In this week’s interview with singers on the October Project recording The Book of Rounds: 21 Songs of Grace we profile Jerry Lieblich, whose sonorous bass voice is featured on the musical round “Together,” track 11.
Jerry Lieblich is a bass from Brooklyn who is featured on “Together” in Chapter Two of the Book of Rounds.
To Jerry, music has always been important, but it is what he considers a “hat” on his life, more a peripheral, ever-present aspect rather than his primary pursuit. Growing up, Jerry played piano, and was first introduced to choral singing while accompanying his middle school choir on the piano. However, it was singing a cappella with the Society of Orpheus and Bacchus at Yale (affectionately referred to as the SOBs) when Jerry says he really learned to sing, inspiring him to take voice lessons while on campus and eventually to sing with the Yale Whiffenpoofs. In fact, a cappella continued to stay present in Jerry’s life even after he graduated in 2011 – he continued on to sing with the New York-based a cappella group Lost Keys alongside Keiji Ishiguri and two other Book of Rounds alums, Jessy Tomsko and Jamie Serkin.
At Yale, Jerry majored in philosophy, although he originally intended to be a cognitive science major, and today, he works as a playwright. Currently, this profession has taken Jerry to L.A. where a theater is performing one of his plays. And while Jerry’s main theatrical focus is in playwriting (as opposed to writing librettos or composing), he says he has always been interested in using music for theater. “I love music and what it can do theatrically.” Jerry says, noting that he is not opposed to trying his hand at writing for musicals at some point in the future. His approach to playwriting? “Just do it. It’s not rocket science.”
While Jerry considers all the songs on the Book of Rounds equally fun to sing, his favorite is “Meadow”, especially its unique 5/4 time signature and the way the layered vocal parts “soar” at the song’s end. He attributes a lot of that success to Keiji Ishiguri’s arranging prowess as well as to Emil Adler’s structuring of the rounds. “It’s so nice to take something really simple and just build and build on it,” Jerry says.
Looking forward, Jerry hopes to continue playwriting as well as to keep living with curiosity and exploration. It is a humble but universal dream: “I want to keep getting to make the work that I want to make with the people I want to make it with. To be surrounded by joy and love.”
You can enjoy a lyric video of the song “Together” here: https://youtu.be/b7VzyvMClK4
By Lucy Tomasso
Lucy Tomasso is a prospective Theater Studies major at Yale and an avid a cappella singer. A member of Yale’s Redhot and Blue, she is honored be a descendant of the Redhot lineage that includes October Project’s Marina Belica. Looking forward, Lucy hopes to pursue a career in the entertainment industry, particularly writing for either the stage or screen.
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