AWESOME GIVEAWAY: 3 Pairs of Tickets to The Anthem

What do you get when you combine the teachings of Ayn Rand and a synthesizer? Well, a sci-fi musical of course! The new musical The Anthem is based off the capitalist author's novella "Anthem," and tells the story of a revolt of the young against an evil state.

In a world where individuality is illegal, Prometheus abandons everything to confront the State -- controlled by the overlord of evil efficiency, Tiberius. With a forbidden copy of Ayn Rand's ancient tome in hand, 

can Prometheus overthrow the system?

The show opens next week at the Lynn Redgrave Theater at 45 Bleecker. To receive a discount on tickets--$39 from May 20 to May 28 (regularly $60) and $45 from May 30 to July 6 (regularly $64)--click here and use code ANTRRM, call 866.811.4111 and mention code ANTRRM, or show up at the box office at the Lynn Redgrave Theater at 45 Bleecker (box office opens daily 2 hours before performances).

Good news! I'm giving away 3 pairs of tickets to the show! Please use the form below (follow all instructions!) to enter to win by 5/21/14. Best of luck!

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It All Went On Like You Like It

Last week we wrote about a special, star-studded, one-night-only concert event of Like You Like It at 54 Below. The evening was the epitome of a perfect night out in New York. There was great food (try the risotto!), wine, and lively entertainment by some of Broadway's top talent.

Here are some photos from the event:

Rebecca Faulkenberry sings "Be a Little Wild"

Sam Underwood and Jenna Leigh Green sing "Easy Way Out"

Dana Steingold and A.J. Shively sing "Creating a Monster"

Lyricist Sammy Buck talks about the show

Real life husband and wife duo Laura Osnes and Nathan Johnson sing "All of the Above"

Laura Osnes and Nathan Johnson

We weren't kidding about the chocolate dessert! Try the Dark Chocolate Tart!

Watch the 2014 Tony Noms at 8:30 am!

Good news for theater lovers...Tony nominations will be announced this morning at 8:30 am EST by Jonathan Groff and Lucy Liu!

Launch the 2014 Tony Awards Live Video Console!

Starting this morning at 8:15 am you will be able to load the live video feed right from Awesome in New York (click the link above)! Tune in and see if your favorite shows and performers will be nominated for the biggest award in all of theater.

The Tony Awards will air live on Sunday June 8 at 8/7c on CBS.

Celebrate The Bard's 450th Birthday 80's Style

Shakespeare may have once said all the world's a stage, but in Like You Like It, a brilliant musical adaptation of As You Like It that takes place in the 1985, all the world's a mall!

A HUGE Broadway cast is coming together for one night only to perform a concert presentation of Like You Like It this Wednesday 4/23 at 9:30 pm at 54 Below (254 W. 54th St, Cellar), Broadway's Supper Club. The ensemble includes Laura Osnes (Cinderella), Sam Underwood (Homeland), Jenna Leigh Green (Wicked), Max Crumm (Grease), Kate Rockwell (Rock of Ages), Amy Spanger (Elf), and Nic Rouleau (Book of Mormon).

I must admit that I have a personal tie to the show and practically grew up listening to the soundtrack thanks to lyricist Sammy Buck, a close family friend. With that said, you know I'm giving you a genuinely wholehearted recommendation when I tell you that you are in for a real treat on Wednesday. Check out the latest coverage on Playbill here!

Tickets are currently $25-$35 ($5 off the main dining room with code LYL5) with a $25 food/beverage minimum. The show begins at 9:30 pm, but you can make reservations as early as 8:45 pm. If that is too late for dinner, I hear they have a fabulous chocolate dessert...

Dance Your Artist Heart Out

It's time to party, Brooklyn style. The Brooklyn Museum is hosting the Brooklyn Artists Ball Dance Party next Wednesday April 16 from 10-1, and you are not going to want to miss it.

The event will feature a performance by LE1F and later DJ Brenmar will be spinning some tunes. There will also be a silent auction powered by Artsy and dessert prepared by Amirah Kassem of Flour Shop. Tickets are $100 ($90 for museum members) and today is the last day to buy them!

Increase Your Cultural Heart Rate at The Pulse Party

Need something to do tonight? The Rubin Museum of Art is throwing a pretty awesome party featuring electronic music and multimedia from 6-11pm.

In traditional Tibetan medicine, pulse reading is a complex form of diagnosis which requires physicians to listen deeply to the sound waves and vibrations of one’s heartbeat. In collaboration with Warper Party, the Rubin Museum presents PULSE, a museum-wide multimedia event  that invites electronic musicians and video artists to listen deeply and explore their own beats through inspiration from the new exhibition, Bodies in Balance: The Art of Tibetan Medicine.

There will be a happy hour from 6-7pm with 2-for-1 specials on all beer, wine, and well drinks. Also there will be a combination of free and ticketed events throughout the night (see the full schedule here), including a free tour of the new exhibition and tunes mixed by several DJs.

AWESOME GIVEAWAY: Pairs of Tickets to 2 Carnegie Hall Concerts

It's hard to realize how much of a gem both Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center are when you walk by them every day and they seem to blend into the general hubbub of Midtown. However, I cannot stress enough how important it is that you go to a concert at either venue if you have never been. Upon entering the majestic theaters, you will feel transported to a time when ladies wore gloves and men wore top hats to the opera and when orchestral music was commonly enjoyed by all.

I would like to highlight 2 upcoming concerts and...SURPRISE...giveaway a pair of tickets to each! Both giveaways will end at midnight on Tuesday April 8th. Make sure to follow the instructions in order to win :)

Vocal Colors: A night of unprecedented vocal technicality and talent
Saturday April 12, 7 pm
Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center

Featuring conductors Timothy Powell, Director Davidson Fine Arts School Chorale, Scott Buchanan, Director Indiana State University and Combined Choirs, and Horace Carney, Director Alabama A&M University.

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If you want to purchase tickets on your own, use the code DCIWEB to save 50% when you call CenterCharge at (212) 721-6500 or visit www.lincolncenter.org.

The Drop of Dawn: The Music of Christopher Tin
Sunday April 13, 8:30 pm
Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage, Carnegie Hall

Two-time Grammy award-winning composer Christopher Tin once again teams up with DCINY for a night of new music. Both Calling All Dawns and the world premiere of The Drop That Contained The Sea navigate diverse musical terrain with fusions of orchestral and world music, accompanied by 200 voices. “Baba Yetu,” the opening movement of Calling All Dawns, made history as the first piece of music written for a video game to win a Grammy.

Soloists: Mezzo-soprano Jacqueline Horner-Kwiatek ,Indian Classical Vocalist Roopa Mahadevan, Singer Saum Eskandani, and Mongloian pop star Nominjin

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If you want to purchase tickets on your own, use the code DCD18795 to save 30% when you call CarnegieCharge at (212) 247-7800 or visit www.carnegiehall.org.

AWESOME GIVEAWAY: 2 Tickets to The Bridges of Madison County

Every so often a new musical comes around and completely blows me away. The Bridges of Madison County, a palpable love story based on the book and 1995 movie, is one of those. I was invited to see it last week and became wrapped up in the love triangle of Francesca, her All-American husband Richard, and the "hippie" National Geographic photographer Robert Kincaid who whirlwinds into Francesca's life and changes it forever. What would you do if you got a second chance at love?

Songs like "One Second and a Million Miles" and "It All Fades Away" were stuck in my head all weekend; catchy an emotional, but milder and not as sing-song-y as showtunes can often be. Kelli O'Hara (Francesca) is a vision on stage and, especially if you saw her in Nice Work if You Can Get It, is an extremely versatile performer. Steven Pasquale, making is Broadway musical debut, melted my heart a little bit with his rich singing voice, and, oh that hair! The set was simple, yet elegant, and call me weird, made me want to visit rural Iowa.

Good news! I'm giving away a pair of tickets to a Tues-Thurs performance of The Bridges of Madison County now playing at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre (236 W. 45th St., between Broadway and 8th). The winner will need to redeem his/her tickets for a show before April 3. To enter to win, please use the form below and follow the instructions carefully. If you don't leave the comment requested and subscribe to my blog you cannot be the winner. A winner will be chosen and notified on Friday March 21.

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Can't Buy Me 50 Years of Love

Fifty years ago, The Beatles made headlines in America, and the music world was forever changed. If you caught the 2014 Grammy awards on TV a few weeks ago, you witnessed firsthand how much the 2 remaining boys from Liverpool can still rock out. We thought it was pretty awesome!

The wonderful Paley Center for Media is celebrating in it's own way this weekend. They will be presenting two essential programs for the Beatles fan at 1 pm on both Saturday 2/18 and Sunday 2/9. Experience their debut as it happened by seeing the complete Ed Sullivan Show from February 9, 1964, including commercials; and see the behind-the-scenes antics and the hysteria in the city captured in a cinema vérité documentary from the Maysles brothers. You might have seen clips of these shows on TV or YouTube, but now you need to see the Fab Four as big as life on a movie-size screen.

The screenings are free for Paley Center members, $10 for adults, $8 for students and seniors, and $5 for children under 14.

Riding Wax Wings at LPR

Last night was one of those amazing New York nights that makes me so happy to be where I am and doing what I'm doing. I have never been someone who remembers the name of every [insert famous band name] song or who can quote lyrics at the drop of a pin, but there are certain artists and certain songs that have clung to me at different points in my life that remain vital to who I am as a person. Joshua Radin is one of those musicians and if you've ever heard his music, or even better, heard him play live, you know why.

The wonderful people at Le Poisson Rouge invited me and a friend to an intimate Joshua Radin performance tonight and I was over-the-moon happy all week in anticipation. LPR is a great venue for a concert because they offer plenty of seating if you get there early enough that enables you to feel like a civilized adult at a concert rather than the college students we all used to be standing chin to shoulder to hip to elbow trying to get a glimpse of the stage. Yes, there is a 2 drink/food item minimum per person at tables, but to be honest, their food is great and their drinks are even better. I'd highly recommend the edamame with truffle salt ($5) or the fresh-out-of-the-oven chocolate chip cookies and milk ($5) if you are in the mood for something sweeter.

There are not many people I'd go out at 10:30 on a Wednesday night to see (the doors didn't even open until 10:15...here's to being hip and happening!), but with a Pina Colada sandwich from Peanut Butter and Co. freshly down-the-hatch (best Greenwich Village dinner ever), we got to the front of the line only to run into other friends and managed to snag a table so close to the stage that we were sitting practically on top of music people (one musician and 2 suited execs perhaps?) that seemed to be "with the band."

My Name is You opened with some pretty mushy gushy loves songs (hey, there's nothing wrong with those) reminiscent of The Weepies and Of Monsters and Men. Songs like Come Back (The summer’s passing so are you and i’ll come if you want me to, but if you leave without me dear i’ll understand. Come back to me my dear. All has been forgiven. For life without you here is barely even living) will melt your heart, but I especially liked Fortunate Ones (We have all that we could need and some more that we don’t even need, so when we see something new why do we now think we need it too? Let me tell you a secret: we're the fortunate ones. Let me tell you a secret: we're the ones with it all).

My Name is You

When Josh Radin came on stage, clad in a dark grey t-shirt, ripped jeans, and an orange beanie and proclaiming this show would be just like us watching him play in his living room, I knew we were in for a treat. He played the majority of his first two albums We Were Here and Simple Times, which I was very happy about, and I loved that he kept stepping away from the microphone and once even unplugging completely for the most authentic live acoustic experience we could ask for. He also played a good selection of tracks from his newly released album, Wax Wings.

Joshua Radin

Playing with My Name is You

Songs like You've Got Growin Up to Do (So the best thing I can give to you is for me to go, leave you alone cause you got growing up to do) and Winter (I should know who I am by now. I walk the record stands somehow. Thinking of winter. Your name is the splinter inside me. While I wait) are super relatable and have definitely helped me through harder times in my life, but the best part of the show was knowing that life may suck sometimes, but sitting no more than 20 feet away from Joshua Radin pretending he was serenading only me made my entire universe infinitely better. I can only hope to one day feel the way he describes in Today (But you are the one I've been waiting for today. And here comes the sun that's been baiting on today) and You Got What I Need (When I see you it's a beautiful world, but when you're gone, I want you in my arms I'm telling you the last time. Baby you, you got what I need. Baby you, you got my sunshine).

Josh also brought up Brandon from My Name is you to cover Bob Dylan's Don't Think Twice, It's All Right:

Ok, enough sap for today. Hope you enjoyed the pictures (taken with my new phone!) and a big shout-out to Lauren for providing the video.

AWESOME ALERT: The Iconic NYC Jazz Club You Knew Existed But Have Never Been To

Jazz clubs. They are about as New York as it comes (well, if you don't count New Orleans). But have you every actually step foot in one? If you have, give yourself a pat on the back. If not, you owe it to yourself to tap your toes and sip a glass of wine at one of the city's musical gems.

My friend invited me along to the speakeasy-like Smalls Jazz Club, tucked into a basement space on West 10th Street, for their free Tuesday night show. I honestly went in with no expectations. I'm not ashamed to admit that I never liked (or thought I liked) jazz because I associated it with old people. I don't exactly know where that came from, and yes, older people do seemingly like jazz, but I digress.

When we walked in, a trio comprised of the piano, guitar and bass were playing upbeat tunes and taking turns showing off crazy skill with their solos. I know practically nothing about music theory or "why" music is "good," but it sure as heck sounded amazing. We grabbed seats a few rows from the front and had fun watching the cat (I'm told her name is Mina) sleep on the piano with intermittent breaks for cleaning herself.

Mina (Photo Courtesy Rachel Reed)

The music was so good that we decided to stay for the paid show at 9:30. Good thing we did too! For only $20, we got an intimate concert with the Scott Hamilton quartet, a pretty big deal in the jazz world (or so the Internet tells me).

Scott Hamilton Quartet

You can find the Smalls Jazz Club schedule here. Most shows are either indicated as "no cover" (aka FREE!) or cost $10 or $20. Looking for last minute Valentine plans tonight? The club is featuring 2 quartets and a quintet playing late into the night and I'm sure your date will be pleasantly surprised.