Melissa Errico ’92
Melissa Errico is a Tony Award-nominated Broadway actress, singer, and author. Touring the world with her inimitable thematic concerts, she has built a unique niche in the world of theater and jazz—so much so that when Steven Reineke, principal conductor of the New York Pops, introduced her Carnegie Hall debut, he announced that “Melissa Errico is a unique force in the musical life of New York City: a Broadway star, a concert artist, and an author who regularly contributes essays to the New York Times. There’s really no one like her!”
Errico specializes in the seemingly very different music of Stephen Sondheim and Michel Legrand. Her 2018 album Sondheim Sublime was called by the Wall Street Journal “The best all-Sondheim album ever recorded,” and her 2024 Sondheim in the City was dubbed by the New York Times “a New York house tour of thrill and heartbreak,” in a review that also called her “one of Sondheim's deepest-hearted yet lightest-touch interpreters.” Her interpretation of Legrand’s music has been equally highly praised, so much so that she was asked to write his eulogy by the Times and was the only American singer invited to perform at his memorial at Le Grand Rex in Paris.
Her performances in the past year alone have included a Paris concert broadcast nationally on Radio France, followed by a sold-out cabaret at the historic Le Bal Blomet. In that same summer, she opened for music icon George Benson at the Montreal Jazz Festival. A writer from London Jazz News wrote: “Every high note was heroically held, and she got a standing ovation from this audience.” Melissa will premiere an original concert of the music of World War I on May 7, 2025, at the Kennedy Center, in a collaboration with the WWI Centennial Commission and the Doughboy Foundation in Washington, DC, and she will be making her solo concert hall debut at Cadogan Hall in London July 12, 2025, singing Sondheim in the City. She has upcoming concerts at the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach, the Staller Center, NJPAC, and much more, including her annual New York City Valentine’s residency at Birdland Jazz Club, this year running two shows a night February 14 through 16.
In addition to her starring roles on Broadway, including My Fair Lady, High Society, Anna Karenina, White Christmas, Dracula, and Les Misérables, Melissa has had a wide-ranging career in television and film. She starred in the CBS show Central Park West and played roles on Blue Bloods, The Knick, and more, as well as Billions on Showtime. She has starred in many non-musical works by Shaw and Oscar Wilde, including Dear Liar in the spring of 2023, playing George Bernard Shaw’s original Eliza Doolittle.
She is currently working on expanding her collected New York Times essays about a singer’s antic life on the stage and road, gathered under the heading “Scenes from an Acting Life,” into a book. She has three daughters and is married to tennis player and journalist Patrick McEnroe. For tour information visit melissaerrico.com.