Singer-composer-actress Dawn Derow is an award-winning performer whose much-lauded solo cabaret production, My Ship: Songs from 1941, has now been captured in a hot-off-the-press CD (Zoho Music Label ). Originally from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, Derow is a graduate of the Boston Conservatory of Music, whereupon she began performing in operas and musicals around the world. She began to pursue a Cabaret career about a dozen years ago, appearing in venues that include the Weill Center at Carnegie Hall, Birdland Jazz Club, the Bitter End, The Cutting 
Room and more. Derow won her first MAC Award for the duo show Revolution in 2015 and has gone on to win more MACS, including for My Ship. Her most recent show, The House That Built Me, at the Laurie Beechman Theater, would have been followed by Gypsy In My Soul: The Songs of Eydie Gorme, but was delayed due to COVID-19. To celebrate My Ship‘s CD release, Dawn is performing the show this Saturday, at the Green Room 42 at 7 PM (see ticket link below).
NiteLife Exchange (NLE) asks Dawn Derow (DD) Six Questions:
NLE: What was your inspiration for creating the show My Ship: Songs From 1941?
DD: It started back in 2017. I was already obsessed with Anita O’Day’s version of the song “My Ship” from her 1975 album. At the time, I was working closely with the late Music Director Barry Levitt on the American Songbook and Jazz Standards. I had been asked to present a show for that June’s Provincetown Cabaret Festival and the theme was 1940s: A Sentimental Journey. “My Ship” was written in 1941 for the Kurt Weill/Ira Gershwin Broadway show Lady In the Dark. Barry and I started looking for other songs written that year and there were tons of great ones—some classics. I brought on the terrific Jeff Harnar as director and suddenly, My Ship: Songs From 1941 was setting sail.
NLE: Did you know at its inception that you’d eventually record a CD of the show’s music, or did that become a reality after the fact?
DD: At the start, I didn’t know where the show would take us. I was just happy that it was a success on many levels, that people loved it, and that myself and my “crew” had a blast taking the journey each time we performed it. It wasn’t until after I won the MAC Award in 2018 for “Best Female Vocalist” that I thought this is something we ought to preserve.
NLE: You have a remarkably flexible vocal instrument and your original career intention was to pursue opera. At what point did that goal change for you and why?
DD: I graduated from The Boston Conservatory, where I mainly studied Opera and Vocal Performance. I only performed in operas another year before I gave it up. I just realized that there were too many other styles of music I was drawn to—and always had been since I was a child—that I really couldn’t see myself only doing Opera. It’s so challenging and I knew I would have had to eat, breathe and sleep that genre. But I don’t regret those years of my focus and determination to craft that technique that still serves me well today.
After I moved to New York City in 2000, I began pursuing Broadway musical theater auditions but with no success on that end. I did get hired for some very unique, interesting, and enjoyable projects on cruise ships. They paid well, I got to see the world, and use my full vocal range and dancing ability on some of them. Then in 2008 I got into cabaret and started creating my own performance opportunities.
NLE: Who are those that have been your greatest mentors and/or inspirations along the path of your journey as a performer?
I’d have to start with the late Nancy Fadely. Growing up on Cape Cod, she was one of the most popular piano teachers and music directors in the theater community for decades. She passed away hours after playing for a production of Guys & Dolls in 2005. I wasn’t in that, but I sang at her funeral. Nancy was not only my first Music Director and piano teacher when I was a little girl, but also was married to my grandfather for a couple years. Then when I was in my late teens, we teamed up to do concerts. Those concerts we did together laid the groundwork of who I am today as a cabaret artist.
Of course, the late Maestro Barry Levitt was a huge inspiration and mentor. I only got to work with him for three years, but some of the tools and tips he imparted will last a lifetime. He opened me up to jazz and the Great American Songbook standards. The September 19, 2017, night we were opening My Ship at The Laurie Beechman Theatre, we had just finished our sound check when disaster struck like the Titanic hitting an iceberg. Barry collapsed before the show started and two days later he was gone due to heart failure.
When we re-launched the show, I was extremely lucky to bring on Ian Herman as Music Director. Ian has now music directed two of my shows, the most recent being Gypsy in My Soul: The Music of Eydie Gormé, which barely got off the ground due to the Covid pandemic. Ian has become a dear friend and mentor. He keeps me honest, classy and true to the music. He’s an amazing musician and if you just listen to his playing on the album you’ll see what I mean.
NLE: You’ve recently moved from New York to Florida. How do you see that change affecting your career path?
DD: I certainly hope it won’t affect it too much. I have been back and forth to New York almost every month. I also hope that with the productions I have created thus far that they will be booked elsewhere around the country in various venues. Now that the album is out, and we have the show in NYC this weekend (January 15 at The Green Room 42 at 7 pm, with Covid restrictions in place), I will focus more on networking in Florida and wherever else I can sing.
NLE: What is next for you? What are your goals and aspirations for the future?
DD: Well, there’s this little thing called a wedding in late May when I’ll marry John Williams. So that’s been a big focus right now. My manager, Stephen Hanks, and I plan to take the next six months and book my various shows into as many venues as possible. Naturally, we’re hoping the pandemic has greatly subsided by then. There’s certainly no shortage of creative ideas I have and wish to cultivate. Now that I live in North Palm Beach, it’s a little like starting over in that most of the venues will be new to me. I will miss the familiarity of walking into Don’t Tell Mamas, Birdland, or the West Bank Cafe to sing at the piano. That’s why I’m so excited to do My Ship at the Green Room 42. I have sung there before but never one of my own full shows. Of course there are venues in Provincetown that I have a close connection to and I will be back there to sing in the summer. But until then, it’s all new territory for me. It’s a little scary but I’ve been ready for a while to branch out beyond the Big Apple. I miss you, NYC. I miss my community too, I just hope they come to see me when I’m in town.
For tickets to Dawn Derow’s My Ship: Songs From 1941 at The Green Room 42, go to: https://thegreenroom42.venuetix.com/
For more about My Ship the CD, click here.
Listen to Dawn Derow with “At Last” from My Ship.
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