Jason Robert Brown

Jason Robert Brown, composer of "The Last Five Years" and winner of the Tony award for his score to "Parade" will be performing along with some hot-stuff Broadway talent, including Carolee Carmello, Brian d’Arcy James, and Darius deHaas, on April 26, 8pm, at Le Jazz Au Bar, 41 E. 58th [Park/Mad] 212.308.9455. There’ll be some surprise guests, you’ll hear numbers from Mr. Brown’s upcoming new musicals, and other great songs from the highly talented Mr. Brown. Should be a lot of fun – and it’s only $20. We spoke with Mr. Brown recently about his work and the state ofRead More »

You’d think that any young composer who’d been plucked from relative obscurity to replace Stephen Sondheim in a new Broadway musical, then landed a Tony Award for his efforts, would thank his lucky stars. Not Jason Robert Brown. "Broadway is an inhospitable place to work," said Brown, 33, who stepped in for a departing Sondheim to finish "Parade," based on the infamous murder trial and lynching of Leo Frank; Brown won a 1999 Tony for original musical score. "Broadway isn’t kind or forgiving to new or smart work. It’s unsophisticated and sort of, well, stupid. Everyone in the business knowsRead More »

HAVING already left an indelible mark on this year’s Adelaide Cabaret Festival with two remarkable but very different shows, New York composer Jason Robert Brown once again delivered the goods to bring this year’s event to a rousing finale. Unlike his complete shows Songs for a New World and The Last Five Years, the closing concert was a grab-bag of tunes from other assignments, ranging from Tony Award-winning musicals to box office duds, from incidental music reinterpreted for albums to songs which have never been recorded – and therefore never before heard in Australia.  Again, they demonstrated the amazing diversityRead More »

Tomorrow at Belmont Park, a horse named Supervisor will line up for the Belmont Stakes. At odds of 50 to 1, he is almost certain to trot home a loser.  Jason Robert Brown knows how he feels.  On Sunday, Mr. Brown’s name will be announced at Radio City Music Hall as one of the 30 songwriters on the failed musical "Urban Cowboy," which was, surprisingly enough, nominated for a Tony Award for best score, along with "Amour," "A Year With Frog and Toad" and "Hairspray." What does he make of his chances?  "The odds are, how should I say?" Mr.Read More »

An essay that JRB contributed to the souvenir program of the Kennedy Center Celebration of Stephen Sondheim, June 2002. To be an aspiring writer for the musical theatre is to worship regularly at the Church of Steve.  Some of us wear our affiliation more overtly than others, and some of us are more strict in following the Commandments, but the fact cannot be denied: no one who has aspired to write a musical in the last thirty years can possibly claim that they haven’t wanted to be blessed by the grace of Stephen Sondheim, a grace that is most abundantlyRead More »