STRIKING 12 To Join Arena Restaged Part Two For Their Upcoming Winter Holiday Season

Arena Stage announces the pop-concert musical comedy Striking 12 to join Arena Restaged Part Two for this winter holiday season. Co-written with Tony Award-winning author Rachel Sheinkin (The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee) and performed by pop-rock band GrooveLily, Striking 12 is a witty journey through the ups and downs of the holiday season. Musicians turned actors Valerie Vigoda (electric violinist and D.C.-area native), Brendan Milburn (pianist) and Gene Lewin (drummer) serve as both accompaniment and performers for this amusing score that is “alive with wit and humor” (The New York Times). This unique blend of musical theater and live rock concert is a distinctive addition to Arena’s 2009/10 season. Striking 12 runs December 2—December 13 at Arena Stage in Crystal City. 

”The music in Striking 12 captured me immediately,” said Arena Stage Artistic Director Molly Smith. ”This is a playful, tune-filled story with quirkiness and charm. It is a unique holiday show for people who don’t like holidays, but suspect that they do. At its very center, Striking 12 is a story about finding love in unusual places.”

Striking 12 is an upbeat concert-musical full of old-fashioned uplift and 21st century skepticism. The secular story follows a “Grumpy Guy” who makes all attempts to avoid the hectic, loveless world on New Year’s Eve, until he is visited by an incandescent salesgirl who promises to ease away his winter doldrums. Full of parody and humor and through their genre-bending style of rock, folk, jazz and pop music, Striking 12 is truly a one-of-a-kind holiday show.

Having premiered at the Prince Music Theatre in Philadelphia in 2002, Striking 12 has since appeared at theaters across the country including The Old Globe (San Diego), TheatreWorks (Palo Alto), Off-Broadway at the Daryl Roth Theatre and the Zipper Factory Theatre among many other venues. Striking 12 won a Bay Area Theatre Critics Choice Award and received a Lucille Lortel nomination for Outstanding Musical, making it one of the most critically acclaimed productions in the band’s repertoire.

The Company of Striking 12:

Valerie Vigoda, electric violinist and singer, is the founding member of GrooveLily. Originally from McLean, VA, Valerie is a classically trained musician, honors graduate of Princeton University, and former Army lieutenant. Vigoda has toured the world with Cyndi Lauper (opening for Tina Turner and Cher), Joe Jackson and the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. She founded GrooveLily (originally The Valerie Vigoda Band) in 1994, with the critically acclaimed CD Inhabit My Heart. Dirty Linen Magazine wrote: “to call Valerie Vigoda talented barely seems to do her justice. She has a great voice, is an intelligent lyricist... and an ace violinist. Methinks we'll hear more of her.” Vigoda is a two-time winner of the Jonathan Larson Award for Excellence in Writing for the Theatre, along with her husband and longtime collaborator Brendan Milburn.

Brendan Milburn (keyboards/vocals) graduated from Pomona College and NYU’s MFA program in Musical Theatre Writing. He does a lot of arranging for GrooveLily, and he’s an accomplished record producer as well. Milburn often yearns for his native San Francisco. Seth Rogovoy wrote: “Milburn was a deft pianist, his nimble fingerwork doing double-duty as the band’s bassist and provider of its harmonic foundation, delivered with the jazzy sophistication of Steely Dan’s Donald Fagen and the rock and roll theatrics of Billy Joel.” Milburn’s music and/or lyrics have been/will be featured in a growing number of Off/on-Broadway shows, and he’s always on the lookout for new projects/productions which will add more slashes (“/”) to his bio/credits.

Gene Lewin plays the drums and sings, and hails from Princeton, NJ. Like many of his heroes (Jack DeJohnette, Russ Kunkel, Vinnie Colaiuta), Lewin joyfully blurs the lines between jazz and rock, supporting and complementing the music but unafraid to instigate when the time is right. After graduating from Princeton University, he earned a master’s degree from the Manhattan School of Music. He tours regularly with Audra McDonald, and has appeared on CDs with George Coleman, John Patitucci and many others. “His gift lies in his frenzied dynamo attack of cymbals and skins. Think Tony Williams sits in with Weather Report,” (Mark Corroto, All About Jazz).

Striking 12: Ticket Information and Performance Calendar:

Tickets for Striking 12 range from $25 to $45, with discounts available for students and groups. A limited number of $10 tickets for patrons 30 and under go on sale beginning on Monday for the following week of performances (Tuesday through Sunday) until all available $10 tickets sell out. Patrons may purchase $10 tickets by phone, online or in person. (All patrons must be 30 or younger.) Patrons will be required to present valid ID for age verification. HOTTIX, a limited number of half-price, day-of-performance tickets, are available from 90 to 30 minutes before curtain prior to every performance for all patrons. Tickets are available for purchase online at www.arenastage.org, at the Arena Stage Sales Office at 1800 S. Bell Street, Arlington, VA 22202 or by phone at (202) 488-3300.

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