A Q&A with Glen Burtnik

A Q&A with Glen Burtnik about Jersey Beatles Bash V coming to the State Theatre on Sat., July 23 at 8pm

Q: What can the audience expect to see different at this year’s Beatles Bash?

A: Enhanced orchestration. I pretty much know all Beatles albums by heart. And so before I carefully went over it, I originally—and absent mindedly—thought doing a note-for-note performance of Revolver could be fairly straight forward, executed by a simple ‘rock band’ (just bass, a few guitarists, pianos, and drums backing the vocals) as the Revolver album seemed to feature somewhat straight ahead, uncluttered arrangements.

But then I remembered “Eleanor Rigby”, the one and only song on the album with a string section. A song that’s a big fat landmark in the marriage of pop music and classical arranging. A masterpiece for sure.

Now, I love working with live strings and have grown fond of the group of players I’ve been working with—a quartet consisting of violinists Dana Marchioni, Linda Heffentrager, Taylor Hope and cellist James Celestino.

Upon informing them of my plans to tackle “Eleanor Rigby”, violinists Dana & Linda appealed to me that we go the distance with this important song and do it for real. To me, this would mean using the absolute correct orchestration (on the record, George Martin had arranged it for 8 strings: 4 violins, 2 violas, and 2 cellos).

Loving such enthusiasm, I took the bait, deciding to expand the string section by double. But upon going through the process of hiring eight classical string players to play for only one tune seemed an inefficient use of musicians (or kinda stupid, as we rock musicians would say).

Instead of missing an opportunity, since I’ll have all these cellists, violinists, and viola players hanging around backstage with nothing to play all evening except “Eleanor Rigby”, I figure let’s add some of the more orchestrated Beatles material to the show. It seemed a good idea to include other, more ambitious productions. The bigger, more classical & symphonic songs like “She’s Leaving Home”, “Yesterday” and “The Long And Winding Road,” “Across The Universe” as well as the wilder “Strawberry Fields Forever,” “All You Need Is Love,” “I Am The Walrus,” and “A Day In The Life.

Of course, once I got the ball rolling in such a direction, it behooved me to assemble a large horn section (featuring James Egan) and a 25 voice female choir. This music deserves 100% effort and the audience certainly deserves such as well. This event is as much a celebration as anything, and I’m planing to fill the State Theatre with the sound and passion of 40 musicians all joyfully performing this amazing music from the soundtrack of our lives.


Q: How was it different preparing for this with Revolver as opposed to other Beatles albums?

A: The Beatles began experimenting during the making of this 45-year-old album. George Harrison delved much deeper into his eastern influence with “Love You To,” a song featuring Indian instrumentation of sitar and tabla. Then there’s the beautiful French Horn of “For No One.”

And most importantly, there’s the avant gard “Tomorrow Never Knows”—an iconic breakthrough for rock music, featuring tape loops, and guitars played backwards.


Q: What is your favorite Revolver song?

A: Very difficult to say, as it’s such an interesting album. “Good Day Sunshine” makes me happy.


Q: How has Beatles Bash evolved over the years?

A: Each year the stakes are higher, at least in my mind. It is a self imposed task to try to recreate this classic music as meticulously as possible, and with each year I strive a little harder to get closer to this “holy grail” type journey. We, my fellow musicians and I, up the ante a bit each time—we get into more and more heated discussions about how each sound was produced. We’re truly music nerds about this material, and each brings their own knowledge and research to the table. There’s a sort of competition and because of this, the attention to detail grows each time.

I’ve been approaching each year as an Anniversary. In 2007 it had been 50 years since Sergeant Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band was released. 2008 was the 50th birthday of what’s known as The White Album, 2009 was the anniversary of Abbey Road’s release. Each year we performed those albums. And since last year it had been 50 years since Let It Be and 45 years since both Help! and Rubber Soul (both came out in ’65) we performed all three.

But here’s the real deal; as our musical drive and ambition for perfecting this great music has grown in intensity, so has the audience. The evenings have become a bit of a love fest—attended by both aficionados and music fans all sharing my passion for what is truly some of the most important, powerful and beautiful music ever made.

For tickets to Jersey Beatles Bash V with Glen Burtnik & Friends on July 23, 2011, visit http://www.statetheatrenj.org/jersey_beatles_bash_v

Get ready to Rock & Roll in July!

By Kayla Steinbach, PR & Marketing Intern

The month of July brings sunshine, pool parties, and Rock & Roll to New Brunswick. We have four rockin’ acts set between July 10-23 including four Grammy® Award-winners!

On Sunday, July 10 at 7pm come out to the State Theatre for Grammy® Award-winning singer/songwriter, Rick Springfield. He has had 17 top 40 singles, including the smash hits “Jessie's Girl,” “Don't Talk To Strangers,” “Affair of the Heart,” “Love Somebody,” “Celebrate Youth,” and “Rock of Life.” Springfield is also a TV actor starring in General Hospital and Californication.

Huey Lewis and the News are set to perform on Tuesday, July 12 at 8pm. For one night only, the Grammy® Award-winning band will pay tribute to Memphis soul with the Soulsville Tour including songs like “Respect Yourself” and “Got to Get You Off My Mind. But don’t worry, the band will also play all those classic Huey Lewis and the News songs you know and love— like smash-hits “The Power of Love,” “If This is It,” “Doing It All For My Baby,” “(Too) Hip to be Square,” “Workin’ For A Livin’,” and “Back In Time.”

That weekend on Saturday, July 16 at 8pm, Shawn Colvin & Loudon Wainwright III will take the stage. In her 19-year career, singer/songwriter Shawn Colvin, best known for her Top 10 hit “Sunny Came Home,” has won three Grammy® Awards and released eight albums. Grammy® Award-winning folk singer Loudon Wainwright III has recorded over 20 albums. His songs include “Dead Skunk,” “Needless to Say,” and “My Girl” with John Hiatt. Wainwright has also appeared on the TVshow M*A*S*H as the singing surgeon, Capt. Calvin Spaulding.

To close out the month, Glen Burtnik & Friends are back at the State Theatre on Saturday, July 23 at 8pm for their fifth annual Beatles Bash. Marking the 45th anniversary of Revolver, Glen and friends are to perform the Beatles album note-for-note! Songs include “Eleanor Rigby,” “Got to Get You into My Life,” “Yellow Submarine,” “Tomorrow Never Knows,” “I Want to Tell You,” and “Taxman.”

For tickets and more information please visit www.StateTheatreNJ.org.

What a Blast -- 3rd Annual Jersey Summer Beatles Bash Proves to Be the Best Yet

For three years, the State Theatre has partnered with local celebrity musician Glen Burtnik (former member of Styx) on a Beatles tribute concert called the "Jersey Summer Beatles Bash." Every year, Glen picks a Beatles album, and some friends (a very talented group of musicians) to perform a note-for-note rendition of that album. This year's album was Abbey Road.


(Above, people browse through the Beatles Rock Art that was displayed during the pre-show Happy Hour.)

From start to finish, this year's performance was amazing. I mean you could just feel the energy of the crowd in the hall, it was electric. (And it's still funny to me that lighters have been replaced by cell phones.) One of these highly charged moments was during I Want You (She's So Heavy)." The song, which is hypnotic without a live performance, was mesmerizing to listen to and to watch, especially as Glen and several other guitarists including Bob Burger (who has performed alongside Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, and Jon Bon Jovi), John Merjave (from the band Liverpool), Marc Muller (has played guitar for Shania Twain, Kelly Clarkson, and Elton John, among many others), and Marty O'Kane (lead guitarist/multi-instrumentalist for award-winning songwriter April Smith) poured themselves into the repetitive guitar riffs of the song (which is in fact 8 minutes long).

The last song of the night was the ever-popular "Hey Jude," where quite a few folks (including some State Theatre staff members, see pic at right) jumped onstage to join Glen & Friends for the song's repeating "Na-Nas". So, it really was a great night and we can't wait for next year's.

The State Theatre is located at 15 Livingston Avenue in New Brunswick, NJ. For information or to purchase tickets call 732-246-SHOW (7469) or visit http://www.statetheatrenj.org/. Check us out on Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace.

Toxic Audio: A Cappella with a Twist

A guest blog by Marketing & PR Intern Kelly Dolan

Last week, while on a Royal Caribbean Cruise, I had the opportunity to see many shows. I was beginning to get bored of night after night of subpar shows, when finally I saw Toxic Audio perform. I could hardly believe that they were using nothing but their own voices as the background music to some highly intricate instrumental songs. This five- person a cappella group not only sang popular songs such as Vicki Sue Robinson’s “Turn the Beat Around” and Mika’s “Grace Kelly” but they also use their own voices to supply all of the background music. When I shut my eyes for a second I felt as though there was a real trumpet, guitar, and piano being used during performance.

The singing was not the only thing that kept me entertained. The performance of each song had some type of twist to it. For example, when they sang “Paperback Writer” by the Beatles they walked around the audience and had members point to random words from a book. By the end cast member Jeremy James, known as the “Rap Master”, was able to create a rap song on the spot using all the words collected from the audience. Toxic Audio puts on a show that keeps audiences in awe throughout the entire performance. After seeing them perform, you may just be tempted to try and move your own nose at just the right angle in order to sound like a trumpet.

For more information on Toxic Audio, visit: http://www.toxicaudio.com/.

The State Theatre is located at 15 Livingston Avenue in New Brunswick, NJ. For information or to purchase tickets call 732-246-SHOW(7469) or visit http://www.statetheatrenj.org/. Check us out on Twitter, Facebook, and Myspace.