Interview: Aaron Gandy, Composer of THE CRINOLYNNS, Talks Music, Collaboration and Writing an 'Actor-Proof Show' at Stage Right!

It's not every day you get to see the development of a new musical in real time, let alone one with major Broadway talent attached. I've been lucky enough to see the development of The Crinolynns, a new musical by composer Aaron Gandy and librettist/lyricist Scott Logdson, through the first stages of its development. The musical has been an initiative of the Ghostlight new works development program at Stage Right! Greensburg since early 2022, and is now preparing for a stripped-down concert-style presentation at Saint Vincent on September 30th. (Full disclosure: I am a longtime associate of Stage Right!, and their Ghostlight program also workshopped my own musical The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari.)

I sat down with Aaron Gandy via telephone call to New York, during a rehearsal lunch break before the show transfers to the Pittsburgh area. “We’re prepping the show in New York and then coming into Latrobe a few days before the show to get fitted with the band. The three ladies blend so beautifully, the sound is so great. Today was the first time we actually got all three in the room together, and it’s one of those moments that raises the hair on your arms.” While Logdson has ties to the area, Gandy is a New Yorker with years of experience in the theatre scene: “I’m coming up on thirty years of being a professional musician in New York City; I sub-conducted and taught vocals for Lion King plus played keyboards for that. That was a lot of fun, I did that for ten years. I also did a lot of concert work and recording work, but in between those I wrote and composed when time allowed.” 

When the theatres shut down during the pandemic, Gandy found himself with time on his hands, and needed a project. “I was so happy when Scott Logsdon pitched me on this project during COVID. We’re old friends, we’ve known each other for years. He sent me a song lyric, and that very night I sent him over the music for it. That song, ‘Baby Weight,’ is still in the show. After that, every night, or at least several times a week, we’d be sending things back and forth. The show wrote itself very fast, which is always a good sign for a project.” One essential to the show's conception was writing characters that were deep enough to inhabit, but not impossible to perform or too closely fitted to the talents of one specific performer: “One thing were pleased with in the reading May 2022 is that the piece held water and the women knew exactly what and how to play. It’s not one of those pieces like Grey Gardens where it’s quirky and very specific, and if you don’t cast it perfectly the show might not work as well as you’d wish. Scott has written these women as three different but very familiar paths of life that a lot of women find themselves on. So there’s something for many, many different types of women to see themselves and their experiences in.”

Donna Lynn Champlin, Sally Mayes and Valerie Wright make up the three-person cast, playing three sisters who sang together in the midcentury girl-group era. Says Gandy of the cast: “Oh my gosh. They bring a career’s worth of experience into the room. And they’re so experienced by this point- these are mature women, they didn’t start yesterday- but they bring a history of working on original musicals and understanding the comedy beats and the storytelling. It’s just our dream to have such a credentialed trio of ladies to be wrapping their vocal cords around the material. And they’re being lit up by the material too; they really took to the tightness of the script and how it feels cohesive, like a whole piece.”  One writer to another, that's a highly relatable feeling and high praise. I can't wait to see The Crinolynns this month, and I hope all of you can't either.