Billie Holiday News

Acclaimed singer Antonia Bennett makes her Cafe Carlyle debut, May 23 - June 3.

Axis Company has announced that Randy Sharp, who has won acclaim for directing Edgar Oliver's celebrated trilogy of solo performances charting his life in New York City, will stage a new production of Dead End, Sidney Kingsley's seminal play about kids growing on the streets of the City during the Great Depression.

Rep Stage, the professional regional theatre in residence at Howard Community College, announces its 25th anniversary season lineup of three contemporary classics-'The Heidi Chronicles,' 'Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill,' and 'True West'-and a world premiere play about Baltimore's eccentric Cone sisters in Susan McCully's 'All She Must Possess.'

BROADWAY BY THE YEAR, the musical revue series created, written, directed, and hosted by Scott Siegel and which pays tribute to a different era of Broadway composers each program, is a stroke of brilliance. Occurring once a month, each evening is dedicated specifically to one decade of American musical theater, and features some of the most talented stars currently working in American musical theater. The series' most recent installment (and the first of 2017) on February 27 at its usual home, The Town Hall, paid tribute to the 1920s. The decade, which inducted into the theatrical cannon the likes of George and Ira Gershwin and Richard Rodgers, brims with melodically-rich scores including songs of yearning and joviality. The tunes selected for the evening certainly felt of their era; however, put into the hands of such skilled performers as Carolee Carmello, Beth Malone, and Robert Cuccioli (to name a few), they could be heard with fresh and non-cynical ears.

Vocalist and jazz aficionado Keith A. Dames presents his annual journey through the Billie Holiday songbook 'Homage To Eleanora' on Friday, April 7 & Saturday, April 8 at 7pm and Sunday, April 9 at 4pm at Manna House Workshops (338 E. 106th Street) in East Harlem.

At the 32nd Bistro Awards on March 13, produced by Sherry Eaker, attendees hunkered down at Gotham Comedy Club in the hours before a blizzard hit Manhattan to honor the best in the year's cabaret, comedy and jazz performances. Of course, the prospect of a little snow wouldn't deter honorees from coming out, though it did slightly impact the order of the evening's events, shifting the 'grand finale' to the 'grand opening.'

At the 32nd Bistro Awards on March 13, produced by Sherry Eaker, attendees hunkered down at Gotham Comedy Club in the hours before a blizzard hit Manhattan to honor the best in the year's cabaret, comedy and jazz performances. Of course, the prospect of a little snow wouldn't deter honorees from coming out, though it did slightly impact the order of the evening's events, shifting the "grand finale" to the "grand opening."

Jazz Women of New York is a new all-woman band conceived by vocalist Lee Torchia.  The core group is pianist Jill McManus, bassist Melissa Slocum, drummer Sylvia Cuenca, flutist Andrea Brachfeld, and saxophonist Carol Sudhalter, with occasional subs from the female side of NY jazz.

Theatrical Outfit, Atlanta's second-oldest continually-operating professional theatre, aspires to create a compassionate, joyful and just community by starting the conversations that matter. From The Hunchback of Notre Dame, a timeless, epic musical co-production with Aurora Theatre (our third year in a row), to the conversation-starting new play Boy about gender reassignment, to the Atlanta premiere of GA native Lauren Gunderson's new, co-authored, Jane Austen-inspired holiday hit Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley, to an intimate look at one of legend Billie Holiday's final solo appearances in Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill, to the Atlanta professional homecoming of Perfect Arrangement, local writer Topher Payne's mid-century gay-rights comedy, to a world premiere collaboration with Atlanta Opera, to T.O.'s non-traditional update on the sizzling Broadway classic 110 in the Shade, to year two of our Unexpected Play Readings, our 2017-2018 Season of Character truly offers something for everyone.

Tony Award winner Karen Ziemba (Bullets Over Broadway, Curtains, Contact), multi-award winning Nightclub star Klea Blackhurst and Steve 'The Whistler' Herbst are set to star in Town Hall's Broadway by the Year Series on Monday, March 27 at 8pm, 'The Broadway Musicals of the 1940s,' which will highlight the music of Rodgers & Hammerstein, Kurt Weill & Leonard Bernstein.

The inaugural cohort of The Field Leadership Fund announces Moon Shine, a wine reception with pop-up expressions, to be held on Wednesday, April 19, 2017 at the National Black Theatre (NBT) in its current 48th season themed In Pursuit of Black Joy.

The Gilmore-Hoerner Endowment will present a special, one day only concert, 'A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald' featuring the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra on Sunday, April 30, 2017 at 3:00 p.m. at the Capitol Theatre in Chambersburg, PA.  Tickets for the event are $12 each, all seats reserved, are currently on sale at the Capitol Theatre at 717-263-0202 or online at www.thecapitoltheatre.org .  The Box Office is open from 11:00 A.M. - 4:30 P.M. Monday thru Friday and one hour prior to show. The theatre is located at 159 S. Main Street in Chambersburg, PA.

Irvington Town Hall Theater's Stage Door Series will present a reading of The Burning of New York by award-winning playwright Samuel Harps on Thursday, April 13 at 7:00 pm. Now in its third season, the series produces staged readings of original works complete with a Q&A afterwards with the playwright and actors. Without the technical aspects of a fully-staged show, the series offers a unique and exciting way to hear new voices in theater and be up close with the thought process that goes into writing a play. 

Axis Company is pleased to announce that Randy Sharp, who has won acclaim for directing Edgar Oliver's celebrated trilogy of solo performances charting his life in New York City, will stage a new production of Dead End, Sidney Kingsley's seminal play about kids growing on the streets of the City during the Great Depression.

Record-breaking six-time Tony Award-winner Audra McDonald makes her greatly anticipated debut, as part of the acclaimed Broadway @ series, at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills, a one-night-only event featuring two intimate concerts at 7:00pm and 9:30pm on Thursday, May 11. Produced by Mark Cortale, the Broadway legend will be joined on stage by Broadway @ series host and pianist Seth Rudetsky, who recently starred in the five-star London premiere of his Broadway musical Disaster!

Record-breaking six-time Tony Award winner Audra McDonald will perform at Steppenwolf as a part of the LookOut Series on Monday, May 22 for one night only. McDonald will be joined on stage by host and pianist Seth Rudetsky, who this past November starred in the five-star London premiere of his Broadway musical, Disaster!  

Portland Center Stage at The Armory kicks off its 30th anniversary season with the "heart-gripping and cathartic" musical Fun Home, which swept the 2015 Tony Awards with five wins.

Madame Tussauds, the world-renowned wax attraction slated to open its newest location in Nashville on April 14, and Luke Bryan teamed up to reveal the country superstar's new wax figure in Time Square on March 1 prior to his sold-out show at Madison Square Garden this evening.

Rubicon Theatre Company celebrates Black History Month with THE DEVIL'S MUSIC: THE LIFE AND BLUES OF BESSIE SMITH, starring singer and actress Miche Braden of the original Off-Broadway production (named one of the 10 Best Off-Broadway productions of the year by the N.Y. Daily Times). Described by CBC as a, "bawdy, bluesy, boozy rollicking night out at the theatre," the show follows the life, loves and career of blues and jazz singer Bessie Smith, called the "Empress of the Blues." 

Playwright Lanie Robertson's alternately harrowing and exhilarating work, LADY DAY AT EMERSON'S BAR & GRILL, is an intriguing take on Billie Holiday's final performance in 1959. Holiday was a jazz singer who could captivate an audience with her unique vocal style, which combined elements of Louis Armstrong and Bessie Smith, two performers she idolized growing up. She had a storied career and tumultuous life that was further undone by drug and alcohol addictions that would leave her dead from heart failure and cirrhosis of the liver. But, her legacy is undeniable, and this play allows us to see her talent, as well as the demons that haunted her. Max & Louie Productions is presenting a superlative production of this work which is smartly crafted and brilliantly performed.