Audra McDonald performs songs from her new album and more on "Audra McDonald In Concert: Go Back Home," airing on PBS's Live From Lincoln Center tonight. The show presents McDonald's May 9 at performance in New York City for Lincoln Center's spring gala, which the New York Times called "absolutely thrilling." USA Today, in recommending tonight's show, says: "McDonald has one of the warmest, most glorious singing voices on the planet." McDonald discusses her inclusion of Adam Gwon's "I'll Be There" on the album and concert in a new video clip you can watch here.
Audra McDonald, whose first solo album in seven years, Go Back Home, was released on Nonesuch Records earlier this week, performs songs from the album and more on "Audra McDonald In Concert: Go Back Home," airing on PBS stations across the United States for the season finale of Live From Lincoln Center, starting tonight at 9 PM ET/PT (check local listings). The show presents McDonald's May 9 performance at Avery Fisher Hall in New York City for Lincoln Center's spring gala.
"Absolutely thrilling," raved the New York Times music critic Stephen Holden of the concert. "The very sound of the word 'thrilling,' with its suggestion of an embedded trill, evokes qualities inherent in Ms. McDonald’s soprano, which seemed to unfurl in ever-richer textures as she imbued songs with a sense of bursting possibility." McDonald, he concludes, is "a defining voice of our time."
"As usual, PBS is a great place for fans of good music to spend the TV portion of their Memorial Day weekend," says USA Today's Robert Bianco. "[T]hose who know McDonald only from Private Practice will find out what Broadway fans discovered many Tonys ago: McDonald has one of the warmest, most glorious singing voices on the planet."
Last fall, McDonald was named the official host of Live From Lincoln Center, adding a new chapter to her long history with the Lincoln Center campus, where she attended The Juilliard School and won her first Tony Award for her performance in Lincoln Center Theater’s production of Carousel.
Many of the selections on Go Back Home, as on the concert program, are by composers with whom McDonald has long been associated (Adam Guettel, Michael John LaChiusa, and Stephen Sondheim, among others), while some songs, including the Kander and Ebb title track, are by names that are relatively new to her repertoire.
In addition, Audra McDonald continues her tradition of championing works by an emerging generation of composers, represented by Adam Gwon, among others. She talks about her choice of Gwon's moving song "I'll Be There" for the album and what it means to her in a short video clip here:
Audra McDonald recently spoke with BroadwayWorld for an "InDepth InterView" Q&A about the new album, the PBS special, and more, available now at broadwayworld.com.
To pick up a copy of Go Back Home, head to the Nonesuch Store, where CD orders include a download of the complete album at checkout. You can hear the album track "Some Days," with music by Steven Marzullo and text by James Baldwin, here:
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