cd review - Grey's Anatomy - the Music Event

We watch a lot of tv.   Well, probably as much as any normal person does or maybe a little more.  A few of our favorites, which we try to watch the same day or within a day or two of them airing, are NCIS, The Good Wife, Glee, The Amazing  Race  and Grey's Anatomy.  So, with my love of musicals, when I heard a couple of months back that Grey's would be airing a special "musical" episode, I was fairly excited- mainly because I knew that two of the regular cast members on the show, Sara Ramirez and  Chandra Wilson had appeared on Broadway before.  Sara won a Tony for Spamalot- check out my review of the current tour of that show by scrolling down or clicking here as it has some videos of Sara rocking the house!  So, I knew that Sara and Chandra would be good on the songs they were given to sing, but I had no idea how the rest of the cast would be or how effective they'd be at fitting the songs into the show.

Sara Ramirez and Jessica Capshaw

The plot of this episode, for those of you who missed it, is fairly basic- Ramirez's character, Callie, is pregnant and is in a car accident.  The rest of the Doctors race to find a way to save both Callie and the baby - while Callie imagines her co-workers, who are also her closest friends, in a way she's never seen them before- singing.  The episode is told almost completely from Callie's point of view - sorta an "out of body experience" as she sees what is happening around her lifeless body as the Doctor's try to save her and the baby.   I loved how in the opening sequence "Callie" is singing "Chasing Cars" while pandemonium is happening around her, sorta like she is in a dream like state, singing a song to herself and knows no one else can hear you.  However, when "Owen" joins in singing the same song, the look that "Callie" gives him and the scared sounds she makes perfectly shows her realization that she is actually in the real world and that something terrible has happened to her.   A great and perfect way to start this episode off and to seamlessly incorporate the singing into the show.

The music the show uses is all pop songs that were either introduced on the show, or were used in pivotal moments in previous episodes - songs like "How to Save a Life" and "Chasing Cars."   Nine songs in total were used, including other pop hits like "Breathe" and "The Story."  All in all, a nice collection of pop songs that include upbeat ones as well as ballads that all have a former connection to the series.

Kevin McKidd

Before the episode aired, some people were calling it Glee's Anatomy, which I thought was pretty humorous.  So, now that the show has aired I will say that overall it was fairly good, the episode effectively incorporated the songs into the scenes and for the most part the songs chosen and the lyrics of each song tied in well to the scene they were a a part off.  However, I think they were scared to just have a bunch of people singing so they incorporated the other non-singing character's dialogue into the songs, and at many times it was kinda hard to understand both the dialogue and the lyrics. Some of the songs just ended up being a little lackluster with overlapping dialogue and singing.  Watch some of the clips below to see what I mean.  But I still enjoyed what they were going after, and appreciated the emotional heft the songs were able to add to the episode.

Fortunately the nine songs from the episode are available via iTunes -without any dialogue from the episode to get in the way of the lyrics- and having listened to them several times now I have to say that I am thoroughly enjoying them. 

Chyler Leigh

As far as the cast's singing abilities goes - Ramirez gets the most to sing and sounds great on her songs, Chandra Wilson is also very effective on her parts.  I was most surprised with Kevin McKidd (Owen) and Chyler Leigh (Lexie) as they have many solo's and they actually have really good voices.   McKidd actually gets the most amount to sing with the exception of Ramirez and he has a great, strong voice.   Justin Chambers also turns out to have a really nice voice.   Jessica Capshaw, who stars as "Arizona" - Callie's girlfriend - doesn't have much to sing in the first part of the episode, but the duet of "Universe and U" she has with Ramirez toward the end is pretty special.  And while almost everyone in the cast has something to contribute to the songs, I did find it an interesting choice that both Patrick Dempsey and James Pinkins, Jr don't sing one note.  I'm not sure if this is because they both thought it was beneath them or that neither of them have good voices, but I like to think that in Callie's mind she wouldn't have either of them singing since one is the current Chief of Staff and the other was previously in that role.

So overall I give them an A for effort, a B for execution and give the 9 track audio download from iTunes a big A+.

The episode is currently available for streaming for a limited time at abc.com as well as here from imdb/hulu

Songs included in the episode and the original artist who performed them:

• "Breathe (2AM)," Anna Nalick
• "Chasing Cars," Snow Patrol
• "Grace" Kate Havnevik
• "How To Save A Life," by The Fray
• "Runnin' On Sunshine," Jesus Jackson
• "How We Operate," Gomez
• "The Story," Brandi Carlile
•  "Wait," Get Set Go
• "Universe & U," KT Tunstall

Promo for the episode -

"Chasing Cars" from the episode

Behind the scenes footage -

Behind the Scenes - Part 2

"How to Save a Life" from the episode-

"Running on Sunshine" from the episode -

"Wait" from the episode -

"Universe and U" - (I love how Jessica and Sara's voices blend on this song!)

"The Story" -

And, bringing this back to Broadway- here is Jessica's mom, Kate Capshaw singing (or at least lipsynching) "Anything Goes" (which the Broadway revival of that show opens tomorrow)  in the opening credits of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.  I think the Grey's producers need to get Kate to play Jessica's mom on the show and I think her step-dad Steven Spielberg should direct a musical- I mean, come on, check out the amazing camera work for this musical number he did for this movie!