Melissa Errico to Release New Album 'SONDHEIM IN THE CITY' Alongside Birdland Residency This Month

Melissa Errico will release a new Sondheim album, "Sondheim in the City," on February 16. She will also offer a 10-performance residency at Birdland Jazz Feb 14-18, titled “A Manhattan Valentine”. The February 16th & 17th shows are album release concerts. The shows on February 14th, 15th & 18th will be Sondheim alongside classics by Cole Porter, Rodgers & Hart, and Billy Joel.

A follow-up to her acclaimed 2018 album Sondheim Sublime which Mr. Sondheim was consulted for, called “the best all-Sondheim album ever recorded” by The Wall Street Journal, Errico's new album Sondheim In The City (released with Concord Theatricals Recordings) masterfully explores another side of his musical legacy, focusing on his New York stories, songs, and characters (both albums produced by Rob Mathes who has produced artists like Sting, Elvis Costello, Carly Simon, Bruce Springsteen, and arranged/conducted music for artists like Elton John, Beyoncé, Jay Z, James Taylor, Stevie Wonder, Eric Clapton, and the late Tony Bennett & Aretha Franklin).

Errico was a longtime friend/collaborator of Sondheim's; they corresponded regularly in the decade leading up to his passing and her history with him began when he selected her to star as Dot in Sunday In The Park With George at The Kennedy Center in 2002, then as Clara in Passion at Classic Stage Company, followed by starring in the New York City Center Encores! production of his rarely produced musical Do I Hear A Waltz? And Nov. 2022, Errico made her Carnegie Hall debut co-starring in its big Broadway concert with the NY Pops, performing several Sondheim songs to honor him a year after his passing.

From the wide-eyed newly-wed for whom a basement room with a quarter-inch view is all that she needs, to the cynical nouveau from New Rochelle who can't choose between uptown & downtown for her bitter pleasures, with Sondheim In The City, Melissa Errico celebrates and embodies New York characters of all kinds – with a clear arc of passage along the way. Beginning in innocence (“What More Do I Need?” and “Another Hundred People”) passing into experience (“The Little Things You Do Together”, “Everybody Says Don't”) and falling into the plaintive, bittersweet ambivalence that is Sondheim's tonic note and which Melissa's lands' better than any singer alive (“Good Thing Going”, “Sorry-Grateful”). At the very end, we rise, in a driving, deeply emotional, and redemptive version of “Being Alive” to some kind of broken-hearted, Sondheimian hope. The stories of New York live here. Joined by the inimitable pianist Tedd Firth, the recording was produced by Rob Mathes (Sting, Elvis Costello) and features Lewis Nash on drums, David Finck on bass — plus strings & horns.

Tracklist:

1. Dawn (from unproduced film, Singing Out Loud)
2. Another Hundred People (from Company)
3. Opening Doors/What More Do I Need? (from Merrily We Roll Along/from Saturday Night)
4. Take Me To The World (from Evening Primrose)
5. Can That Boy Foxtrot! (cut song from Follies)
6. Anyone Can Whistle (from Anyone Can Whistle)
7. Everybody Says Don't (from Anyone Can Whistle)
8. Good Thing Going (from Merrily We Roll Along)
9. Broadway Baby (from Follies)
10. Uptown, Downtown (from Marry Me A Little)
11. It Wasn't Meant To Happen (cut from Marry Me A Little)
12. The Little Things You Do Together (from Company)
13. Sorry-Grateful (from Company)
14. Being Alive (from Company)