Tag Archives: understudy

We love spreading the word about talented black folks! And it’s even better when the said talent is an exceptional actress and musician with great pipes and an equally fabulous husband. Such is the case with Alicia Hall Moran. Here’s a little info via Ozy.com : If you’d asked Alicia Hall Moran how she was feeling a year ago, fresh off the heels of a Broadway run, the Harlem-based opera singer would sigh and say it was like finally getting “off the treadmill.” It’s an understatement, considering she wasn’t just in the ensemble of Broadway’s Porgy & Bess; she was also the understudy for Audra McDonald’s Bess and performed the role every Wednesday. Juggling eight shows a week, rehearsals for two parts, five-year-old twins, a weeklong commission she was asked to do for the Whitney Museum Biennial and, you know, sleep, left her feeling depleted — and energized at the same time. And it also explains why she has signed back on, heading out in November to star as Bess in the national tour. “Doing theater every day is like pushing a rock up a mountain. There’s the exertion of always moving it forward and also going out there, raw and wondering, ‘How is this going to end?’” she admits. “But with Porgy & Bess, it’s like being in the Olympics. I learned to do a vault on a jacked-up ankle and nail that thing!” But nailing hard-to-execute routines has been the norm for Hall Moran throughout her career. “I’ve departed from the classical mold, which is that you’re assigned music, you learn it and you perform it,” explains the mezzo-soprano. “I’m co-creating the music now, which is highly improvisatory.” That sounds fancy and hard and innovative, but what does it actually mean? It means that there are going to be more creations like the Motown Project, where she recreated the world of Mozart and translated it for a contemporary audience through Motown lyrics. Or new collaborations with her husband, Jason Moran, a jazz pianist and the Kennedy Center artistic director of jazz. Or works with others, like a late September performance at Jazz at Lincoln Center called “Gershwin & Beyond” featuring guitarist Bill Frisell. Clap for Mami… She’s dope. Check out a performance from her below: Pretty amazing right? Facebook Continue reading →