Jeff Lunden

Jeff Lunden is a freelance arts reporter and producer whose stories have been heard on NPR's Morning Edition, All Things Considered and Weekend Edition, as well as on other public radio programs.

Lunden contributed several segments to the Peabody Award-winning series The NPR 100, and was producer of the NPR Music series Discoveries at Walt Disney Concert Hall, hosted by Renee Montagne. He has produced more than a dozen documentaries on musical theater and Tin Pan Alley for NPR — most recently A Place for Us: Fifty Years of West Side Story.

Other documentaries have profiled George and Ira Gershwin, Stephen Sondheim, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Lorenz Hart, Harold Arlen and Jule Styne. Lunden has won several awards, including the Gold Medal from the New York Festival International Radio Broadcasting Awards and a CPB Award.

Lunden is also a theater composer. He wrote the score for the musical adaptation of Arthur Kopit's Wings (book and lyrics by Arthur Perlman), which won the 1994 Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Musical. Other works include Another Midsummer Night, Once on a Summer's Day and adaptations of The Little Prince and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn for Theatreworks/USA.

Lunden is currently working with Perlman on an adaptation of Swift as Desire, a novel of magic realism from Like Water for Chocolate author Laura Esquivel. He lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.

For This Pair Of Clowns, 'Old Hats' Mean New Laughs

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Credit Joan Marcus

Nellie McKay, David Shiner and Bill Irwin use old-time comedy, newfangled tricks and zany music to score laughs in their new theatrical revue, Old Hats.

Credit Joan Marcus

Shiner and Irwin last collaborated in Fool Moon, which premiered on Broadway in 1992.

By Jeff Lunden

Originally published on Tue March 5, 2013 6:14 pm

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Twenty years ago, theatrical clowns Bill Irwin and David Shiner collaborated on a Broadway show called Fool Moon — a giddy mixture of slapstick, improv and audience participation that proved such a success that it came back to Broadway for two more runs and toured both the U.S. and Europe. Now Irwin and Shiner have put together a new show called Old Hats, and it's been receiving rave reviews off-Broadway.

Irwin and Shiner's rubber-faced, loose-bodied clowning hasn't gotten easier over two decades.

2:40 am

Fri February 1, 2013

Grand Central, A Cathedral For Commuters, Celebrates 100

By Jeff Lunden

Originally published on

Friday marks the day that 100 years ago, Grand Central Terminal opened its doors for business for the very first time. The largest railroad terminal in the world, the magnificent Beaux-Arts building is in the heart of New York City on 42nd St. And while it no longer serves long-distance trains, it's still a vibrant part of the city's eco-system.

1:03 am

Sat January 26, 2013

The Composer Who Tested Fighter Planes And Partied With Sinatra

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Credit Courtesy of Burns Media Productions

Jimmy Van Heusen with Frank Sinatra in the 1950s. Van Heusen wrote dozens of songs for the crooner and became Sinatra's close friend and confidant.

Credit Courtesy of Burns Media Productions

Van Heusen in his second life as a World War II-era test pilot.

Credit Courtesy of Burns Media Productions

Van Heusen at work in the 1960s.

By Jeff Lunden

Originally published on Sat January 26, 2013 4:36 pm

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2:47 am

Tue January 8, 2013

A Vet's Haunted Homecoming In 'Water By The Spoonful'

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Credit Richard Termine /

Liza Colon-Zayas plays a troubled character named Odessa Ortiz, who finds her better self online. She's pictured above with Bill Heck, as Fountainhead.

Credit Richard Termine /

Quiara Alegria Hudes' Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, Water by the Spoonful, opens off-Broadway on Tuesday. Above, Bill Heck as Fountainhead and Frankie R. Faison as Chutes & Ladders in the play, directed by Davis McCallum.

Credit Richard Termine /

Armando Riesco's character Elliot was inspired by Hudes' cousin, also named Elliot. Riesco has played Elliot throughout the trilogy. He's pictured above in Water by the Spoonful with Zabryna Guevara, who plays Yazmin Ortiz.

By Jeff Lunden

Originally published on Tue January 8, 2013 5:06 am

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The cliche about writers is they should write what they know, and that old saw has certainly worked for Quiara Alegria Hudes. The 35-year-old playwright has mined her Puerto Rican family's stories into a series of plays, a musical and even a children's book. Now, her Pulitzer Prize-winning drama, Water by the Spoonful, is being brought to life in the first New York production of the play, opening off-Broadway on Tuesday evening.

2:29 am

Thu December 6, 2012

Anonymous 4 Marks A Milestone Year, Together And Alone

Credit Chris Carroll / Brooklyn Academy of Music

To mark the group's 25th anniversary, Anonymous 4 commissioned the new piece love fail from Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang.

By Jeff Lunden

Originally published on Thu December 6, 2012 8:05 am

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As of this year, the vocal group Anonymous 4 has been introducing modern audiences to medieval music for a quarter century. When the all-female quartet asked David Lang to help mark the occasion by writing them some music, he didn't need any convincing. The Pulitzer Prize-winning composer was already a big fan.

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5:20 pm

Tue March 5, 2013