Recordings for Vanya's - A New Musical
After years of work on our project VANYA'S, we are so excited to be making proper demo recordings for the show!
The project. VANYA'S is a jazz chamber musical set that transports Chekhov's classic play to a dingy club in contemporary Soho (London).
These recordings will let us pitch the show to theatres and producers - and also, to share our work with people we care about.
Bella has been hard at work on gorgeous orchestrations that will be brought to life with our producer Ian Shaw (two-time BBC Jazz Vocalist of the Year) and some of the best gigging musicians and singers in London.
This funding will contribute towards: Studio time, the time and talent of our singers, musicians, and sound engineer, instrument rental, mastering, music printing, and the range of other miscellaneous bits that go into tackling a project of this scale
Your funding will NOT go towards: our time or expenses - we are working for free (and dipping into our savings). We are just thrilled to have the opportunity to bring this to life.
If we raise more than we are asking for, we are going to put that money towards making high quality recordings of our songwriting cabaret. It would be wonderful to share that work with you as well!
Why is this happening so fast? Well, as it turns out, a commission we did for the Canales Project in association with the United Nations Decade of Women is getting performed in NYC this October at Joe's Pub.
We initially weren't sure whether whether we would both be able to make the trip. However, Alli's doctors have cleared her to travel, so we are going to see the show!
You're going to New York!? How exciting!!!
We think so, too! And we want to make the most of it. :-)
This is going to be a fantastic opportunity to connect with NYC theatre makers and funders. Our agent is already working on setting up meetings for us.
We'll be sending out these demos in advance, and have also arranged our US cabaret debut so we have an event to invite people to! (If you fancy coming, you can catch LONDON CALLING: AN EVENING WITH BARLOW & SMITH at the Duplex on Tuesday 15 October. We aren't up on their website yet but will have a link to share soon.)
Why is it so important to have help? Musicals are a long term investment - HAMILTON took seven years to write!
At each stage of development, you make the piece a bit better, learn a bit more, and have something new to share.
We've been developing this piece since 2015 when it was shortlisted for an award, and have since workshopped it on a West End stage through the Criterion New Writing Programme, through Old Vic New Voices, and most recently at ArtsEd.
What will help us most at these stage is really high quality recordings that will hopefully help people fall in love with the show. (It worked for Andrew Lloyd Webber and the writers of Les Mis!)
We won't be recording the whole show - indeed, that would be a truly eye-watering pricetag - but we have picked out some of the best songs to share what the show is all about. This is really critical to help us take the next step in our careers.
To share our ETERNAL GRATITUDE, we will send you the full set of demo recordings!
This is true whether you can give £1 or £1000!
We know that most people are giving out of the goodness of their hearts to support us . Not everyone can give at the same level, but we are so grateful for whatever you can donate to help with this!
Thank you so much for showing your support of us - and for this musical!!!
With love and gratitude,
A&B
(Thanks to Julia Forsman for the B&S photos!)
