Orchestra Luna, a Boston band, made its public debut in 1973; and from the very start, things moved really fast for this new theatrical rock group. Orchestra Luna was signed to Epic Records out of Jeremiah's, a non-music venue in Allston;² and less than a year after the members first took the stage, they found themselves at Medium Sound recording studio in New York, working on their debut album. This is highly unusual. New England, at the time, was turning out singer-songwriters, folk-circuit string ensembles, the ever-present cover outfits, and countless boogie bands. Orchestra Luna didn't come close to fitting any of those categories, and it didn't really fit into any others, either. Its market niche could be pretty much defined as simply Orchestra Luna.

The album the band made, Orchestra Luna (LP, Epic, 1975), is basically the original Broadway cast recording of a musical play that was never staged.³ It is a most peculiar record. And peculiar seems to be what the creators of this project had in mind. We get our first clue from the jacket pictures of the band/cast, in costume, goofing off on an otherwise deserted beach, in broad daylight, with the moon going through its full cycle in the bright blue sky. The record inside is a unique view of some life dramas seen through the eyes of music.

Orchestra Luna gets off to a promising start with the song, "Were You Dancin' on Paper," featuring the voices of Lisa Kinscherf and Liz Gallagher. Richard Kinscherf, now known as Rick Berlin, gives us quite a variety of keyboard styles. At one point in the second number, "Miss Pamela," we're treated to sounds very much like those on tracks that Brian Wilson produced for the Beach Boys' Smile album.⁴ A little later, in "Love Is Not Enough," we hear piano playing that is quite similar to passages of dramatic cantatas by Henry Russell from a century and a quarter earlier. Interesting range. The singing is too theatrical for rock, and the guitar is often too rocking for most musical theater; but on the whole, the combination makes for a fine Orchestra Luna album.

The centerpiece of the record is "Heart" ("Ya gotta have heart") by Richard Adler and Jerry Ross from Damn Yankees. Peter Barrett's narration, somewhere near the middle, is quite effective. Since this number was already well established in the musical theater/cabaret repertoire, it stands out in bold relief from the other tracks. "Heart" was much discussed in the group's notices; and evidently it has had a very long run at WBCN, each year, on major league baseball's opening day.⁵

"Doris Dreams," the closing track, is more like a medley of various Doris songs, recitations, and instrumentals; and a long-ish medley it would be--its length is listed on the record's label as 11:53. Jon Garelick of the Boston Phoenix described "Doris Dreams" as ranging "from Gilbert & Sullivan to scat jazz singing to psychedelic Hendrix guitar, through a poetry reading, a long ballad section and a final instrumental improvisation."⁶ That closing guitar solo by Randy Roos received much favorable critical notice.

"It was, like, a magic experience," said Rick Berlin. "In six months we were signed [to Epic Records] and six months later we were dropped. The band was a totally naive experience for everybody. We were all new at it and we were super weird. I don't know how we ever got the deal."⁷ Berlin often used the word "naive," with apparent fondness, when speaking of the original Orchestra Luna--a group that made an album without a lot of thought to what record companies and radio stations wanted. According to several accounts, though, this band built quite a loyal following.

Ron Alexenburg dropped Orchestra Luna from Epic's roster of artists, and the band broke up late in 1975. The next year, it was back with a new lineup. A bit later, the band rejected a contract offer from Sire, in the belief the deal wasn't strong enough.⁸

Singer Karla DeVito attended Loyola University, majoring in theater, en route to the New York stage by way of Chicago. "I couldn't major in rock 'n' roll," she said; "there's no rock 'n' roll college to go to. I wound up auditioning that summer for a national company of Godspell and that got me started in theater. From there I did a show called El Grande de Coca Cola, and spent some time in Hair, which was a little berserk."⁹ While in New York, DeVito attended shows at CBGB by influential acts such as the Ramones, Patti Smith, and the Talking Heads.

In the summer of 1977, Orchestra Luna was the band for a Meatloaf/Jim Steinman play, Neverland. DeVito told Steve Morse of the Boston Globe, "When I heard Luna was going to play CBGB's, I wanted to join."¹⁰ She became acquainted with members of Orchestra Luna. "Two weeks later," she said, "they gave me a call, and that's when I joined the band."¹¹ Don Shewey, in Rolling Stone, described this Orchestra Luna 2 lineup as "shamefully underrated and never-recorded."¹² "The record companies," said DeVito, "just didn't know what to do with it."¹³

Billie Best, DeVito's high school friend, was living in Boston by this time. Orchestra Luna and company resided in a house in Newton Highlands, and soon Best moved in. Subsequently she took over the band's management. Up to that time, female managers of rock bands were rare; and many are the stories of Best finding it hard to gain acceptance.

Years later, Jim Sullivan of the Boston Globe called Orchestra Luna "the most outrageous troupe around." Jon Garelick, in the Phoenix, described the company as an "outlandish cabaret-rock-jazz-poetry outfit." It seems likely ex-members were flattered by these reminiscences. After all, y'gotta have heart.

SOURCES DIFFER, but either later that year or early in 1978, Orchestra Luna broke up. Rick Berlin then organized a smaller, more focused group with the shorter, more focused name, Luna. This new outfit traded its recording rights to Titanium for studio time. Then when Luna came close to signing with Cleveland International Records, the members found that Titanium "wanted a lot of money in exchange for the recording rights."¹⁴

The legal struggle that followed was a serious setback for the band's career. Yet, at least one thing good came out of Luna's involvement with Titanium--a great local single, "Hollywood" b/w "Dumb Love" (45, Titanium, 1978).¹⁵ The B-side sounded much like Orchestra Luna. But "Hollywood" was quite a departure. Oh, the subject matter of the lyrics is still theatrical; but there is much New Wave in the music and its performance. Around Boston, at least, this new group got respect that was often denied to the original Orchestra Luna. And "Hollywood" reached an expanded audience, when it was included on the Best of the Boston Beat compilation.

Sometime around this point, the members of Luna found themselves performing on the cover-band circuit, playing the hits of Foreigner, Styx, and Yes. Even without the legal dilemma, this would have been a tough time for Luna. In the spring of 1979, Massachusetts raised the minimum legal drinking age to 20, cutting out a sizable part of the audience for rock shows at establishments that served alcohol--important venues to the financial well-being of most rock bands. And income was not keeping pace with the then-current sharp rise in gas prices and the general rapid pace of inflation. Said manager Billie Best, "The drinking age and the sudden increase in everything--it was just like getting laid off." The band traveled much less to out-of-town engagements. Mike Porter, who managed the band Reckless, pointed out that Boston had a huge number of groups; and concentrating on the home turf had problems of its own. "Every club is swamped with local bands wanting to play."¹⁶

Day jobs through the summer of 1979 involved the often dangerous work of driving a cab. Best reported that "three members had been robbed, two had accidents and one had been robbed at knifepoint."¹⁷ One of the musicians was diagnosed with cancer. Finally, in the spring of 1980 or not much later, Luna disbanded. A few months earlier, Steve Morse had concisely summed up the band's history.

If there ever was a band that had paid its dues, it's Luna, a progressive rock group that used to be known as Orchestra Luna... The new Luna, having outgrown the theatrical excesses of the Orchestra Luna days but still occasionally weighted with the stigma of that period, has quietly become one of the most intelligent, musically-expansive bands on the Boston scene.¹⁸

By the summer of 1981, Berlin was back with a promising new outfit, the Berlin Airlift,¹⁹ bringing this Luna profile to an end.

Carter Alan, writing about Luna, said that "it was the lead singer's engaging on-stage drama that gave the band its unique bent, as Berlin embodied the characters about whom he sang."²⁰ That quote seems to go far toward describing Orchestra Luna's appeal, as well. Brett Milano wrote that these early Rick Berlin bands "were an odd combination of Broadway and metal, the closest thing Boston had to Queen."²¹ The Boston Phoenix said that "Luna was the most intelligently flashy hard-rock band in town."²²

-- Alan Lewis, January 19, 2002

1. Later, Tom Werman produced records for Cheap Trick.

2. Rick Berlin, e-mail message, 8/20/2002.

As I recall, none of our print sources tell the story of what led up to the band's signing. The Orchestra Luna album jacket says that Bruce Patch Productions Inc. managed the band; so perhaps the signing was one of Bruce Patch's successes. Patch also managed the now-legendary Ric Ocasek and Benjamin Orr outfit, Richard and the Rabbits, and headed Spoonfed Records.

3. I have the original LP but nothing right now for playing vinyl. I regret that I was unable to give this album another listen. My comments come from a piece drafted a few years ago, when my writing style was quite different.

The members of this lineup of Orchestra Luna were Peter Barrett, Scott Chambers, Liz Gallagher, Lisa Kinscherf, Richard Kinscherf (Rick Berlin), Don Mulvaney, and Randy Roos. Rick Berlin is still quite active in the Boston area, and it has not been long since we last saw a listing for a Randy Roos performance. We would love to learn about the more recent activities of the other band members, and we know our readers would, too.

4. Of course, it's well known that Brian Wilson never completed work on Smile. (Dumb Angel was an early working title for the album.) For an LP that was never released, Smile was pretty successful. Two Beach Boys hits came from the Smile sessions--"Good Vibrations," which was sung wonderfully by Carl Wilson, and "Heroes and Villains," my personal all-time favorite Beach Boys recording. As an old Beach Boys fan, I just had to digress.

5. Boston Phoenix, 3/13/1992.

6. Boston Phoenix, 3/13/1992.

7. Boston Globe, 10/29/1982.

8. Advertising materials used to promote Orchestra Luna appearances at the Rat in Kenmore Square in May 1977 bear a photograph that seems to show the original group, or at least Rick Berlin and the original female singers. Did the original lineup of Orchestra Luna stay together longer than is generally acknowledged? Was the new membership only slightly changed from the original? Did advertising simply include an old publicity photo? We really don't know.

In 1982 a new Rick Berlin outfit, the Berlin Airlift, signed with Handshake Records--a company, ironically, founded by Ron Alexenburg, who dropped Orchestra Luna from Epic.

9. Oui, 2/1982. (We'll go to any length in our search for information sources.) Evidently this refers to Summer 1975.

10. Boston Globe, 6/6/1986.

11. Oui, 2/1982.

12. Rolling Stone, 2/18/1982.

13. Oui, 2/1982.

14. Rick Berlin, Boston Globe, 10/29/1982.

15. The single gives these as the names of the members of Luna: Bob Brandon, Chet Cahill, Rick Kinscherf, Steve Perry, Joe Petruzzelli. For some reason when "Hollywood" was released on the compilation, The Best of the Boston Beat (LP, Infinity, 1979), Cahill's name was omitted.

16. Billie Best and Mike Porter quotes were published in the Boston Globe, 12/13/1979.

17. Boston Globe, 12/13/1979.

18. Boston Globe, 1/3/1980.

19. Berlin Airlift: Jane Balmond, Rick Berlin, Chet Cahill, Steven Perry, Joe Petruzzelli.

20. Boston Rock, 1/21/1982, Issue 25.

"I think I have an unrelenting visual imagination. I see songs as much as I hear them. I like to ask more of an audience than many bands do." -- Rick Berlin, Boston Globe, 10/29/1982.

21. Boston Phoenix, 10/15/1998.

22. "Nine Days a Week" column edited by Donna Kay Williams, Boston Phoenix, 8/18/1981.