Edie Brickell and Steve Martin on stage at the Fox Performing Arts Center on Thursday, October 10, 2013. Steve Martin, Edie Brickell and the Steep Canyon Rangers are filming a PBS “Great Performances” at the Fox Performing Arts Center in Riverside. Thursday night, which was filmed, was only open to 500 people. (Kurt Miller/Staff Photographer)
As majestic as the Fox Performing Arts Center in Riverside looks on any given day, the city’s renovated jewel sparkled even brighter for its close-up with Steve Martin with the Steep Canyon Rangers and Edie Brickell on Thursday, Oct. 10.
While a little bit of the shine came from the iridescent curtains framing the stage, it was the set by musicians in front of them that lived up to “Great Performances,” the long-running PBS show for which the intimate dress rehearsal was filmed.
The night was full of rapid-fire wit and rapid-fire bluegrass from Martin and friends.
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“The next song is a singalong but it has no lyrics, so good luck,” Martin said before launching into an instrumental.
Known for his comedy and acting roles, Martin didn’t disappoint on the laughs, even poking fun at the network filming him.
As he tuned his banjo with an electronic device, he joked that he could check his email on it and was watching PBS’ “Masterpiece Theatre” on it.
“Oh wait, it’s the pledge drive; click,” he said.
Steve Martin, Edie Brickell and the Steep Canyon Rangers perform at the Fox Performing Arts Center in Riverside on Oct. 10, 2013. Thursday night, which was filmed, is only open to 500 people. (Kurt Miller/Staff Photographer)
As a crane with a camera swooped over the crowd, which was limited to the orchestra section for the show, Martin told the story about meeting the Steep Canyon Rangers at a party in North Carolina, where they were the local band playing, but admitted that the true story wasn’t very Hollywood.
“There we tell people we met in rehab,” Martin said.
While the jokes were entertaining, the true musical talent is what showed off the Fox as a gem of a theater. The vocal blend amongst the Steep Canyon Rangers, whether on an a cappella version of the spiritual “I Can’t Sit Down,” or joining Martin on the hilarious “Atheists Don’t Have No Songs,” proved the Fox as an acoustic “sweet spot.”
Martin explained that he doesn’t think of the Steep Canyon Rangers as his backup band.
“I think of them like I am their celebrity,” he said.
Despite the incredible talent the Steep Canyon Rangers possess on their own, it was the combination of them, Martin and Brickell that made the night so special.
Brickell shared the stories behind the songs she and Martin wrote together for their latest release, “Love Has Come for You,” explaining that Martin would email her audio files of him playing the banjo and she would walk around singing along to them until she found the right lyrics.
One of them, which became “Sarah Jane and the Iron Mountain Baby,” had Brickell singing “Whooo baby” along to it, like a train’s whistle. It inspired her to search out trains on the Internet and she came across the tale of the Iron Mountain train and a man who rescued an abandoned baby along train tracks in Missouri. He took the baby home to his wife, Sarah Jane, and they raised him.
“I could not believe my good luck that her name rhymed with ‘train,’ ” Brickell said.
The song was among the dazzling show’s highlights, as well as Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers’ “Jubilation Day,” the newly penned murder ballad “Pretty Little One” with all of the performers and the main set closer “Auden’s Train,” which featured blistering fiddle work from the Steep Canyon Rangers’ Nicky Sanders.
Friday night’s show will also be filmed for “Great Performances,” which is set to air in March 2014 and will likely live on in pledge drive perpetuity.