RON DROTOS AND FRIENDS to Return to Pangea for Two Shows
Vocalists Lina Koutrakos, Dorian Woodruff, and Juliet Ewing will each headline a mini-set at the cabaret room.
Jazz pianist and Broadway veteran Ron Drotos will return to Pangea, with vocalists Lina Koutrakos, Dorian Woodruff, and Juliet Ewing, for two evenings of jazz, bossa, ballads, and blues. On Thursdays, August 27 and October 29, at 7:00 PM, expect many musical surprises as Drotos plays jazz piano solos and each vocalist is featured in a mini-set. Ron Drotos and Friends: Featuring Lina Koutrakos, Dorian Woodruff, and Juliet Ewing, premiered at Pangea on April 24.
"Ron Drotos and Friends is the order of the day... an awesome thing to have happen in this or any other cabaret season, especially in the intimate and homey (and sweet smelling) cabaret room at Pangea. It's a perfect fit.' ~ Stephen Mosher, BroadwayWorld
Music Director Ron Drotos is a jazz pianist, composer, and arranger. Drotos received a Bachelor's degree in Music Composition from The University of Connecticut. He studied jazz piano with Dr. Billy Taylor, Walter Bishop, Jr., Harold Danko, and Ellen Rowe, and worked as assistant to the baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan. In New York City, he served as Associate Music Director and created orchestrations for the Broadway musical Swinging On A Star, which received a Tony Award nomination for Best Musical in 1995. Additional Broadway credits include Smokey Joe's Café, The Life, and Fosse. Drotos has orchestrated for the New York Pops Orchestra, with whom he has appeared several times at Carnegie Hall. He has been featured as Music Director on the 92nd St. Y's famed Lyrics and Lyricists series, and has performed with vocalists Julius LaRosa, Judy Collins, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Nell Carter, Giacomo Gates and Juliet Ewing. In addition, he has taught in Alaska at the Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival annually since 1999, and has been inducted into the festival's Hall of Fame.
Lina Koutrakos is an award-winning singer/songwriter/teacher/director based in New York City. As a singer, she has repeatedly received rave reviews from The New York Times to Billboard Magazine in both rock and roll and cabaret and has been awarded Cabaret's most prestigious awards for 'Best Female Vocalist' and 'Entertainer of the Year,' multiple times. For three decades Koutrakos has been a New York City musical fixture - as both soloist and as a director and performance coach. Her directorial nods include being a 4-time winner for 'Best Director' from the MAC Association as well as a lifetime Backstage Bistro Award-Winner for 'Best Director.'. Koutrakos was on staff as a Master Teacher for years at both the Eugene O'Neill Cabaret Symposium and The Yale Cabaret Conference. She was the first Master Teacher with The St. Louis Cabaret Conference and co-founded NYC's Summer in the City yearly workshop on weekends. She has since gone on to start her own performance workshop 'Performance Connection,' which umbrellas many ongoing and specialty workshops and seminars both online and in person. The Advance Performance Workshop in NYC has produced many award-winning performers and shows over the last 2 decades. Her singing and being the founder of the Midwest Cabaret Conference in Chicago for 10 years won her the 'Gold Coast' Award with the Chicago Cabaret Professionals in 2019. She spearheads an annual Advanced Performance Workshop on the island of Mykonos. Due to her performance workshops with full bands to one-on-one clients across the U.S. to her own award-winning original material and one woman shows, Koutrakos has been called a 'Walking Master Class' by Billboard Magazine.
Dorian Woodruff is an accomplished cabaret singer and has performed in clubs internationally while providing touring and studio vocals. In New York, He has appeared at Joe's Pub, 54 Below, Don't Tell Mama, The Beach Café, and Pangea. His shows Welcome Home: Everybody Has a Story and Studio Musician: The Music of Manilow were nominated for MAC Awards. He has appeared in Chicago at Davenport's, The Jazz Cave at the Nashville Jazz Workshop, and the New York Cabaret Convention in Lincoln Center's Rose Hall. His most recent show, The Lyrics of Alan and Marilyn Bergman, celebrates the lyrics of Alan and Marilyn Bergman with music created with some of the greatest composers of our time including Marvin Hamlisch, Dave Grusin, and Johnny Mandel. Cabaret Scenes says, 'Many songwriters of today would be lucky to have their more thoughtful material rendered by such a thoughtful and caring vocalist."
Juliet Ewing has performed in New York City at Birdland, 54 Below, Laurie Beechman Theatre, Triad Theater, Tavern on the Green, and The Duplex. She made her solo cabaret debut at Don't Tell Mama on April 11, 2024, in Rise Up Singing-The Music of George Gershwin, directed by Lina Koutrakos, with musical direction by Ron Drotos. Ewing has appeared on Broadway and in the first US National Tour of the hit musical Footloose. She has enjoyed leading roles in the European tours of Gershwin's Crazy For You and the tap-dancing blockbuster 42nd Street, as well as numerous regional theater productions. Ewing's album Simply 'S Wonderful-The Magic of Gershwin, released September 12, 2025, on the Lexicon Classics Label, draws on her experience performing Gershwin on Broadway and in international tours, creating an album of jazz-infused George Gershwin tunes, including 'Embraceable You,' "The Man I Love,' 'S Wonderful' and hidden gems like 'Naughty Baby' and 'The Lorelei.' The album features a superb combo of musicians, including the album's producer Tedd Firth on piano, Ron Drotos on piano, David Finck on bass, and Mark McLean on drums. Simply 'S Wonderful-The Magic of Gershwin is available now on all streaming platforms. Of the album, Jazz2love says, "Her voice resonates passion and refinement, reminding audiences of old-school swing delivered with a contemporary perspective.'
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