By Brian Lawlor
Hershey Pennsylvania native Meghan Cary and her group appeared Wednesday July 20, 2022, on a balmy evening at the Pastorius Park Concert whose concert series has run continuously in Chestnut Hill for the past 77 years.
The scene is what we now call ‘user friendly’ as the audience consists old, young and in-between with blankets, chairs, coolers, dogs on leashes and the youngsters safely running around playing chase.
Ms. Cary who sang and played a Taylor acoustic/electric guitar was accompanied by her husband Peter Farrell on keyboards, mandolin and vocals; Irene Lambreau on vocals and percussion, and ace horn player Ken Ulansey on soprano sax, alto sax, flute and pennywhistle.
Throughout her seventeen-song performance divided into two sets, Ms. Cary demonstrated amazingly powerful and passionate singing. One could not help but notice Ms. Cary’s excellent standing posture and physicality which made me think she practiced yoga with a renowned local yoga instructor, who was sitting in the front row of the natural grass amphitheater.
My first exposure to Ms. Cary’s abilities was when she appeared in a lead role in a musical stage production of “Week Between the Holidays” written by local playwright/musician Mickey Leone. That production, in 2010 at St. Paul’s Church in Chestnut Hill, showcased Ms. Cary’s excellent stage acting as well as superior vocals.
At Pastorius Park, Ms. Cary played all original music which, by her own admission, were autobiographical in subject matter. In the third song of the performance entitled Sweet and Shiny Red, the lyrics reminded me of subject matter found in Liz Phair’s breakout record Exile in Guyville.
In a song written for her mother who recently passed away during the pandemic, Ms. Cary sang with heartfelt emotion about her mother ‘putting her life on hold’ presumably to raise Ms. Cary and her brother, who incidentally was present at the performance.
In keeping with autobiographical subject matter, she began the second set with a song for her father which in essence expressed her father’s hope for a son while Ms. Carey was “more resourceful than any boy is strong” and encouraging her father to “find the love in me.” In fact, throughout the evening it became clear that the lyrics were personally honest without a touch of sugarcoating.
The musicians who accompanied Ms. Cary played with taste and provided an excellent platform for the songs. Ken Ulansey picked out different instruments to fit the mood of each song; Peter Farrell was the group’s glue on the piano and also played a popping mandolin solo on a song I believe entitled When I’m Home.
Similarly, vocalist/percussionist Irene Lambreau displayed a wonderful dual lead vocal with Ms. Cary on a song I called “The Contrarian” due to the subject matter. I also want to mention, Ms.Cary’s exceedingly strong/facile right hand attack on the guitar which can be overshadowed by her vocal prowess.
As I was walking away from the concert I overhead a young woman remark that Ms. Cary had excellent pitch in comparison with other performers she had heard in the park and older gentleman mused that if Pete Seeger and Melissa Etheridge had a baby, she may sound something like Ms. Cary.
Ms. Cary finished the show with a song in which she is working with a Broadway playwright so we shouldn’t be surprised if we see her work on a New York theater stage.
Brian Lawlor is Attorney for First Judicial District and bass guitarist in Ten Of Hearts.