Friday night's Winter Whingding at Spaulding Auditorium featuring the Dartmouth Dodecaphonics, The Tufts Beelzebubs, and hosts, the Dartmouth Decibelles, was, in a word, successful.
The sold-out performance began with the Dodecs and their opening rendition of "Dreams" originally by The Cranberries, which was strikingly similar to the real song.
The highlight of the Dodecs performance was a skit-turned-musical number in which they talked about a compact disc offer "Totally Jr. High" and followed it up with a rendition of the theme song to "Family Ties." The Dodecs finished with a collaborative effort of U2 songs and "Let it Be" by the Beatles.
The Tufts Beezlebubs, who have sung for Dartmouth in the past, are a pleasure to watch because of the physical comedy within their performance. They put their all into their show, going beyond merely singing by adding many subtle (and some not-so-subtle) dance moves to their repertoire.
Voice imitations of the real musical artist, as featured in their songs "Walk This Way, Talk This Way," and "Poison," also add to their charisma.
Later, The Beelzebubs performed a skit entitled "Mickey and Juliet" that was replete with again, hit songs from the 1980s. The group acted out scenes from "Romeo and Juliet" with 1980s hits such as "Cold-Hearted Snake," "Sweet Dreams," "Straight Up Now Tell Me" and many, many more, providing the lines of dialogue among the players.
The Beelzebubs performed an encore for the crowd, singing "Poison."
Whingding concluded with the hosts, the Dartmouth Decibelles, who toned down the evening a bit with a selection of more mellow songs featuring impressive solos by Jennifer McCullough '97, Camille Masini '97, Ngina Simpson '97, and Lani Sipe '98 among others.
Seniors Simpson, Sarah Eckels, McCullough, Masini and Meghan Barry were honored by the rest of the women in the Decibelles for their hard work and talent.
The program finished with Simpson's hit solo "Killing Me Softly," a song orginally recorded by Roberta Flack.
All in all, Winter Whingding was an enjoyable and amusing precursor to Winter Carnival activities this weekend.
