Get Happy! Judy Garland 1944-’54
Joan Ellison, with pianist Jason Aquila

Joan Ellison has been called a “rare combination of artist, archivist, and arranger” by Michael Feinstein.  In this intimate concert, she shines a spotlight on the musical and personal life of Judy Garland from her star turns in Meet Me in St. Louis and Easter Parade, to the termination of her contract at MGM, to her dramatic comeback as a concert artist and triumphant return to the big screen in A Star Is Born.  Between “The Boy Next Door” in 1944 and “The Man That Got Away” in 1954, the hit tunes and rarities performed in authentic arrangements based on the originals include “I Love a Piano,” “Johnny One-Note,” “Get Happy,” “Last Night When We Were Young,” “If You Feel Like Singing, Sing,” ”The Trolley Song,” and “Over the Rainbow.”

In addition to headlining thirty times over the last decade with symphony orchestras, Joan has been performing a full-length Garland symphonic pops concert and a radio-style show of Garland’s music in theaters and clubs around the U.S. for the past five years, and recently completed a run as Ms. Garland in The Boy From Oz in Naples, Florida. Her second album, Retrophonic Gershwin, was released to critical acclaim in 2015.  This is her NYC debut.

“Ellison is all freshness, vulnerability, and charm, singing up a storm (and, yes, a rainbow…). She inhabits the texts as if living them anew.” ~Donald Rosenberg, The Plain Dealer