Jason Robert Brown

Chris Slattery’s article here. Broadway on the Pike Strathmore presents – and produces – “Songs for a New World” by Chris Slattery, staff writer It’s the arts world equivalent of the house on the block where all the kids like to play: the Music Center at Strathmore in North Bethesda. Which is why the prolific Tony Award-winning composer/lyricist Jason Robert Brown is planning to visit next week, along with a hand-picked Broadway ‘‘dream cast” and a group from the Arlington-based Signature Theatre, to perform his song cycle ‘‘Songs for a New World.” ‘‘This all happened in a roundabout way,” BrownRead More »

News, news, lots of news! I go to New York on Monday to start rehearsals for the big all-star Songs for a New World concert at Strathmore. Man, I’m excited about this. Alice came over this week and was rehearsing with me and holy cats, can that woman sing. Did you buy your tickets yet? Huh, did ya? Did ya? Huh? Closer to home, I’ve got a weekend of great concerts coming up. On June 8, I’ll be down in Rolling Hills, CA for a swingin’ night with the Caucasian Rhythm Kings and our special guest Jan Bunker. Then, theRead More »

The title of this entry is based on an entirely unjustified optimism that I’ll do one of these every month. Wagers are being taken. Marshman 21 wants to know: I was just wondering why you changed George Epps’s name to Frankie Epps for Parade? Simple, probably stupid question, but I thought that there was no harm in asking it. JRB say: A couple of people have asked me this over the years. It’s a logical question. We also changed the name of one of the police officers; his real name was Rogers, we changed it to Ivey. That was aRead More »

Brian Kellow’s review available here. I don’t have much problem with his criticism of my “onstage persona” (which is not all that different from my offstage persona, truth be told), but I do find it odd that the one part of my patter he chooses to quote as an example of what “doesn’t always play well onstage” is actually the line that got the biggest, warmest laugh of the night, followed by applause. Go figure. He says lots of nice things about me anyway. OPERA NEWS April 2007, vol 71, no 10 On the Beat Brown strikes sparks in aRead More »

I’m in the house today making rehearsal tapes for the cast members of the really exciting production of Songs for a New World that we’re doing next month, and it put me in mind of the origins of some of this material. It’s a fascinating process for me now, listening to these songs, because they have layers and layers of events embedded in them. Not just the when-I-wrote-them, but the rehearsals at the WPA in 1995, the parties at Hal and Judy’s house, the production in Nyack in 1997 (with Beth Leavel as Woman 2!), a college in Minnesota, aRead More »