Barry Manilow

Barry and Bruce got their first big break with a musical titled Jump Shout Boogie. They couldn't believe it when Jump Shout Boogie got rave reviews. The musical was about the swing era and two young kids who just loved to dance. They were even more shocked when Jump Shout Boogie got nominated for a bunch of Tony's. Then on Sunday June 17th the day of the Tony awards. Barry and Bruce couldn't believe their ears when Liza Minnelli announced Jump Shout Boogie won best Broadway musical. All Barry could say was he was freaking out. Bruce was no better with  his oh thanks speech. After that Barry and Bruce had a string of hits and misses. Then  Bruce introduced Barry to friend another songwriter named Jack Feldman. Then together in 1994 they wrote a musical based on the 1940's. They called their musical Copacabana after the famous nightclub in New York City. The musical dealt with aspiring Broadway songwriter  Anthony Stern (Tony Starr) and aspiring Broadway actress Luella Higgins (Lola Lamar). Plus Sam Silver the owner of the Copa. Rico Castilli the owner of the Tropicana nightclub in Havana Cuba. Actually Tony Starr was a guy named Stephen Goldberg who was a Broadway songwriter. Stephen was the one who came up with idea for Copacabana. He also imagined his wife Samantha as Lola Lamar, his father-in-law as Sam Silver and his mother-in-law as Gladys Roberts the cigarette girl. The very next year in 1994 their musical went to London's West End. It finally ended up on Broadway in the fall of 2001. Copa was nominated for a bunch of Tony's.in 2002 best book, costume, choreography, director, musical,  musical score, producer, set design. When Copacabana swept the Tony awards by winning all the ones they were nominated for Barry and Bruce again couldn't believe their eyes. At least this time they were prepared with acceptance speeches. In 1984 Barry wrote some jazz songs. He did so with his songwriting partners Adrienne Anderson, Enoch Anderson, Jack Feldman, Marty Panzer and Bruce Sussman. At first they thought about turning it into a musical about a jazz club called the Paradise Café. But tit didn't appeal to them.  So Barry decided to record it as a jazz album which he did. He titled it 2:00 AM Paradise Café and the album shot straight to number one on Billboard's Hot 200 album and jazz charts. For the album he gathered some jazz greats like Mel Torme, Sarah Vaughan and Gerry Mulligan. He also did a VHS tape of the making of the album. Barry decided to do a small tour to promote the album. So he put together a band. He added Mark Scholl on drums, Vanessa Brown percussion,  Larry Antonio on bass, John Pondel on guitar, Joey Malotti on keyboards, Billy Kidd on keyboards,  Dana Robbins on saxophone, Brian Claxton on horns and Doug Fender on trombone. Everyone but Mark, Brian and Doug sang backup. For this tour Barry and company would hit the jazz clubs. He was kicking off the tour  at the Manchester Craftsman Guild in Pittsburgh. This show was sold out within twenty minutes of the tickets going on sale. Because of that he added a second show at the guild which sold out in the same twenty minutes.