Piano man Michael McAssey hosts Piano Bar Live! tonight, Tuesday, June 9th at 7:15 pm ET, following New York City’s 7 O’Clock Cheer. This week’s guests will be Luba Mason, Phyllis Pastore, Nina Gabianelli, Bob Diamond, Bob Egan, Jovan E’Sean and a weekly mystery guest!
This week’s guests include performers who were originally scheduled for our June 2nd show which was postponed in solidarity with our industry for Blackout Tuesday.
PBL! is the 2020 MAC (Manhattan Association of Cabarets) Award winner for Show of the Year “for excellence in getting the word out about Cabaret and Piano Bar” through live-streams from The Duplex Cabaret and Piano Bar and Brandy’s Piano Bar in 2019.
Join us this TUESDAY www.facebook.com/PianoBarLive Take a break from your busy day and let’s have some fun! …because the Piano Bar is that special place where we can gather, entertain, support and create as we connect with live music.
Luba Mason is a classically trained singer, pianist and actor. On Broadway she appeared (until lockdown) in Girl From The North Country as Mrs. Burke. She has also appeared in Chicago (Velma Kelly), Jekyll & Hyde (Lucy), Paul Simon’s The Capeman (Mrs. Kresinsky), How To Succeed in Business (1st Revival as Hedy LaRue), Sunset Blvd., The Will Rogers Follies and played opposite legendary comedian Sid Caesar in Sid Caesar & Co. Mason is the recipient of the 2019 Bistro Award as Outstanding Vocalist, a 2019 Lucille Lortel nominee for her featured role in GFTNC and a 2015 Drama Desk and Lucille Lortel nominee for the Off Broadway hit PRETTY FILTHY. She has many television credits and is also a recording artist, set to release her 4th solo album later this year. Mason has performed in major music venues in the US as well as in the Bratislava, Costa Rican and Panama Jazz Festivals. She is a graduate from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts (Drama) and Circle In The Square Theater School. www.lubamason.com
Phyllis Pastore has been a staple on the New York cabaret scene since arriving in New York in 1988. A Bistro Award winner and MAC Award nominee, Pastore has appeared at Don’t Tell Mama, 88’s Cabaret & Piano Bar, Upstairs at the Downstairs and One If By Land, Two If By Sea, among others. She was the first cabaret performer to be invited to sing at Ireland’s Wexford Opera Festival fringe and has been seen on stages in St. Thomas, London, Hamburg, Frankfurt and Munich, sharing stages with legends such as Barbara Cook, Michael Feinstein, Steve Ross and Petula Clark. In 1993, Pastore began an association with Montparnasse cabaret/piano bar called Montparnasse, in the Greek island of Mykonos, which continues to this day. In recent years, Pastore has been the lead singer with the JT Wildman Jazz Band, an eight-piece Dixieland ensemble performing at Superfine in the Dumbo area of Brooklyn. She has also ventured into songwriting and is currently working on a showcase featuring her original compositions.
Nina Gabianelli’s interest in the cabaret world began over 25 years ago when she attended the Eugene O’Neill Cabaret Symposium. She spent the next five years performing in solo and group shows in the NYC cabaret circuit, before escaping to Aspen. In Aspen, Gabianelli has performed with Theatre Aspen, Thunder River Theatre Company and at the Crystal Palace Theatre Restaurant. It was there that Nina and Michael McAssey worked together for several years. Her most recent show at Don’t Tell Mama’s was a sold-out success. Prior to the pandemic lockdown, Gambianelli was planning to bring her new show Polka Dots and Moonbeams to NYC this spring, a project now on hold.
Bob Diamond, born in Great Falls, Montana, moved to Seattle in his early teens where he started acting at The Bellevue Playbarn. Upon graduating from the University of Washington as a TV Production major, he spent two and a half years in the Army teaching enlisted men Psychological Warfare. After his discharge, Diamond moved to New York and started directing television for WOR-TV. He directed “The Joe Franklin Show” for thirty-five years, among others. He was Director of Supernumeraries and Children at the Metropolitan Opera and also acted in “All My Children” and “Days of Our Lives” as well as acting in many theater productions. Diamond created his first cabaret show in the late 1980s at Danny’s Skylight Room with the late Dean X. Johnson as his musical director. He was a MAC Nominee in 2013, 2017 and 2020, winning the MAC Award for Best Male Vocalist in both 2017 and 2020. His love of cabaret started with being in the company of John Wallowitch and Margaret Whiting and also being in love with Blossom Dearie. He is a member of SAG/AFTRA, AEA, DGA and is. on the Board of Directors of MAC.
For over forty years Bob Egan has appeared at restaurants, cabarets and events in PA, NJ, Atlantic City and NYC. He is an accomplished accompanist, musical director, cabaret and show producer—and was the producer and founder of the famed “Cabaret at Odette’s” in New Hope, PA for it’s entire 21-year run.
Jovan E’Sean has appeared Off-Broadway in Anything Can Happen in the Theater: The Musical World of Maury Yeston (York Theater Company) and The Secret Life of Bees (Atlantic Theatre Company). He is a recent graduate of Pace University’s BFA Musical Theatre Program.
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