Roxy Bar Presents: Pianist Michael Garin

Michael Garin brings his resident piano set to Roxy Bar on this Tuesday evening. The Roxy Hotel’s resident pianist, Garin shapes the music as a free-flowing musical collage that, in the venue’s words, blurs the line between pianist and D.J. His selections move across sources as far apart as Shaggy, Om Kalthum, Rossini, Jobim, Zappa and Raymond Scott, with requests part of the exchange. The setting is Roxy Bar in downtown New York, where the venue pairs the performance with cocktails and oysters.

Garin has been a fixture of New York nightlife for decades. His résumé includes Elaine’s, The Monkey Bar, The Rainbow Room and the VIP Room at Limelight, and he is a Drama Desk Award winner for co-creating and co-starring in Song of Singapore, described by the venue as a groundbreaking environmental musical. He also hosted midnight burlesque shows in the mid-1990s that helped launch the burlesque revival, and has acted in projects with Spike Lee. A pianist, songwriter, singer, poet, actor and song-and-dance performer, he has built a practice around adapting to the room and the occasion. The venue calls his Roxy work “goofy, stylish, and very smart,” including self-deprecating asides and occasional tap dancing from the piano bench.