Devonté Hynes is known as a musical collaborator, songwriter and producer who has worked with a diverse and ever-expanding group of artists (Solange, Mariah Carey, Harry Styles and Carly Rae Jepsen, to name a few) and as a composer for film, television, dance and classic ensembles. Now, Advertising sign can exclusively reveal that the artist known as Blood Orange will soon add another creative milestone to his resume: his Broadway debut.
Hynes will compose original music for the project WORKwhich begins performances at the Hayes Theater on July 15 before the official opening on July 30. WORK arrives after an acclaimed, successful Off-Broadway run that began in fall 2023 at the SoHo Playhouse and transferred to the Connelly Theater for a second, standing-room-only run.
“Anyone familiar with Dev's work already knows what a brilliant storyteller he is,” producer Hannah Getts said in a statement, “so it's no surprise that his work in WORK it not only enriches the thematic and narrative threads, but also deepens the emotional appeal of the play.”
A psychological thriller written by Max Wolf Friedlich and directed by Michael Herwitz, WORK centers on an employee of a large technology company (played by Sydney Lemmon), who is put on leave after becoming the subject of a viral video and, determined to find the job that gives her life meaning again, seeks the help of a crisis therapist (played by by Peter Friedman).
Hynes is friendly with Lemmon, who relayed WORKIts producers that he had seen and loved the show during Connelly's run. When it became clear that the show would transfer to Broadway, the producers along with playwright Wolf Friedlich—who had always wanted to incorporate outside artists into the show's creative team—approached Hynes to compose music for it.
Nominated for a 2021 Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music or Small Ensemble Performance for his work with Third Coast Percussion on their album Fields, Hynes has released four solo albums as Blood Orange. His musical work includes the films Queen and Slim, Passage and Master Gardeneras well as the HBO series We are who we are. A multi-instrumentalist, Hynes was one of only four pianists invited to perform alongside composer Philip Glass at the Kennedy Center in 2018, and his own debut concerto for piano and strings premiered at New York's Little Island festival in 2021. He has also collaborate with various major symphony orchestras.
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/music/pop/devonte-hynes-broadway-debut-job-score-1235718721/