In early April, the piano virtuoso who usually performs solo and is known for his work with a three- (not five-)man band will hit the stage alongside a decidedly larger ensemble.
That virtuoso is Ben Folds, whose global orchestral tour comes to the Ohio Theatre for a show with the Columbus Symphony Orchestra on April 9. He’s touring in support of his 2015 symphonic album So There but, as always, is expected to perform plenty of favorites from his 20 years of musical renown, all with orchestral backing.
Photos courtesy of Allan Amato
So There was a collaboration with yMusic, a New York City-based group of six instrumentalists, so it fits the tour perfectly. But Folds’ musical library stretches back to the mid-1990s, when his three-man ensemble, Ben Folds Five, scored a smash hit with its album Whatever and Ever Amen, featuring U.S. pop chart success “Brick” and alternative chart successes “Battle of Who Could Care Less,” “Kate” and “Song for the Dumped.” He went solo in the early 2000s and saw further musical triumph with such tunes as “Rockin’ the Suburbs,” “Still Fighting it,” “Landed” and “You Don’t Know Me,” the latter featuring Regina Spektor.
Folds delved into orchestral music in 2013 when he composed “Concerto for Piano and Orchestra.” Since then, he has distanced himself from Ben Folds Five and explored the classical.
“You always want to venture into the unknown, otherwise it’s … boring,” Folds says. “I mean, you’re doing what you know. If I had access to make music with orchestras when I was 20 years old, I’d be doing that then. It’s just something that, at the moment, is there.”
Folds’ persona seems to clash with the orchestral scene in the best of ways. Despite the fact that he is approaching 50 years old, Folds still assumes an air of defiance and punk.
His fans will know that his live shows are boisterous, loud and often foul-mouthed, and the audience shows up expecting to laugh. Folds has been known to cover tunes by Dr. Dre and Kesha, perhaps bizarre for someone whose talent on piano has been compared to the likes of Elton John and Billy Joel.
“I like a little less formality than you’d expect of a symphony show,” Folds says. “When you can identify a human or a story or context behind any kind of performance, it makes it powerful … so I like making it human.”
Another unique piece to Ben Folds’ orchestral tour is a song that Folds fans will be happy to hear made the cut: “Rock This Bitch.” Though there is an official, album version of “Rock This Bitch,” the song’s roots go back to the early 2000s when a fan at a show in Chicago screamed out the title, and Folds improvised an entire song on the spot. Ever since, Folds has been playing a completely improvised song at his shows, always titled “Rock This Bitch.”
With an orchestra, the improvisation becomes quite impressive. Typing “Rock This Bitch” into YouTube produces well over a dozen live, orchestral versions of the song from his current tour alone – each with a different orchestra, each a totally different tune. Folds sits front and center, instructing each part of the orchestra to “do this,” as he plays a melody on his piano.
“Now, let’s get some ‘Eye of the Tiger’ (stuff) going on with the double basses,” he tells the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra in one video.
In another, Folds tells the Salt Lake Symphony, “OK, clarinets, just winds in general, let’s do it this way. Actually, except for the flutes, no flutes, just clarinets and oboes. No, not bassoon. Just clarinets, oboes. And English horn, maybe. Just … something like this.” The crowd erupts with laughter.
After about five minutes, he has composed a full song. As each part of the orchestra comes in and Folds begins to sing, the audience roars with applause. It’s hard not to be impressed with both Folds and the orchestra behind him.
“I think what happens is the audience walks away going, ‘Man, that orchestra’s … great, did you hear what they did?’” Folds says. “That’s the thing about humanizing an orchestra. It’s those kinds of moments that make you really, like, ‘Oh, they don’t just have their heads in the page.’”
Because his music meshes organically with an orchestra, Folds hopes his shows may lead more people back to the symphony.
“If you come and see a funk band play with the symphony orchestra, that’s interesting, but that’s not compelling to come back and see the symphony orchestra again because you know it’s not going to be anything like that,” Folds says. “When I play the piano concerto, it’s what is normally played. It’s more like, ‘Oh, that’s pretty cool and I can see what it means to this guy, I understand that guy.’”
Because Folds has been so focused on orchestra as of late, he thinks his next step will be something totally different.
“Now I have four years where all I’ve been doing is orchestra, and with my head in orchestration and all this stuff, so maybe it’s like I just finished college,” Folds says. “It’s time for me to get a real job, so I’ll probably try IBM. I might do Starbucks for a little while.”
Amanda DePerro is a contributing editor. Feedback welcome at gbishop@cityscenemediagroup.com.
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