In this evening of song, singer Katie Welsh, accompanied by pianist Emily Whitaker, considers what it means to be a “Sondheim woman” by exploring twelve female characters from the musicals of Stephen Sondheim. Katie sings songs from beloved musicals such as Into the Woods, Sunday in the Park with George, Company, Merrily We Roll Along, Follies, among many others.

BIOGRAPHIES:

Katie Welsh is a singer who specializes in musical theater and the Great American Songbook. She graduated magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, from Princeton University, where she studied English, theater, and musical theater and had the opportunity to take classes with Broadway directors John Rando and John Doyle and participate in masterclasses with Tony-nominated composers Pasek and Paul, Broadway actress Becky Ann Baker, and Grammy and Emmy Award-winning music director Paul Bogaev.  For her senior thesis, she collaborated with director Suzanne Agins and music director Emily Whitaker to create Women in the World of Sondheim. This project, in conjunction with her written thesis, garnered Katie the Alan S. Downer Senior Thesis Prize from the Department of English. Currently, Katie studies voice with Judy Bettina and dance at Princeton Ballet School. In addition to her work as a performer, she also works as a research and editorial assistant to Professor Stacy Wolf and Dean Jill Dolan at Princeton and is currently co-authoring an article on musical theater reception theory with Professor Wolf.

Emily Whitaker is a music director, pianist, and accompanist in the New York City area. She recently worked as a music intern on the new musical Unknown Soldierat Williamstown Theatre Festival. She was also a music assistant for the McCarter Theatre production of Fiasco Theatre’s Into the Woods, which appeared Off-Broadway in 2014-2015. Emily graduated from Princeton in 2015, where she worked frequently as a music director and conductor for theater department and student productions. Favorite credits include Sweeney Todd, Next to Normal, andHedwig and the Angry Inch, as well as conducting the Princeton Triangle Club at the historic McCarter Theatre and on a national tour. Emily also works as a music director for improv comedy, having played for the Princeton University group Quipfire! as an undergraduate. She has recently played at the People’s Improv Theater and other improv theaters in the New York area. For her senior thesis, Emily created Ding!, an interactive music-theater piece in which audiences were led through a collective music-making experience by using toys, games, and other objects from childhood as instruments. She is currently a musical theatre teaching artist at the McCarter Theatre Center.