CD Review: The Liz Swados Project – Various Artists

THE LIZ SWADOS PROJECT – Various Artists (Ghostlight Records, digital and streaming formats)

Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

I feel dreadful – I have to admit I don’t think I had ever heard of Liz Swados and, having heard this album I am mad I haven’t been listening to her music until now. If, like me, you aren’t aware of this wonderful woman, let me just include the info from the press release, as I think it will interest you:

Elizabeth Swados received her BA from Bennington College and an honorary Doctorate from Hobart/William Smith College. She composed, wrote and directed over 30 theatre pieces including The Trilogy, Nightclub Cantata, Runaways, Alice in Concert, Doonesbury and Rap Master Ronnie (both with Garry Trudeau), The Haggadah, Jonah, Job, Esther, Jerusalem (with Yehudah Amichai), The 49 Years (with Estelle Parsons), Bible Women, Jabu and Missionaries. For Runaways in 1978, Swados was nominated for Tony Awards in the categories of best direction, best original score, best book of a musical and best choreography, plus Runaways was nominated for best musical.  

As a composer, Swados wrote music for films, television shows, and performed at Carnegie Hall, Merkin Hall, the Asia Society, as well as cabarets, rock clubs, churches and synagogues around the United States and Europe. As an author she published three novels, three non-fiction books, and ten children’s books. Her articles have appeared in the New York Times, New York Times Magazine, Vogue, O Magazine and she is included in a number of journals and anthologies. She also collaborated on film scripts with Milos Forman (based on her musical Groundhog), Marlon Brando, Sean Penn and others and television scripts with Tom Fontana and Kelsey Grammer’s television production company.

Her expertise with young people is exemplified by eight shows made for and with teenagers (Runaways – Broadway, The Hating Pot – PBS Special, as well as two new works Heart and Mind about mental illness in children and Everything is Different about diversity, both for national video release). She developed The Reality Show for and with the students of New York University to introduce incoming freshman to their first year of college.

Swados was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Ford Fellowship, a Convenant Foundation Grant, three Obies, four Tony nominations, a Special Pen Citation, a Cine Award, a Mira Award, and many other awards and grants.

This album is a tribute to her work through the years with some absolutely amazing voices paying homage, including vocalists Starr Busby, Sophia Anne Caruso, Damon Daunno, Amber Gray, Stephanie Hsu, Jo Lampert, Alicia Olatuja, Ashley Pérez Flanagan, Grace McLean, and Ali Stroker, in addition to songwriter/performers The Bengsons, Heather Christian, Michael R. Jackson, Taylor Mac, Dave Malloy, Shaina Taub and the late Michael Friedman, among others. Every one of them giving a totally immersive rendition of their particular tracks.

There are 14 tracks on the album: ‘We Are Not Strangers’, ‘Every Now and Then’, ‘Oh King Daddy’, ‘The Red Queen’, ‘In This My Green World’, ‘Take Me To Paris’, ‘Souf’, ‘You Gave Me Love’, ‘You Do Not Have To Be Good’, ‘Song of a Child Prostitute’, ‘The Dance’, ‘Salvador’, ‘Lonesome of the Road’, ‘War Gets Old’, ‘A Change Shall Come’, ‘Bird Lament’, ‘Amen’ and ‘Things I Didn’t Know I Loved’.

A mixture of powerful, eclectic, experimental and humorous genres, this is one amazing album that all theatre music lovers should have in their collection. And, thank you Ghostlight Records for introducing me to the outstanding works of an utterly amazing lady, Liz Swados.

Nick Wakeham