BIOGRAPHY
JOSHUA ROSENBLUM is a composer, conductor, pianist, music director, author, and educator with wide-ranging experience in classical, contemporary and theater music.
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Rosenblum wrote music and lyrics for the cult hit musical, FERMAT'S LAST TANGO which had a critically acclaimed off-Broadway production at the York Theatre Company in 2000 and spawned both CD and DVD recordings. He is also the composer and creator of BUSH IS BAD, the hit off-Broadway musical revue, which Variety called “a sensation.” Other works for the theater include THE JOY OF GOING SOMEWHERE DEFINITE (Atlantic Theater Company), THE HAUNTED HOTEL (Signature Theater) and GARBO AND ME (Royal Central School for Speech and Drama). His off-Broadway musical EINSTEIN'S DREAMS, based on the best-selling novel by Alan Lightman, was nominated for four Drama Desk Awards, including Outstanding Music and Lyrics.
For the concert hall, Rosenblum has written pieces for trumpeter Philip Smith (New York Philharmonic), flutists Kathleen Nester (New Jersey Symphony) and Janet Axelrod (Radio City Music Hall), Manhattan School of Music faculty trombonist Haim Avitsur, French hornist Eric Ruske of Boston University, the Herrick Trio, and the ground-breaking string quartet Ethel, among others. Recordings of his instrumental music include Impetuosities—Music of Joshua Rosenblum, and Sundry Notes, both available from Albany Records. Rosenblum has won awards from ASCAP and the Meet the Composer Foundation, and his music, including his prize-winning choral setting of Jabberwocky, is published by the Theodore Presser Co.
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As conductor, Rosenblum has led the orchestras for fourteen Broadway and Off-Broadway shows, with a specialty in flying vehicles (MISS SAIGON, CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG, DR. SEUSS'S HOW THE GRINCH STOLE CHRISTMAS). Other conducting credits include guest appearances with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, and the American Repertory Ballet. He has also conducted world premiere productions for the Metropolitan Opera Guild, the B.A.M. Next Wave Festival, Playwrights Horizons, and Lincoln Center Theater, as well as the soundtracks to six major motion pictures.
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As a music journalist, Rosenblum has contributed articles to Newsday and Stagebill, as well as over 800 CD and concert reviews for Opera News. He is the author of the book Closer Than Ever: The Unique Six-Decade Songwriting Partnership of Richard Maltby, Jr. and David Shire, published by Oxford University Press in 2024, and a forthcoming book about Broadway composer/lyricist Maury Yeston, to be published in 2026 by SUNY Press.
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A summa cum laude graduate of Yale College and the Yale School of Music, Rosenblum currently teaches musical theater composition at his alma mater and conducting at New York University, where he regularly leads the orchestras for both musicals and operas. He lives in New York City with his wife, singer, author, and librettist Joanne Lessner, and is the proud father of Julian (Yale, 2018) and Phoebe (University of Miami’s Frost School of Music, 2023).
