Ned Washington News

92Y announces Lyrics & Lyricists 2017, the 47th season of the country's preeminent American Songbook series. L&L brings together top music directors, lyricists, artists and music historians to present original revues featuring award-winning Broadway and cabaret performers.

I didn't catch Rosemary Loar's original 2006 presentation of 'Quando Swing,' but I can't imagine it performed with more muscular honesty than it was Wednesday night at the Metropolitan Room in the latest monthly installment of Producer Stephen Hanks' 'New York Cabaret's Greatest Hits' series. We've come to expect lucid, intriguing shows from the vocalist, but engagement level on this occasion felt almost cathartic. Energy was full tilt, lyric communication authentic.

When vocalist Todd Murray discovered several of the musicians for his excellent show Croon were unavailable for their scheduled Valentine's Day appearance last Sunday afternoon at the Metropolitan Room, he asked Sean Harkness (the guitarist in the show) to join him for a two-hander. The fortuitous accident yielded a terrific presentation of romantic material from sentimental to ardent, a pared down sharing of unadulterated heart and high musical craft that deserves wider audience. “It's our goal to put you in the mood,” Murray tells us. They do.

Recently, Migguel Anggelo returned to Joe's Pub in New York City with an encore performance of his latest concert, I, Inmigrante. Like his pervious concert, Between Dreams / Entre Sueños, the set featured music from both of Anggelo's solo albums, his electrifying energy, his brilliant vocal range, and his unique artistry. Anggelo's latest cabaret is a dynamic treat sewn together with palpable heart and rib-tickling humor.

The Blue Fairy has answered the world's wishes for a new Disney musical! 

Stacy Sullivan is a warm and amusing storyteller with an entertaining family history. The first six numbers of her new Metropolitan Room show on Thursday night, Since You Asked (after the Judy Collins song), are bridged by tales of her parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and her upbringing in Oklahoma. Unfortunately, five of these songs have only the most tenuous relationship to material that follows, diminishing reception with thoughts of--Where's the connection? What's she trying to say?

Celebrating the release of SING YOU TO SLEEP, Anika Larsen made her solo concert debut at Birdland on Monday, March 23. Joined by her BEAUTIFUL castmates Jessie Mueller and Jarrod Spector and her XANADU castmate Kenita Miller, Larsen's set featured songs from her album and thematically appropriate solos that featured her guests' talents too. Thus, the evening was the perfect night cap to an otherwise manic Monday.

ANIKA LARSEN, the 2014 Tony Award nominee and Drama Desk Award winner currently starring on Broadway in Beautiful -- The Carole King Musical, will introduce her debut solo CD Sing you to Sleep with a special concert at Birdland Jazz Club as part of the 'Broadway at Birdland' series tonight, March 23 at 7:00 PM. Birdland is located at 315 West 44th Street in Manhattan.

ANIKA LARSEN, the 2014 Tony Award nominee and Drama Desk Award winner currently starring on Broadway in Beautiful -- The Carole King Musical, will introduce her debut solo CD Sing you to Sleep with a special concert at Birdland Jazz Club as part of the 'Broadway at Birdland' series on Monday, March 23 at 7:00 PM.

Currently wowing audiences eight times a week as the sassy and tenacious Cynthia Weil in BEAUTIFUL: THE CAROLE KING MUSICAL at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre, Anika Larsen recently released her debut solo album, SING YOU TO SLEEP. Sprinkling in subdued jazz, Anika Larsen invites us to loosen our ties, kick off our shoes, and cuddle up with her gentle crooning as we listen to the deliciously soothing SING ME TO SLEEP.

Those who were fortunate, and prescient, enough to avail themselves of tickets to Stephanie Blythe's glorious San Diego Opera concert presentation, We'll meet again:?The Songs of Kate Smith, were treated to an evening as indulgent as musical chocolates and champagne bubble bath.

Last week, New York based jazz duo Magos & Limon took the stage at Joe's Pub. Jazz vocalist Magos Herrera hails from Mexico City and has garnered great attention for her singing abilities. Javier Limon, who plays minimalist Flamenco on guitar, is originally from Madrid. Together the duo bridges the gap between their home countries and creates a unique and intriguing sound that lures the audience into the performance and croons to the soul.

When the orchestra began to play the opening number - Leigh Harline and Ned Washington's Disney signature song, 'When You Wish Upon A Star' - the music began to swell and swirl around the space of the Actors' Church in a way that clearly promised that this was going to be an evening of musical magic. And the entire concert that followed never failed to live up to that promise.

As a young veteran of the New York cabaret scene and someone who rests comfortably in that performer's purgatory between celebrity and what the folks at the Manhattan Association of Cabarets and Clubs (MAC) calls “Major Artist,” Marieann Meringolo certainly doesn't need validation from a Stevie-come-lately reviewer like me. But nobody bats 1.000—in baseball, life, or cabaret—and, frankly, I didn't cheer in print for her slightly pretentious 2013 show Orchestrated, which seemed to feature a band big enough to bust through the far wall of the Metropolitan Room and arrangements that were more than a tad overblown. But in 2011, I loved her annual holiday show, In The Spirit, and had heard nothing but great things about her 2012 tribute to the music of Michael Legrand, so I was willing to consider Orchestrated a mere hiccup—depending on what she came up with next. Well, next arrived on the afternoon of Saturday, April 5 afternoon with Meringolo's new show, Crazy Love, at the Metropolitan Room.

The Douglas Morrisson Theatre continues its 2013-2014 season with a world premiere adaptation of Oscar Wilde's 'An Ideal Husband.' Directed by the Douglas Morrisson Theatre's Artistic Director Susan E. Evans, Bay Area playwright Scott Munson's sparkling new adaptation of the 118 year old play in a modern setting features an ensemble of local performers: Myers Clark as Roosevelt, Teddy Spencer as Thomas Goring, Daria Hepps as Laura Chiltern, Craig Souza as Robert Chiltern, Cynthia Lagodzinski as Rosalind Cheveley, Brooke Silva as Tammy Chiltern, Kendall Tieck as Governor Goring, Celia Maurice as Mrs. Markby, Alicia von Kugelgen as Mrs. Marchmont, Beebe Reisman as Mrs. Basildon and Tina Rutsch as Ambassador Nanjac.

The Douglas Morrisson Theatre continues its 2013-2014 season with a world premiere adaptation of Oscar Wilde's 'An Ideal Husband.' Directed by the Douglas Morrisson Theatre's Artistic Director Susan E. Evans, Bay Area playwright Scott Munson's sparkling new adaptation of the 118 year old play in a modern setting features an ensemble of local performers: Myers Clark as Roosevelt, Teddy Spencer as Thomas Goring, Daria Hepps as Laura Chiltern, Craig Souza as Robert Chiltern, Cynthia Lagodzinski as Rosalind Cheveley, Brooke Silva as Tammy Chiltern, Kendall Tieck as Governor Goring, Celia Maurice as Mrs. Markby, Alicia von Kugelgen as Mrs. Marchmont, Beebe Reisman as Mrs. Basildon and Tina Rutsch as Ambassador Nanjac.

Philadelphia Orchestra Music Director Yannick Nezet-Seguin and President and CEO Allison Vulgamore today announce the 2013-14 season of The Philadelphia Orchestra.

Sutton Foster may be a Tony-Award winning Broadway Musical Theatre darling, but if her opening-night show this past Wednesday at Café Carlyle (which launched her current three-week run until September 28) is the best she can do, she's far from also being considered a nightclub/cabaret diva.

Scot Albertson (Vocalist - Performer - Producer - Recording Artist) - www.scotalbertson.com) announces his sixth CD release concert, set for tonight June 17, 2013 at 7:30p.m. at Symphony Space Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theatre, located at 2537 Broadway & West 95th Street, New York City, NY.

The Satori Group in collaboration with The Bengsons, a New York City based musical duo, will be debuting work from their new piece The Land Is Always Known at On The Boards' Northwest New Works Festival tonight, June 15 and tomorrow, June 16.