Music director from Arlington Heights on Broadway this holiday
Broadway doesn't really take a Christmas break, so neither does music director and conductor James Moore, a native of Arlington Heights.
Instead of celebrating in the suburbs with family, Moore will be working - directing and conducting one of 2014's biggest hit musicals, a revival of Leonard Bernstein's "On the Town" at New York's Lyric Theatre.
The job is much more than just conducting one of Broadway's largest orchestras for eight shows per week. Moore helps the director and choreographer cast the show, making sure the actors' voices meet their musical needs, and then trains and maintains the orchestra.
There's all sorts of other related work, too - like coming up with an "On the Town" performance for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and doing a cast recording of the show, which will be available on iTunes and Amazon in January.
"(The job) is pretty all-encompassing. 'On the Town' is done on a very big-budget, full-scale way, which is getting rarer," Moore said. "Working on Broadway, it never gets old. I love it. You look in the audience and people come from all over the world to see a Broadway show. It's pretty amazing."
Moore's come a long way from his days as a Daily Herald paperboy, delivering to Arlington Heights' Scarsdale neighborhood ("I had to collect the money, too," he laughs), and playing in Arlington High School's bands.
Moore started piano lessons at age 5, and his parents took him downtown to see shows like "Hello Dolly!" with Pearl Bailey and the original tours of "Evita," "Annie" and "A Chorus Line" at what was then known as the Shubert Theatre (it's now the Bank of America Theatre).
"I was bitten by the theater bug early. I always knew from a young age that it's what I wanted to do," he said.
He was so into music, in fact, that little else about high school mattered to him.
"I hated studying anything else. All I wanted to do was be in the band and be in the choir. In high school, I played the trombone only so I could be in the marching band," he said.
Moore went on to earn bachelor's and master's degrees in music from Indiana University's Jacobs School of Music, which he said prepared him well for the difficult and competitive music world that awaited.
After college, he returned to Chicago and found work on some small productions, but fate intervened when he accompanied an actor friend to an audition in New York.
During the audition, Moore helped out by playing piano, which drew the attention of the show's music director.
The man encouraged Moore to move to New York and work as an assistant music director. He did.
"I was in the right place at the right time," Moore said.
He starting working on small shows and then Broadway shows, including the original production of "Ragtime."
"Then it slowly, gradually became me being the boss," he said.
Moore's resume is now packed with highly acclaimed and star-studded shows for which he's been the musical director and conductor, including "The Producers" with Martin Short and Jason Alexander, "Follies" with Bernadette Peters, and "Pirates of Penzance" with Kevin Kline and Glenn Close.
He's now squeezing in rehearsals with the orchestra for "Gigi" starring Vanessa Hudgens, which will be performed next month at the Kennedy Center in Washington.
He even signed on to do a few weeks of outdoor concerts in July at The Muny in St. Louis.
"I'm away from home a lot, which, for me, seems very normal," said Moore, who's lived in New York since 1993. "But I love my job."
- Jamie Sotonoff
Dann Gire and Jamie Sotonoff are always looking for suburban people now working in showbiz. If you know of someone who would make an interesting feature, email them at dgire@dailyherald.com or jsotonoff@dailyherald.com.
Moore's Christmas music musts
• “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas,“ from “Meet Me in St. Louis,” sung by Judy Garland
• “We Need a Little Christmas,” from “Mame”
• Every song on the Vince Guaraldi Trio's “A Charlie Brown Christmas” album