Monday, September 21, 2009

PART of Our Uber-Terrific Creative Team!

As the saying goes, "Behind every great man, there's a great woman" (or two, or three) supporting them, and this goes without saying with our production. Of course, our creative team doesn't only consist of women, but I thought it would be a great opener since without these people, we wouldn't be having a show! (At least not a great one!)

With this said, up first at bat is our esteemed Musical Director and Vocal Coach, Ms. Lisa Joe!



If it weren't for Lisa, we would never have been exposed to "Songs" and definitely would NOT be doing this. I've been taking voice lessons with her for about 5 years now, and I have to attribute all that I "know" to her expertise. She's terrific! In her "off" time (that is, outside of our production) she's a Table Tennis pro. Oh, and she recently bit the bullet and finally got an iPhone. Mucho kudos to Lisa, our Musi-kal dee-rektor! We love her!

I should have posted this next person's photo a while ago, cause without him, we wouldn't know where to go (staging wise) nor envision what the show would look like! And after a long intensive search for capable directors, with names such as Spielberg, and Baz Luhrmann in the mix (and rejected) we decided on Peter J. Kuo to lead the helm and bring us into the "New World".


Peter stretching out for real talent. Ha.

I had never worked with Peter before, but with past projects such as "Letters from a Student Revolutionary" which he also directed, Peter came with some strong recommendations from many of our friends who know and have worked with him. I have to say that I agree with all of them, as he's very focused, creative and easy to work with, plus, he always uses the same hand gestures over and over again (see the first posting on this blog, as we're all doing it with our hands!). That mere fact alone sold us on Peter, and the rest was just a bonus. Thanks Peter for your guiding "hands"! We love you too!

Would anyone like to see a show without ANY movement or choreography? Anyone? Bueler? BUELER? Of course not! Although "Songs" isn't a dance musical by any means, we definitely wanted to have one or two of the numbers choreographed to some extent to add some dazzle to the show. For this, we asked a good friend, and renowned teacher and creator of the
Movement for Actors class at the Edge Performing Arts center in Hollywood, Cindera Che to share with us her fantastic choreography and dance skills!

Cindera showing us how to look and move like true "Ballers". Yo, speak up, SON!

I've been training/studying with Cindera for years now, and as with Lisa, I have to attribute all of my dance ability to Cindera. She has taken this double left-footed dancer and made me into the movement animal I am today! (okay, not really double left-footed, but I have my moments - who doesn't?!). It has been such a pleasure to have her on our team, and we are most grateful to her for her talents and PATIENCE! We are UBER thankful to have her with us :)


As well all know, pianos don't play by themselves (or DO they?). In our case, our pianos don't play by themselves, so we needed a super (insert filipino accent here) tal-lehn-tehd (talented) musican/pianist to help bring our rehearsals to life, and we were so happy to get Marc Macalintal to lend his magic fingers to us! (Perhaps we should be thanking his wife MJ for lending Marc out to us. Either way, we're grateful). We've known Marc for a number of years now, and have worked with him on other projects, like 2005's production of "Imelda: A New Musical" or with his ultra funny band of improvisers - Room to Improv. Marc has also musical directed a number of shows throughout his illustrious career, and he's just plain awesome. Although he's not smiling in this photo below, he's happy. And funny. Oh, and an all around great dude! Thanks for helping us out Marc!


Marc "Fingers" Macalintal, on loan from MJD.

Oh, and just to show you what our rehearsals are like, here it is. Yes, it is all FUN AND LAUGHTER!


I love Randy's expression in this photo. Me, I'm just the king of pop is all.

This photo says it all. 

In addition to our Uber-Terrific Creative Team, we also have Ivy Chou, Ken "Mr. T" Takemoto", Glenn Suravech, Michael Villaneuva, Nathan Wang (and his band, of which I'll name later cause I don't have their names with me right now), and Stefanie Lau. I'll get some photos of everyone up later. Enjoy these for now! 

BTW, ticket sales are starting to happen so click on our ticket link and reserve your spot now! See you guys there!

2 comments:

  1. Wow!!! You guys are soooo suuuuppper-awesome, I cannot help but think your greatness is the most superior greatness of all uber-greatnesses of all, EVER!!! I have no doubt whatsoever you can live up to the hype.

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