Audra McDonald: Greatest Performances

In our run-up to the 2024 Tonys, we look at Broadway 50 years ago: Raisin, Seesaw, Over Here! plus performances by Christopher Plummer, Michelle Lee, Alfred Drake, Lewis J. Stadlen and more.

Since Stephen Sondheim's passing in 2021, there have been several exciting revivals and revitalizations; here are a few: Merrily We Roll Along, Here We Are, Into the Woods, Melissa Errico, Liz Callaway and more.

To tee up the "Rodgers and Hammerstein 80th Anniversary Concert" on Great Performances l PBS on May 31st, I've selected some of my favorite things: performances by Sinatra, Johnny Mathis, Nina Simone, Ray Charles and a surrey full of others.

In preparation for the PBS/Great Performances concert of Audra McDonald from the London Palladium (May 17), we play some of her finest moments from across her storied career: rarities and Tony-winners.

We're kicking off WLIW's "Broadway and Beyond" television/radio programming with a special episode of Game Changers and Groundbreakers: Show Boat, Pal Joey, Company, The Producers, Hamilton, and more.

In classic American musicals, there's usually a supporting--other--couple. Here's a tribute to Nathan and Adelaide, Ado Annie and Will Parker, Fraulein Schneider and Herr Schultz, and many more.

We travel the world for great international performers singing show tunes--Maurice Chevalier, Jacques Brel, Astrud Gilberto--and rare international cast albums, like Mi Bella Dama.

Broadway's troubadour of the 1950s, Frank Loesser was a master of melody. Some of the greatest pop and jazz performers--Ella Fitzgerald, Bill Evans, Bobby Darin, Eliane Elias--roll the dice with Loesser's tune. 

One of the greatest singers of the 20th Century, Sarah Vaughan gets her centennial moment in the show tune spotlight. Songs from Babes in Arms, West Side Story, Golden Boy, South Pacific and more.

  This week's episode is all about quantum physics and the American musical--just fooling! We celebrate the fools and the foolhardy with performances from Phil Silvers, Carol Burnett, Ed Wynn, Sutton Foster and many more.