Ann Hampton Callaway to Perform with Grand Rapids Symphony 1/15-1/17

Ann Hampton Callaway will perform songs from the Great American Song Book accompanied by the Grand Rapids Symphony on Friday January 15 to 17.

Guest conductor Steven Reineke, who is in his first season as conductor of the New York Pops, will lead the Grand Rapids Symphony orchesta. Reineke has previously worked with Callaway on two other occassions, including the 100th anniversary tribute concert to Johny Mercer last November in New York City. Of Callaway, Reineke says in a story in the Michigan Local News, "She has more talent in her little finger than most people ever will have in their whole life time."

The concert will feature songs from the masters such as George and Ira Gershwin; classics that Callaways is all too-familiar with, "Gershwin's songs were the music I grew up singing most around the piano at home. They're so quintessential American in spirit," she says.

To read the rest of the story in the Michigan Local News, click here.

The concert wil be held Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m.; 3 p.m. Sunday, at DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW

Tickets: $18-$90, DeVos Place box office, Ticketmaster outlets, (800) 982-2787, ticketmaster.com

As a champion of the great American Songbook, Ann Hampton Callaway has made her mark as a singer, pianist, composer, lyricist, arranger, actress, educator, TV host and producer. Her unique singing style blends jazz and traditional pop, making her a mainstay in concert halls, theaters and jazz clubs as well as in the recording studio, on television, and in film. Ms. Callaway is best known for her Tony-nominated performance in the hit Broadway musical Swing! and for writing and singing the theme song to the hit TV series The Nanny. Callaway is a Platinum Award winning writer whose songs are featured on five of Barbra Streisand's recent CD's. Ms. Callaway has been a special guest performer with Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, with Keith Lockhart and the Boston Pops at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood and is featured at many of the Carnegie Hall tributes. She has sung with more than twenty-five of the world's top orchestras and big bands, and has performed for President Clinton in Washington, D.C. and at President Gorbachev's Youth Peace Summit in Moscow. A versatile performer, she has also begun work on a new PBS-TV variety show "Singers Spotlight with Ann Hampton Callaway" that recently aired in Chicago with special guests Liza Minnelli and 2007 Tony Award winner Christine Ebersole.