Billie Holiday News

Continuing with its tradition of offering new and interesting theatrical productions to its patrons, The Henegar will be the first Florida Theatre to produce the new musicals, The Witches of Eastwick and It Shoulda Been You.

Happy Birthday Audra McDonald!! Today is six-time Tony Award winner Audra McDonald's birthday and to celebrate her special day BroadwayWorld has decided to round up some of our favorite Audra McDonald videos!

Though somewhat familiar with and already an admirer of actor/vocalists Carpathia Jenkins and Alton Fitzgerald White, I was, until tonight, unaware of the apparently prolific musician, songwriter, librettist, and educator Louis Rosen. Rosen's Dream Suite, which occupied the second part of this June 28 show at Birdland, unearths the music of poems by American poet, social activist, novelist, and playwright Langston Hughes (1902 -1967).

For Blue Note Hawaii, the state's premier venue for the world's most celebrated artists, July is heating up with music legend David Crosby, ground-breaking fusion artist, Robert Glasper, chart-topping funk and R&B singer Jeffrey Osborne and multi-platinum vocalist Joan Osborne.

The 42nd Annual Jazz Record Collectors' Bash will be held this weekend, June 24-25, 2016, at the APA Hotel Woodbridge (formally Hilton Woodbridge, 120 Wood Avenue South Iselin, NJ 08830).

After enjoying its World Premiere engagement earlier this spring at the Playroom Theater, A Class Act, the inaugural and relevant new play by attorney and playwright Norman Shabel, will now hold court at New World Stages  - Stage 5(340 West 50th Street - between 8th & 9th Avenues) for a summer run.  Produced by Eric Krebs, performances will begin on Saturday, July 9 at 8pm and continue through Sunday, September 4.

The Bayou Theatre Company returns with its third season entitled 'The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly: Exploring the Complexities of Womanhood'. With a season focused on female-centered stories, the season will open with Lanie Robertson's riveting one woman play with music LADY DAY AT THE EMERSON'S BAR AND GRILL, followed by PECONG by Steve Carter, a resetting of the myth of Medea.

Drama Desk Awards Nominees Rachel Bay Jones (Pippin, Hair, Broadway's upcoming Dear Evan Hanson), Robert Creighton (Cagney, Chicago) & Farah Alvin (The Marvelous Wonderettes, Grease, Saturday Night Fever), in addition to Noah Racey (Never Gonna Dance, Curtains, Thoroughly Modern Millie), Morgan Weed (American Psycho, Rent) & Maxine Linehan just took part in Town Hall's Broadway by the Year Series last night, June 20, THE BROADWAY MUSICALS OF THE 1970s (this is the 16th year of the series).

Birdland Jazz Club has announced its July 2016 schedule, featuring Stacey Kent, The Birdland Big Band 10-Year Celebration, The Legendary Count Basie Orchestra, Nicholas Payton Quintet, Arturo O'Farrill Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra, Tony Yazbeck, Lesli Margherita, Ravi Coltrane, Laila Biali, Barbara Carroll, Jim Caruso's Cast Party, and more!

Drama Desk Awards Nominees Rachel Bay Jones (Pippin, Hair, Broadway's upcoming Dear Evan Hanson), Robert Creighton (Cagney, Chicago) & Farah Alvin (The Marvelous Wonderettes, Grease, Saturday Night Fever), in addition to Noah Racey (Never Gonna Dance, Curtains, Thoroughly Modern Millie), Morgan Weed (American Psycho, Rent) & Maxine Linehan are set to star at Town Hall's Broadway by the Year Series on Monday, June 20 at 8pm, THE BROADWAY MUSICALS OF THE 1970s (this is the 16th year of the series).

Four talented emerging playwrights of color - members of the 2016 INKtank Playwrights Lab -  will unveil their exciting new works when Rising Circle Theater Collective presents its 7th annual PlayRISE Festival, a series of staged readings featuring some of New York City's most exciting theatre artists of color. The festival will run from June 16-19 at The Sheen Center (18 Bleecker Street in Manhattan).

Australian cabaret performer, Analisa Bell, brings her Billie Holiday tribute, Strange Fruit, to the Metropolitan Room on Thursday, June 30 at 9.30pm.

Madeleine Peyroux, a blues and jazz singer often compared to Billie Holiday, performs live in concert at Gala 2016, Syracuse Stage's major annual fundraiser, today, Friday, June 10 in Goldstein Auditorium at Syracuse University's Schine Student Center.

Theatre Three announces a five-show season for its Theatre Too downstairs studio space, including revamped classics, a world premiere and a chilling Conor McPherson thriller.

Directed by B'Anca and written and starring singer Sybil Harris, the production is billed as 'a show with songs.' The latter part is certainly true.

It's midnight in March of 1959 at a seedy bar in Philadelphia. The audience is about to witness one of Billie Holiday's final appearances, just four months before her death. In between funny and heartbreaking stories about her life and career, "Lady Day" sings her most beloved songs including "What a Little Moonlight Can Do," "Crazy He Calls Me," "God Bless the Child" and "Strange Fruit."

Joey Arias, vocalist/songwriter/actor/performance artist/host, has been on the scene here since the 1980s. Visually and vocally distinctive, Arias's signature black bangs and ponytail have been on stages such as Club 57, Astor Theater, HERE, and Abrons Art Center--not to mention playing Mistress of Seduction at Cirque du Soleil's Zumanity in Las Vegas.  To say the physically diminutive Arias is larger than life is a comment on her fully inhabited, unique presence and talent. On May 30 (the third of seven show run through late July), she's aided and abetted in Little Black Book (no idea what the title means) by Musical Director (and superb bass player) Ben Allison and guitarist Brandon Seabrook.

Reji Woods, a Lancaster area stage and song fixture, has a full plate this summer, with his PORTRAIT OF A LADY series and two summer shows in Philadelphia and Vermont. He talks about producing and performing at the same time.

Two-time Drama Desk Award-nominee & YouTube sensation Christina Bianco, two-time Nightlife Award-winner Scott Coulter (who travels around the world performing with Stephen Schwartz), Jeannette Bayardelle (original cast of The Color Purple) and Cooper Grodin (plays The Phantom in the National Tour of Phantom of the Opera), will join previously announced Tony-nominee Christiane Noll (Ragtime) & Drama Desk Award-nominee Kerry O'Malley (Into the Woods, Irving Berlin's White Christmas) at Town Hall's Broadway by the Year Series on Monday, May 23 at 8pm, THE BROADWAY MUSICALS OF THE 1960s (this is the 16th year of the series).