Ghostlight Records to release "Make Me A Song" soundtrack

GHOSTLIGHT RECORDS, a division of Sh-K-Boom Records, is proud to announce the release of the Original Off-Broadway cast recording of Make Me A Song: The Music of William Finn. The deluxe two-disc set – featuring several color photos and complete lyrics – was recorded live at New World Stages last fall. The critically-acclaimed revue features selections from Finn’s popular hits Falsettos and A New Brain, in addition to rarely heard selections from Romance in Hard Times, Elegies, and the yet to be produced The Royal Family. The disc includes a special studio bonus version of the title track sung by William Finn. The recording, produced by Joel Moss with Kurt Deutsch serving as executive producer, will be available in stores and online on April 29, 2008.

“This is an evening dedicated musical theater fans will not want to miss,” according to The New York Post. “D.B. Bonds brings a sweet directness to such numbers as “I Went Fishing With My Dad,” Adam Heller conveys a Randy Newman-style acerbity in “Republicans,” Sandy Binion infuses such ruminations as “All Fall Down” with a bitter edge, and Sandy Wilfert brings a touchingly plaintive quality to the evening's emotional showstopper, “Anytime (I Am There).”

Time Out New York, raved “William Finn is the Walt Whitman of show tunes: a composer and lyricist whose vibrant, idiosyncratic voice – always personal but rarely merely so –finds potential for transcendence amid the zigs and zags of the everyday. This musical revue, conceived and directed by Rob Ruggiero and sung by a solid cast of four, provides a worthy survey of the contradictory impulses – witty, wistful, jaunty, neurotic, brave – at play in Finn’s work. He contains multitudes, and in his own stubbornly unique way, he’s one of the musical-theater greats.”

Make Me A Song: The Music of William Finn is a theatrical revue featuring the songs of one of the most acclaimed composer-lyricists currently writing for the musical theatre. The musical, conceived and directed by Rob Ruggiero, had its world premiere last year at TheaterWorks in Hartford, CT. The cast features Sandy Binion, D.B. Bonds, Adam Heller and Sally Wilfert, with Darren R. Cohen serving as Musical Director and Pianist. Set design is by Luke Hegel-Cantarella; costume design by Alejo Vietti; lighting design by John Lasiter; sound design by Zachary Williamson; and musical supervision by Michael Morris.

Make Me A Song: The Music of William Finn was presented by Junkyard Dog Productions (Randy Adams, Sue Frost, Kenny Alhadeff), Larry Hirschhorn and Jayson Raitt. The show started performances on October 30 and closed on December 30, 2007.

WILLIAM FINN (Writer and Composer) is the writer and composer of Falsettos, for which he received two Tony Awards, Best Book of a Musical (with James Lapine) and Best Original Score. He has also written and composed In Trousers, March of the Falsettos and Falsettoland (Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Musical, two Los Angeles Drama Critics Awards, two Drama Desk Awards, the Lucille Lortel Award and Guggenheim Fellowship in Musical Composition). Mr. Finn wrote the lyrics to Graciela Daniele’s Tango Apasionado (music by the great Astor Piazzolla) and, with Michael Starobin, the music to Lapine’s version of The Winter’s Tale. His musical Romance in Hard Times was presented at The Public Theater. Recently, he wrote Painting You for Love’s Fire, a piece commissioned and performed by the Acting Company, based on Shakepeare’s sonnets. For television, Mr. Finn provided the music and lyrics for the Ace Award-winning HBO cartoon “Ira Sleeps Over,” “Tom Thumb and Thumbelina,” “Pokey Little Puppy’s First Christmas” and, with Ellen Fitzhugh, two “Brave Little Toaster” cartoons. Mr. Finn has written for Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar and The New Yorker. A graduate of Williams College, where he was awarded the Hutchinson Fellowship for Musical Composition, Finn now teaches a weekly master class at the NYU Tisch Graduate Program in Musical Theatre Writing. His most recent projects include Elegies: A Song Cycle (Lincoln Center) and The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, which ran on Broadway for over two years and has been produced nationally and internationally as well.

ROB RUGGIERO (Conceiver and Director) Make Me A Song is Rob’s third collaboration with William Finn, having previously directed productions of Falsettos and Elegies. His work was first seen Off-Broadway as director of All Under Heaven (starring Valerie Harper), which toured regionally and had a critically acclaimed run in Los Angeles. In 2005 he conceived and directed the highly successful Ella, a musical about the life of jazz legend Ella Fitzgerald (starring Tina Fabrique), which continues to be produced nationally. Rob’s work on both plays and musicals has been seen at many regional theatres around the country, including Barrington Stage Company, Pittsburgh Public Theater, Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, Arizona Theatre Company, Cleveland Play House, Asolo Repertory Theatre, San Jose Repertory Theatre and Goodspeed Opera House. Make Me A Song earned him his second Connecticut Critics Award, this time for Best Director of a Musical. He is also the recipient of two Kevin Kline Awards, for both Best Director of a Musical (Urinetown) and Best Director of a Play (Take Me Out). He is currently the Associate Artistic Director of TheaterWorks in Hartford, Connecticut where he has been a key partner in its artistic leadership since 1992. An online portfolio of his work can be viewed at www.robruggiero.com.

ABOUT GHOSTLIGHT:

It is a standing practice in the theatre that a ghostlight – a floor lamp holding a single bare light bulb – be lit on stage after everyone has left for the night, so that the theatre never goes dark. In the same spirit, Ghostlight Records, created by Sh-K-Boom co-founders Kurt Deutsch & Sherie Rene Scott, ensures that music of the theatre by composers old and new will always be enjoyed. Ghostlight Records honors the past while shining a light toward the future. Ghostlight Records was honored with a special 2006 Drama Desk Award for dedication to the preservation of musical theatre through cast recordings, as well as Grammy Award nominations for Best Musical Show Album: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Hair (The Actors’ Fund Of America Benefit Recording), The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and most recently The Drowsy Chaperone. Other recent recordings include the original cast recording of Legally Blonde, Martin Short – Fame Becomes Me, High Fidelity, See What I Wanna See and Bernarda Alba by Michael John LaChiusa, Irving Berlin’s White Christmas, Patti LuPone’s The Lady With The Torch and the forthcoming LoveMusik. Ghostlight Records is distributed by Razor & Tie Entertainment. For more information, visit www.GhostlightRecords.com or www.sh-k-boom.com.