'Hamadeus' Delights Children

If Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Dr. Seuss traversed the centuries that separate them to collaborate on a piece, it would be “Green Eggs and Hamadeus.” Just as the combinatory title suggests, Rob Kapilow’s “Green Eggs and Hamadeus” merges performance and audience, tradition and innovation, and—of course—Mozart and Dr. Seuss.

As a presentation of the “Celebrity Series of Boston,” an organization founded to further the performing arts in Boston, this original work comes to Boston University’s Tsai Performance Center with the aim of bringing classical music to life, even for children.

Kapilow, nicknamed the “Pied Piper of classical music,” aims to help audiences of all ages and backgrounds to make connections to the music that often seems esoteric and boring. “Green Eggs and Hamadeus” is one of the most recent pieces composed, conducted, and commentated by Kapilow, and it truly succeeds in making the music accessible and fun to viewers—ranging from squirmy, eager five-year olds to their grandparents.

In his quest to demonstrate music as “telling a story with no words, just notes,” Kapilow spends the first half of the 1-hour performance explaining the intricate mechanics behind Mozart’s “Eine kleine Nachtmusik.”

Asking the audience to clap the rhythm and sing the tune with a series of “bum” and “bo-da-ga-bum,” Kapilow helps the audience become more familiar with the music. After these mini lessons, the grinning conductor poses “quiz” questions, requesting that the audience answer with a unanimous “Tempo!” or “Accompaniment!” This interactive educational sequence paves an irresistibly engaging and entertaining segue into the full piece itself.

His explanations, coupled with live examples on the piano, are simple yet informative, easy to digest without sounding like excerpts from “Classical Music for Dummies.” Kapilow is remarkably straightforward with his comments and makes the information easy to retain through funny quips—“Yes, ‘bum’ is the first word of this song”—and activities like creating sixteenth notes by slapping on the thighs.

The techniques behind musical phrasing and motifs are brought down to the comprehensible level of his junior audience. The ensemble itself is small, including only two violinists, one violist, one cellist, and one bassist, but the intimate size of the group is useful as it allows for the audience to better hear the subtle elements of Kapilow’s lessons.

A large part of the presentation’s appeal lies in Kapilow’s lively mannerisms and enthusiastic voice, making it difficult to resist his magnetic pull. With hair flying as he conducts, his hand and arm movements morph into a continuous stream of hops and goofy dancing. In breaking free from the seriousness of traditional conductors, he is both humorous and demonstrative of the fact that classical music can be fun.

Thanks to Kapilow’s lessons, the crucial elements of “Eine kleine Nachtmusik”—the surprise in each phrase, the sparkle made possible by underlying, repeated sixteenth notes—come alive, truly transforming the piece into a story the audience could fully understand.

With the last G major chord of “Rondo” ringing the decisive finale to the first half of the presentation, the stage is rapidly rearranged to replace the music stands with a stool, a chair, and a table set for breakfast. Kapilow reemerges to present his own original piece, named “Green Eggs and Ham,” named after the well-known rhyme by Dr. Seuss.

Like he does with “Eine kleine Nachtmusik,” Kapilow involves the entire audience in a conversation and an activity. Furthermore, he transforms each line of Dr. Seuss’s work into a varied, expressive musical phrase. By adding his own personal touches, like an adaptation of “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” preceding the lines of “A train, a train, a train, a train! Could you, would you on a train?”—Kapilow transforms Dr. Seuss’s classic tale.

In addition to adding variety, the creative arrangement and interplay of ritardandos, accelerandos, crescendos, and diminuendos further the emotional component of “Green Eggs and Ham” and shape the plot dimension of the otherwise playful but repetitive rhyme.

The biggest success of “Green Eggs and Hamadeus” is the appeal to a remarkably wide range of ages and its interactive, engaging presentation. The line between performers and audience is blurred from the beginning to end of the hour, and both children and adults alike are inspired to learn more about music.

Kapilow turns the stuffiness of a classical concert into a fresh, participatory show, enhancing the performance with an innovative approach to a time-tested classical piece and an original contemporary work.

Though this presentation may at first seem as puzzling or doubtful as a plate of green eggs, especially for those beyond the age of 11, it is a performance that is sure to make one want music here and there and anywhere.