Award-Winning Songwriter Joey Contreras and Special Guests to Perform at Feinstein’s/54 Below on Monday, April 18, 2022!

Joey Contreras will bring “In the Works, with Special Guests,” to Feinstein’s/54 Below on April 18, 2022. Having amassed millions of streams and acclaim from his various theatre albums, Joey is playing selections from three of his new stage musicals. From the New York love stories heard in his popular show, In Pieces, the heartfelt yet haunting meditation on grief and identity in Forget Me Not (with Kate Thomas), and the fiery hot pulse of Heartbreakers in Hell (with Benjamin Halstead), audiences will be treated to the Broadway pop versatility Joey Contreras brings to the canon of exciting new musical theatre.

In Pieces reflects on the romantic journeys of six individuals, as they share, ponder and look back on the chosen paths and partners along the way. Set in New York City, there’s the scary excitement of being vulnerable and saying yes to whatever adventure is ahead. The magical first kiss. An unlikely friendship. Well-kept secrets. The monotony. The rebound. An awkward reunion on the 1 train. And the honest conversations of deserving more.

All these pieces of a life that at times connect and disconnect, but once at a distance, come together to create a universal remembrance of what it’s like to be young and learning in love. The star-studded highlights recording, In Pieces: A New Musical (Highlights) released by Broadway Records in 2021 featured performances by American Idol’s David Archuleta, Andrew Barth Feldman (Dear Evan Hansen), George Salazar (Superstore), Solea Pfeiffer (Hamilton), Ben Fankhauser (Newsies) and more. The underground popularity of the show has spawned multiple licensed productions in the US, UK and Australia in its first year. Producers are eying a 2023 commercial run.

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In Heartbreakers in Hell, there are exactly nine ways to break a heart, and there’s a special place in Hell for each type of heartbreaker. This modernized, pop-music adaptation of “Dante’s Inferno” intertwines Dante Aligheieri’s medieval mythic Hellscape with the realities of modern-day dating. We follow Dante, a contemplative poet, as he journeys deeper and deeper into the fiery depths, falling in and out of love with the sinners, monsters, and demons within each circle of Hell. “Ye who enter” should expect an experience like the intimate, conceptual storytelling of the musical “Company,” erupting with the ferocious grandiosity of a Lady Gaga arena concert. A concept EP and visual album, Heartbreakers in Hell: The First Date Mixtape, was released in February 2022, featuring performances by Keri René Fuller (Six), Deon’te Goodman (Hamilton), Katherine Thomas (Ragtime), Nick Martinez (Bat Out of Hell), Megan Masako Haley (Mean Girls) and more.

Forget Me Not is an original story that explores grief, identity, and missing white woman syndrome (heavily discussed in the media most recently with the Gabby Petito case). In Forget Me Not, a whale washes ashore in a coastal town in 1998, and brings a burst of attention to the remote community. Townspeople initially welcome the interest, but that all changes, when a journalist decides to reopen a cold case that has long haunted them. Ten years prior to the whale, three local women were strangled on the beaches of Forget-Me-Not Cove, but the murderer was never found. When Pete Medina, the brother of one of the victims, returns home after a decade to reinvestigate, he and his fellow townspeople are forced to confront the grief they have buried. This stunning dive into the past leads to an explosive reveal, and ultimately, collective healing. Forget Me Not is a new ensemble musical that not only upends the murder mystery trope, but urges us to wonder what we would do to keep from being forgotten. Jacob Dickey (Company) and Kerstin Anderson (My Fair Lady) have been attached to the project over the last five years. A concept EP is planned for a Winter 2022 release.

Joining Contreras are Keri René Fuller (Six, Jagged Little Pill), Jacob Dickey (Company, Aladdin), Deon’te Goodman (Hamilton), Cailen Fu (Mean Girls), Nick Martinez (Bat Out of Hell), Ben Fankhauser (A.D. 16), Leslie Hiatt (The Evolution of Mann), Diana Huey (The Little Mermaid), Brad Greer (Anastasia, The Bridges of Madison County), Henry Platt (“Sing On!”), Mia Gerachis (Jekyll & Hyde, Creator of Bored Belting), Sean Doherty (The Lightning Thief), Noah Virgile (The Royal Family of Broadway), Denise Neumerkel, Max Heitmann, and Senzel Ahmady, The evening is produced by Contreras and Zachary Hausman.