(LENOX, Mass.) – There are a couple more chances to laugh off some election-year stress this weekend as the award-winning musical satire group The Capitol Steps completes its summer residency at Cranwell Spa & Golf Resort in two final shows on Thursday, Sept. 1 and Friday, Sept. 2, at 8pm each night.
The Capitol Steps are always at their best in an election year, when the material is ripe for satire. This year’s bizarre presidential race provides the troupe with plenty of fodder, which gets updated by the day and by the minute, with fresh material straight from the headlines.
The Capitol Steps will perform songs from their newest album, “What to Expect When You’re Electing,” and although the material is subject to changes in the headlines and the scandals of the day, current songs include both political and non-political stories:
- “If There Were No Rich Men”
- “Shut Up and Vote for Me”
- “Deleter of the Facts”
- “Trump Acres”
- “Apple vs. the FBI”
- “Lirty Dies! And more!”
The Capitol Steps began as a group of Senate staffers who set out to satirize the very people and places that employed them.
The group was born in December 1981, when some staffers for Senator Charles Percy were planning entertainment for a Christmas party. Their first idea was to stage a nativity play, but in the whole Congress they couldn’t find three wise men or a virgin. So, they decided to dig into the headlines of the day, and they created song parodies and skits which conveyed a special brand of satirical humor.
In the years that followed, many of the Steps ignored the conventional wisdom (“Don’t quit your day job!”), and although not all of the current members of the Steps are former Capitol Hill staffers, taken together the performers have worked in a total of eighteen Congressional offices and represent 62 years of collective House and Senate staff experience.
Since they began, the Capitol Steps have recorded over 30 albums, including their latest, “What to Expect When You’re Electing.” They’ve been featured on NBC, CBS, ABC, and PBS, and can be heard twice a year on National Public Radio stations nationwide during their “Politics Takes a Holiday” radio specials.
The troupe performs at Cranwell’s new Harvest Barn stage, a 220-seat venue. Cranwell Spa & Golf Resort offers pre-show dining from 4:30 to 6:30 at its Wine Spectator Award-winning restaurant in the Gilded Age Mansion, as well as casual fare at Sloane’s Restaurant and Bar. Show tickets and an optional dinner may be reserved directly by calling (413) 881-1636, or online at Cranwell.