Piano man Michael McAssey hosts Piano Bar Live! Tonight, Tuesday, June 16th at 7:15 pm ET, following New York City’s 7 O’Clock Cheer. This week’s guests will be Sal Viviano, Liz Larsen, Phyllis Pastore, Mark Hartman, Beckie Menzie, Yvette Monique Clark and our weekly mystery guest!
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, June 16 at www.facebook.com/PianoBarLive or on PBL!’s new streaming outlet, BroadwayOnDemand.com.
The Piano Bar is that special place where we can gather, entertain, support and create as we connect with live music.
Sal Viviano has sung over 500 Pops Concerts with nearly 200 Symphony Orchestras at concert halls around the world. A Detroit native, Viviano began his career in Chicago as a teenager, opening for many comedy greats of the last generation in clubs throughout the Midwest. After graduation from Eastern Illinois University, Viviano taught high school entertained at Wisconsin’s Nippersink Manor Resort during the summer and also pursuing acting and singing in Chicago. He made his Broadway debut in 1984 in The Three Musketeers and went on to star in Broadway musicals City of Angels, Falsettos, Chicago and The Full Monty, among others, as well as Off-Broadway’s Closer Than Ever, Beau Jest Golf, The Musical and more, winning awards for many of his performances on these stages. He’s also a veteran of many tours and has done extensive film and TV work. Viviano’s CDs number over 70 with his newest titled, Frank, A Century of Sinatra.
Liz Larsen (who’s married to Sal Viviano) recently originated and played the role of Carole King’s mother, Genie Stein, in Beautiful on Broadway. Larsen’s many Broadway credits include Hairspray, Fiddler on the Roof, A Little Night Music and The Most Happy Fella, for which she received the TONY, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle Award nominations, and the Los Angeles Dramalogue Award for Best Featured Actress. Off-Broadway credits include A New Brain, Loman Family Picnic and many more. On tour and in regional theater Larsen has co-starred in Blues in the Night, Annie, Evita, Sunday in the Park with George, Sweeney Todd, Baby and more too numerous to mention. Her credits also include many film and television roles as well as solo performances worldwide with symphonic pops orchestras and many recording ventures.
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.
Mark Hartman is a New York-based pianist, coach, conductor, arranger and composer working in theater, cabaret and concerts around the world. He was the Associate Conductor of Sondheim On Sondheim and Avenue Q on Broadway. He has many Off-Broadway, regional, and national tours to his cedit. In cabaret, Hartman has appeared as a music director, pianist and arranger at Café Carlyle, Birdland, Feinstein’s 54 Below and The Nikko, Eighty-Eight’s, and many others. Piano bar appearances include New York City (all of them) as well as internationally. He is the recipient of two MAC Awards and the Backstage Bistro Award for Music Direction.
Beckie Menzie has appeared at Carnegie Hall, Jazz At Lincoln Center, Chicago’s Auditorium Theatre and Park West, as well as at concert halls, art series and with symphonies across the country. Hailed by Chicago’s WGN Radio as “indispensible to Chicago cabaret,” Menzie serves as an MD for Michael Feinstein’s Songbook Academy. She performs regularly with Tom Michael, as well as the trio, Girls Like Us. Menzie is the co-host for Monday Night Live at Petterinos and is an award-winning songwriter who coaches both Chicago’s young musical talent and national cabaret artists.
Yvette Monique Clark has performed on stages regionally, nationally and internationally. She’s been fortunate to perform iconic roles such as Nell (Ain’t Misbehavin’), BJ (Smokey Joe’s Cafe) and Mama Morton (Chicago). In the Fall of 2019, she performed her first NYC cabaret, Let’s Give ‘Em Something to Talk About at the Duplex to two sold-out audiences. Clark has performed in the piano bar world via Kenney M. Green, who brought her to Marie’s Crisis Cafe; a few years later she became a singing server and says, “the rest is history.”
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