Margaret Dorn, Emily Bindiger, Dennis Deal, Bill Mitchell, Marcia Pelletiere, Rosie Vallese, Jim Vincent, Matt Perri
Influences
Please turn off the sound on the Music player to hear this video. This is from our recent appearance with Jamie De Roy and Friends at the Metropolitan Room in NYC, celebrating Oscar-winning songs. This is our version of "White Christmas/It’s Hard Out Here For A Pimp". It has some nasty language, sorry!!!
Sounds Like
From Cabaret Scenes magazine:
The Reprise Room, December 17, 2007
New York, NY
There is something special about the human voice that a musical instrument can try to emulate or even manage to enhance, but never duplicate. The Accidentals are an eight-voice a cappella group that filled Dillon’s Reprise Room with sounds of Christmas music, both secular and sacred.
The lack of instrumental accompaniment was amply swept out of mind by the ingenuity of the arrangements that orchestrated the eight voices into an effervescent symphony of sound. They were more than a great choir however. The singers were alive— animated, responsive to one another, and smartly aware of the value of their body language for communicating the sense of the song.
The voice-only stricture was broken to invite songwriter David Friedman to the piano to play and sing (not badly, either) his raucously funny “My Simple Christmas Wish” and his “Truth About Christmas.” More to the serious side was his moving paean “We Can Be Kind.”
The Accidentals did a bang-up job. “O Tannenbaum” in both German and English, and “Seasons of Love” from the musical, Rent (“525,6000 minutes—how can you measure the life of a woman or man?”) were choice. They encored with “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” using the arrangement The Accidentals leader, Margaret Dorn, prepared for Petula Clark, then closed the show with a reverent “Silent Night.” ‘Tis a shame that Christmas comes but once a year.
Peter Leavy
Cabaret Scenes
December 17, 2007
www.cabaretscenes.org
"If you think a cappella choristers are inherently square, think again. This group's irreverent sense of humor inspired Denis Leary to feature them in his Merry F$%n' Christmas Special on Comedy Central."
NYmag.com
A unique mixed-voice octet, The Accidentals have received several awards for Best Vocal Group, including three MAC AWARDS (Manhattan Association of Cabarets and Clubs) and the BACK STAGE BISTRO AWARD. They were the 1995 National Finals Champions of the HARMONY SWEEPSTAKES A CAPPELLA FESTIVAL, winning three out of four prizes: First Prize, Audience Favorite, and Best Song. Their CDs have won two CARAS (Contemporary a Cappella Recording Awards).
With material ranging from the haunting "You Win" ('95 Sweeps Best Song), to an outrageous take on "Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer" ("Rudiana"), and a much-praised comic tribute to Hollywood's worst movie director, Ed Wood, Jr., the group has sophisticated arrangements with lush harmonies and an offbeat sense of humor. Their eclectic repertoire includes pop originals, pop/jazz standards, classical (traditional and modern), novelty music and film scores.
The professional backgrounds of the group members include the recording industry (Bette Midler, Neil Sedaka, Leonard Cohen, Jennifer Lopez, Diana Ross, Barry Manilow, Celine Dion, David Johansen, Nell Carter, Taylor Dane), Broadway (The Drowsy Chaperone, Hair, Shenandoah, Jesus Christ Superstar, Nite Club Confidential), commercials, industrials, arranging, songwriting (covers by Karen Carpenter, Barry Manilow, Tom Jones, The Dells), and concerts (Bette Midler, Michael Feinstein, Donald Fagen, Leonard Cohen, Eddie Arnold, Petula Clark, Boz Scaggs, Willie Nelson, Neil Sedaka). They were the soloists and the backbone of the choir for the Bottom Line's Downtown Messiah each December, performed composer Kevin Hayes' live film scores for the 1920's silent film classics Metropolis and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and were the outrageous lyric-altering choir on the Comedy Central holiday special, "Denis Leary's Merry F#$%in' Christmas". They are also a welcome yearly fixture singing holiday music at the World Financial Center's beautiful Winter Garden in New York City.
For more on The Accidentals and individual members’ bios and more song clips, please go to their website, www.theaccidentals.com.
I edited my profile with Thomas' Myspace Editor V4.4
Thanks so much for the Add–and your friendship. We enjoyed your music very much. Thanks for sharing it with all of us. It's a pleasure having you among our friends! We've added two blogs about Umano, plus four more new compositions, making ten on our page. We hope you and your friends visit us and enjoy our music, too. We wake up every morning and play the music of the new MySpace friends who have arrived at our site during the night. It occurred to us that these friends (you are among them) are almost universally positive, whether they be novices or legends, and without regard to their station in life or the country they occupy. Although it's not an original thought, it also occurred to us that we couldn’t hold a verbal conversation with most of these friends, but we have bridged that gap by expressing our art honestly with each other. We all have been filling the world with our music and art, in the hope that our messages of love and human understanding will have an impact on the world at large. What a gift and what an opportunity we have received from this technology!
Hi everyone! It was so nice to see you again! Your busiest season is about to start now, please take good care of your beautiful voices and good luck to you with all the concerts! Take care, takako
I must say that it was such a honor to be able to go to your concert in New Jersey on May 14. You are all talented singers and it was just wonderful to listen to your beautiful songs. I've listened to your CDs, thanks to my friend Emily but listening to you "live" was so impressive and such an experience for me indeed! What a wonderful group you are! Yes, you are the best a cappella group in the U.S.A. and also in the world! Congratulations!!
Hey Y'all...we are just lovin' your music and performances here in NYC...keep up the great work. And you know a very special shout-out to Margaret and Emily. Hope to see you soon and check out my new solo CD, "Ticket to the World" here:
What an honor to be in the top friend list of THE Accidentals! We got our start with a cappella and vocal jazz in 'Up in the Air.'
And we had the opportunity to recently sing a concert that included among other great talent, Kim Nazarian and Kevin DiSimone - so we had to look you up!
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