Michael Feinstein, A Holiday to Remember - New York City Article

Feinstein’s / 54 Below

254 W 54th Street, (646) 476-3551

Through Friday, December 30

With a Michael Feinstein show, the question is not whether it’s any good – all of his productions are invariably tremendously entertaining – but which part moves you the most. For this year’s holiday show at the club that bears his name, Mr. Feinstein focuses on Judy Garland, and builds meaningfully to her one holiday standard (“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”) as an encore. Along the way, he gives us such set-pieces as his assemblage of all the verses and choruses of “If I Only Had a Brain” – not only smart, but also full of heart and nerve. There’s also his juxtaposition of two excellent, lesser-known songs that John Meyer wrote for Garland, the exuberant “I’d Like to Hate Myself in the Morning” and the heart-breaking almost suicidal “After the Holidays.” Still, the most moving moment was a duet from beyond the grave – when Mr. Feinstein played a hitherto unknown private, a capella recording of a young Garland singing “I’ll Be Seeing You” and accompanied her on the piano. It would have given chills to all of us in the sold-out crowd, except that we had already been experiencing them up and down our spines for the previous 70 minutes.

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