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More Broadway stars join Songbook Academy mentor team

7/15/2024 12AM


Performance pros will share experiences with students

 

CARMEL, Ind. – The Great American Songbook Foundation has assembled an impressive cast of Broadway performers and other arts and entertainment professionals to serve as mentors this week at its annual Songbook Academy® music intensive.

 

Now in its 15th year, the Songbook Academy brings together 40 talented high school students from across the nation for a week of workshops, masterclasses and performance opportunities that help participants hone their vocal and stage skills with an emphasis on song interpretation, while building friendships and professional connections for a lifetime. The 2024 Songbook Academy continues through Saturday at the Center for the Performing Arts in Carmel, where the Songbook Foundation is headquartered.

 

This year’s industry mentors include the following artists, some of whom will appear at the week’s three public events: the Public Masterclass at 2 p.m. Tuesday, the Songbook Showcase at 7 p.m. Thursday, and the Songbook Academy in Concert at 7 p.m. Saturday.

  • A blonde woman poses in a white dress, hands in her lap.

    Ginna Claire Mason

    Michael Feinstein is the multi-platinum-selling, two-time Emmy and five-time GRAMMY® Award-nominated entertainer known as “The Ambassador of the Great American Songbook.” Feinstein founded the Great American Songbook Foundation in 2007 and serves as Artistic Director for the Center for the Performing Arts. He will lead the Public Masterclass and emcee Saturday’s Songbook Academy in Concert.
  • Joshua Henry is best known for his Tony-nominated leading roles in Carousel, The Scottsboro Boys and Violet on Broadway, as well as his portrayal of Aaron Burr in the Chicago production and First National Tour of Hamilton. He recently starred in the 2022 Broadway revival of Into The Woods, sharing a GRAMMY Award for the cast recording. He will join Feinstein as special guest for the Public Masterclass.
  • Nicole Zuraitis (Mentor and Special Guest for the Songbook Showcase), a New York-based jazz singer-songwriter, pianist, arranger and bandleader whose career highlights have included winning the prestigious 2021 American Traditions Vocal Competition Gold Medal, as well as the 2024 GRAMMY® Award for Best Jazz Vocal Album with her sixth release, How Love Begins. She will serve as both a mentor and a special guest for Thursday’s Songbook Showcase.
  • A dark-haired woman in a sleeveless red dress wears a broad smile.

    Bryonha Marie Parham

    Ginna Claire Mason starred in the Hallmark Channel original movies A Holiday Spectacular and A Heidelberg Holiday and recently finished a multi-year run as Glinda in Wicked on Broadway. Mason toured nationally with Wicked, Newsies and Flashdance; and appeared in Las Vegas with The Duck Commander Musical. Mason has also been seen in the documentary Broadway Rising and the television series Preach.
  • Bryonha Marie Parham is best known for her Broadway performances in Prince of Broadway, The Book of Mormon, After Midnight, Porgy & Bess and Ragtime. She was double-cast with Audra McDonald as the Beggar Woman in Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd for the New York Philharmonic, having also appeared in Lincoln Center’s Showboat and Ragtime.

 

The faculty who will work with the student finalists throughout the week are music directors Caelan Cardello, Jeff Harris, Russ Kassoff, Beckie Menzie and Melanie Shore, alongside vocal coaches Kanisha Feliciano, La Tanya Hall, Devin Ilaw, Melvin Brandon Logan and Mary Michael Patterson.  

 

Other special guests assisting with this year’s Academy include Michael Hanley as Special Vocal Technique Coach, Elaine Moebius as Songbook Choir Director, Kenny Shepard as Guest Choreographer, and 2013 Songbook Academy alumna Kyrie Courter, who made her Broadway debut in the 2023 revival of Sweeney Todd and will perform during the Songbook Academy in Concert.

 

The public events take place at the Center’s Palladium concert hall before a live audience and are livestreamed for viewers worldwide. Tickets and livestream registration are available now at TheCenterPresents.org, by phone at (317) 843-3800 or toll-free at (877) 909-2787.

 

The central Indiana-based Efroymson Family Fund is continuing its national Songbook Academy partnership this year with a $100,000 grant to the Songbook Foundation. The Public Masterclass is sponsored by Bob and Rose Popovich. The Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation and Mentor Champions provide support to expand program awareness and financial assistance to students who request it. Additional support comes from the City of Carmel and Salon 01.

 

Activities are made possible in part by Noblesville Creates, a regional partner, Indiana Arts Commission, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency.

 

About the Great American Songbook Foundation
The mission of the Great American Songbook Foundation, founded in 2007 by five-time Grammy® Award nominee Michael Feinstein, is to inspire and educate by celebrating the foundational era of American popular music. Headquartered at the Center for the Performing Arts in Carmel, Indiana, the Foundation advances this rich legacy by curating physical artifacts of its creators, performers and publishers in the Songbook Library & Archives; operating a multimedia exhibit gallery; overseeing the Songbook Hall of Fame; offering programs for the public and research opportunities for scholars and artists; and providing educational opportunities for student musicians, including the annual Songbook Academy® summer intensive. The Foundation is a Cultural Affiliate of the Los Angeles-based Grammy Museum®. More information is available at TheSongbook.org.