The Unsinkable Marilyn Maye
Nearing 95, the inimitable singer is about to make her Carnegie Hall solo debut. In an eight-decade career, it’s a crowning moment — and just another gig. Turning the corner of 54th Street in a New York City taxi, the peerless nightclub singer Marilyn Maye is reminded of an early moment in her career. Sixty […]
Is It Always ‘Or’? Is It Never ‘And’?
Melissa Errico Explores Sondheim’s ‘Losing My Mind’ Ahead of Carnegie Hall Debut The Amour Tony nominee explains in a personal essay how one word can affect a singer’s entire interpretation of a song. Get Tickets Editor’s Note: On November 18, Broadway favorite Melissa Errico will make her long-awaited Carnegie Hall debut with the New York Pops in […]
BroadwayWorld Guest Blog: the Allure of ‘Noir’ and ‘Out of the Dark’ at London’s Crazy Coqs
I’d like to invite you, London lovers of American music – and especially of dark, sexy American music – to my cabaret nightclub concert fantasy on November 1-3. For three nights in a row (yes, you can even come each night and unwind from your busy London day!) I’ll sing from my new film noir […]
A ‘Girl Singer’ and Her Extra Hair Hit the Road
After a two-year hiatus, Melissa Errico is performing a slew of gigs honoring the composers Michel Legrand and Stephen Sondheim. As long as she gets to the airport (which airport again?) on time. Alone in a Florida hotel room, I reach around the back of my (rented) red lace minidress. I find the zipper but […]
The Purist: What Wellness Means to Me
Wellness, lately, has come to mean: connection. A kind of flow of energy, and a flow that happens with ease. I suppose the idea of “wellness” changes at different times in one’s life, but I have felt my most healthy and most joyful, especially during and after the pandemic, while making music. A flow between […]
Column: The Purist
In the autumn I went to university, I declared myself an art history major and thrilled to the menu of classes, especially those about the Middle Ages. Before long, I thought of myself as a serious medievalist and a part-time musical theater actress—a condition I would say is now firmly in reverse order—and one of […]
Up at Bat: Melissa Errico
Actors turn night into day. Our lives on the stage have this effect. This is a story of how I have used a showgirl’s wisdom—or is it madness?—to turn winter into summer. In September 2019, I found myself overworked, and down with a painful case of shingles, having sung concerts all summer followed by autumn […]
Back in the Girdle Again: Getting Fitted After a Year Untouched
Confessions of an actress seeking reassurance — and sleeves — as she steps before a live concert audience again. Here I am, back at the confessional at last. Forgive me, father, for I have sinned. It has been 13 months since my last visit to you. The father-confessor, to whom I am looking for absolution, is Eric […]
Melissa Errico Reflects on Finding the Music in a Turbulent Year
From Covid quarantining to Inauguration Day, Errico discusses music’s promise of hope. The past year has been full of shocks — philosophical, practical, fundamental — and perhaps the one that stalled me into a state of frozen disbelief was the idea that singing — the central act of my life — was now toxic. The […]
Essay: on Happiness and Yip Harburg
In this essay, Errico reflects on Harburg’s legacy as she celebrates the release of the new single “Happiness is Just A Thing Called Joe,” a collaboration with pianist Lara Downes I consider myself an acolyte in the church of Yip. By Yip, of course I mean E.Y. “Yip” Harburg, one of the lyricists in The […]
Just Me and the Music and the Green Screen
As the pandemic wore on, the new technology became a theatrical force, allowing, among other things, actors to reunite for shows they’d done earlier.
Column: The Purist
I was weeping. Not just crying, or quietly tearful—but full out shoulder-shaking and wracked with sobs, alone in my seat in a suburban movie theater. My three young daughters—the oldest, 13, the twins, 11—and I had just seen Greta Gerwig’s wonderful adaptation of Little Women, and they were surprised—maybe even alarmed—by my reaction. Oh, I […]