Blake Allen
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Blake Allen | |
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| Born | July 21, 1988 Tucson, Arizona, U.S. |
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| Website | www |
Blake Liahona Allen, PhD (born 1988) is an American composer and viola player who is most known for writing INSOMINA,[1] which debuted at Carnegie Hall,[2] the shards of an honor code junkie,[3] music directing the 2019 revival of Over Here!,[4] writing the theme song for the talk show Doris Dear's Gurl Talk,[5] and appearing on Shade: Queens of NYC.
Early life and education
[edit]Allen was born Blake Liahona Allen in Tucson, Arizona on July 21, 1988, the fourth of the four children of Marsha Allen (née Wilcox), a piano pedagogue, and San Allen, an engineer and Chief operating officer for Winchester Electronics. Shortly after Allen's birth, his family moved to St. Petersburg, Florida. Allen was born with spherocytosis and had his spleen removed when he was four at St. Petersburg General Hospital. Allen's family then moved to Gainesville, Florida and ultimately El Paso, Texas, where Allen spent most of his formative years.[6] Allen grew up a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and was in the viola sections of both the El Paso Symphony Orchestra and Las Cruces Symphony while attending Franklin High School.[7]
Allen attended Brigham Young University where he studied viola performance under Dr. Claudine Bigelow and worked at the Primrose International Viola Archive in special collections. As a sophomore, Allen's friend Alan Taylor committed suicide, which led to the creation of his musical the shards of an honor code junkie,[8] starring Tony Awards nominated actress Alison Fraser, Teal Wicks, Kristy Cates, Hannah Cruz, and Michael Lowney. [9] BYU is where Allen also met lifelong friend, and frequent collaborator, Christopher Koelzer (pianist), who has premiered several of Allen's works as well as being featured on INSOMNIA, Sonatas, the shards of an honor code junkie, of which Koelzer is also a character.
Allen also attended CCM in 2010–2011 and graduated with his Masters in Music, Masters in Philosophy, and Philosophy Doctorate from New York University where he studied viola with Stephanie Baer, composition with Joseph Church, and songwriting with Billy Seidman and Alex Forbes. Allen's dissertation created the singular reductive analysis of György Ligeti's "Viola Sonata" using fractal geometry and linguistic stress analysis. Using an NYU research award and travel grant, Allen spent the winter of 2024 in Budapest, Hungary where he studied the ethnomusicological discoveries of Béla Bartók in order to gain an understanding of how these discoveries affected Ligeti's work.[10]
Early Career
[edit]As a performer, Allen has performed with the New York Pops, Little Orchestra, on Broadway in Notre Dame de Paris (musical), Tootsie (musical), and Misery (play), recordings for Philip Glass, and many Off-Broadway productions including several shows and scores by Michael Friedman, Dave Malloy's Drama Desk nominated Beardo, and Marisa Michelson's Tamar of the River.[11] Allen was Tony Award Winner, and Grammy and Emmy Nominee Rob Fisher's music assistant from 2012 til 2022.
Allen was one of nine composers[12] and lyricists[13] involved with the Off-Broadway musical Folk Wandering,[14] which premiered in March 2018.[15]
In 2019, Allen won the 2019 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Award for Best Recurring Series for his "An Evening With... Series"[16] as well as the award for Best Special Event (Solo) for Marti Gould Cummings's Marti & The Cummers while also being nominated for Best Musical Director and Best Independent Album, for his An Evening With..., Vol. 1[17] That same year, Allen also won the 2019 GLAM Award for Best Cabaret for his work with Tina Burner on Witch Perfect[18] at Alan Cumming's Club Cumming along with fellow performers Bootsie Lefaris and Tammy Spenks.[19] In 2020, Allen won Best Arrangement of the Decade for Mack the Knife[20] and was nominated for My Funny Valentine, Best Musical Director, and Best Recurring Series for An Evening With... Series.[21] Allen also performed, to rave reviews, at Birdland with Lortel and Drama Desk Award winner Kuhoo Verma[22] in early 2020.[23]
Allen produced, music directed, and orchestrated the 2019 Off-Broadway, and first ever, revival of Over Here! at the Triad Theatre with Will Nunziata directing.[24] Smashing box office records at the Triad Theatre, the show starred Tony Award Winner Debbie Gravitte, Jessica Hendy, Haley Swindal, and Nikka Graff Lanzarone.[25] The revival was nominated for four BroadwayWorld Awards including Best Special Event and Best Musical Director, for Allen.
Allen also wrote a one-act play, Kelly [1955] based upon the Kelly-Hopkinsville Encounter, which premiered at the Hudson Guild Theatre in March 2019 and also starred Jessica Hendy.[26] The score was also featured on Allen's Sonatas.
In 2020, Allen was an artist in residence at the Kimmel Nelson Harding Center for the Arts in Nebraska City, Nebraska,[27] after which Allen released his album Sonatas[28] on Earth Day 2020. The album features music which premiered at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The album debuted at #1 on the iTunes Classical Chart, where it stayed for two weeks, and debuted at #4 on the Billboard charts Classical, where it stayed in the top 10 for two weeks.[29] The album was recorded in one, 12-hour session, along with Allen's other album, "An Evening With...vol. 1", at Moon Recording, in Brooklyn, NYC in 2019.
At the height of the 2020 Pandemic, Allen wrote Livin' the Dreamboat with lyricist Claire Tran for the Astoria Performing Arts Center in Astoria, Queens.[30] The show premiered on YouTube and was one of the first theatrical shows to be written and presented virtually, in its entirety, as a result of the pandemic.[31] Also in 2020, Allen wrote the theme song and incidental music to Doris Dear's Gurl Talk, a weekly lifestyle show on Broadway on Demand. Allen was also the music director for the Doris Dear Christmas Special, which featured Tony Nominee Karen Mason, Amra-Faye Wright, and more.[32] For the special, Allen wrote "At Least It's Winter", a postcard song about NYC at Christmastime during the pandemic. The song was performed by Allen and Kristina Nicole Miller.
Allen's INSOMNIA was developed for Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall and had its premiere performance November 8, 2022.[33] The piece was written and performed by Jeanna de Waal, Cree Carrico, Argus Quartet, and Christopher Koelzer. The album was released on No Reverse Records in 2024 featuring the Carnegie Hall cast. [34]
Allen wrote Farmyard Follies with Christopher Seeber (Tina Burner). The show debuted in 2023 in Provincetown at the Crown & Anchor and was filmed for a forthcoming documentary feature.[35] The show had been in development for three years before its debut. Allen and Seeber collaborated for several years on cabaret shows, including releasing two full-length albums and the Christmas single "I'd Rather Be Naughty Than Nice". Allen and Seeber were nominated for a 2021 MAC Award for Best Recording (LaMott Friedman Award) for their album and tour Maybe This Time.[36] They collaborated for seven years on the international hit Witch Perfect based upon Disney's Hocus Pocus (1993 film) including winning the 2020 GLAM Award for Best Cabaret.[37] The two parted ways as full-time collaborators at the end of 2023.
Shortly after Allen received his PhD from NYU in spring of 2024, Allen began to work with librettist Will Nunziata on an operatic adaption of Virginia Woolf's 1931 novel The Waves. [38]
the shards of an honor code junkie
[edit]After the sold-out world premiere of shards in 2017 as a benefit concert for The Trevor Project, Allen's classical-crossover score was picked up by No Reverse Records to be released in July 2021 as a storybook album.[39] The record is being produced by Ashley Kate Adams of AKA Studio Productions and Mitchell Walker, with mixing by Grammy-nomninated sound engineer Daniel Alba, mixing by Grammy-winner Alex Venguer, and mastering by Grammy-winner Oscar Zambrano. Conducted by Allen, with Zi Alikhan as the script consultant, the album is slated to feature, in returns to their roles, Alison Fraser, Teal Wicks, Kristy Cates, Brita Filter, Hannah Cruz, Cree Carrico, Tori Scott, and Michael Lowney with Kuhoo Verma, J. Harrison Ghee, Josh Daniel, Ron Tal, and Isaac Phaman Reynolds rounding out the cast. The album was recorded in December 2020 and January 2021 at Atomic Studios in Brooklyn as well as Second Story Sound in Manhattan.
shards was also performed at 54 Below in 2016, along with Allen's other pieces Boston|Nebraska (based on Willa Cather's "A Wagner Matinee") and HOCKET, a gay-fantasia on hard drugs. shards had its Actors' Equity Association, 29-hour reading in 2015 featuring Cates, Josh Tolle, and Ephie Aardema in the lead roles. Both versions were produced by Isaac Dayley. shards was developed in part at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity as part of a 2014 residency.
Characters and Cast Lists
[edit]| Character(s) | New York AEA Reading (2015) | 54 Below Concert (2016)[40] | Off-Broadway (2017) | Album (2021) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boy | Josh Tolle | Josh Daniel | Michael Lowney | |
| Girl | — | Teal Wicks | ||
| Woman | Kristy Cates | Kerry Conte | Laura Shoop | Kristy Cates |
| Man | Joseph C. Bellino | — | Kenyon Phillips | J. Harrison Ghee |
| Little Girl | Ephie Aardema | Hannah Cruz | ||
| Angel | — | — | Cree Carrico | |
| Madame Fontaine von Redgrave | — | — | Alison Fraser | |
| It Is Me | Christine de Frece | Tori Scott | ||
| Lost Child of God 1 | CJ Palikowski (as LB1) | Kylan Ross | James Crichton (as LB1) | Ron Tal |
| Lost Child of God 2 | Pierce Cassedy (as LB2) | Giovanni Bonneventura | Andre Jordan (as LB2) | Josh Daniel |
| Lost Child of God 3 | Jeremy Greenbaum (as LB3) | Tim Hein | Isaac Phaman Reynolds | |
| Lost Child of God 4 | — | — | Hannah Cruz (as LB4) | Kuhoo Verma |
| Starr Lyte | — | — | Brita Filter | |
| The Light | — | — | Virginia Preston | — |
Shade: Queens of NYC
[edit]Allen joined the cast of Shade: Queens of NYC at its inception in October 2017, as Blake Allen, the then-spouse to Marti Gould Cummings. The series documents the daily reality of lives as Manhattan drag queens.[41] In the series, Allen also music directed, arranged, and performed in several episodes culminating in the album A Very Marti Holiday,[42] an album of Christmas music featuring Daphne Rubin-Vega,[43] Cady Huffman, and Lesli Margherita to raise money for The Ali Forney Center.[44]
Personal life
[edit]Allen moved to New York City in 2011 and married New York City Council candidate, and drag artist, Marti Gould Cummings in 2016. Together, they were politically active in their community of Hamilton Heights, Manhattan until their divorce in 2022.[45]
Television
[edit]| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Shade: Queens of NYC | Himself; music arranger | Supporting Role |
| 2018 | Mozart in the Jungle | Audition musician | |
| 2020 | Doris Dear Gurl Talk | Composer | |
| 2020 | The Doris Dear Christmas Special | Music director; composer | |
| 2021 | In the Know Dragged [46] | Himself; Emma Tallgal | |
| 2024 | Conversion | Composer | Album producer |
Theatre
[edit]| Year | Production | Role | Venue | Ref(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | the shards of an honor code junkie | Composer; Lyricist; Book Writer | Metro Baptist Church | [3] |
| 2018 | Folk Wandering | Composer; Lyricist; Musician | Pipeline Theatre Co. | [47] |
| 2019 | Kelly [1955] | Playwright; Composer | Hudson Guild Theatre | [26] |
| 2019 | Over Here! Revival | Music Director; Arranger | Triad Theatre | [48] |
| 2020 | Livin' the Dreamboat | Composer; Orchestrator | Astoria Performing Arts Center | [49] |
| 2022 | Insomnia | Composer; Lyricist | Weill Recital Hall | [50] |
| 2023 | Farmyard Follies | Composer; Lyricist; Book | Provincetown, MA | [51] |
Discography
[edit]| Title | Details | Peak chart positions | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Billboard Classical | Billboard Cast Album | iTunes Classical | iTunes Top 100 | iTunes Vocal | Amazon Classical | ||
| INSOMNIA |
|
3 | 1 | 99 | |||
| Conversion (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack |
|
||||||
| the shards of an honor code junkie |
|
12 | 2 | 78 | 1 | ||
| Tina Burner Maybe This Time |
|
2 | |||||
| One Thing Is For Certain (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) |
|
||||||
| Sonatas |
|
4[29] | 1 | 40 | |||
| An Evening With..., Vol. 1 |
|
||||||
| A Very Marti Holiday |
|
||||||
| "—" denotes releases that did not chart | |||||||
Awards and nominations
[edit]| Year | Award | Category | Work | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2006 | National String Orchestra Award | Won | |||
| 2019 | BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Recurring Series | An Evening With... | Won | [55] |
| BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Special Event - Solo | Marti at Lincoln Center | Won | ||
| BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Musical Director | An Evening With... | Nominated | ||
| BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Independent Album | An Evening With... Vol. 1 | Nominated | ||
| GLAM Awards | Best Cabaret | With Perfect | Won | [56] | |
| GLAM Awards | Best Cabaret | Marti at Lincoln Center | Nominated | ||
| 2020 | BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Arrangement | Mack the Knife | Won | [57] |
| BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Arrangement | My Funny Valentine | Nominated | ||
| BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Musical Director | Over Here!; An Evening With...; Witch Perfect | Nominated | ||
| BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Recurring Series | An Evening With... | Nominated | ||
| BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards | Best Special Event - Multiple | Over Here! | Nominated | ||
| 2021 | Telly Awards | Online Scripted Web Series | Doris Dear's Gurl Talk | Silver | [58] |
References
[edit]- ^ "Jeanna de Wall to Lead World Premiere of Insomnia".
- ^ "Insomnia Front Row Center". 10 November 2022.
- ^ a b "New Musical "Shards Of An Honor Code Junkie" Tackles Gay Mormons, Suicide". LOGO News.
- ^ Ridge, Richard. "OVER HERE! - Back with the Beat at The Triad". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ Mosher, Stephen. "BWW Review: DORIS DEAR'S GURL TALK Walks The Walk... In Six Inch Heels". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ "On Point With: Blake Allen". March 1, 2021.
- ^ "Blake Allen". IMDb.
- ^ Gans, Andrew (October 25, 2017). "Alison Fraser, Teal Wicks Set for New Musical That Shines Light on LGBTQ Suicide". Playbill.
- ^ BWW News Desk. "Blake Allen's THE SHARDS OF AN HONOR CODE JUNKIE Moves to Metro Baptist Church". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ "Toward a Musical Grammar: Text-Tune Relationships and Reductive Transformations in Ligeti's Sonate pour Viola". ProQuest.
- ^ "Meet the Music Team | Pipeline Theatre Company". 14 December 2016.
- ^ Clement, Olivia (March 2, 2018). "Watch the Cast of Folk Wandering Perform 2 Songs From the New Musical". Playbill.
- ^ "Pipeline Theatre Company's Folk Wandering Opens Off-Broadway | TheaterMania". www.theatermania.com.
- ^ Clement, Olivia (March 4, 2018). "Folk Wandering Musical Opens Off-Broadway". Playbill.
- ^ "Folk Wandering | Pipeline Theatre Company".
- ^ Matsuki, Sue. "Blake Allen's An Evening With...Series".
- ^ BWW News Desk. "Winners Announced For The 2019 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards!". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ Patrick, Bobby. "BWW Review: With WITCH PERFECT Club Cumming Shows Us Which Witch is Which for Halloween". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ "21st Annual GLAM Awards - The Art of Being Queer". TAOBQ. February 12, 2020.
- ^ "Winners Announced For The 2020 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards!". www.broadwayworld.com.
- ^ BWW News Desk. "Just 3 Weeks To Vote For The 2020 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards!". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ "Lucile Lortel Winners 2020".
- ^ "The Lineup with Susie Mosher". March 4, 2020.
- ^ "Conference Call: "Over Here!" at The Triad: Will Nunziata, Blake Allen, Debbie Gravitte, Jessica Hendy, and Haley Swindal". Call Me Adam.
- ^ Gans, Andrew (October 28, 2019). "Tony Winner Debbie Gravitte Joins Concert Presentation of Over Here!". Playbill.
- ^ a b podcasters, Omny Studio is the complete audio management solution for; Stations, Radio. "Bagels and Broadway 3-9-19 - Bagels and Broadway with Valerie Smaldone - Omny.fm". omny.fm.
- ^ "Blake Allen in Residency at KHN".
- ^ "Blake Allen Announces Release of SONATAS, KHN Center News".
- ^ a b "Traditional Classical Albums Chart". Billboard.
- ^ Kaye, Jacob (13 May 2020). "Astoria Performing Arts Center to debut six musicals about the COVID-19 crisis – QNS.com". qns.com.
- ^ "COVID-19 Themed Musical Shorts". www.ny1.com.
- ^ "Doris Dear's Gurl Talk Broadway Tickets : : Broadway Show : New York City : Schedules and Showtimes : Buy Your Tickets Now!". NYC.com.
- ^ "Interview for INSOMNIA featuring Jeanna de Waal and Blake Allen to play Carnegie Hall". 6 November 2022.
- ^ "Blake Allen's INSOMNIA to receive recording".
- ^ "Cock-A-Doodle-Doo Farmyard Follies Makes Its Debut in Provincetown". 21 September 2023.
- ^ "MAC AWard Nominee Maybe This Time".
- ^ "2020 Glam Award Winners List".
- ^ "New Blake Allen Will Nunziata The Waves in Development".
- ^ Mosher, Stephen. "BWW Interview: Ashley Kate Adams And Mitchell Walker of NO REVERSE RECORDS". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ "Music of Blake Allen at 54 Below"./
- ^ New Series Looks at the 'Hustle And Sacrifice' of NYC Drag Queens - "Shade: Queens of NYC" examines the less glitzy side of Manhattan's drag stars, 3 October 2017
- ^ "Gay Agenda, Nov. 3: Scissor Sisters' Ana Matronic & Jake Shears Go Solo, Plus Sam Smith, Kim Petras & More". Billboard.
- ^ Daphne Rubin Vega and more join Marti Gould Cummings, Playbill
- ^ TV, BroadwayWorld. "BWW Exclusive: Listen to Marti Gould Cummings & Daphne Rubin-Vega Duet on A VERY MARTI HOLIDAY Album!". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ Cut, the (June 8, 2020). "'The Next Thing I Remember, I'm on the Ground.'". The Cut.
- ^ Pellot, Emerald (January 19, 2021). "Marti Gould Cummings gives their husband a retro-inspired drag makeover". In The Know.
- ^ Collins-Hughes, Laura (March 5, 2018). "Review: 'Folk Wandering,' a Wistful Musical Full of Story and Searching". The New York Times.
- ^ "1974 Broadway 'Over Here' in Concert at The Triad Theater". Theater Pizzazz. November 12, 2019.
- ^ "Astoria Performing Arts Center | FOTV". www.fiveohm.tv.
- ^ Wiltbank, Michael (November 9, 2022). "See Jeanna de Waal, Cree Carrico, More Celebrate the World Premiere of Blake Allen's Insomnia". Playbill.
- ^ "Provincetown Magazine Farmyard Follies". 21 September 2023.
- ^ Tina Burner Releases Covers, BroadwayWorld
- ^ BWW News Desk. "Tennessee Waltz And More Featured On An Evening With... Series Debut Album!". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ B. W. W. Staff. "Just Two Weeks Left To Vote for the 2019 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards". BroadwayWorld.com.
- ^ "Winners Announced for 2019 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards".
- ^ "21st Annual GLAM Awards".
- ^ "Winners Announced for the 2020 BroadwayWorld Cabaret Awards". www.broadwayworld.com.
- ^ "Doris Dear's Gurl Talk Wins Silver Telly Award".