Stephen Sondheim & Wynton Marsalis to Collaborate on A BED AND A CHAIR Concert at New York City Center, Nov. 13-17

Stephen Sondheim and Wynton Marsalis will collaborate on A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story, a new musical event featuring Sondheim's music arranged and performed by the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, announced Arlene Shuler, President & CEO of New York City Center. This Encores! Special Event, directed by frequent Sondheim collaborator John Doyle, and conceived by Peter Gethers, Jack Viertel and John Doyle, will run for seven performances, November 13 - 17 at City Center. City Center's annual Gala Benefit will take place on Thursday, November 14 and will include a post-performance dinner at the Plaza Hotel.

A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story, presented by the combined forces of City Center's Encores! program and Jazz at Lincoln Center, celebrates love in New York and love of New York. Native Manhattanite Sondheim and adopted citizen Marsalis (originally from New Orleans) will compare musical notes on their shared passion for our city.

The program will feature more than two dozen Sondheim compositions, each piece newly re-imagined by the unique musical sensibility of Marsalis and performed by the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Singers will be drawn from both the jazz and Broadway worlds. Casting will be announced at a later date.

A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story is the second production of the City Center and Jazz at Lincoln Center producing partnership that began in 2011 with the acclaimed Cotton Club Parade, a celebration of Duke Ellington's years at the famed Harlem nightclub. The show returned to City Center for a limited run in 2012; a Broadway production is scheduled to open during the 2013-14 season.

Stephen Sondheim wrote the music and lyrics for Road Show (2008), a revision of Bounce (2003); Passion (1994); Assassins (1991); Into the Woods (1987); Sunday in the Park with George (1984); Merrily We Roll Along (1981); Sweeney Todd (1979); Pacific Overtures (1976);The Frogs (1974); A Little Night Music (1973); Follies (1971, revised in London, (1987); Company (1970); Anyone Can Whistle (1964); A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962); also, lyrics for West Side Story (1957), Gypsy (1959), Do I Hear A Waltz? (1965), and additional lyrics for Candide (1973). Side by Side by Sondheim (1976), Marry Me A Little (1981), You're Gonna Love Tomorrow (1983), Putting It Together (1992) and Sondheim on Sondheim (2010) are anthologies of his work as a composer and lyricist. He is also the author of two books about lyrics: Finishing the Hat and Look, I Made a Hat.

Wynton Marsalis is the Managing and Artistic Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. He is an internationally acclaimed musician, composer, bandleader, educator and a leading advocate of American culture. Born in New Orleans, Louisiana, he made his recording debut as a leader in 1982, and has recorded more than 70 jazz and classical recordings, which have won him nine GRAMMY awards. Marsalis became the first jazz artist to be awarded the prestigious Pulitzer Prize for Music, for his oratorio Blood on the Fields, which was commissioned by Jazz at Lincoln Center. By creating and performing an expansive range of brilliant new music for quartets to big bands, chamber music ensembles to symphony orchestras, tap dance to ballet, Marsalis has expanded the vocabulary for jazz and created a vital body of work that places him among the world's finest musicians and composers. He helped lead the effort to construct Jazz at Lincoln Center's home - Frederick P. Rose Hall - the first education, performance, and broadcast facility devoted to jazz, which opened in October 2004.

The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, composed of 15 of the finest jazz soloists and ensemble players today, has been the Jazz at Lincoln Center resident orchestra since 1987. Featured in all aspects of the organization's programming, the remarkably versatile Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra performs and leads concert and educational events in New York, across the U.S. and around the world and with many of the world's leading symphony orchestras, ballet troupes, local students and an ever-expanding roster of guest artists. Education is a major part of Jazz at Lincoln Center's mission and its educational activities are coordinated with concert and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra tour programming.

Under Music Director Wynton Marsalis, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra spends over half of the year on tour and performs a vast repertoire, from rare historic compositions to Jazz at Lincoln Center-commissioned works by guest artists and Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra members.

John Doyle (Co-Creator, Director) most recently directed Stephen Sondheim's Passion at Classic Stage Company. His Broadway credits include Sweeney Todd (Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards, Best Director of a Musical); Company (Tony Award, Best Revival) and A Catered Affair, and his off-Broadway credits include Wings and Road Show. He directed the London productions of Gondoliers, Sweeney Todd and Mack and Mabel.

Peter Gethers (Co-Creator) is a novelist, screenwriter and playwright, has written and produced several television shows and is the president of Random House Studio and an editor-at-large for Random House Inc. He is the author of a bestselling non-fiction trilogy about his amazing Scottish Fold cat, Norton: The Cat Who Went to Paris, A Cat Abroad and The Cat Who'll Live Forever. He is the co-creator and co-producer of the hit off-Broadway show Old Jews Telling Jokes. Mr. Gethers also admits to being one of the founding fathers of Rotisserie League Baseball, which begat the fantasy sports craze. His new novel, Ask Bob, is being published in August of this year.

JACK VIERTEL (Co-Creator, Encores! Artistic Director) has been in charge of Encores! since 2000, overseeing 36 productions and counting. He is also senior vice president of Jujamcyn Theaters, which owns and operates five Broadway theaters, currently presenting The Book of Mormon, Jersey Boys, Kinky Boots, and The Testament of Mary. He was a producer of the Broadway revival of Gypsy starring Patti LuPone, which was first seen in 2007 at Encores! Summer Stars, and was recently represented on Broadway by Finian's Rainbow, first seen at Encores! in the spring of 2008. He helped shepherd six of August Wilson's plays to Broadway and worked on the original Broadway productions of Angels in America, Into the Woods, and M. Butterfly, among others. Mr. Viertel conceived and co-produced the long-running musical revue Smokey Joe's Café, and conceived the Encores! revue Stairway to Paradise. He served as dramaturg for The Wedding Singer and Hairspray on Broadway and is the co-author of the musical Time and Again. Mr. Viertel spent two years as dramaturg of the Mark Taper Forum in L.A., and began his work in the theater as a critic for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner.

New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city for nearly 70 years. It was Manhattan's first performing arts center, dedicated by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia in 1943 with a mission to make the best in music, theater and dance accessible to all audiences. Today, City Center is home to many distinguished companies, including City Center's Principal Dance Company, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, as well as New York City Opera and Manhattan Theatre Club; a roster of renowned national and international visiting artists; and its own critically acclaimed and popular programs. The Tony-honored Encores! musical theater series has been hailed as "one of the very best reasons to be alive in New York." Dance has been integral to the theater's mission from the start, and dance programs, including the annual Fall for Dance Festival, remain central to City Center's identity. City Center is dedicated to providing educational opportunities to New York City students and teachers with programs such as Encores! In Schools and the Young People's Dance Series. City Center recently completed an extensive renovation to revitalize and modernize its historic theater.

A BED AND A CHAIR: A New York Love Story will run for seven performances, November 13-17, 2013. Tickets go on sale on September 3. Further information is available at NYCityCenter.org and jalc.org.

For the November 14 Gala tickets and information, please call 212.763.1205 or visit www.NYCityCenter.org/gala.

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