Rufus Does Judy At Carnegie Hall

Wow! It really doesn’t get any gayer than this. Rufus Wainwright doing a cover of an entire 1961 Judy Garland concert at Carnegie Hall – with a little assistance from his mom and his sister. Hmmm...
Recorded over two days in June 2006, a seriously camp-sounding Wainwright is backed by a 36-piece orchestra (conducted by Stephen Oremus), and joined at various points by his mother (Kate McGarrigle), his sister (Martha Wainwright) and Garland’s daughter Lorna Luft.
The songs are faithfully performed in their original running order and he even talks at every point that Garland did in her original performance. There are several minutes of opening overture, before Rufus lisps, “Thank you very much. I’m gonna speak now because on the album Judy speaks here.”
He then goes on to tell a story about how when he was a young child, some days he wanted to be Dorothy, others he wanted to be the Wicked Witch. It’s all very nudge, nudge, wink, wink, and the audience laughs uproariously. This reviewer disgustedly threw a crumpled copy of Playboy at the stereo.
His sister sings on ‘Stormy Weather’ (“One of things I have in common with Garland is that I have an incredible family,” he explains, introducing Martha). Mother McGarrigle does ‘Over The Rainbow’, and Luft comes on towards the end to perform ‘After You’ve Gone’.
This sort of stuff really doesn’t do it for me at all, but – fair’s fair – it’s undeniably a superb performance. Suffice to say, if you like such schmaltzy ‘classics’ as ‘Puttin’ On The Ritz’ and ‘The Man That Got Away’, you’ll simply adore this live double album.