Chris Tsujiuchi’s first rule for his annual Christmas cabaret is firm and inflexible: the song list will never include All I Want for Christmas.
Tsujiuchi has been performing his Christmas cabaret every year for ten years, even before he graduated from theatre school.
“I decided there weren’t a lot of parts in music theatre for giant Asian people, so I decided to produce my own series of cabarets,” said Tsujiuchi.
He learned along the way, playing piano for cabaret artist Sharron Matthews, and studying the medium.
“What [cabaret] means for me is that it’s the middle ground between a concert format show and a musical,” said Tsujiuchi. “In a concert, there’s no fourth wall like there is in a musical. I think, in a musical, what’s really cool is the relationship between story and song. In a cabaret, there’s no fourth wall, but I’m going to tell you a story and that story is going to be related to the song I sing.”
A Very Chris-terical Christmas Cabaret features stories from Tsujiuchi’s life. He calls it his year in review. He chooses the songs based on how they relate to the stories he’s telling.
Tsujiuchi is the writer, music director, co-producer, and performer, and he’s joined by special guest Sharron Matthews, who he toured with at the start of his cabaret career.
The show also includes Leah Canali (vocals), Colin Asuncion (vocals), Kevin Wong (vocals, violin), La-Nai Gabriel (keyboard), Bruce Scavuzzo (bass), Robin Claxton (drums), and Steve John Dale (guitar).
The result of mixing his life stories with Christmas music is a show that reflects the many sides of Tsujiuchi.
“It’s very fun and explicit in parts,” said Tsujiuchi. He does sing a Justin Timberlake song about a certain private part in a box, and the tagline for the cabaret is “Keeping the Yuletide Gay.”
“But I also tell stories about falling in love, and about grief,” said Tsujiuchi. “Christmas is a time to slow down and reflect on the time you’ve had and the people you might have lost. You’re given an opportunity to live in that grief. So it’s funny and it’s heartwarming and it gets very sad. You get a lot of sides of me.”
This year marks a big change in Tsujiuchi’s life, and one that he’ll be singing about: he’s in love.
“I’ve been unlucky in love for as long as the Christmas cabaret has been going on,” said Tsujiuchi. “I was starting to think I might never find love, and then I did.”
While he used to sing a song about never receiving a New Year’s Kiss, he’ll have to strike that one from the list this year.
There are some songs that remain, and others that rotate. He’s done Baby, It’s Cold Outside once, and as a duet with another male singer.
He’s not interested in bringing it back, but not because of the controversy surrounding the song this year.
“It’s not my favourite song, I find that it’s been done,” said Tsujiuchi.
He will, however, be keeping his classics like White Christmas and a finale of Oh, Holy Night.
This year, he’s looking forward to singing Dear Santa as part of his Asian Riffing Trio - as he has fondly named the group, which includes himself, Kevin Wong, and Colin Asuncion.
“The song is about identifying what is wrong in the world and asking Santa to bring the solutions to our problems in the world today as opposed to presents,” said Tsujiuchi. “I think that song will resonate with a lot of people.”
A Very Chris-Terical Christmas Cabaret, presented by Theatre Collingwood, is coming to the Gayety Theatre this Dec. 20 and 21. You can get tickets online here.
Tsujiuchi couldn’t talk about his cabaret without mentioning the work of Theatre Collingwood’s Erica Angus (executive director) and Anne Raciunas (box office manager).
“Having done a lot of regional theatre, I see how special Theatre Collingwood is, especially when it comes to the way they interact with and treat the artists they bring in,” said Tsujiuchi. “[Angus] doesn’t see the artists she brings in as simply numbers, but she cares very deeply about the artists … and that’s a very special thing.”
He further praised the whole Theatre Collingwood for the amount of work they do.
Theatre Collingwood has a yearly operating budget around $400,000, and after ticket sales, the team works to raise about $200,000 a year to continue to bring in original work by a variety of artists in the entertainment and theatre world.
Currently Theatre Collingwood is raffling off a Toyota Rav4 Hybrid worth about $50,000. They are selling 1,000 tickets at $100, and the winner will be drawn on Friday, Dec. 21 by Tsujiuchi at the Chris-tacular Christmas Cabaret.
To purchase raffle tickets, call the Theatre Collingwood office at 705-445-2200 or, visit Collingwood Toyota.
