Review: THE MUSIC OF QUEEN+JOURNEY at Prima Theatre

It's true that Prima Theatre's own music shows can be its best productions. This one, THE MUSIC OF QUEEN+JOURNEY, is no exception to that rule. This was performed outdoors in 3021; now, post-pandemic, it comes to Prima's stage, tuneful all the way. Executive Artistic Producer Mitch Nugent directs this delightful musical mayhem for a warm summer evening with evident pleasure. Your pleasure will be equally evident.

Donovan Harper, Alicia Wray, and Brook Wood are the performers gleefully delivering the songs of the two both famous and favorite rock bands. While Harper isn't a Freddie Mercury clone, he's powerful in his own right and delivers the same kind of emotional power as Mercury. Wray, last seen in MURDER BALLAD at Prima, and Wood, who tours in Neil Betg's (ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF BROADWAY IN ONE NIGHT) concerts, are both compelling performers in their own right, Wray in particular excellent with the kid of raw, emotional rock This of course means that you'll be trying and failing at not singing loudly along to "Don't Stop Beleivin'" and "Somebody to Love," possibly at the top of your lungs when you do fail.

Yes, of course Hoffer's "Bohemian Rhapsody" is killer, and of course you will at least break loose for your "Galileo" moment, if for no other lyrics, although every time you hear it you remember that you really do know every word of it by heart (that's you I'm talking to; I know you sing it in the shower...) But you'll have the same reaction to "Love Kills" and everything else on the... journey through the music, because it's all ingrained in you now; it's just that "Bohemian Rhapsody" has its own special "on" switch in our brains.

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