Roxy Bar Presents: Pianist Michael Garin

Michael Garin plays Roxy Bar’s early evening live-music set, continuing his Tuesday-through-Saturday residency as the hotel’s pianist. His approach moves freely through a wide range of references, with the venue citing Shaggy, Om Kalthoum, Rossini, Jobim, Frank Zappa and Raymond Scott among the musical worlds he brings into the room. Rather than treating the piano set as a fixed recital, Garin blurs pianist and DJ, building a quick-changing stream of songs and styles and taking requests. The evening pairs his performance with the bar’s cocktails and oysters.

A longtime figure in New York nightlife, Garin is a Drama Desk Award winner whose résumé includes Elaine’s, the Monkey Bar, the Rainbow Room and Limelight’s VIP Room. He co-created and co-starred in Song of Singapore, described as a groundbreaking environmental musical, and hosted midnight burlesque shows in the mid-1990s that helped launch the burlesque revival. His work also includes acting stints with Spike Lee, as well as songwriting, singing, poetry and song-and-dance performance. At the Roxy, his playing is marked by playful interventions: he has tap-danced from the piano bench and jokingly announced that he is “in his office” while accepting requests. He has also released the album Hey Look! It’s Michael and Mardie.