Young @ Heart rocks on 'til the end
Hip foggies comprise Young @ Heart, the focus of Bob Cilman's honest film.
Lauren Barbato
Issue date: 3/27/08 Section: Lifestyle
Ninety-two-year-old Eileen Hall peers out into the large, jam-packed theater, her small and seemingly feeble frame nearly lost among the vastness of the stage.
After a moment, she leans on her purple cane and lets out a scream that would have made Joe Strummer proud. In her incredibly endearing English accent, Hall bursts into her rendition of an iconic Clash tune.
"Should I stay or should I go now?" she playfully asks the audience, to which they promptly respond, "Stay!"
Meet 24 elders who initially appear just as senile as your lilting grandparents at Christmas dinners and family reunions.
Yet instead of crooning the Rat Pack or Italian ballads, these old folks cover everything from James Brown to Sonic Youth, along with the occasional Prince, Queen and Talking Heads song. Adorned in chest-high pants, chunky knit sweaters and newsboy caps, these hip fogies are bringing bifocals back in style.
Beginning in 1982 as vaudeville dinner theater, the Young @ Heart chorus consists of 70- to 90-year-olds who share a passion for music.
They staged their first production a year later before four sold-out audiences in their quaint town of Northampton, Mass.
Soon followed numerous European tours, concerts with David Byrnes of Talking Heads and a range of collaborations with area art groups, quickly turning the members of Young @ Hearts into legends.
Filmmaker Stephen Walker met with the group seven weeks before their next hometown performance in his documentary of the group's same name.
The audience watches the chorus convene three times a week under the guidance of long-time musical director Bob Cilman. As they attempt to add seven brand new songs to their repertoire, it proves to be a rather daunting task.
This poignant and heartfelt documentary features a cast of colorful characters, which includes the aforementioned Eileen, the shameless flirt who claims she single-handedly started the British Invasion; Joe Benoit, the phenomenon who could memorize a whole song in an afternoon; Len Fontaine, Young @ Heart's harmonica soloist, who has a reputation for mistaking his age for the speed limit on the highway; and Pat Linderme, whose heart-tugging version of Prince's "Nothing Compares 2 U" brings down the house each and every time.
After a moment, she leans on her purple cane and lets out a scream that would have made Joe Strummer proud. In her incredibly endearing English accent, Hall bursts into her rendition of an iconic Clash tune.
"Should I stay or should I go now?" she playfully asks the audience, to which they promptly respond, "Stay!"
Meet 24 elders who initially appear just as senile as your lilting grandparents at Christmas dinners and family reunions.
Yet instead of crooning the Rat Pack or Italian ballads, these old folks cover everything from James Brown to Sonic Youth, along with the occasional Prince, Queen and Talking Heads song. Adorned in chest-high pants, chunky knit sweaters and newsboy caps, these hip fogies are bringing bifocals back in style.
Beginning in 1982 as vaudeville dinner theater, the Young @ Heart chorus consists of 70- to 90-year-olds who share a passion for music.
They staged their first production a year later before four sold-out audiences in their quaint town of Northampton, Mass.
Soon followed numerous European tours, concerts with David Byrnes of Talking Heads and a range of collaborations with area art groups, quickly turning the members of Young @ Hearts into legends.
Filmmaker Stephen Walker met with the group seven weeks before their next hometown performance in his documentary of the group's same name.
The audience watches the chorus convene three times a week under the guidance of long-time musical director Bob Cilman. As they attempt to add seven brand new songs to their repertoire, it proves to be a rather daunting task.
This poignant and heartfelt documentary features a cast of colorful characters, which includes the aforementioned Eileen, the shameless flirt who claims she single-handedly started the British Invasion; Joe Benoit, the phenomenon who could memorize a whole song in an afternoon; Len Fontaine, Young @ Heart's harmonica soloist, who has a reputation for mistaking his age for the speed limit on the highway; and Pat Linderme, whose heart-tugging version of Prince's "Nothing Compares 2 U" brings down the house each and every time.
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