Passing Strange Will Get a Live Cast Recording

Passing Strange is going to get stranger. The musical will be recorded before a live audience on April 14 from the stage of the Belasco Theatre, but there will be no lights, no set, no costumes and no scenes from the show. There will only be music.

The original cast recording of Passing Strange is expected to be released in June on Ghostlight Records. Sh-K-Boom/Ghostlight Records President Kurt Deutsch and Bill Rosenfeld will serve as executive producers and Stew and Heidi Rodewald, who wrote the music and lyrics, will be the producers.

"A live recording session of Passing Strange will be a wildly unique event," says Stew, who also stars in the show. "More than just a live show document or a studio recording, we are aiming for a freaky hybrid of the two. The audience will be in on the process, witnessing it. Heidi Rodewald and I have always tried to bring the spontaneity of live performance into our studio recordings. But now, through the magic of theater, the studio is coming to the Belasco."

The coming-of-age story of a middle-class youth seeking to find "the real" by embarking on a journey of escape and exploration, Passing Strange opened on February 28 at the Belasco with a cast that includes Stew, De'adra Aziza, Daniel Breaker, Eisa Davis, Colman Domingo, Chad Goodridge and Rebecca Naoi Jones, plus a four-piece onstage band that includes composer Rodewald.