First Capital Bank LIVE at the Clifton Center presents Tony & Grammy Winner, DUNCAN SHEIK, in concert with special opening guest
LAUREN PRITCHARD - a part of his “Spring Awakening” tour.

With the Tony Award-winning Broadway musical Spring Awakening, singer-songwriter and composer DUNCAN SHEIK has successfully accomplished what few pop or rock artists before him have done: create original music that seems right at home on Broadway yet feels very much his own, a natural progression from the recordings he has been making for more than a decade.

His songs don’t try to move the story forward in the manner of a traditional musical, but instead refract the actions and emotions through a musical prism ~ part of the strange and wonderful alchemy of the show. The original cast recording, which Sheik produced, is an album that rewards devoted listening…it immediately becomes clear why hardcore fans of the show, grownups as well as teenagers, return to see the show again and again.

Sheik, who garnered two Tony Awards of his own as composer and arranger for Spring Awakening, went on to win a Grammy for producing the cast recording.

In addition to Spring Awakening, which received a critically acclaimed Lincoln Center American Songbook Concert staging last season, Sheik collaborated with playwright Steven Sater on The Nightingale, a musical based on the Hans Christian Andersen classic which premiered during the 26th annual O'Neill Music Theater Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Sheik has composed original music for the Public Theatre's Shakespeare in the Park production of Twelfth Night and for The Golden Rooms of Nero, which recently debuted at Cornell University and opened at the Magic Theater in San Francisco earlier this year. Film Soundtracks include Great Expectations, The Saint, Teaching Mrs. Tingle, Three to Tango, What a Girl Wants, Transamerica and A Body Goes Down. Sheik recently composed and produced the original score for the feature film A Home at the End of the World, directed by Michael Mayer and starring Colin Farrell.

Meanwhile, his self-titled debut album, which was an enormous popular and critical success, introduced the hit singles "Barely Breathing" and "She Runs Away," and spent 30 weeks on the Billboard 200. Subsequent albums include Humming, Daylight, Phantom Moon with lyrics by Steven Sater, and his January 2006 release, White Limousine. “I’m going to make records because I like to make records,” he says. “I don’t need to have expectations of making my living doing that. I now can completely get rid of that sense of having to get a song on the radio. It just doesn’t matter any more. That’s liberating, and it feels really, really good. Of course, you want to be successful -- I’d be happy to have a song on the radio -- but that’s not why I do it.”

Duncan’s upcoming cd Whisper House is due to release in early 2009 and is part of his current tour, along with Spring Awakening and earlier work. Sitting in and opening for the show is LAUREN PRITCHARD, a lead in the original Broadway production. “I feel really fortunate to be able to be working in these different media,” Sheik concludes. “I think that, more and more, the way people will experience music is in different media. And that will keep music alive.”

First Capital Bank LIVE at the Clifton Center welcomes Duncan Sheik back to Louisville for an all-ages performance on Monday, February 9 at 7:30 p.m. ~ the first stop on the 2009 leg of the tour. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. with refreshments available. $23 advance tickets are on sale now at www.ticketweb.com and will be available at ear x-tacy soon. Day of show tickets are $28 and will be sold at the door only, pending availability.