august header
 
July 2015  
Make Your Voice Heard!

 

Backstage has opened voting for their annual Readers' Choice Awards for 2015. Show some love to all the folks that make our community great! Who's your favorite voice teacher? Acting coach? headshot photographer? OH! And there's that "Favorite Rehearsal Studio" category as well.....hmmmmmmm.

Click on the "VOTE" button below to join the chorus!
 

 


 
Introducing Studio 10J

A sweet little 6 x 9 vocal room on the 10th floor for only 13 bucks!

The Gate-Keeper!

Creativity Starts with a friendly face!
With thousands of people through the door every day, tour groups numbering in the triple-digits, desperate actors in a rush, and the need for 21st century security and safety in a Manhattan office building, it takes a special kind of guy to keep things friendly and flowing, while keeping his cool and presenting a competent and professional face to the public. Showing our love this month for the incomparable Kad, the point man for safety and security here at the 520 building. We can't take the credit for hiring him, as security is handled by our landlords, but we are sure glad he's here, and hope he's with us quite some time! 
Employee of the Season!

Congratulations, Shayne!
Shayne Grier, ladies and gentlemen!
Big thanks and big love to this guy. He somehow manages to be a rock-solid manager, a patient and understanding co-worker, a good friend to all of us, and a great dad to his giant tribe of kids all at the same time. Plus there's that great head of hair, of which I am insanely jealous. Take some time to give him a pat on the back! Thanks, SG!!!
Greetings!

Happy Mid Summer, everyone. I trust you all had a smashing 4th of July.  As I have said before, there is nothing more american than grilled meat and explosives!  We've been delightfully busy here at RG, and we'd like to give a big shout out to Broadway Artists Alliance and the many other performing arts summer programs that keep us hopping in the hot months. me and boysMake sure to vote on all your favorite actor-y stuff for the Backstage Readers Choice Awards! We hear that you MIGHT have a favorite rehearsal studio....

 Be well- John
Michael Harrington
Vocal Teacher

   Michael Harrington once helped land men on the moon. Now he brings that same passion to landing your voice in the right spot
"Every singer has a break between their speaking voice and their singing voice" he says, "I help them to eliminate that....I get the voice free, and then they can do what they want with it."

So how did this aerodynamic scientist get into vocal arts? "I don't know how I did it, except I knew I was very unhappy." After leaving NASA, he went to work for another engineering firm, who placed him on a project developing bombs for use in Vietnam. That was the last straw for Harrington, and he left his old life behind, ending up living out of a storage container in Berkeley, while he pursued his new career in performance. Those hard years paid off in lead acting roles on NBC, ABC, PBS and lead roles in many musicals. To date, he has trained nearly 900 singers in his 45-year career.

So are there any similarities between his approach to voice and his approach to science? "Well, yes. An airplane can't flap its wings and fly. You have to calculate the proper flow of air over the airfoil to generate lift. The same is true with the voice. You must co-operate with nature."

If you are interested in working with Michael, he can be reached via email at mharrington@thanksmikie.com

 

Introducing Fitness Concepts for Life! 
Classes for adults 50+, taught by some of our most experienced and respected instructors, including Patricia Ripley and Butch Grier.
Click on the image below to check out their website

 

 

 

I hope you are having a wonderful summer.

 

At the end of June and the beginning of August, I went to three events. On June 27, I went to PressPlay, which is an event for YouTubers/Viners to come together and perform, kind of like Digifest (which was held in the beginning of June) Digifest was a lot bigger and more crowded, but PressPlay was more intimate and I was able to meet more people. On June 30, I went to my second Imagine Dragons concert at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. I took my friend Rayleene and my nephew Jackson. We had great seats very close to the stage, and I even got to meet the band before the show with our VIP meet and greet passes. I got two pictures with them! The concert was amazing, even better than the first one I went to last March. On July 9, I went to see MOVE live on tour Derek and Julianne Hough (from the show "Dancing With The Stars") at the Radio City Music Hall. I had a VIP meet and greet ticket and got to meet them before the show and they did a Q&A. They answered my question! After the meet and greet ended, the show began, and I had a front row seat. The show was great. They danced, sang, and their backup dancers were great too. These events were so much fun to attend and I'd love to see all of them again. Thanks to my parents.

~Jeannie