[Midsummer Night's Dream] is built around the jazz-rock band GrooveLily, and their luscious stylings recall a smooth but hard-driving blend of Roxy Music and Herbie Hancock, quite suitably ornate and theatrical. – Jonathon Warman, The New York Blade, May 8, 2006
The Daily Record March 31, 2006 McCarter dreams up a Shakespearean extravaganza by William Westhoven Shakespeare challenged our imaginations some 400 years ago with “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Now, director Tina Landau is challenging our senses with an early spring “Midsummer” at Princeton University’s McCarter Theatre that leaves dazzling in the dust and rises to [...]
CurtainUp March 26, 2006 A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Simon Saltzman William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is believed to have been written around 1596 for an actual wedding festivity of a prominent person. No one can agree on whose wedding, but one thing is fairly certain, the guests could not have had a better [...]
February 16, 2006 – 2:36 pm
Striking 12 Writers Among Winners of 2006 Larson Awards for New Musical Writing By Kenneth Jones 16 Feb 2006 Composer-lyricists Valerie Vigoda and Brendan Milburn, the married two-thirds of the pop trio called GrooveLily, are among recipients of the 2006 Jonathan Larson Awards, recognizing excellence in new musical theatre. read the rest of the article [...]
November 18, 2005 – 2:35 pm
Playbill Online November 18, 2005 GrooveLily’s Cult-Hit Striking 12 Musical Celebrates Holidays in NYC Dec. 3-23 by Kenneth Jones The Manhattan performance space Ars Nova will present a limited December engagement of the holiday-themed musical Striking 12, by [Brendan Milburn, Valerie Vigoda] and Tony Award winning librettist Rachel Sheinkin. Seen recently in engagements around the [...]
Baltimore City Paper March 24, 2005 Critic’s Pick by Bret McCabe You might wonder how a violin, keyboard, and drums outfit could be called a “power trio.” Those two words conjure fried, oomph-ful rushes of Cream, Blue Cheer, et al., not pop-inflected fun fronted by a classically trained violinist. But New Yorkfs GrooveLily pushes its [...]
Playbill Online March 22, 2005 Live Cast Album of GrooveLily’s Musical, ‘Striking 12′ by Kenneth Jones The live cast album of Striking 12, the new Hans Christian Andersen-inspired musical by the pop group GrooveLily, hits the streets March 22 following an earlier web release. The score was preserved by the PS Classics label, which made [...]
February 14, 2005 – 2:30 pm
Music Connection Magazine February 14, 2005 CD review of “Are we there yet?” A seasoned pop trio led by vocalist/violinist Valerie Vigoda shows excellent chops, owing to jazz experience. The band’s “Live Through This…” exudes a buoyant optimism floating on Vigoda’s sun-drenched voice. On “No Room…” Brendan Milburn’s lead vocal shows a kinship to Michael [...]
December 27, 2004 – 2:29 pm
Variety December 27, 2004 Legit NOISES OFF by Robert Hofler Can they take heat? NEW YORK — IS THERE LIFE BEYOND Dec. 25? In the world of legit, “Xmas” has a way of turning into a four-letter word come the New Year. For example, “White Christmas” would appear to have everything going for a Broadway [...]
December 26, 2004 – 2:28 pm
San Francisco Chronicle December 26, 2004 Critics Choices 2004 By Robert Hurwitt, Chronicle Theater Critic HIGH “The Black Rider: The Casting of the Magic Bullets.” Flawlessly performed and luminously designed, the mesmerizing blend of Tom Waits’ richly eclectic songs, William S. Burroughs’ hipster-huckster text and Robert Wilson’s astonishing stagings was a gift of enormous artistic [...]