Rootstech and Oscar Hammerstein III

Rodgers and Hammerstein. Creators of The Sound of Music, Carousel, Oklahoma, South Pacific, etc.

We performed the opening concert for the Rootstech concert and the emcee for the evening was the grandson of Oscar Hammerstein of "Rodgers and Hammerstein" fame. Singing songs of Broadways most iconic musicals was a fun way to spend the evening.

The concert included video vignettes of family connections to music.

The staying power of these musicals continues to amaze generations. They are still being performed and their movie interpretations are classics.

The music we sang for the evening came from the arrangements from Arthur Harris in the 1960's-1970's. These arrangements are also classics and I have the album of the choir from 1971 performing these pieces. I listened to them and enjoyed hearing the interpretation from back in that time.

Interesting fact: Arthur Harris composed music for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir but he never heard the choir perform live. He never visited Salt Lake City either. He lived in New York City. On the album from 1971 he conducted the Columbia Orchestra and Richard Condie conducted the choir.

We were also able to learn more about Oscar Hammerstein and his family during the program.

It also included video clips of choir members and the stories of their past family members who have choir connections. It was my favorite part of the program.

This was one of my favorite programs we have done because I love the music so much.

For the broadcast we performed music from the concert. Every song was a show tune. Woot. Here is the broadcast on youtube. Watch it. It was fun to sing and you can sing along with it too.