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| Lyrics and Lyricists Features Mary Cleere Haran |
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| Tickets/Registration: 212.415.5500 |
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| Media Contact: Beverly Greenfield, 212.415.5452, email |
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| LYRICS & LYRICISTS 2004 SEASON |
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MARY CLEERE HARAN
SPECIAL GUEST MARGARET WHITING |
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"HARRY WARREN: THERE WILL NEVER BE ANOTHER YOU"
Presented by the 92nd Street Y Tisch Center for the Arts |
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Sat, Feb 14 / 8pm / $45
Sun, Feb 15 / 2:30 & 8 pm / $45
Mon, Feb 16 / 2 and 8 pm / $45
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| New York, NY, January, 20, 2004—On February 14, 15 and 16, the 92nd Street Y's Lyrics & Lyricists series presents Mary Cleere Haran in a tribute to composer Harry Warren. The show features songs, film clips and reminiscences by special guest Margaret Whiting, who knew Warren personally. This season, for the first time, each of L&L's five shows is conceived and directed especially for L&L by a different artistic director. As always, performances are presented on Saturdays at 8 pm, Sundays at 2:30 & 8 pm and Mondays at 2 & 8 pm. |
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Mary Cleere Haran considers Harry Warren (1893-1981) in the same class with composers George Gershwin, Richard Rodgers and Cole Porter. Warren's melodies include classics like "We’re In the Money," "I Only Have Eyes for You," "Chattanooga Choo-Choo" and "That's Amore." Between 1935 and 1950 Warren had more songs than anyone else — 42, to be exact — on the hugely popular and influential radio show "Your Hit Parade." (Irving Berlin came in a distant second with 33 songs.) Though successful as a "Tin Pan Alley" songwriter, Warren made his mark in movie musicals. Over the course of his career, he wrote music for Warner Brothers, 20th Century Fox, MGM and Paramount; won three "Oscars" and earned 11 Academy Award nominations; and saw his songs performed by Louis Armstrong, Judy Garland, Glenn Miller and Dean Martin, among others. |
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| ABOUT HARAN'S L&L TRIBUTE TO HARRY WARREN |
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| "This show is my love letter to Harry Warren," says Haran, whose interest in the composer is as much emotional as it is scholarly. "His melodies are in our blood, and his songs are part of the fabric of American culture," she says. To celebrate the work of this tremendously influential but relatively unknown songwriter — his name never became the household word that Gershwin or Porter did — Haran intersperses performances of Warren's songs with a generous helping of movie clips featuring his music and historical anecdotes about his life and career. |
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| The show opens with what Haran calls the "black-and-white" half, which reflects the look and feel of Warren's Depression-era movie work. Warren arrived in Hollywood in the early 1930s and wrote most of the songs (with Al Dubin) for Busby Berkeley's lavish production numbers in "Forty-Second Street" and the "Gold Diggers" series for Warner Brothers. The studio also used many of Warren's movie melodies in its classic cartoons, from Bugs Bunny to Road Runner, weaving Warren's music into yet another slice of the American experience. |
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| The second half of the show moves into the 1940s and early '50s — the "Technicolor" years — and features Warren's big-band hits in the years leading up to, including and following World War II. Highlights include classics like "Chattanooga Choo-Choo," which was written by Warren and lyricist Mack Gordon, and gave Glenn Miller the first gold (million-selling) record in history. Margaret Whiting joins Haran for songs from the movie "The Harvey Girls," written by Warren and lyricist Johnny Mercer. Selections include "My Intuition," a tune cut from the film, and "It's a Great Big World," performed in the movie by Garland, Cyd Charisse and Virginia O'Brien. Whiting, who knew Warren through her father, composer Richard Whiting, and through her longtime friend and mentor Johnny Mercer, also shares personal anecdotes about Warren — the man Bing Crosby called a "genial curmudgeon." Closing out the show are songs from Warren's Jerry Lewis-Dean Martin period in the early 1950s, including one of Martin's signature songs, "That's Amore." |
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| A quartet of longtime colleagues (and Harry Warren fans) join Haran at L&L. Pianist and conductor Don Rebic serves as music director; his Broadway conducting credits include Jesus Christ Superstar, Dancin' and Sweet Charity. Joining Haran and Whiting on vocals is jazz singer and band leader Marion Cowings, who is also co-founder of the Vocal Jazz Department of New York University; Harry Connick, Jr., was among his students. The band features Mike Migliore on alto saxophone, Chip Jackson on bass and Dave Ratajczak on drums. |
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| ABOUT MARY CLEERE HARAN |
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Mary Cleere Haran was in the original Broadway cast of The 1940s Radio Hour. Off-Broadway, she appeared in Manhattan Music at the Manhattan Theatre Club, The Heebie Jeebies and Swingtime Canteen, and in San Francisco in the long-running Beach Blanket Babylon. She has brought her cabaret act to Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall and Town Hall in New York, as well as to the Oak Room at the Algonquin Hotel, Rainbow & Stars, the Cinegrill in Los Angeles, the Plush Room in San Francisco, and London's Pizza on the Park. In 2000 she made her debut at the Café Carlyle. Her writing and research talents are evident in PBS television specials, Remembering Bing, Irving Berlin's America, Satchmo, and Doris Day: A Sentimental Journey. She has published feature articles on lyricist Dorothy Fields, Frank Sinatra, and Al Dubin and Harry Warren. She was recently seen on the PBS Great Performances series in The Rodgers & Hart Story:Thou Swell, Thou Witty, and was featured in a recurring role in Sidney Lumet's television drama One Centre Street. She has many recordings available, most recently This Funny World and Pennies From Heaven.
Biographies of all the performers appearing in this show are available upon request. |
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| ABOUT "LYRICS & LYRICISTS" |
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| "Lyrics & Lyricists has been a powerful vehicle for exploring American popular song and encouraging its growth for more than 30 years," says Kristin Lancino, artistic advisor to the 92nd Street Y Tisch Center for the Arts, who is working with the new artistic directors to create original productions for L&L. "We are very excited about showcasing a variety of artistic voices and visions, and bringing a range of different perspectives to bear on this rich repertoire." |
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| The granddaddy of American songbook programs, Lyrics & Lyricists was launched on December 13, 1970, when longtime Broadway conductor Maurice Levine and lyricist E.Y. "Yip" Harburg (The Wizard of Oz) took to the stage of the 92nd Street Y to talk about the then unusual topic of songmaking. The idea came from Arthur Cantor, a trustee of the Billy Rose Foundation, who approached Hadassah Markson, then the director of the 92nd Street Y Music School, about presenting a music series focusing on lyricists. Markson enlisted Levine, a longtime Broadway conductor, who in turn enlisted Harburg to appear on the first show. The response from the audience was overwhelming; the series quickly expanded to present multiple shows, eventually included composers (as well as lyricists), and in 1984 went from first-person histories of the American musical theatre to a series of narrated musical revues. When Levine died in 1997, Barry Levitt took over as artistic director, and continued in that post until the end of last season. |
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| Lyrics & Lyricists has featured Broadway and Hollywood's greatest songwriters, laying the groundwork for more recent series like Lincoln Center's American Songbook, Carnegie Hall's American Popular Song Celebration and City Center's Encores! Great American Musicals in Concert. Those who have appeared at L&L over the years include Betty Comden and Adolph Green, Fred Ebb and John Kander, Dorothy Fields, Sheldon Harnick, Jerry Herman, Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller, Johnny Mercer, Stephen Sondheim, Elizabeth Swados and Jule Styne. |
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| LYRICS & LYRICISTS: UPCOMING SHOWS THIS SEASON |
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TED SPERLING, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
MARCH 20-22 / BEYOND THE RAINBOW: 'YIP' HARBURG
E.Y. "Yip" Harburg was the first lyricist on stage with Maurice Levine for Lyrics & Lyricists' inaugural show in 1970. Now, 34 years later, Ted Sperling celebrates the legacy of the Russian-Jewish immigrant who brought us Finian's Rainbow and much of The Wizard of Oz. Harburg wrote such hits as "April in Paris," "Brother Can You Spare a Dime" and "It's Only a Paper Moon," but he was blacklisted in the 1950s by film, radio and television for his liberal views. |
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ANDREA MARCOVICCI, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
MAY 8-10 / EASY TO LOVE: THE LYRICS OF COLE PORTER
Marcovicci and an all-star cast communicate the different elements of Cole Porter's personality. Soprano Anna Bergman explores Porter's early soprano-friendly work ("You Do Something to Me") and Klea Blackhurst embodies the period when "belters" (like Ethel Merman in Kiss Me Kate) took center stage. Jeff Harnar fits the role of Porter's male ingénue ("It's De-Lovely") and Mark Coffin serves as the "rough and tough" Sinatra-like cad with a contemporary sensibility ("I Get a Kick Out of You"). Rounding out the ensemble is newcomer Maude Maggart; Marcovicci acts as both host and chanteuse. Shelly Markham is the musical director. |
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ROB FISHER, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
JUNE 12-14 / THE WIT AND WISDOM OF IRA GERSHWIN
The multi-talented Rob Fisher, musical director of City Center's Encores!, also has a long and well-documented pedigree as an expert on the music of George Gershwin. Fisher was artistic advisor for Carnegie Hall's two-year Gershwin Centenary Celebration, and has performed Gershwin's music from Carnegie Hall to Katmandu. In this show, he looks at the lyrics Ira Gershwin wrote with his brother George and with subsequent collaborators like Burton Lane and Kurt Weill. Fisher says, "I'm interested in how he was a different lyricist with different composers, and in how the music changed his approach to words." |
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| ABOUT THE 92ND STREET Y |
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| The 92ND STREET Y TISCH CENTER FOR THE ARTS, endowed through the generous support of the Tisch family, produces and presents world-class concerts of classical, world, folk and cabaret music, lyric theater and jazz. The Center's Unterberg Poetry Center, established in 1939, produces a renowned literary reading series that presents the most distinguished writers of our time and offers extensive educational programs for writers of all levels. |
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The 92ND STREET Y unites culture, education and community service in one multifaceted institution. Founded in 1874 by a group of visionary Jewish leaders, the Y has grown into an organization guided by Jewish principles but serving people of all races and faiths. Its mission is to enrich the lives of the 300,000 people who visit its three facilities each year. People come to the 92nd Street Y to attend performances of classical and popular music, jazz, American standards and contemporary dance; to hear renowned novelists, poets and playwrights read from their work; to explore the richness of Judaism with eminent scholars; and to listen to world leaders, public figures and experts in every field discuss timely issues. A wide-ranging curriculum offers adults of all ages the chance to learn and grow, while developmental programs help children, teenagers and families reach their full potential. Committed to sharing its programs with all New Yorkers regardless of economic circumstance, the 92nd Street Y provides over $1 million in annual financial assistance as well as an outreach program that brings the arts into the lives of 8,000 economically disadvantaged schoolchildren. For more information, visit. For more information, visit
www.92Y.org/content/PRESS_RESOURCES.asp.
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