Posted on November 12, 2007 at 10:30 pm

Click that subscribe button, people! You know you want to!

Good day, citizens!

It is I, Jason Robert Brown, one of your few entertainment options that’s not currently on strike. I would be if I could, but I’m my own employer and that’s awkward.

So here I am, back in business at the ol’ ranch, and I wanted to tell you about all the exciting JRB-osity that’s coming your way.

Firstly, I have to congratulate my two friends on their sensational new CD’s:

Lauren Kennedy, the golden-throated thrush, has released her second album, Here and Now, on the PS Classics label, and it’s totally killer. She not only does two previously unreleased JRB songs, she introduces all kinds of great material from those hot new writers you always hear about but never actually hear, and she sings the bejeepers out of every song. (Also, I got to arrange a song apiece by my friends Andrew Lippa and Adam Guettel, which was way fun.) AND Georgia’s got a fabulous song on there too.

And no less wicked cool is Andréa Burns, who starred in Songs for a New World AND the national tour of Parade, and who has released her debut solo CD, A Deeper Shade Of Red, also on PS Classics. It’s a beautiful record, featuring (among other things) an awesome new song by Lin-Manuel Miranda, and also a real kicky treat: Andréa asked me if I would arrange one song in the style of our mutual hero, Eydie Gormé, and I was delighted to oblige. The result is a great version of “A Little Brains, A Little Talent” that she wails all over and makes me goofy every time I listen to it.

Buy their CD’s! All right, enough of those people.

There are three JRB concerts coming up, all featuring the Legendary Underpaid But Not On Strike Caucasian Rhythm Kings and Golden-Throated Thrush Lauren Kennedy, and you should come to all three and bring your entire family and all of your friends. Failing that, just come to one. Which one? You decide:

December 1: The Bendheim Performing Arts Center in Scarsdale, NY, 8 PM. Details here!

December 2: The Stockbridge Theatre in Derry, New Hampshire, 7 PM. Details here!

And finally, on December 8, Lauren and the Boys and I are doing a very special benefit concert at the Turtle Bay Music School. Basically, all the proceeds will help fund a scholarship program to allow very low-income kids to get free music lessons at the school, which makes me cry just thinking about it. It’s a small venue (just 120 seats), so it’ll be a real intimate night, and we’re planning a couple of special surprises for the setlist. I hope you’ll consider coming up to East 52nd Street for this one. Details here!

If you haven’t been to the website in a while, you’ve missed my rehash of the process of putting together the Olivier-nominated (oops) Evening Standard Award-nominated British premiere of Parade, and you’ve missed my most-viewed posting ever, in which I explain to eager teenagers how they can find out more about auditioning for the Broadway production of my new musical, 13.

So go take a look! And Happy Thanksgiving to all.

And hey, if you pass a picket line, send a little love to those folks walking around with the signs. Both the WGA and the IATSE strikes are very complicated, but those are real people putting their livelihoods at stake out there, and they could use any support you can throw their way. Dig that.

Yours in solidarity,
Jason Robert Brown