, and the fact that they were new and unknown did nothing to impede the audiences experience of enjoying an evening of great music, in a well produced show done by a talented performer.
The show is high energy, for sure, and Frankie has a very real, almost irreverent way about himself that reminds me that he is indeed a real person, and he seems be in no way caught up in the idea that he should be "bigger than life". His TALENT is, and THAT is what you cannot help but respect.
This show is also one that young people can appreciate and parents can feel free to take their young kids and even their teenagers to see this show because the music can reach them without alienating the parents and vice-versa. That quality, in and of itself, is what makes this show so unique and completely worth going to see.
I cannot say enough good things about this show, but I will keep going just in case there is something new to discover, because I can tell that as amazing as Frankie Moreno is, the best of him (and this show) is yet to come.
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