By Madison Anidjar
Staff Writer
Lyric Theatre and Broadway's Solea Pfeiffer celebrated the works of Jason Robert Brown on April 17 in Kendall Hall. Brown is a Tony award-winning playwright, composer and lyricist. Pfeiffer is known for playing Eliza in the first “Hamilton” national tour. She also starred in a 2018 Off-Broadway concert of Brown’s “Songs for a New World.”
Pfeiffer and the company performed songs from six of Brown’s musicals, including “Parade,” “The Last Five Years” and “Mr. Saturday Night.”
Lyric Theatre is one of the College's vocal ensembles. For the third year in a row, students had the opportunity to attend a weekly course where they spent the semester learning the work of a living Broadway composer. In previous years, Lyric Theatre has honored the works of composers like Andrew Lippa and Jeanine Tesori.
At the end of the semester, students are joined by a Broadway star like Pfeiffer to perform what they have learned.
In January, Lyric Theatre students also attended a masterclass with Brown, where he gave students notes on performing his songs and told them about his writing process.
“It was so cool to learn about his song structure and how he writes music and composes music. It was an awesome experience,” said Ella Osbeck, a sophomore elementary special education major.
Osbeck said that Lyric Theatre allowed her to continue her love of musical theater, despite the College not having a specific musical theater degree.
“Now I’m a theater minor because I just love being incorporated with theater here even though we don’t have a musical theater major,” said Osbeck.
Lyric Theatre Director Nathan Brewer said the program is a unique opportunity for college students.
“I don’t know of another program like this anywhere in the world, even musical theater conservatories that I know of,” said Brewer. “I also teach at New York University and my musical theater students are so jealous of what the TCNJ Lyric Theatre students get to do because this type of access to a composer and to stars like Solea is unparalleled.”
Anthony Masefield, a freshman finance major, said that the Lyric theater program was one of the reasons he decided to attend the College.
“A lot of the students in our class are not pursuing arts in the future, this is just a passion for them,” said Masefield. “A lot of our people just have a great voice and they want to express that talent.”
Parents and students alike came to see their family and friends perform with Pfeiffer. Kit Weedon, a senior biology major, and Oliver Eloe, a junior history secondary education major, were excited to see their peers perform.
“We are in one of the theater organizations on campus so a lot of our friends were in the show,” said Weedon. “It was a lot of fun to get to see them, especially seeing the seniors one last time before graduation.”
Some crowd favorites included “I Love Betsy,” a humorous song in which character Jack Singer works up the courage to ask his girlfriend to get married, sung by Aidan Hulse, and “I’m Not Afraid of Anything,” about a brave young woman who feels held back by the fears of those around her, performed by Amelia Zakroff.
“You can tell they worked really hard on the show and it’s obvious from the production,” said Eloe.
Brewer plans to announce next year’s featured composer before the end of the semester. He told the audience that of the four composers he has asked to collaborate with TCNJ, all of them have said yes.
“We’re four for four already, and I can’t wait for you to find out who we’re studying and working with next year,” said Brewer.”
