Jason Robert Brown

In honor of the great Randy Landau’s birthday today, a heretofore unreleased track. Gary, Randy and I did a trio date in Copenhagen in 2009, and this recording comes directly from the soundboard (it was pretty late in the show, as you can tell from my voice). It’s not a perfect performance from any of us and it’s not a perfect recording, but it exemplifies everything I love about The Bald One’s playing – the inventiveness, the technical security, the emotional depth, the rhythmic strength, it’s all there. You wanna know why I’ve been playing with Randy since 1993? HereRead More »

Starting the New Year and the New Residency with a blizzard of notes! Among the high points: the boys and I revisited “I’m In Bizness” for what I’m pretty sure is the first time this decade (in fact, I don’t see any record of us having performed it as a trio since 2006!); the NY premiere of “The Hardest Hill,” which is criminally fun to sing and play; our guest band member, the amazing Guy Klucevsek, who not only added his virtuoso accordion stylings to many of our greatest hits, but allowed us to accompany him on his epic “DancingRead More »

I can’t think of a better way to start out the New Year than by making music with my favorite singers and players in the world. Shoshana texted me the day I got to LA and said “You wanna do a show or not?”, to which the only logical reply is “YES,” and so Chris Isaacson offered us the great room at Catalina Bar & Grill for my one night off from conducting The Bridges of Madison County, and we got the party started. Eblen was here anyway visiting his family, Landau wanted to come visit his old hometown, andRead More »

A couple of months ago, I got an email saying that a high school principal had told one of his students that they couldn’t do “13” for their Spring Musical because one of the lead characters in the show was a terminally ill child. I wrote the following piece and sent it to that student in the hopes that it would help sway the principal from a position that honestly made no sense to me. I haven’t heard back as to whether I was successful, but the article made me think a lot about Archie and the show, and IRead More »

Here’s what I got in 2015. I got to conduct Parade at Avery Fisher Hall. I got to conduct The Trumpet of the Swan at the Halle Staatskapelle. I got to conduct three songs from Bridges with the Des Moines Symphony in front of 100,000 people. I got to conduct the overture to Honeymoon In Vegas (and many other things) with a kickass orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall in London. I got to conduct thirty performances of Bridges of Madison County on national tour. I guess I am a conductor now. (I alternate between two batons, one a giftRead More »