Reviews

Ring Around The Moon

Ring Around The Moon “[Colin Richmond’s] sumptuous frocks [...] Jason Carr's score, inspired by the tango and French cabaret music, and Wayne McGregor's elegant dance routines [...] capture the play's distinctive Gallic mood in which style, wit and moments verging on farce are accompanied by an undertow of melancholy.” Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph

Sunday in the Park with George

Sunday in the Park With George Composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim himself has described Jason’s new orchestration as superlative.

The score’s lush melodies and chromatic feverishness sound ravishing ... Sam Marlowe, The Times

Musical director Caroline Humphris and a talented band do Jason Carr’s orchestrations proud for what is a much recommended production. Lisa Martland, The Stage

Six Pictures of Lee Miller

Poster Image - Photo Clare Park Jason Carr's music and lyrics are busily inventive and the show is done with great brio [...] there is much in the show to savour. Carr's score has a darting, feverish urgency that reminded me of Sondheim [...] Anthony van Laast's production whisks us crisply through the decades, and Sue Blane's design, with its solarised back-canvas, evokes the impending burnout in Miller's life. And Anna Francolini is remarkable as Miller: she gives us the heroine's caustic wit, erotic zest and spiritual restlessness. Michael Billington, The Guardian

Under Anthony Van Laast’s direction the action moves swiftly and smoothly and enhanced by Jason Carr’s score, which is played superbly by a five piece orchestra, making it more operatic than your average musical [...] Anna Francolini is a superbly beautiful Lee Miller – a view endorsed by Lee’s granddaughter Ami - and [...] Now that I have discovered Lee Miller I need to know more. I now feel I have to read the book and visit the farm - it’s that sort of show! Sheila Ann Connor, Whatsonstage.com

[...] infinitely more alluring than most of the mindless jukebox musicals that have cluttered up the West End for so long. Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph

Three Women and a Piano Tuner

Three Women Poster Image - Photo Clare Park [...] now comes this superb new play by Helen Cooper in the Minerva. It's an astonishing piece—witty, emotionally raw and deeply affecting—that leaves you gasping at the imaginative ingenuity of the dramatist's central conceit.

[...] It receives a strikingly deft production from Samuel West, stylishly designed by Ashley Martin-Davis and with music by Jason Carr that gives a strong impression of Ella's atmospheric [piano] concerto. Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph

The Water Babies Click for photos

Water Babies Poster Image - Photo: Clare Park This delightful musical adaptation at Chichester does justice to the piece's wild originality while also making it far more consumer-friendly to a present-day audience. [...] the whole show has a freshness and charm that should make it irresistible both to children and their parents.

[...] Jason Carr contributes terrific music and lyrics, with songs that range from the yearningly lyrical to vaudevillian knockabout, with the odd knowing nod to G & S and Sondheim. [...] The Water Babies is a treat, and, as well as being a delightful show for children, it strikes me as that rarest of phenomena—a genuinely successful new British musical [...] It must surely have a life beyond Chichester. Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph


Vivian Ellis Prize 1988

I am overwhelmed to hear a major talent emerge. Andrew Lloyd Webber

Born Again Click for photos

Born Again - Poster: Gerald Scarfe (The) score (is) as notable for its variety as its contemporary punch. Carr’s music is most itself when wind and percussion are energetically corkscrewing up and down the octaves; but he also injects hummable parodies of a torch song, a waltz, blues and even a madrigal, as well as rumbling rhino tunes. Benedict Nightingale, The Times

(Mandy Patinkin) is the ideal interpreter of Jason Carr’s music; a jaunty, spiky blend of affectionate musical parody and psychological comment. John Peter, The Sunday Times

(Jason Carr) saves the tunes for the second act, and they’re glorious when they come. Michael Kennedy, Glasgow Herald

Design For Living

This production, blessed with a splendidly lush and jazzy score by Jason Carr, is breathtakingly sexy. Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph

Les Parents Terribles

The tone and temperature of Cocteau’s hothouse is underpinned by Jason Carr’s excellent background music. Michael Coveney, Observer

Christmas Carol

Jason Carr’s score of carols and festive songs greatly adds to the pleasure of the evening. Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph

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