MELISSA and David’s show was bookended by duets
There were striking differences in the performing styles of David Pomeranz and Melissa Manchester—and they were precisely what made the passionate sexagenarians’ back-to-back “Live in Manila” concert at the Big Dome on April 6 viewable and instructive.
While the 65-year-old balladeer of the jukebox staples, “Got to Believe in Magic” and “King and Queen of Hearts,” was warm and eager to please, the Grammy-winning songstress behind the enduring melodic schmaltz of “Looking Through the Eyes of Love” and “Don’t Cry Out Loud” was calculated and occasionally cold.
When it took longer for the show’s band of accompanists to begin playing her second song in the second portion of the concert, Melissa, also 65, turned around and impatiently quipped, “I’m ready when you are.”
When things went as planned, however, her icy impatience thawed considerably, replaced by a burst of warmth, especially when she began singing her hit singles as images of her willowy curves from her early music videos in the ’70s and ’80s were flashed on the big screen.
Before launching into “You Should Hear How She Talks About You,” the song that turned the ballad-belting singer into one of America’s Queen of Aerobics in 1982 (Olivia Newton-John’s “Physical” hit the charts in 1981), she beamed at her young self on the video wall and said, “Look at that little girl—and those shoulder pads!”
For his part, David, who was Emmy-nominated for the 1981’s TV drama “Homeward Bound,” was chatty and “accessible.” He said that the Philippines was second home to him, because its music-loving and -generating people have always welcomed him and his songs with open arms.
Bookended by duets, the show began with David and Melissa singing “When I Fall in Love,” made a little underwhelming by awkward counterpointing. But they more than made up for this collaborative misstep before they wrapped up the show with rousing renditions of Kenny Loggins’ 1978 hit, “Whenever I Call You Friend” (which Melissa cowrote), followed by David’s self-penned “Born for You.”
Before singing “Undying Admiration,” written for David’s wife, the singer began introducing what he referred to as an “unknown” song. You can imagine how the audience roared into a frenzy when the tune turned out to be… “Got to Believe in Magic.” The guy certainly knows how to tease—and please.
He then offered milk and cookies before his anecdote about his demo tape of a song he wrote for Karen Carpenter and her brother Richard. When Barry Manilow got wind of this, Barry recorded his own version of David’s hit-bound composition, “Trying to Get the Feeling Again.”
He also performed his 2009 duet with Sharon Cuneta, “If You Walked Away,” which lacked much-needed oomph without its soaring harmony. To make the number more engaging, he came up with a stilted Filipino translation of its lyrics: “Kung ikaw ay lilisan ngayon/ Para sa ’yo, walang magbabago sa himig ko.” The rest of the lyrics sounded incomprehensible, however, prompting the singer to quip with a grin, “I screwed it up!… Well, I can do ‘Pasko Na, Sinta Ko’ better, but it has to be Christmas.”
David enjoyed himself so much that he seemed to have gotten carried away. So, after singing the last song of the first set, “King and Queen of Hearts,” a beaming Melissa “stormed” onstage to cut David’s overextended goodbye spiel short.
THE BALLADEER was warm and eager to please; the songstress was calculated and occasionally cold. MAGIC Liwanag
Unfamiliar songs
Melissa’s portion was weighed down by some unfamiliar songs, but stories about her life and career were just as entertaining: When she isn’t performing, she said she “moonlights” as an adjunct professor teaching pop music performance at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music.
It was her students who encouraged her to record her No. 17-charting jazz album, “You Gotta Love the Life,” her first all-original collection in 20 years.
Its first single, the self-penned “Feelin’ for You,” was inspired by a drunk in a “jook” joint in Mississippi she once visited. After his unsolicited pass at Melissa was rebuffed, he scoffed at her and said, “Too bad, ’cause I gotta feelin’ for you”—and a new song was born.
Melissa acquitted herself well when the melodies weren’t high (“Midnight Blue” and “Big Light,” her jazzy duet with Al Jarreau). But she occasionally struggled when it was time to reach the stratospheric parts of her hit singles.
So, her renditions of “Looking Through the Eyes of Love” (from the 1985 screen drama, “Ice Castles”), “I’ll Never Say Goodbye” (from 1979’s “The Promise”) and “Don’t Cry Out Loud” were proficient but not quite seamless. She hit the high notes, all right, but because she couldn’t sustain them, she’d rush through their phrasing and cut the stanza short.
But there was something else from her performance that saw her through those missing grace notes and clipped melodies—her lived-in soulfulness: Melissa wasn’t just singing a bunch of musical notes, she was telling moving and relatable stories about finding fame and managing to stay alive in the cutthroat world of entertainment. The woman has spunk—and that’s more than we can say about many people from the opposite gender.
If Melissa hasn’t learned anything about sustaining viewers’ interest after 45 years of performing, she would have lost our attention long after she sang the last notes of her first song.