Billy May News

Spend the 4th of July weekend at America's oldest continuing summer chamber music festival, Music Mountain, when its 87th Anniversary Season continues with the young ensemble Cantata Profana on Sunday, July 3rd (3PM) performing Beethoven and Schubert. Saturday, July 2 (6:30pm) brings Swingtime Big Band back for their ninth season playing the best of the Swing Era! The summer will feature 15 weekends of incredible music including returning favorite chamber ensembles and musicians (pianists Peter Serkin and Julia Hsu), first-time guests (pianist Richard Goode), the ever-popular Saturday Evening Twilight Series, featuring an array of Jazz ensembles and musicians, including the artists of the Catskill Jazz Factory, and the second season of the new Music Mountain Master Classes for Young Artists plus so much more! See why the New Yorker called Music Mountain 'The Summer Shrine of the String Quartet.' Concerts are scheduled through September 11.

Concert aficionados from around the country will want to mark their calendars for Music Mountain, America's oldest continuing summer chamber music festival, when it kicks off its record-breaking 87th Anniversary Season beginning Sunday, June 5th!

Nominations have been announced for the 2nd Annual New York City Drone Film Festival, the world's first film festival dedicated to works filmed by drones.

Nominations have been announced for the 2nd Annual New York City Drone Film Festival, the world's first film festival dedicated to works filmed by drones.

Nominations have been announced for the 2nd Annual New York City Drone Film Festival, the world's first film festival dedicated to works filmed by drones.

TV/film composer David Ricard (The Tom & Jerry Show, The Pink Panther & Pals) puts an exciting new twist on traditional holiday music with his 20-piece big band and their release of 'Holiday Swingin'.'

Dale Head (dalehead.net), a jazz and blues powerhouse vocalist and trumpet player, today announced that he will be celebrating the hundredth anniversary of the birth of the voice of the 20th century, Frank Sinatra, by reviewing 40 years of his amazing career. 'From his early days to his retirement in 1972 and his comeback in the Main Event, Frank Sinatra lived a life of legends,' said Dale Head. 'With this performance, we will show you how Frank rose to stardom, fell from grace, and came back, multiple times to be the most iconic entertainer of the 20th Century. Using photos, videos, creative narration, and recreating some remarkable vocal duets, our goal is to give you a taste of what it might have been like to be in the studio at Capital with Nelson Riddle, in the audience at the Sand with County Basie and Quincy Jones, or finally at Madison Square Garden when none other than Howard Cosell introduced Sinatra as a boxer making his comeback in the Main Event.'

Tribute shows to iconic entertainers celebrating a centennial birthday in 2015 seem to be all the rage this year. But nobody has been celebrated more in cabaret variety shows than Frank Sinatra—and rightly so. Wall Street Journal entertainment columnist Will Friedwald, also a producer and author who wrote the 1997 book Sinatra! The Song Is You—A Singer's Art, this past Saturday presented the biggest (and longest) tribute to “Ol' Blue Eyes” so far this year with Sinatra-Thon at The Cutting Room (co-curated with performer Cary Hoffman), a potpourri of events running from 10 am to an after-midnight jam, and which included varied live entertainment, rare film clips, and panel discussions.

Ol' Blue Eyes is celebrating a big birthday!

Centennial Sinatra starring Steve Lippia is a celebration of the life and music of the twentieth century's most remarkable singer of the Great American Songbook.

Centennial Sinatra starring Steve Lippia is a celebration of the life and music of the twentieth century's most remarkable singer of the Great American Songbook.

Mesa Encore Theatre is celebrating the 70th Anniversary of Rodgers and Hammerstein's CAROUSEL with a delightful and dazzling production, directed by Philip Fazio and Sarah Wolter and featuring standout acting and singing performances by Brenda Jean Foley as Julie Jordan, Joseph Cannon as Billy Bigelow, Alanna Kalbfleisch as Carrie Pepperidge, and Harmon Swartz as Enoch Snow.

In celebration of Frank Sinatra's centennial year, new, career-spanning collections of the entertainment icon's timeless music have been compiled for worldwide CD and digital release on April 21 by Capitol/UMe.

One of the world's best Big Band Jazz Orchestras teams up with two of the UK's most talented vocalists to present the spectacular concert: 'Sinatra, Sequins & Swing'.

Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts at Brooklyn College continues its 2013-14 season with the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra's A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, featuring vocalist Deloris King Williams,on Sunday, April 27, 2014 at 3:00pm. Tickets are $35 and can be purchased by phone at 718-951-4500 (Tues-Sat, 1pm-6pm) or online at BrooklynCenterOnline.org.

'The best jazz repertory band in the country' (The New Yorker) honors The First Lady of Song-Ella Fitzgerald-by seizing a special moment in American history. Pulling original, little played arrangements done for Ella in the '40s and '50s-charts penned by superstar arrangers such as Billy May, Count Basie, Billy Strayhorn and Benny Carter- Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra and the ever-elegant Kim Nazarian will join together in an evening at Harris Center for the Arts of 'fascinating rarities...each played with as much skill as authenticity' (Chicago Tribune).

With Valentine's Day quickly approaching, set the perfect mood for this special night with the romantic styling of 'The Chairman of the Board.' Today, January 28, 2014, Universal Music Enterprises (UMe) will release Sinatra, With Love, a 16-track collection of Sinatra's romantic classics from his Capitol and Reprise catalogs. This is Universal's second release under the newly launched 'Signature Sinatra' imprint, a deal uniting Sinatra's classic Capitol and signature Reprise recordings.

With Valentine's Day quickly approaching, set the perfect mood for this special night with the romantic styling of “The Chairman of the Board.”

Jay is an enormous fan of Broadway and all its denizens and has done many Broadway Cast Albums, but he has also worked with every great star of our time in every category of music.

National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Senior Deputy Chairman Joan Shigekawa announced today that Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts is one of 150 not-for-profit organizations nationwide to receive an NEA Challenge America Fast-Track grant. Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts is recommended for a $10,000 grant to support their April 27, 2014 presentation of the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra's A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald.