Joshua Rosenblum
Encyclopedia
Joshua Rosenblum is an American composer
, conductor, pianist
, arranger
, and music journalist. He has composed extensively for the concert hall as well as for musical theatre
, and currently teaches "Composition of Musical Theatre I" at Yale University
, his alma mater. As a pianist, he performs frequently in the New York City
area as soloist
and accompanist, as well as in Broadway
pit orchestra
s. He has conducted numerous Broadway and Off-Broadway
shows, including How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, Wonderful Town
, Falsettos
, Miss Saigon
, and Anything Goes
. He and his wife, Joanne Sydney Lessner, live in New York City with their two children, Julian (b. 1996) and Phoebe (b. 2001).
in his hometown of Marietta, Ohio
, and spend summers at the Interlochen Arts Camp in Interlochen, Michigan
. He graduated summa cum laude from Yale College
in 1983 at the age of 20, and proceeded directly to graduate school
at the Yale School of Music
, where he studied piano
with Ward Davenny and Donald Currier. Among his composition
teachers were Jacob Druckman
, Martin Bresnick
, and Frank Lewin
(Composition for Film). He earned his M.M.
in Piano Performance in 1985.
for the Off-Broadway show Fermat's Last Tango, and he is the creator and composer/lyricist
of Bush Is Bad.
Other musical theatre pieces include Einstein's Dreams
(based on the best-selling novel by Alan Lightman
), which had its international premiere at Teatro da Trindade in Lisbon
, and Arabian Nights. Both works, as well as Fermat's Last Tango, were written in collaboration with Rosenblum’s wife, an author
, librettist, and singer, Joanne Sydney Lessner. Rosenblum and Lessner have a new musical
in development which is based on the life of screen legend Greta Garbo
.
professor
Andrew Wiles
' proof
of Fermat's Last Theorem
. It debutted at the York Theater in New York and went on to perform internationally in Portugal
. The hit musical received numerous rave reviews and lots of praise.
. In its original iteration, it starred Kate Baldwin
, Michael McCoy, and Neal Mayer who each portrayed various figures in the Bush administration.
label
. In 2009, Rosenblum founded The Pit Stop Players, a chamber group composed of New York freelance musicians. The group plays mostly contemporary music, including Rosenblum’s own compositions, from a wide variety of genres
.
and CD review
s to Opera News
magazine on a regular basis. He has also written for Newsday
, Stagebill, and The Charleston Post and Courier (as Overview Critic for the Spoleto Festival USA
).
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
, conductor, pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
, arranger
Arrangement
The American Federation of Musicians defines arranging as "the art of preparing and adapting an already written composition for presentation in other than its original form. An arrangement may include reharmonization, paraphrasing, and/or development of a composition, so that it fully represents...
, and music journalist. He has composed extensively for the concert hall as well as for musical theatre
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
, and currently teaches "Composition of Musical Theatre I" at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
, his alma mater. As a pianist, he performs frequently in the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
area as soloist
Solo (music)
In music, a solo is a piece or a section of a piece played or sung by a single performer...
and accompanist, as well as in Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
pit orchestra
Pit orchestra
A pit orchestra is a type of orchestra that accompanies performers in musicals, operas, and other shows involving music. In performances of operas and ballets, the pit orchestra is typically similar in size to a symphony orchestra, though it may contain smaller string and brass sections, depending...
s. He has conducted numerous Broadway and Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...
shows, including How the Grinch Stole Christmas!, Wonderful Town
Wonderful Town
Wonderful Town is a musical with a book written by Joseph A. Fields and Jerome Chodorov, lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green and music by Leonard Bernstein...
, Falsettos
Falsettos
Falsettos is a musical with a book by James Lapine and William Finn and music and lyrics by Finn, comprising March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland, the last two in a trio of one-act off-Broadway plays focusing on Marvin, his ex-wife Trina, his psychiatrist Mendel, his son Jason, and his gay...
, Miss Saigon
Miss Saigon
Miss Saigon is a musical by Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil, with lyrics by Boublil and Richard Maltby, Jr.. It is based on Giacomo Puccini's opera Madame Butterfly, and similarly tells the tragic tale of a doomed romance involving an Asian woman abandoned by her American lover...
, and Anything Goes
Anything Goes
Anything Goes is a musical with music and lyrics by Cole Porter. The original book was a collaborative effort by Guy Bolton and P.G. Wodehouse, heavily revised by the team of Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse. The story concerns madcap antics aboard an ocean liner bound from New York to London...
. He and his wife, Joanne Sydney Lessner, live in New York City with their two children, Julian (b. 1996) and Phoebe (b. 2001).
Education
Rosenblum attended Marietta High SchoolMarietta High School (Ohio)
Marietta High School is a four-year, public, secondary school in Marietta, Ohio. The school serves students in the Marietta City School District in grades nine through twelve. As of 2010-2011, the approximate enrollment was 1,050. The glorious class of 2011 boasts enrollment of 236 students....
in his hometown of Marietta, Ohio
Marietta, Ohio
Marietta is a city in and the county seat of Washington County, Ohio, United States. During 1788, pioneers to the Ohio Country established Marietta as the first permanent American settlement of the new United States in the Northwest Territory. Marietta is located in southeastern Ohio at the mouth...
, and spend summers at the Interlochen Arts Camp in Interlochen, Michigan
Interlochen, Michigan
Interlochen is a town in Northwest Lower Michigan. The town is noted for the internationally renowned Interlochen Center for the Arts.-History:...
. He graduated summa cum laude from Yale College
Yale College
Yale College was the official name of Yale University from 1718 to 1887. The name now refers to the undergraduate part of the university. Each undergraduate student is assigned to one of 12 residential colleges.-Residential colleges:...
in 1983 at the age of 20, and proceeded directly to graduate school
Graduate school
A graduate school is a school that awards advanced academic degrees with the general requirement that students must have earned a previous undergraduate degree...
at the Yale School of Music
Yale School of Music
The Yale School of Music is one of the twelve professional schools at Yale University and one of the premier music conservatories in the world....
, where he studied piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
with Ward Davenny and Donald Currier. Among his composition
Musical composition
Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...
teachers were Jacob Druckman
Jacob Druckman
Jacob Druckman was an American composer born in Philadelphia. A graduate of the Juilliard School, Druckman studied with Vincent Persichetti, Peter Mennin, and Bernard Wagenaar. In 1949 and 1950 he studied with Aaron Copland at Tanglewood and later continued his studies at the École Normale de...
, Martin Bresnick
Martin Bresnick
Martin Bresnick is a composer of contemporary classical music, film scores and experimental music.-Education and early career:Bresnick was born and raised in the Bronx, and is a graduate of New York City's specialized High School of Music and Art. He was educated at the University of Hartford ,...
, and Frank Lewin
Frank Lewin
Frank Lewin was an American composer and teacher.-Biography:Frank Lewin was born March 27, 1925, in Breslau, Germany. He and his family escaped from Germany in 1939, spent a year in Cuba, and came to the United States in 1940...
(Composition for Film). He earned his M.M.
Master of Music
The Master of Music is the first graduate degree in Music awarded by universities and music conservatories. The M.Mus. combines advanced studies in an applied area of specialization with graduate-level academic study in subjects such as music history, music theory, or music pedagogy...
in Piano Performance in 1985.
Musical theatre
Rosenblum composed the scoreSheet music
Sheet music is a hand-written or printed form of music notation that uses modern musical symbols; like its analogs—books, pamphlets, etc.—the medium of sheet music typically is paper , although the access to musical notation in recent years includes also presentation on computer screens...
for the Off-Broadway show Fermat's Last Tango, and he is the creator and composer/lyricist
Lyricist
A lyricist is a songwriter who specializes in lyrics. A singer who writes the lyrics to songs is a singer-lyricist. This differentiates from a singer-composer, who composes the song's melody.-Collaboration:...
of Bush Is Bad.
Other musical theatre pieces include Einstein's Dreams
Einstein's Dreams
Einstein's Dreams is a 1992 novel by Alan Lightman that was an international bestseller and has been translated into thirty languages. It was runner up for the 1994 L. L. Winship/PEN New England Award. Einstein's Dreams was also the March 1998 selection for National Public Radio's "Talk of the...
(based on the best-selling novel by Alan Lightman
Alan Lightman
Alan Lightman is an American physicist, writer, and social entrepreneur. He is a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the author of the international bestseller Einstein's Dreams. He was the first professor at MIT to receive a joint appointment in the sciences and the...
), which had its international premiere at Teatro da Trindade in Lisbon
Lisbon
Lisbon is the capital city and largest city of Portugal with a population of 545,245 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Lisbon extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of 3 million on an area of , making it the 9th most populous urban...
, and Arabian Nights. Both works, as well as Fermat's Last Tango, were written in collaboration with Rosenblum’s wife, an author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
, librettist, and singer, Joanne Sydney Lessner. Rosenblum and Lessner have a new musical
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
in development which is based on the life of screen legend Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo
Greta Garbo , born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson, was a Swedish film actress. Garbo was an international star and icon during Hollywood's silent and classic periods. Many of Garbo's films were sensational hits, and all but three were profitable...
.
Fermat's Last Tango
Fermat's Last Tango (2000) is a musical written by Rosenblum and his wife, Joanne Sydney Lessner, that is based on the true story of PrincetonPrinceton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
professor
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
Andrew Wiles
Andrew Wiles
Sir Andrew John Wiles KBE FRS is a British mathematician and a Royal Society Research Professor at Oxford University, specializing in number theory...
' proof
Mathematical proof
In mathematics, a proof is a convincing demonstration that some mathematical statement is necessarily true. Proofs are obtained from deductive reasoning, rather than from inductive or empirical arguments. That is, a proof must demonstrate that a statement is true in all cases, without a single...
of Fermat's Last Theorem
Fermat's Last Theorem
In number theory, Fermat's Last Theorem states that no three positive integers a, b, and c can satisfy the equation an + bn = cn for any integer value of n greater than two....
. It debutted at the York Theater in New York and went on to perform internationally in Portugal
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
. The hit musical received numerous rave reviews and lots of praise.
Bush Is Bad
Rosenblum's Off-Broadway satirical hit Bush Is Bad debuted at The Triad Theatre on September 29, 2005, but went on to have other iterations all across the United States. It got lots of acclaim from prestigious sources such as The New York TimesThe New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
. In its original iteration, it starred Kate Baldwin
Kate Baldwin
-Biography:Born in Evanston, Illinois, Baldwin graduated from the theatre program at Northwestern University in 1997.-Career:Kate Baldwin made her Broadway debut in The Full Monty in 2000, followed by appearances in Thoroughly Modern Millie and Wonderful Town...
, Michael McCoy, and Neal Mayer who each portrayed various figures in the Bush administration.
Concert music
Rosenblum has composed extensively for the concert hall, and his works can be heard on two recordings, Impetuosities and Sundry Notes, both on the Albany RecordsAlbany Records
Albany Records is an American classical music record label focusing particularly on contemporary classical music. It was established by Peter Kermani in 1987, and is based in Albany, New York.-External links:**...
label
Record label
In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...
. In 2009, Rosenblum founded The Pit Stop Players, a chamber group composed of New York freelance musicians. The group plays mostly contemporary music, including Rosenblum’s own compositions, from a wide variety of genres
Music genre
A music genre is a categorical and typological construct that identifies musical sounds as belonging to a particular category and type of music that can be distinguished from other types of music...
.
Music journalism
Rosenblum contributes concertConcert
A concert is a live performance before an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, a choir, or a musical band...
and CD review
Review
A review is an evaluation of a publication, a product or a service, such as a movie , video game, musical composition , book ; a piece of hardware like a car, home appliance, or computer; or an event or performance, such as a live music concert, a play, musical theater show or dance show...
s to Opera News
Opera News
Opera News is an American classical music magazine. It has been published since 1936 by the Metropolitan Opera Guild, a non-profit organization located at Lincoln Center which was founded to support the Metropolitan Opera of New York City...
magazine on a regular basis. He has also written for Newsday
Newsday
Newsday is a daily American newspaper that primarily serves Nassau and Suffolk counties and the New York City borough of Queens on Long Island, although it is sold throughout the New York metropolitan area...
, Stagebill, and The Charleston Post and Courier (as Overview Critic for the Spoleto Festival USA
Spoleto Festival USA
Spoleto Festival USA in Charleston, South Carolina, is one of the world's major performing arts festivals. It was founded in 1977 by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Gian Carlo Menotti, who sought to establish a counterpart to the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto, Italy...
).
External links
- Joshua Rosenblum at the Internet Off-Broadway Database (Lortel Archives)