His final “UnCovered” features The Music of ABBA – SesayArts in conversation with Reza Jacobs 

16 years in, it’s safe to say that The Musical Stage Company’s inspired UnCovered series has become a tradition. 

A highly anticipated fixture of the Musical Stage Company’s annual programming, UnCovered re-examines and reimagines the songbooks of legendary singers/songwriters through the lens of storytelling developed and performed by some of Canada’s most celebrated musical theatre artists.

This year, UnCovered interprets the music of pop supergroup ABBA. Don’t call it his Waterloo, but yes, it will be the final UnCovered for Music Director Reza Jacobs, the award-winning music director, arranger, composer, and sound designer who co-created the concept with the company’s previous artistic director, Mitchell Marcus. (The tradition will continue in 2023, passing to new hands).

This bittersweet 2022 edition of the concert runs November 8-10 at the prestigious Koerner Hall in the Royal Conservatory of Music, where audiences will again experience Jacobs’ imaginative arrangements and orchestrations performed by Landon Doak, Hailey Gillis, Kelly Holiff, Gavin Hope, Vanessa Sears, Germaine Konji, and the 2021-2022 Syd & Shirley Banks Prize Winners Rosie Callaghan and Matthew Joseph – all accompanied by musicians by Sasha Boychouk, Jamie Drake, Justin Gray, Rachel Pomedli, and Jacobs.

As it happens, UnCovered: The Music of ABBA coincides with the 50^th anniversary of the band’s founding.  Diehards will remember that ABBA was Sweden’s first-ever winner of the Eurovision Song Contest with “Waterloo,” which was chosen in 2005 as the best song in the competition’s history. And ABBA jukebox musical  Mamma Mia! remains in the top ten longest-running productions on Broadway, and continues to run in London’s West End. The band even reunited unexpectedly last year to release a new album, their first in 40 years.

SesayArts Magazine spoke with Jacobs about the collaborative approach to song selection and interpretation, the theatricality inherent in ABBA’s lyrics, and the dramatically different road that lies ahead for him. 

SM: UnCovered is a brilliant concept, and those familiar with the annual production associate it with you as an integral part of it. How did you originally become involved as its Musical Director?  

RJ: Mitchell Marcus and I sat down in a coffee shop and decided to do a concert covering Beatles tunes, but focusing on the stories and using theater artists to tell those stories.  

SM: Has the role evolved and changed over the past 15 years?

RJ: I have evolved as a human being, as a musician, as an artist, but the role has basically remained the same.  I collaborate with artists to find where the stories in the songs live in the artists.  And then I try to tell those stories with them.  

SM: Every year, the cast list reads like a who’s who of Canadian theatre! How were the performing artists and the program assembled for this concert? 

RJ: This year, Fiona Sauder (director), Ray Hogg (artistic director), Kevin Wong (associate director of music) and I sat and brainstormed the names of people we wanted in the show.  That’s how it happens every year.  The creative team sits and comes up with a list of desired singers.  We try to get different types of voices to be in the show.  

SM: And how is a song matched with the artist who will interpret it?

RJ: The pairing of songs happens a lot by instinct. And of course, the artist has to feel on board and to feel like the song resonates with them.  

SM: UnCovered is known for its unique collaborative process… From what I understand, each artist works with you on the songs they will sing, and together, you determine how their interpretation will a) highlight the narratives in the lyrics and b) bring characterizations to the songs. 

RJ: I’ve been surprised and moved by the melancholy in the ABBA song lyrics.  Melancholy is a language my heart speaks fluently, so it’s been good to be living with these songs.  

SM: Can you describe this collaboration for us and its influence on musical arrangements? What have been some highlights and surprises for you so far? 

RJ: I sit with the artists, and we talk about what the lyric means.  We talk about how that meaning translates to a musical feeling.  And then we do some improvising to see what comes out, and how we can surprise ourselves.  

SM: New generations have discovered the music of ABBA through the musical Mamma Mia, a long-running, hugely popular jukebox musical, and the hit films it spawned. In this way, some of the group’s biggest hits have already been interpreted dramatically. That said, I imagine that you will interpret and arrange the selected songs in imaginative and unexpected ways. What would you like us to know about this?

RJ: Come to the concert and experience it!  The artists in this year’s lineup are staggeringly good.  They are deep humans who are able to express the truth in these songs in a way that is compelling and entertaining.  That’s a killer combo.  

There’s no escaping the fact that everyone knows these songs and that the musical already repurposed them for a narrative.  But I think the way we have reinterpreted the songs with our unique group of artists is different.  But come and see for yourself. 

SM: Since this is your finale as the musical director of UnCovered after 15 years, the big question on everyone’s mind is, what led to this decision and what lies ahead for you? 

RJ: I have started training to be a psychotherapist. It is something I am passionate about and feels like an evolution of what I do in music.  I am also following my interest in the mystical and healing modalities of music.  I’m not sure where it all leads, but I’m following my instincts and desires.  

Reserve tickets to UnCovered: The Music of ABBA on rcmusic.com.

© Arpita Ghosal, SesayArts Magazine, 2022