Songs for a New World
James Robert Brown (Music & Lyrics)
Hillbarn Theatre & Conservatory
& Sidney Matthew Román
With a cast of four whose stellar voices individually and collectively soar and a three-piece, on-stage band that stirs one’s emotions to the core, the ground-breaking, 1995 song cycle by Jason Robert Brown, Songs for a New World, becomes incredibly current due both to evocative staging and to eye-popping projections on six screens that become a show unto themselves in Hillbarn Theatre & Conservatory’s latest, yet-another-must-see opening.
While there is no overall plot, almost no spoken dialogue, and no characters whose identities remain the same throughout Brown’s Songs for a New World, each of the sixteen numbers is a complete story unto itself, with one or more people facing a decision, a hardship, or a transition and discovering some new-found clarity or a committed resolve how to move on. Their paths and journeys — occurring any time from centuries past to maybe just yesterday — all have themes and emotions universal and timeless. Together, they ensure Songs for a New World is not just a revue of Brown’s incredibly clever, hard-hitting, and meaningful lyrics set to music ranging from pop to gospel, show tune, and jazz, they guarantee that Songs for a New World rips with messages loud and clear that the decisions we make, the choices we take for involvement in our world, and the people we seek to befriend and to love can and will make a difference not only for us individually, but for us as a whole.
Please continue to Talkin’Broadway for the remainder of my review.
Rating: 5 E, MUST-SEE
A Theatre Eddys Best Bet Production
Songs for a New World continues through March 5-22, 2026 in a ninety-minute (no intermission) production by Hillbarn Theatre & Conservatory, , 1285 East Hillsdale Blvd., Foster City, CA. Tickets are available online at www.hillbarntheatre.org or by contacting directly the box office by emailing boxoffice@hillbarn.org or by calling 650-349-6411.
Photo Credit: Mark Kitaoka
