Sneak Peek of Michael Lomenda’s Interview with The Big Green!
October 17th, 2011
Michael Lomenda, photo courtesy of David Leyes
Alyssa Firth has a fun Q&A with Michael Lomenda, Nick Massi of the JERSEY BOYS first national tour. Here’s a sneak peek of the interview below:
Alyssa Firth: I haven’t seen the play, but I know your character is Nick. Can you describe him a little bit?
Michael Lomenda: Nick is the bassist of the group. He sings bass and he also plays bass, the instrument and he’s sort of the quiet, silent type, you know? He doesn’t say a whole lot in the group, but he’s credited by Bob Gaudio and Frankie Valli as sort of the arranger of the group. He created a lot of the great vocal arrangements and also Frankie sometimes talks about him as the guy who helped him early on with his voice and coaching his voice early on, so Frankie’s got a pretty distinctive style so that’s kind of an awesome credit to his name.
AF: What do you do personally to prepare for your role besides with the cast?
ML: Well, individually there’s of course I mean it’s sort of funny. The hair is kind of one of the big things about the period. It’s sort of 50s, 60s, 70s and if you go and look at some of those pictures online of that era and those guys during that era, they had some pretty awesome hair. So the hair takes a little bit of time cause you’re using- I certainly use a lot more hair gel and spray than I would use in my hair on a daily basis that’s for sure.
A lot of people do a vocal warm up, which is kind of key. especially Frankies. I know Frankies have very personalized, very specific warm up that helps them sing that hefty role. I mean, they sing 27 songs in the show and I think there’s like only 30 or something like that so they’re pretty much on stage for the whole show. They have a really extensive warm up. And like I said, it’s very specific. Some people don’t eat certain things during the day, like milk products and stuff like that because it’s harder to sing, but for me personally, I like to go to the gym ahead of time to get my body warmed up.
I get to the theatre about an hour to 45 minutes ahead of time and I like to go around and sort of chat with everybody and see how their day’s going and you know, just sort of connect with them cause we’re going to connect on stage in about an hour and it’s important to sort of touch base with everybody and then I start you know getting ready. I shave everyday, you put your hair on, you get your mic, you know, and you have to get all wired up and then you just sort of take your time to focus and do a little bit of a vocal warm up and what not and then you’re ready to go.
Visit TheBigGreen.net for the full interview with Michael.
