Eden Espinosa to Mentor Top Talents at 2017 Songbook Academy in Carmel

Broadway star Eden Espinosa has joined the team of professional mentors for the Great American Songbook Foundation's 2017 Songbook Academy, the nation's only summer youth music intensive focused on the timeless standards of jazz, pop, Broadway and Hollywood.

Forty top high school-age vocalists hailing from coast to coast will participate in the weeklong Academy, taking place July 15-22 at the Foundation's home, the Center for the Performing Arts in Carmel. Foundation founder and five-time Grammy Award nominee Michael Feinstein will provide one-on-one instruction to the participants and serve as emcee of the July 22 Songbook Academy Finals concert, where one rising talent will be named Songbook Youth Ambassador for the coming year.

Espinosa is perhaps best known for her portrayal of Elphaba in the Broadway, Los Angeles and San Francisco productions of Wicked. Her other musical theater work has included originating the title character in Brooklyn: The Musical on Broadway, starring as Flora in the Reprise Theater Company's production of Flora, the Red Menace, and playing Maureen in the closing company of Rent. Her many voiceover credits for film and TV include her current role as Cassandra on Disney's Tangled: The Series. Acclaimed for her powerful vocal style, Espinosa was the featured soloist in Magical, the Disneyland fireworks spectacular, and soon will release the follow-up to her award-winning debut album, Look Around.

Other professional mentors leading workshops and master classes throughout the week include two-time Grammy winner Sylvia McNair, star of opera, oratorio, cabaret and musical theater; Marc Cherry, creator of ABC's Desperate Housewives and writer and producer on several other TV series; and Ly Wilder, a contemporary vocal artist, educator and arranger whose works have been performed worldwide.

The Songbook Academy, which includes three public performances, is sponsored nationally by the Efroymson Family Fund, a fund of the Central Indiana Community Foundation. More information is available at TheSongbook.org.

The mission of the Great American Songbook Foundation, founded by five-time Grammy nominee Michael Feinstein, is to inspire and educate by celebrating the timeless songs of pop, jazz, Broadway and Hollywood. The Foundation is committed to preserving and elevating this rich legacy by curating physical artifacts of its creators, performers and publishers; offering programs for the public and research opportunities for scholars, historians and performers; providing educational opportunities and multidisciplinary curricula for student musicians; overseeing the Songbook Hall of Fame; and operating a multimedia gallery for public exhibition of its collections. More information is available at TheSongbook.org.

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