Tracy Young News

Today, PlayMakers Repertory Company at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill announced it will reopen for the 2021-2022 season, staging five productions in the 550-seat Paul Green Theatre between November 2021 and May 2022. The season features works that explore the resilience of family bonds in all their complicated forms, friendships that transcend language, time, and space, and one man's connection to his community that helps him stand taller than he could alone.   

Cyndi Lauper has announced that her 10th annual Home for the Holidays benefit concert will premiere on Friday, December 11 exclusively on her TikTok at 8PM EST, with an additional stream Sunday, December 13 on Lauper’s YouTube and Facebook handles at 8PM EST.

Lauper continues to reinforce her status as a role model, advocate and icon.

With one month to go until the monumental high-stakes U.S. election, Cyndi Lauper has enlisted GRAMMY-winning producer/remixer Tracy Young to create an amped up version of “Hope.” 

GRAMMY®/EMMY®/TONY®-winner Billy Porter has released For What It's Worth (Tracy Young 'Groove for Good' Remix). For What It's Worth (Tracy Young 'Groove for Good' Remix) is available on all streaming platforms and digital retailer.

Electric songstress Anabel Englund seeks to share her personal connection with music, creative writing, and people in her artistic output.  Today, August 21, she offers “Picture Us,” a brand-new single on AREA10/Ultra Records. 

Tegan and Sara unveil a brand-new video for “I Know I’m Not The Only One” as part of a 25-minute special on their YouTube channel.  The duo also announce the release of their Hey, We’re Just Like You (The Remixes) EP, out on Sire Records next Friday, August 7th.

Steppenwolf's artistic team and ensemble have announced three new virtual projects that the company will be sharing exclusively with Members.

Steppenwolf Theatre Company is replacing its 2020 Gala with a special online event, Pants Optional: A Steppenwolf Soirée, celebrating the power of theatre and raising vital funds to keep it alive during a time of necessary social-distancing.

Steppenwolf Theatre Company will celebrate 44 years of trailblazing theatre and with an unforgettable evening inspired by the art and artists of our past, present and future. This phenomenal event will be emceed by esteemed ensemble member Gary Cole (Veep, The West Wing, Office Space), who will also tread the Steppenwolf boards for the first time in 20 years in this summer's production of Catch as Catch Can. A dynamic collaboration between artists and board members, Gala 2020 co-chairs include ensemble member Joan Allen; trustee Susan Berghoef; ensemble members Gary Cole and Sandra Marquez; and trustee Anne Phillips and Don Phillips. The Gala will take place at a new location, the stunningly renovated Old Post Office (415 S. Canal St., Chicago).

The GRAMMY AWARDS Premiere Ceremony took place at Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles on Sunday, January 26, from 12:30-3:30 p.m. PT. Preceding the 62nd Annual GRAMMY AWARDS telecast, the Premiere Ceremony was hosted by two-time GRAMMY winner and current nominee Imogen Heap and featured a number of performances by current GRAMMY nominees. Performers included classical violinist Nicola Benedetti, jazz legend Chick Corea, folk music supergroup I'm With Her, West African sensation Angélique Kidjo and Best New Artist nominee Yola.

Chance Theater, Anaheim's official resident theater company, presents a?oeA Wrinkle in Time,a?? kicking off the company's TYA (Theater for Young Audiences) Family Series for its 2020 season. Playwright John Glore has created a wild, highly theatrical adaptation of Madeleine L'Engle's acclaimed 1962 story about three teens who traverse the boundaries of time and space in search of a beloved parent, bringing it magically to life on the Chance's Fyda-Mar Stage.

Recording Academy® President/CEO Deborah Dugan alongside Academy Chair of the Board of Trustees and renowned record producer Harvey Mason Jr., as well as GRAMMY Awards® host Alicia Keys and past two-time GRAMMY® nominee Bebe Rexha, today revealed nominees for the 62nd GRAMMY Awards in select categories. This year's nominees reflect a melting pot of artistic innovation that defined the year in music, showcasing the unparalleled craftsmanship of established artists and the industry-shifting impact of rising music creators. Leading nominees Lizzo (8), Billie Eilish (6) and Lil Nas X (6) not only topped the charts but ignited a cultural conversation around their genre-bending hits. As the only peer-selected music award, the GRAMMY Awards are voted on by the Recoding Academy's membership body of music makers, who represent all genres and creative disciplines, including recording artists, songwriters, producers, mixers and engineers.

ACT a?' A Contemporary Theatre, under the direction of Artistic Director John Langs, officially announces its 55th seasona?'a celebration of five contemporary plays including ACT's 50th Mainstage world premiere. The 2020 mainstage season will open with the Pulitzer Prize-winning Sweat by Lynn Nottage, followed by The Effect, a scintillating, pill-popping love story by Lucy Prebble. Summer 2020 will feature a co-production with the Denver Center for the Performing Arts with the soaring coming-of-age musical-drama Choir Boy by the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of Moonlight, Tarell Alvin McCraney. Fall at ACT will feature the world premiere of The Laugh Track by Wendy MacLeod, inspired by the true story of the first female Hollywood writer on the I Love Lucy Show. Closing the season, will be the weirdly wonderful and witty Witch by Jen Silverman, an updated version of The Witch of Edmonton, where the Devil comes to bargain for souls and things go awry when he meets up with the town outcast.

Future IDs at Alcatraz, a yearlong project, exhibition, and series of monthly public programs on view in the New Industries Building on Alcatraz Island until October 2019, brings attention to criminal justice reform efforts and second chances. The exhibition encourages the viewer to reevaluate ideas about rehabilitation, reentry, and reintegration, which features ID inspired artwork created by individuals who have a conviction history as they conceive and develop a vision for a future self.

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival invites audiences to enjoy two plays by William Shakespeare-plus one about a young girl with a crucial superpower, curiosity, and the beloved fantastical dream adventure in which she tries to figure out how to stay true to who she is-under the stars when its flagship outdoor theatre opens the weekend of June 7-9, 2019. The Allen Elizabethan Theatre will feature Macbeth, directed by Jose Luis Valenzuela; Alice in Wonderland, adapted from Lewis Carroll by Eve Le Gallienne and Florida Friebus, directed by Sara Bruner; and All's Well That Ends Well, directed by Tracy Young. Previews begin May 28, and all three shows will run through the weekend of October 11-13.

Play On Shakespeare today announces an expansive list of compelling actors and dynamic directors confirmed to participate in the Play on! Festival, presented in association with Classic Stage Company (CSC) and Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF). Play on! features 39 readings of new, work-in-progress translations of Shakespeare's plays into contemporary modern English by some of today's most exciting playwrights-May 29-June 30 at the Lynn F. Angelson Theater at CSC (136 E. 13th Street). In 2015, Oregon Shakespeare Festival launched an ambitious 39-play, three-year commissioning project, Play on!, tasking 36 playwrights-more than half of whom were women and playwrights of color, each paired with a dramaturg-to translate Shakespeare's canon in celebration of the enduring impact of the Bard's work. Supported by a generous grant from the Hitz Foundation and inspired by long-time patron Dave Hitz's passion for Shakespeare, the project was and continues to be led by Lue Morgan Douthit. For more information, visit playonfestival.org.

The Actors' Gang presents VIOLENCE: The Misadventures of Spike Spangle, Farmer, written by The Actors' Gang Artistic Director Tim Robbins and Adam Simon and directed by Bob Turton, who was most recently seen at The Actors' Gang as "The Maniac" in Accidental Death of an Anarchist. This no-holds barred satire of militarism and media manipulation begins performances May 2nd (Press Opening May 11th at 8:00pm) and will run Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, through June 22nd. 

Play On Shakespeare in association with Classic Stage Company (CSC) and Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) presents the Play on! festival-featuring 39 readings of new, work-in-progress translations of Shakespeare's plays into contemporary modern English by some of today's most exciting playwrights-May 29-June 30 at the Lynn F. Angelson Theater at CSC (136 E. 13th Street).In 2015, Oregon Shakespeare Festival launched an ambitious 39-play, three-year commissioning project, Play on!, tasking 36 playwrights-more than half of whom were women and playwrights of color, each paired with a dramaturg-to translate Shakespeare's canon in celebration of the enduring impact of the Bard's work. Supported by a generous grant from the Hitz Foundation and inspired by long-time patron Dave Hitz's passion for Shakespeare, the project was and continues to be led by Lue Morgan Douthit. For more information, visit playonfestival.org.

The Actors' Gang presents One Act Festival, featuring two contrasting programs performed in repertory. Show one, entitled The Classic, begins performances March 14th (press opening March 23) and features two classic one-act plays -- Jean-Paul Sartre's No Exit, directed by Brian T. Finney, and Samuel Beckett's Krapps's Last Tape, directed by Cynthia Ettinger. Show two, entitled The Original, begins performances March 16 (Press Opening March 29) and features three new one-act plays written, directed, and acted by The Actors Gang ensemble:  Tradition, written by James Edward Bane and directed by Tess Vidal, A Perfect World, written by Lynde Houck and directed by Danielle Powell, and Clean Slate, written by Bob Turton and directed by Zoe Hall. Both programs will run Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, through April 20th.