Nancy Magarill: The Carousel

Nancy Magarill

NYC singer-songwriter Nancy Magarill is the “resident composer” for NYU Tisch School of the Art’s classical studios, which specializes in updated soundtracks for plays of Shakespeare and mainstage productions. Mixing her classical inklings with modern day pop, her full-length The Carousel is, a idiosyncratic left-field pop album with songs that are begging to used in an off-Broadway show.

Magarill knows how to spice up a track - the acoustic I Am Not A Monster becomes far more interesting with the distant feedback of an electric guitar as a warning sign for the mayhem that will pop out for a few bars. Glass is a duet a la Kate Busch with Peter Gabriel with Dave Eggar, who also plays cello. Where Are All The Beautiful People?, with its driving dry drum sound, is the kind of song you want to hear in movies like Little Miss Sunshine of Burn After Reading. The stand-out track is Falling, a mash-up of poetry read by David Barnes, dance, and come-hither vocals wrapped in a luscious string arrangement. The Carousel is an apt title for a musical joy-ride.