Like Tom Waits

A BOY in lederhosen is staring down at us from a screen.  He’s on his way to a piano recital at his teacher’s house, all dressed up to accompany the piece he’ll be playing.  Somehow he looks fine about it all, unselfconscious.  Pretty soon, however, he’ll be the most self-conscious boy in the world.  Such are the travails of Bob Karper, pianist, accordionist, raconteur, and American as apple pie, as he slowly unwinds a series of true stories concerning his childhood, his parents, and his own road to self-discovery en route to love.  Like Tom Waits soundtracking ‘The Waltons’. Karper is part performance artist, part cabaret, complete with audience participation concerning the nature of true love.  “That never happened before,” he says, after asking who’s not been smitten in the past five years, only to find himself alone.  Warmth, generosity, and good old-fashioned honesty ripple through this purging of a past gone mad.

— Neil Cooper, Glasgow Herald