Who: Jeremy Jordan
When: May 4, 2014
Where: Feinstein's at the Nikko/ San Francisco, CA
With: My hacking cough
Of Note: I am ready to declare Jeremy Jordan a national treasure.
Oh, sad neglected website. Since we last saw each other, I've been to ten different cities and seen six or seven shows. I didn't mean to neglect you; I promise. It's just... sometimes life gets busy (these last couple months have been more heavily weighted to the "mogul aspirant" side of my "mogul aspirant/ live music enthusiast" spectrum).
No matter. Tonight, I had the esteemed privilege of seeing Jeremy Jordan at Feinstein's at the Nikko Hotel, here in SF and I want to say things about it. I "discovered" Feinstein's last month and determined it one of the coolest places in the city - the bar area is adorably damask and pink and the performance area feels markedly like a NYC cabaret. When I checked out their full schedule and saw Jeremy Jordan, of general Broadway and 'Smash' fame, I was super pumped - a talent like his in a space like that? Sign me up. I underestimated just how incredible it was going to be.
The show opened with a version of his college audition and it was hilarious. Off the bat, you could tell he was super excited to be there and didn't take himself too seriously. The story that went along with it - that he was so used to playing characters he was nervous about being himself and wanted to start by doing a take on the "character" of himself was charming. It is also worth noting that I loved his shirt - standard plaid button down but the side panels were the same plaid offset by 45 degrees. (I don't know. I feel like since I comment on bad fashion, I also have to comment when it's great?)
Anyway, the nature of the show - songs mixed with stories mixed with the feeling that we were all just sitting around listening to "college friend Jeremy" or "cousin Jeremy" talk about his crazy adventures was a great way to lessen the divide between performer and audience - if that makes any sense - and was well-suited to the venue. There were great bits about trying to find his musical director a date (from the audience, naturally), a running gag about drinking apple juice that I totally didn't get, and some really, really sweet stories about meeting and marrying his wife.
The set mostly included numbers from the various Broadway shows he's done, songs from 'Smash', and original songs he'd written. One of the things that was incredible to watch was how he slipped in and out of characters for the various numbers. Like, despite the fact that it was one dude in one outfit on a small stage, Jimmy Collins was markedly different than Jack Kelly who was completely different than Jeremy Jordan and so on. Not having done much acting beyond the 11th grade myself, I can't really speak to easy or difficult that is but I was kind of blown away. Other than improv/stand-up comedians, I've never seen someone slip in and out of that many characters that quickly and seamlessly before. He also had a great sense of dynamics and the pay off of the fortes was all that much sweeter because of the "lean forward in case I miss something" of the pianissimos.
So I have some history with the song 'Rewrite This Story'. I mean, who doesn't love a good anthem about reinvention, becoming more than you currently are... having the opportunity to, as the song says, rewrite your story (or at least that's what I get out of it). I have this really specific memory of my moving to SF cross-country drive, somewhere between Denver and Vegas, listening to my "sing along in the car really loudly" playlist and this song came up. And as I was belting out, "Someone tell me when/ Can I start again/ And rewrite this story," it hit me. You can rewrite your story at any time. And...I feel like that's a good lesson to always have in your back pocket. If you don't like the story, change it. You always can. Anyway, live (sung as a duet with his lovely, also a Broadway star, wife, Ashley Spencer), this was incredible. All power and wistfulness and hope at the same time. I may have shed an artful couple of tears. Yowzas. ('Broadway, Here I Come' from 'Smash' was also ridiculously good.)
The other stand-out, for me, was one of his originals. Having said that if he was going to perform as himself, he was not going to half-ass it and that meant playing his own stuff, he wrote a song about the idea of playing these concerts. It was such a good song, describing the process of over-coming self-doubt and challenging yourself to personal growth and... just kind of getting over all the stuff that gets in your way. It started out by saying that he couldn't seeing his own song so he'd sing us one we knew because he's not enough. But! By the end, that message was flipped and he was good enough and could sing his song. (Reading this back, it seems I in a very receptive place for lessons on the themes of self, confidence, ownership, achievement, and overcoming. That seems convenient!)
I hope this guy records an album because his originals were great. Someone with more music education than I have would probably put this more eloquently, but it was also kind of captivating that his voice sounded equally as lovely in both the rock/pop and "theater" styles. Some performers have a very specific "theater" sound and it sometimes gets messy when you try to take that to a pop/rock/radio place. Jordan seemed well-suited in both - like I could see him a couple of years and an album later playing somewhere like the Fillmore and being right at home.
The set also included a medley from 'Rock of Ages' and 'Maybe I'm Amazed' from the church choir movie 'Joyful Noise', both as duets with Ashley, 'Bonnie' from Bonnie & Clyde with an audience assist, some more originals, 'Losing My Mind' from 'Follies'... The whole thing was just ridiculously good. The show closed with a charming story about how 9 year old Jeremy was obsessed with Jack Kelly and a goosebump inducing version of 'Santa Fe' from 'Newsies'. I have no actual words to say about the encore because it was simply that intensely good.
I feel like this has been even more effusive and gushing than I normally am (a challenge) but with good reason. I think this run of shows was limited to this weekend in SF (which is a tragedy for the rest of the country) but, seriously, if you ever have the chance to see this guy in anything, take it. If you need me, I'll be off thinking about ways to rewrite my story.
When: May 4, 2014
Where: Feinstein's at the Nikko/ San Francisco, CA
With: My hacking cough
Of Note: I am ready to declare Jeremy Jordan a national treasure.
Oh, sad neglected website. Since we last saw each other, I've been to ten different cities and seen six or seven shows. I didn't mean to neglect you; I promise. It's just... sometimes life gets busy (these last couple months have been more heavily weighted to the "mogul aspirant" side of my "mogul aspirant/ live music enthusiast" spectrum).
No matter. Tonight, I had the esteemed privilege of seeing Jeremy Jordan at Feinstein's at the Nikko Hotel, here in SF and I want to say things about it. I "discovered" Feinstein's last month and determined it one of the coolest places in the city - the bar area is adorably damask and pink and the performance area feels markedly like a NYC cabaret. When I checked out their full schedule and saw Jeremy Jordan, of general Broadway and 'Smash' fame, I was super pumped - a talent like his in a space like that? Sign me up. I underestimated just how incredible it was going to be.
The show opened with a version of his college audition and it was hilarious. Off the bat, you could tell he was super excited to be there and didn't take himself too seriously. The story that went along with it - that he was so used to playing characters he was nervous about being himself and wanted to start by doing a take on the "character" of himself was charming. It is also worth noting that I loved his shirt - standard plaid button down but the side panels were the same plaid offset by 45 degrees. (I don't know. I feel like since I comment on bad fashion, I also have to comment when it's great?)
Anyway, the nature of the show - songs mixed with stories mixed with the feeling that we were all just sitting around listening to "college friend Jeremy" or "cousin Jeremy" talk about his crazy adventures was a great way to lessen the divide between performer and audience - if that makes any sense - and was well-suited to the venue. There were great bits about trying to find his musical director a date (from the audience, naturally), a running gag about drinking apple juice that I totally didn't get, and some really, really sweet stories about meeting and marrying his wife.
The set mostly included numbers from the various Broadway shows he's done, songs from 'Smash', and original songs he'd written. One of the things that was incredible to watch was how he slipped in and out of characters for the various numbers. Like, despite the fact that it was one dude in one outfit on a small stage, Jimmy Collins was markedly different than Jack Kelly who was completely different than Jeremy Jordan and so on. Not having done much acting beyond the 11th grade myself, I can't really speak to easy or difficult that is but I was kind of blown away. Other than improv/stand-up comedians, I've never seen someone slip in and out of that many characters that quickly and seamlessly before. He also had a great sense of dynamics and the pay off of the fortes was all that much sweeter because of the "lean forward in case I miss something" of the pianissimos.
So I have some history with the song 'Rewrite This Story'. I mean, who doesn't love a good anthem about reinvention, becoming more than you currently are... having the opportunity to, as the song says, rewrite your story (or at least that's what I get out of it). I have this really specific memory of my moving to SF cross-country drive, somewhere between Denver and Vegas, listening to my "sing along in the car really loudly" playlist and this song came up. And as I was belting out, "Someone tell me when/ Can I start again/ And rewrite this story," it hit me. You can rewrite your story at any time. And...I feel like that's a good lesson to always have in your back pocket. If you don't like the story, change it. You always can. Anyway, live (sung as a duet with his lovely, also a Broadway star, wife, Ashley Spencer), this was incredible. All power and wistfulness and hope at the same time. I may have shed an artful couple of tears. Yowzas. ('Broadway, Here I Come' from 'Smash' was also ridiculously good.)
The other stand-out, for me, was one of his originals. Having said that if he was going to perform as himself, he was not going to half-ass it and that meant playing his own stuff, he wrote a song about the idea of playing these concerts. It was such a good song, describing the process of over-coming self-doubt and challenging yourself to personal growth and... just kind of getting over all the stuff that gets in your way. It started out by saying that he couldn't seeing his own song so he'd sing us one we knew because he's not enough. But! By the end, that message was flipped and he was good enough and could sing his song. (Reading this back, it seems I in a very receptive place for lessons on the themes of self, confidence, ownership, achievement, and overcoming. That seems convenient!)
I hope this guy records an album because his originals were great. Someone with more music education than I have would probably put this more eloquently, but it was also kind of captivating that his voice sounded equally as lovely in both the rock/pop and "theater" styles. Some performers have a very specific "theater" sound and it sometimes gets messy when you try to take that to a pop/rock/radio place. Jordan seemed well-suited in both - like I could see him a couple of years and an album later playing somewhere like the Fillmore and being right at home.
The set also included a medley from 'Rock of Ages' and 'Maybe I'm Amazed' from the church choir movie 'Joyful Noise', both as duets with Ashley, 'Bonnie' from Bonnie & Clyde with an audience assist, some more originals, 'Losing My Mind' from 'Follies'... The whole thing was just ridiculously good. The show closed with a charming story about how 9 year old Jeremy was obsessed with Jack Kelly and a goosebump inducing version of 'Santa Fe' from 'Newsies'. I have no actual words to say about the encore because it was simply that intensely good.
I feel like this has been even more effusive and gushing than I normally am (a challenge) but with good reason. I think this run of shows was limited to this weekend in SF (which is a tragedy for the rest of the country) but, seriously, if you ever have the chance to see this guy in anything, take it. If you need me, I'll be off thinking about ways to rewrite my story.
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