Rock all-stars bring Beatles 'White Album' tribute to Greensburg

Fifty years ago today, Jason Scheff was 7 years old. At that age, the former Chicago vocalist/bassist says, he wasn’t really aware of The Beatles.

“Back then, I was listening to Dionne Warwick, because that’s what my mom was playing,” he says.

But 50 years on, he’s not only a Beatles fan, he’s also part of the “It Was Fifty Years Ago Today Tour 2019 — A Tribute to The Beatles White Album.”

The tour has a Nov. 30 date at The Palace Theatre in Greensburg.

Beatles’ fanatics might note that it’s actually 51 years since the release of the White Album, but hey — a catchy title is a catchy title, playing off the “It was 20 years ago today” line in the Fab Four’s “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.”

The tour’s all-star lineup has a rich musical history of its own, also featuring Christopher Cross, Todd Rundgren, Mickey Dolenz and Joey Molland.

Tour mates

“Christopher Cross’s management company puts some great tour packages together. They’ve done others before that have been very successful,” Scheff says. “Todd Rundgren and Christopher Cross had done this one before.

“I was actually the last one in,” he says. “They were looking for a bass player who sang and who had a musical pedigree, a kind of guy with a link to the Baby Boomer-based crowd and, with Chicago, I’m also linked to the ’80s.”

Scheff joined the multi-platinum, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame super group in 1985, replacing original vocalist/bassist Peter Cetera and becoming one Chicago’s principal songwriters until his 2016 departure. He sang on hits like “Will You Still Love Me?,” “What Kind of Man Would I Be?” and a remake of the 1970 smash hit, “25 or 6 to 4.”

Here are brief musical bios of Scheff’s tour mates:

• Christopher Cross won five Grammy Awards for his eponymous 1979 debut album, which included the hit, “Sailing.” He earned an Academy Award in 1981 as co-composer of “Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do)” from the movie “Arthur.”

• Philadelphia native Todd Rundgren started as founder and front man of the 1960s psychedelic band Nazz. He reached super-stardom with 1972’s “Something/Anything?,” on which he played all the instruments, sang all the vocals and produced. Later hits included “Hello It’s Me,” “Can We Still Be Friends” and “Bang the Drum.”

• Mickey Dolenz was vocalist/drummer for the made-for-TV 1960s pop group The Monkees, singing hits like “I’m a Believer” and “Last Train to Clarksville.” The group’s first four albums went to number one on the charts. When the group disbanded in 1970, Dolenz went on to a solo musical career and work as an actor, director, writer, producer and more.

• Joey Molland is best known for his work with rock band Badfinger, whose 1970s hits included “Day After Day” and “No Matter What.” He also played on solo albums by the late Beatles, John Lennon and George Harrison. He has also fronted a group called Joey Molland’s Badfinger.

Also on board is musical director Joey Curatolo, who was musical director for the theatrical production, “Rain: A Tribute to The Beatles.”

Hits and more hits

At The Palace, Scheff says, the audience can expect 2½ hours of music, punctuated by a 20-minute intermission. including most of the White Album. The five alternate on lead vocals.

“A couple (songs) were left out, like ‘Yer Blues,’ which I wish we played. I think it was accidentally overlooked,” he says. “Then each of us does two of our own hits. I wondered if that was going to work with all the different personalities — we’re all the result of a lot of different influences — but that’s a really beautiful part of the show.”

And good news for fans of the trippy, repetitive sound experiment “Revolution 9” — with the phrase “Number nine, number nine” repeated for more than 8 minutes over a background of other vocals, musical snippets, sound effects and tape loops.

“We use that as a (taped) walk-in and then, boom, we go straight into ‘Back in the U.S.S.R.,’” Scheff says.