How Sara Bareilles became a Broadway writer, Sondheim star, and sitcom lead
Alchemy with Anthony MasonShow Notes
One of my favorite singers, Sara Bareilles, is our guest this episode. Sara's released five top 10 albums, written the music and lyrics for the hit Broadway show "Waitress," and starred in a Sondheim musical. She's back with her first new studio album in seven years, "Good Grief," and it's a beauty.
00:00 Intro
01:03 Juggling an album, a tour, a film and a musical
03:24 "Good Grief": an album born from loss
05:20 How "Forever" became a song for Gavin Creel
07:12 Morning pages and The Artist's Way
09:33 How writing Waitress changed her songwriting
12:42 Asking big questions without answers
14:17 "Capsize Me": a letter to God
16:41 "Wind Is The Weather" and feeling out at sea
19:05 Letting go of control in the studio
22:06 Finding herself in the music industry
26:05 Why being "somewhere in the middle" served her
27:41 A word from The FLAG Art Foundation
28:50 Jennifer Nettles and the musical that never was
31:01 Adapting "The Interestings" for the stage
33:58 Saying yes to Girls5eva
36:43 Working through anxiety
37:42 Grief is love
42:48 Putting lost friends into songs
44:13 Staying on the growth edge
46:36 Her first time on a Broadway stage
49:20 The chimney video that went viral
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About our Founding Sponsor, The FLAG Art Foundation:
The FLAG Art Foundation is a nonprofit contemporary art exhibition space in New York's Chelsea Arts District. Since 2008, FLAG has staged more than 100 exhibitions celebrating nearly 1,000 artists, with innovative partnerships including the Parrish Art Museum, the Serpentine Galleries in London, and the Harlem Children's Zone. FLAG is free and open to the public. Follow FLAG on Instagram.
About Anthony Mason:
Anthony Mason, the host of Alchemy, is also a Special Correspondent with CBS News. One of the most versatile and experienced television journalists, Anthony co-hosted CBS This Morning: Saturday for seven years (2012-2019), and then the weekday CBS This Morning broadcast for two more. But he may be best known for his interviews with artists like Bruce Springsteen, Aretha Franklin, Dolly Parton, Annie Leibovitz, Judi Dench, David Hockney, and André 3000. He has won a dozen Emmy Awards. In 2023, the Songwriters Hall of Fame presented him their Patron of the Arts Award. And for the past three years he has hosted the GRAMMY Hall of Fame Gala.
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