Todd Rundgren on Joining the ‘Burt Bacharach Songbook Live’ Tour: ‘When a Seminal Influence Is Involved, It’s Payback’
variety.comChris Willman Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic What the world needs now, many Burt Bacharach fans can agree, is for that deep catalog of songs to not be consigned to history.
Stepping up to present much of that material in a new light is a tour dubbed “What the World Needs Now: The Burt Bacharach Songbook Live,” which kicks off this weekend in southern California with Todd Rundgren in the nine-piece ensemble and handling many of the lead vocals on Bacharach/Hal David classics from the ’60s, ’70s and beyond.
Rundgren will not be doing any of his own material when he hits L.A.’s Wiltern on Sunday night, among other dates, but the show may still represent a utopian ideal for many of his fans, who will recognize some of the same gifts for melodic genius evident across his and his hero’s respective catalogs.
The group performing the material is led by longtime Bacharach conductor-arranger Rob Shirakbari. It also includes “Voice” alumnus Wendy Moten, veteran Rundren/Utopia associate Kasim Sulton, and Probyn Gregory, Tori Holub, Kenny Dickenson and Elise Trouw.
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