Alan Cumming (Photo: Steve Vaccariello via The Broadway Blog.)
It’s going to be a wild night at Carnegie Hall come February 8, when Alan Cumming headlines in his Carnegie Hall debut in Alan Cumming Sings Sappy Songs with Friends. Those friends happen to include Kristin Chenoweth, Darren Criss, Ricki Lake, and a special performance by the New York City Gay Men’s Chorus.
Backed by Cumming’s longtime musical director Lance Horne on piano, Eleanor Norton on cello, Chris Jago on drums and Michael Croiter on guitar and percussion, Alan Cumming Sings Sappy Songs premiered in Spring 2015 for a limited run at the iconic supper club Café Carlyle, garnering such critical praise that producer Daniel Nardicio approached Cumming about bringing the show to Carnegie for a one-night-only performance.
This evening also marks the release of Cumming’s newest CD Alan Cumming Sings Sappy Songs, from Yellow Sound Label, recorded live at the Café Carlyle. It includes his singular interpretations of pop hits (Billy Joel’s “Goodnight Saigon,” Miley Cyrus’s “The Climb,” Rufus Wainwright’s “Dinner at Eight”), musical theater songs (“The Ladies Who Lunch” from Company, “You, You, You” from Kander & Ebb’s The Visit, “If Love Were All” by Noël Coward) and numbers that Cumming has collected from around the world (“Mother Glasgow” from Scotland, “La Complainte de la Butte” from France, “How Do Humans Live” from Germany). The new album – produced by Michael Croiter, with Daniel Nardicio serving as associate producer – is currently available for pre-order at www.
An actor and activist, Cumming currently plays political maverick Eli Gold on CBS’s “The Good Wife,” for which he received Golden Globe, Emmy, SAG and Satellite Award nominations and earlier this year finished his Tony Award-winning role of the Emcee in the Broadway musical Cabaret. His diverse career has found him performing at venues around the globe including the Sydney Opera House; making back to back films with Stanley Kubrick and The Spice Girls; directing and starring in a musical condom commercial; creating voices of a Smurf, a goat and Hitler; entering upside down and suspended by his ankles in a Greek tragedy (in the National Theatre of Scotland’s The Bacchae); and recording an award-winning album of songs (plus a dance remix). A tireless champion for LGBT civil rights and HIV/AIDS, Cumming serves on the Board of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS and works closely with amfAR, The Trevor Project and the Ali Forney Center to name but a few.
In addition to the New York album launch at Carnegie Hall, Alan Cumming Sings Sappy Songs will also be performed in Tampa, FL (January 24), Toronto, CA (February 6), Bethesda, MD (February 14), Napes, FL (February 28), Detroit, MI (March 19), Minneapolis, MN (March 26) and Port Washington, NY (May 14). Details are at www.AlanCumming.com.