Cynthia Clarey Will Debut BRIDGE OVER MUDDIED WATERS at Laurie Beechman Theatre On February 5th

Opera singer Cynthia Clarey will make her New York City cabaret debut on Sunday, February 5th at 4:00 pm at the Laurie Beechman Theatre at the West Bank Café with her one-woman show entitled "Bridge Over Muddied Waters."

Bridge Over Muddied Waters reflects Ms. Clarey's perspective on the current political and racial turmoil in the United States, as viewed through the songs of Cole Porter and Irving Berlin, as well as songs made famous by Luther Vandross, Lionel Richie, Billie Holiday, Sam Cooke, Marvin Gaye, Stephen Stills and others. This show was recently awarded the Chicago Cabaret Professionals Advocacy Award at its Annual Gala.

The former opera singer was once a musical theater student at Juilliard who participated in (and then walked out of) master classes with Maria Callas, went on to have a 35-year operatic career until, in her mid-sixties, her voice dropped an octave, at which time she left the world of opera to reinvent herself as a Chicago cabaret performer. Cynthia began collaborating with Chicago cabaret legend Beckie Menzie and, in record time, became a leading and popular member of the Chicago cabaret community. In the process, Clarey fulfilled a lifelong dream to have a career singing popular music. An acclaimed singing actress during her opera days, Ms. Clarey sang all over the world in major opera houses and with major orchestras, with appearances that included productions by Trevor Nunn (Porgy and Bess for PBS' Great Performances), Peter Brook (La Tragedie de Carmen at Lincoln Center) and many others. The matriarch of a musical family, Ms. Clarey was once married to an operatic baritone and the couple had a son who has had a long career as lead singer for a heavy metal rock band in Portland; the gentleman is now studying for an operatic career, thereby following the exact opposite of his mother's career trajectory from classical to pop.

Bridge Over Muddied Waters will play The Laurie Beechman Theatre on February 5th at 4 pm, with Beckie Menzie acting as Musical Director from the piano (including additional vocals) and Irwin Berkowitz on percussion. Further information and reservations can be accessed on the Laurie Beechman/West Bank Cafe website HERE.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Cynthia Clarey

With a voice "of near-baritone oakiness" (Cabaret Scenes Magazine), "the great Cynthia Clarey" (Howard Reich, Chicago Tribune) performs in cabaret and other venues throughout the Chicago and surrounding areas. She has performed with "Acts of Kindness Cabaret," (which raises funds for Chicago non-profit organizations) and performs regularly with Black Voices in Cabaret. She also performs at the Chicago Cabaret Professionals Annual Gala and the annual Chicago Paris Cabaret Connexion. She recently participated in the NYC-based Mabel Mercer Foundation's Annual Cabaret Convention, hosted by KT Sullivan. On the 100th anniversary of Cole Porter's birth, she was invited to appear on a London gala along with Julie Wilson, Margaret Whiting, Michael Feinstein, Alice Faye, Van Johnson, Sammy Cahn, Lorna Loft and others. She has also appeared in several of Chicago's Porchlight Theater productions, including "The Scottsboro Boys" and a gender-bending "1776" as well as in an episode of the television series "Chicago Fire." She made her debut as a director with a production of Terrence McNally's Master Class in Binghamton, New York. (While a student at Julliard intending to pursue a musical theater career, Ms. Clarey was chosen to participate in the historic Maria Callas master classes on which McNally's play is based but, when Callas questioned Ms. Clarey's interest in musical theater, Ms. Clarey walked out and did not participate in any further sessions with Callas.) She was recently the focus of a feature article in Cabaret Scenes Magazine entitled "Cynthia Clarey's Remarkable Journey to Cabaret."

Prior to becoming an important part of the Chicago cabaret scene, Ms. Clarey enjoyed a 35-year career as an opera singer performing as both a soprano and a mezzo-soprano. Widely acclaimed as an accomplished singing actress, she performed the role of Serena in Trevor Nunn's film of his groundbreaking production of Porgy and Bess that was broadcast on PBS' Great Performances series following performances at the Glyndebourne Festival and the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden as well as a recording on EMI/Angel; she also sang the title role of Bess in the first ever fully staged production of Porgy and Bess in South Africa. She appeared on Broadway at Lincoln Center's Vivian Beaumont Theater for six months and toured the world as one of several Carmens in Peter Brook's La tragedie de Carmen and has performed the title role in the original version of Bizet's opera in opera houses and stadiums in North America and around the world.

Internationally, Ms. Clarey has appeared in opera performances in, among other countries, Italy, France, England, Spain, Germany, Austria, Japan, Hungary and Australia and, in the US, her appearances included companies in Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Houston, Dallas, Santa Fe, Saint Louis, Seattle and many others. She has also appeared with numerous major orchestras around the US, Canada and Europe, including those of London, Berlin, Amsterdam, Boston, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Washington DC, Saint Louis, Toronto and many others. However, during the classical phase of her career, Ms. Clarey tried to perform popular music whenever she could; for example, in addition to The Irving Berlin Centennial Gala in London, she performed an evening of Gershwin songs with the Jerusalem Symphony and performed a Gershwin song on "American Night" at the Berlin Philharmonic.

Highlights of Ms. Clarey's New York City appearances included a concert performance of a Donizetti opera at Lincoln Center starring Dame Joan Sutherland that was telecast over the PBS Live from Lincoln Center series; her Carnegie Hall debut with

Walter Cronkite, narrator and the American Symphony Orchestra in the New York premiere of a solo song cycle; her New York Philharmonic debut with a difficult solo work by Handel; and the previously mentioned six month run at Lincoln Center

in Peter Brook's La tragedie de Carmen. After an absence of many years from performing in New York City, she recently returned to Lincoln Center to participate, with other esteemed African American vocalists, in a concert called "Masters of the Spiritual;" a version of this program entitled "The Majesty of the Spiritual" was subsequently presented in San Francisco.

Among her recordings are Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, Berg's opera Wozzeck, Michael Tippett's opera The Ice Break and his oratorio A Child of Our Time, Grosz' Africa Songs, Richard Strauss' Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, Mark Anthony Turnage's Some Days (with the Chicago Symphony), John Duffy's A Time for Remembrance (with James Earl Jones, narrator), the Cole Porter Centennial Gala and others.

Ms. Clarey recently retired from teaching voice at the Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University.

Beckie Menzie

Described by the Chicago Tribune as being "indispensable to Chicago cabaret," award winning concert artist Beckie Menzie has appeared at some of the nation's top nightclubs and concert venues including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center and Birdland in New York, Chicago's Auditorium Theatre, The Ravinia Festival and Park West, as well as at concert halls and song series across the country. Hailed by Chicago's WGN Radio as "one of the city's finest cabaret performers," Ms. Menzie is a three time winner of Chicago's After Dark Award for Outstanding Cabaret Artist. A singer, pianist and songwriter, she has worked and collaborated with Cynthia Clarey since the beginning of Ms. Clarey's Chicago cabaret career.

Ms. Menzie was featured in Michael Feinstein's "Now & Then" Series for her Carnegie Hall debut. She has been a featured performer at many of the Mabel Mercer Cabaret Conventions in New York, The Hamptons and in Chicago, as well as many performances for the Chicago Humanities Festival, where she has served as a performer, a director and musical director.

Ms. Menzie has two acclaimed solo CDs, "Real Emotional Girl" and "Heart & Soul," which have received national airplay. Cabaret Scenes Magazine called "Real Emotional Girl" one of the year's finest recordings." She is also an award-winning songwriter and is in demand around the country for coaching musical talent.

Irwin Berkowitz is a well-known percussionist who is active in the Chicago area. He is a member of "The Class of 68," a classic rock and roll band, and works frequently with his wife, Beckie Menzie and other musicians.

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