I’m joined by the multitalented Mark Brymer, a creative entrepreneur with hands-on expertise in turning musical concepts into spectacular shows. Mark brings a wealth of experience — from arranging a vast collection (400,000) of choral pieces with Hal Leonard to producing dazzling shows in theme parks. We’ll get a deeper look at his journey from high school passion to creating WOW! Entertainment and its creative team. Alongside his success, Mark’s story is one of adaptation, learning, and consistent building.
Guest: Mark Brymer, President, Wow! Entertainment
Working in New York City, Los Angeles, and Dallas, turnkey producer Mark Brymer has carved out a singular profile as the man who can arrange almost anything in entertainment. In his successful, decades-long career, the music producer, theatrical producer, author, arranger, orchestrator, and composer has stayed relevant and kept busy in the ever-shifting entertainment industry by seeing change as an opportunity for growth.
Most recently, when Six Flags Entertainment Corporation became interested in the explosion of immersive and in-person experiences, they called Mark. Now, he’s premiering the captivating Halloween experience, Dr. H.H. Holmes’ FREAKSHOW at the Six Flags Over Texas theme park. Holmes’s sensationalized story has been underrepresented in pop culture, but it has the same kind of dark and mythical allure as Jack the Ripper, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Frankenstein. Mark’s groundbreaking Dr. H.H. Holmes’ FREAKSHOW promises to raise the bar for theme park theatrical productions by employing Broadway talent in the production.
Over the years, Mark has parlayed his gifts as a musical arranger and composer into a vastly varied career in the entertainment industry. He is a global trailblazer in both the children’s music education and entertainment industries with such clients as McGraw-Hill, Disney, Warner Bros., Hal Leonard, Music Theater International, and Rhino Records. Mark co-wrote and produced the title song, “Digga Digga Dog,” for Disney Film Studios’ 102 Dalmatians, starring Glen Close. He’s written and produced over 150 live production musical shows for Six Flags theme parks. In addition, he’s written, produced, and mixed scores for the dinner/arena attractions Pirate’s Voyage and Dolly Parton’s Stampede. Since 1995, Mark has headed up the full-service music and live theatrical show production company, WOW! Entertainment, Inc.
The through-line in Mark’s diversely accomplished career is his passion for family-oriented entertainment. It’s a path he stumbled upon after discovering as a college piano major that he loved arranging, and he embraced the full spectrum of arranging and performing opportunities that came his way. Eventually, Mark landed a gig playing piano at theme parks, and this led to a myriad of opportunities in the theme park theatrical space. To steady his income while working in the mercurial world of theme park productions, Mark made inroads in the choral market. He became an exclusive staff choral arranger for Hal Leonard in 1983.
Links:
- info@wowentertainment.net
- https://www.markbrymer.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-brymer-b22411170/
- Hal Leonard: https://www.halleonard.com/biography/102/mark-brymer
Transcript
We had the pleasure of having people from all over the place,
Speaker:and I'm glad to be catching Mark
Speaker:in Texas. But, Mark, you said you have
Speaker:offices and or you have creative spaces in two other
Speaker:places. Yes. My creative team, I mainly
Speaker:draw from New York City, and I
Speaker:will usually meet up there in Ken Billington's office.
Speaker:He has a wonderful office right in the theater district. And
Speaker:then I also do all my recording in Los Angeles.
Speaker:Typically there's East West,
Speaker:United, there's some various studios on Sunset Boulevard. They're just
Speaker:classic, great studios that I record.
Speaker:So I love United space. That's just such a great space.
Speaker:It really is. It's just wonderful. And these
Speaker:are just classic studios that Frank Sinatra recorded it in, the
Speaker:Mamas and Papas. All sorts of vintage great
Speaker:TV themes were done there. And
Speaker:I want to work with the best people on all my projects,
Speaker:and that's where I can find them and record them. So we're
Speaker:finding you in the realm of what current adventures, Mark, what
Speaker:are you currently up to? Well, I've just
Speaker:opened three different Christmas shows out
Speaker:at Six Flags over Texas in Arlington,
Speaker:Texas, and that's ending my
Speaker:journey this year. I've actually produced and
Speaker:written ten different shows for that theme
Speaker:park this year, so it's been quite a
Speaker:busy year. I also have a couple of shows
Speaker:running down at Six Flags Fiesta Texas,
Speaker:long-running Majesty of Christmas and Looney
Speaker:Tunes Christmas. And then, of course, I've got
Speaker:Christmas shows running in Branson and
Speaker:Pigeon Forge and Myrtle beach with
Speaker:Dolly Parton's both her stampede and pirates voyage
Speaker:shows. So a lot of people probably have been to your
Speaker:shows, didn't know they were your shows, and thought, I wonder how
Speaker:in the world this happens. I think, is
Speaker:that a little bit that they go through it or they wonder?
Speaker:Yeah, well, hopefully they want both.
Speaker:They go to. And really what it's about
Speaker:is if I can help produce a wonderful time for them and their
Speaker:family, hopefully enjoying the show, then I've done
Speaker:my job. I grew up in Southern
Speaker:California, so for me, a similar metaphor was
Speaker:I worked at Disneyland for a couple of years. So much
Speaker:creative production. I was instead a ride operator, not
Speaker:a fabulous performer there, but
Speaker:people see that as such of the background of their
Speaker:lives. I'm really excited about talking about how you've
Speaker:ended up in this and the many other things that you've done
Speaker:now. Where did you grow up? Did you grow up in Texas?
Speaker:No. Both my parents are native Texans, so
Speaker:I grew up more in St. Louis, Missouri,
Speaker:but we spent a lot of time in Texas.
Speaker:What got me down here, there was a great music school on
Speaker:North Texas unt up in Denton. And that
Speaker:got me to this area. And I started getting
Speaker:work immediately. And I've stayed here,
Speaker:actually, my first job was with Six Flags in
Speaker:what they called Six Flags Mid America at the time. I think it's just called
Speaker:Six Flags St. Louis now. But that was one of my
Speaker:first work experiences, and really in
Speaker:entertainment was I got a job with the
Speaker:crew on one of the shows. And then I was
Speaker:a piano accompanist for two of the different shows.
Speaker:And did their audition tour and a couple of different things. So that just
Speaker:kept growing, which gave. Me back you up even further.
Speaker:So growing up then in St. Louis, were your
Speaker:parents creative? Were they performers? Were
Speaker:they. My dad was not, but my
Speaker:mom actually taught speech and
Speaker:drama. And so growing up,
Speaker:my sister and I would always. Right after school,
Speaker:we would go to play rehearsal and our musical
Speaker:rehearsal. And I watched a lot of rehearsals
Speaker:as a kid. And I feel that that
Speaker:is in me. It's registered ever since. And so a
Speaker:lot of things, I think, come naturally to me, or
Speaker:it makes sense. But really, I think I've just always been around
Speaker:theater production for my whole life. And had parents that were
Speaker:supportive because some people have the journey story that
Speaker:they love being creative. But mom and Dad said, you must be an engineer,
Speaker:you must be a lawyer, you must be a. And didn't get the creative
Speaker:journey. Yeah, I did have that a little bit because I'm sure
Speaker:my parents were, well, how are you going to make a living? But they were
Speaker:very supportive with piano lessons, and I had
Speaker:a great high school experience. There was a lot of. I could take music
Speaker:theory in high school.
Speaker:So I got a great training ground,
Speaker:and I started really getting
Speaker:work as a pianist, really, when I was still
Speaker:in high school. So my parents couldn't say a lot because I was
Speaker:actually making money.
Speaker:It wasn't just a hobby. It wasn't a hobby. So I did major in
Speaker:music in college, and I switched around
Speaker:a couple of different ways. Once I discovered
Speaker:writing and arranging, I thought, well, this is something I can spend long
Speaker:periods of time doing. And that's what became my focus. That's what got
Speaker:me down to unt to study
Speaker:and led to my career. And
Speaker:that's continuing to be a bit rare for kids to realize
Speaker:that they can compose or even have music theory in high
Speaker:school. That oftentimes that's not even part of the mix, which is
Speaker:one of my big bugaboos with all the wonderful things that happen
Speaker:in high school music. But oftentimes that they both skip
Speaker:theory and they skip learning how to write in their own voice and their own
Speaker:music. Yeah. And it was just a
Speaker:good time. It was before there were so many stringent
Speaker:core educational demands. And
Speaker:so, yeah, I took music theory and jazz theory. There
Speaker:was a great orchestra in my high school that I got
Speaker:to do some piano solos with. I also learned
Speaker:cello. So, yeah, it was just a
Speaker:well rounded education with high school. And then I
Speaker:took two sets of private lessons. One was classical
Speaker:piano, one was jazz piano. So
Speaker:I just had a great training ground. And that definitely gave me
Speaker:a head start on, before you ended
Speaker:up at. The theme park world, what did you
Speaker:think you were going to do with it? I didn't know for sure.
Speaker:I knew that music came very
Speaker:quickly to me and it's something I really
Speaker:enjoyed. And so,
Speaker:I don't know, I kept pursuing it. I really didn't even discover writing and
Speaker:arranging until I was in college.
Speaker:But once I did, because I was
Speaker:advanced enough with piano
Speaker:that my teacher said, you need to spend four to 5 hours a day
Speaker:practicing or you're really not going to get much better because you're at
Speaker:this level. And that was very hard for me. But then once
Speaker:I started arranging and writing out arrangements, I thought,
Speaker:oh, I could do this four, six, 8 hours a day. That would
Speaker:not bother me. And so I just went after it.
Speaker:I knew what level I had to work at.
Speaker:And then certainly transferring to UNT,
Speaker:really, I was with some phenomenal students there
Speaker:from around the world. And that gave me the
Speaker:incentive and the drive to be as excellent
Speaker:as I could be. So how did you end up,
Speaker:you mentioned earlier that you ended up then doing
Speaker:heading into the theme park world. How did that step happen?
Speaker:Well, what happened was
Speaker:at the first college, I went three years to a Milliken
Speaker:university, that's a small private school in the middle of Illinois.
Speaker:And I made a deal with four
Speaker:great singers there. I said, look, I'll do all the
Speaker:arranging if you all agree to rehearse. And we did
Speaker:our own program, and
Speaker:we were our own little group, and we performed at Homecoming and different
Speaker:events. And then we did a recital at the
Speaker:end of the year that I taped that
Speaker:audio and presented it
Speaker:to the VP head producer at
Speaker:Six Flags to say, hey, look, I've been writing and arranging, and
Speaker:I want you to hear this. And the timing was good. As I
Speaker:transferred down to Denton,
Speaker:they had an opening at the Six Flags over Texas show
Speaker:for the music director and to write those. It was
Speaker:a Southern palace show and a smaller saloon show. And they
Speaker:offered that opportunity to me, really, during
Speaker:my senior year of college. Oh, wow. And
Speaker:then the following year it expanded to four
Speaker:or five parks and it just
Speaker:expanded quickly. That's a big journey coming
Speaker:right out of college. It was, in many
Speaker:ways it was hard because I was younger and like, who's this
Speaker:kid? And there were some challenges to it,
Speaker:but you've got to take
Speaker:opportunities when they arise. So I got
Speaker:some great training at UNT
Speaker:quickly and just kind
Speaker:of embraced it and kept getting opportunities.
Speaker:At the same time. I felt, well, the theme park business is so fluky.
Speaker:You have a lot of work one year and then they'll run the same shows
Speaker:over the second year and you're sitting hyperseasonal too.
Speaker:Right. So a big chunk of their life is the holidays
Speaker:and summer. Yeah.
Speaker:I got involved with educational
Speaker:publishing. So what that is, is coral arranging for
Speaker:print publishing. And I work with a company called Hal
Speaker:Leonard Print Publishers. They're the world's largest publisher out of
Speaker:Milwaukee. And I started getting opportunities to arrange for
Speaker:them and I've done that ever since.
Speaker:And you don't make a ton of money on one arrangement,
Speaker:but it's like developing your catalog. I
Speaker:now have like about 3600 choral products in print
Speaker:and available and sell probably
Speaker:around half a million copies of music a year around the world.
Speaker:Wow. Steady
Speaker:income, I was going to say they're almost evergreen. I mean, I'm assuming that some
Speaker:pop because there's popular songs going on, but it's really
Speaker:having in this world of non evergreen music, an
Speaker:Evergreen catalog. Oh, most definitely.
Speaker:And it's interesting. My best selling
Speaker:choral is Bohemian Rhapsody
Speaker:that I actually arranged, I think, in
Speaker:1996 when it came out in Wayne's World
Speaker:at first. And it has continued. I think I'm
Speaker:well over 400,000 copies. I mean, it just sells 20 or
Speaker:30,000 copies a year.
Speaker:There are some definitely evergreen titles and that's what you, as an
Speaker:arranger, you look for and if you can freshen them.
Speaker:Hal Leonard is have I have access to all
Speaker:the. So I mean, that's
Speaker:tremendous. Every title except anything from
Speaker:Warner Brothers. It's EMI
Speaker:jobit, Sony. It's a
Speaker:tremendous amount of music I have access
Speaker:to, to arrange. Wow.
Speaker:So that is just a lovely part of each
Speaker:year or that's something that blossomed and you're letting kind of
Speaker:mature while you do other adventures. I continue
Speaker:to do about 15 to 20 arrangements a year. So
Speaker:you keep supplying the catalog and
Speaker:it'll vary depending on. This year will probably be a little bit less
Speaker:because I had so much writing to do
Speaker:with Six Flags. But then next year I'll bump back up
Speaker:and then teachers know
Speaker:what I do and they hopefully look for my name or dealers
Speaker:do. And I'm very conscious of things like voice
Speaker:leading, and I want my arrangements
Speaker:to make the choir sound great.
Speaker:And if it doesn't, that's my fault.
Speaker:I know what voice leading is, but our audience may not all know what voice
Speaker:leading is. So I just. Composition class last week
Speaker:where they're trying to explain voice leading to a bunch of students, I was kind
Speaker:of laughing. Voice leading, how would you. Well, yeah,
Speaker:voice leading is. It makes it
Speaker:easier for singers to sing. Okay, so
Speaker:instead of having a part. Da.
Speaker:That'S harder to sing, but.
Speaker:You. Make it as melodic as you can, the harmony
Speaker:parts. So you're still trying to achieve great harmonies,
Speaker:but make it as singable as possible.
Speaker:The poor altos and tenors aren't stranded someplace and
Speaker:cursing you out in the middle of rehearsal. Well,
Speaker:poor Altos, they're the ones who kind of always get that
Speaker:fourth extra note. But you count on them being
Speaker:great musicians. Throw them a
Speaker:melody every so often. Absolutely.
Speaker:So you have a lovely
Speaker:interweaving of adventures for a lot of our
Speaker:guests. They kind of bounce and you've threaded, I mean, in many
Speaker:ways, you've got a beautiful long run of
Speaker:doing sort of iterative adventures
Speaker:that have continued. How long have you
Speaker:been with Hal Leonard now? Well.
Speaker:Almost 40 years. Yeah.
Speaker:That's such a long relationship in this space.
Speaker:Yeah, it is. And a lot of times
Speaker:I tell young people
Speaker:is the importance of being helpful to everybody
Speaker:along the way. Because years ago
Speaker:I just started arranging for Hal Leonard and
Speaker:I had one of my instructors say, oh, I've got this grad student
Speaker:and he needs some extra work. And I think he's
Speaker:really excellent. And so I brought him on. He
Speaker:helped fill in some score. That's back when we still worked in pencil.
Speaker:And he helped fill in some scores and taught some vocals for me
Speaker:at my theme park shows.
Speaker:And then today he is actually the president
Speaker:of Hal Leonard and has been for ten years.
Speaker:Yeah. Got a gentleman named Larry Morton.
Speaker:You never know people you help out along the way, what
Speaker:their careers will do. And there have been times that's been
Speaker:helpful that Larry and I go way back and he
Speaker:know, come time for a meAn, that's a helpful thing to
Speaker:have given work to
Speaker:the company president. So how
Speaker:has your work expanded and changed in this time. So
Speaker:you commented. It used to have to do, of course,
Speaker:pencil and staffline.
Speaker:So you're now living in
Speaker:Sibelius, actually, finale.
Speaker:Finale Software finale. Yeah, they're a
Speaker:competitor, but the publishers or the typesetters prefer
Speaker:finale. I've been on finale
Speaker:since 1996 97 and
Speaker:haven't stopped. So you
Speaker:get very fast at that.
Speaker:But I think for me, in my career, what's
Speaker:expanded is I think back there
Speaker:was a time I was just doing creating music soundtracks
Speaker:for theatrical shows or theme park shows,
Speaker:and in Warner Brothers
Speaker:bought the Six Flags parks. And at
Speaker:that time they said, well, we only want to deal with
Speaker:turnkey producers, outside show producers.
Speaker:So they disbanded the internal Six Flag show production
Speaker:group I worked for. And I
Speaker:thought, well, gosh, what am I going to do? And I thought, well, maybe I
Speaker:should become independent turnkey producer.
Speaker:Let me start my own company. Yeah. So I thought,
Speaker:well, but it was kind of because I wanted to keep
Speaker:working. And you just be like, okay, I'll figure it out, I'll figure it
Speaker:out. And so sure enough, I got an opportunity to produce one
Speaker:show the following summer. And then that really
Speaker:took off. That's when I formed WOW
Speaker:Entertainment, and that's launched me into the show production
Speaker:business. And so that really changed
Speaker:the orientation of my business at
Speaker:that point. So you have
Speaker:gone from being an employee to sole
Speaker:proprietor to now having full time and part time staff
Speaker:to make all of these things happen. You started out telling us how many different
Speaker:shows you launched this year.
Speaker:Yes, that's exactly right. I have some full
Speaker:time and then some part time. I have a network
Speaker:of creative vendors from costumers, lighting
Speaker:designers, musicians
Speaker:that I hire as needed. So it operates a lot like an
Speaker:advertising agency. You bulk up when you've got the accounts.
Speaker:When you lose an account, you hunker
Speaker:down.
Speaker:It's very similar to that. So there isn't a lot of
Speaker:elements of running a business. You've got to be aware of the bottom
Speaker:line and projections, what kind of
Speaker:money you need to keep going. And you've had to pick up new skills.
Speaker:Right. So you were doing theater, more full
Speaker:theater, and then you went into piano and music
Speaker:composition, but now are putting on whole shows.
Speaker:So what other hats did you have to learn to put on?
Speaker:And what might have been some tripwires you might have tripped on as you
Speaker:were learning to build even more capacity?
Speaker:There have been a lot working with
Speaker:contracts and understanding contracts and what they
Speaker:really mean and certain clauses
Speaker:and things you need to ask for
Speaker:accounting. Certainly you
Speaker:not only want to project what your income is going to be on a
Speaker:project, but then you have to keep accounting along the
Speaker:way to make sure that you met your
Speaker:projection.
Speaker:Those are boring things, but you got to do
Speaker:it to stay in business, because a lot of times the shows I
Speaker:produce, a particular park or
Speaker:facility will say, tell us we want this show. Yes,
Speaker:tell us what it's going to cost. And then that's the money you're
Speaker:under contract to do to deliver this show for that amount
Speaker:of money. And so if you don't do your job correctly, you
Speaker:don't make that amount of money.
Speaker:But that's okay. My dad was an accountant, and
Speaker:I've had good friends who've gotten MBAs that I kind of help. So
Speaker:I got around it enough that I was
Speaker:able to figure those things out and
Speaker:then just experience having done this
Speaker:so long and worked. I've written probably over
Speaker:150 theme park shows and
Speaker:multiple larger dinner arena attractions,
Speaker:and not only produce music, but also produce those
Speaker:shows that you learn along the way that
Speaker:it's like you've kind of, oh, I've been through this before, or I ran into
Speaker:this. So
Speaker:it's a craft in what you're developing. And the more
Speaker:you do it, the more you develop your. You
Speaker:know, I worked with a gentleman named Ken Billington on my lighting
Speaker:design, and Ken's a Tony Award winner. He's lit
Speaker:Chicago and was most
Speaker:recently, New York. New York, that was on Broadway.
Speaker:And he know at his point in the career, he
Speaker:said, there's nothing really you can throw me that I haven't seen.
Speaker:So all sorts of things, like, we were working on a Halloween show, and I
Speaker:said, well, what about if we made the floor red? That would be great. And
Speaker:he goes, oh, no, it lights horribly. He's actually done.
Speaker:He's lived that dream. He knows that surprise. Yeah,
Speaker:it sounds great, but no, that's not going to work. So it's like,
Speaker:okay, you listen to the guy and learn
Speaker:from that. Has the technology of what you're expected to do changed? I
Speaker:think, of consumers and people coming who are
Speaker:used to looking at, let's say, dancing with the Stars and seeing the video
Speaker:floor. Or are people expecting different things
Speaker:because the tech of everything's changed? Most
Speaker:definitely with not only how
Speaker:I write music, but how we produce it.
Speaker:Combination of synthesized instruments
Speaker:along with live instruments.
Speaker:Now we're in a final tech
Speaker:week or for production of a show. We have
Speaker:time code. The one time
Speaker:code runs the music, but it also runs the video,
Speaker:runs, lighting cues. So
Speaker:it's very technical,
Speaker:but it also enables you to do pretty amazing
Speaker:things visually.
Speaker:You get used to it. You learn along the way. And I've always
Speaker:taken a philosophy of hiring the best people possible,
Speaker:working with the best people around me, versus
Speaker:a lot of times people can hire their friends or I've
Speaker:worked with so and so, but I've been a little more
Speaker:ruthless in that of just, no, I've got to work with the best
Speaker:people because that's a reflection on.
Speaker:It's. It's paid off. It's been successful to work that way. And
Speaker:we started out, we talked about the fact you're in Los Angeles and New York
Speaker:and in Texas, but you come to record in LA,
Speaker:so what parts of all of that now fit together? You're
Speaker:recording the pre recorded elements for your shows, or you have
Speaker:a whole other line of fabulousness that you've got going on.
Speaker:Well, what I do, I actually lived in Los Angeles for
Speaker:about five years, but went through the
Speaker:Northridge earthquake. Great time to be in LA. I
Speaker:know, and the Rodney King riots. And I
Speaker:think when I left was when OJ Simpson was going down
Speaker:the highway. It was time to go. He's going to run the Bronco
Speaker:I got to get out of. Yeah, so.
Speaker:But I did learn so much about the
Speaker:entertainment business and the importance
Speaker:of networking and how
Speaker:to Shamus and all these things.
Speaker:And then I always found how the musicians were just
Speaker:so incredible and the singers were so incredible, and
Speaker:the best people accumulate
Speaker:in. So what I did
Speaker:was I ended up moving back to Dallas,
Speaker:which was much more affordable to run an office. And
Speaker:I had just picked up a producing job with Six Flags over
Speaker:Texas, so it made sense. I was right in their backyard, but
Speaker:I continued to go to LA. And what's
Speaker:happening now, technology wise, is that
Speaker:we'll have pre production on track. So a lot of times I'm doing
Speaker:a demo that it's with electronics and maybe the vocals.
Speaker:We're building the show, trying it out, and then I'll
Speaker:take those sessions, those layouts, and then
Speaker:I bring those to and, you know, now it's on a hard
Speaker:drive, and then you record real
Speaker:instruments and real vocals on top of that.
Speaker:Then I will bring it back to
Speaker:Dallas where I'll have it mixed and we
Speaker:tweak it and fine tune it here. Now,
Speaker:sometimes with technology, it's been
Speaker:nice. I've been doing this for the last ten or 15 years, where
Speaker:if I'm too busy, I might just send my audio engineer out to
Speaker:LA. And then we work with a combination
Speaker:of programs that I can actually sit at my desk in Dallas
Speaker:and produce a recording session with the engineer
Speaker:in. So that's, that's been a real
Speaker:time saver and money.
Speaker:So I have those options that I can do that.
Speaker:And really now so many voiceovers and things
Speaker:work that way all around the world. In fact, some of them
Speaker:spurred by the pandemic, by a lot of people having voiceover
Speaker:studios, not just in their closets, but
Speaker:expected to have them in their homes and to be
Speaker:very much so. It's changed the whole. Well, that
Speaker:and Netflix wanting translations of so many
Speaker:shows that there's so many little micro recording studios
Speaker:and people doing voiceover work here in LA. So interesting times. Yeah.
Speaker:Oh, yes, it is. It know, particularly you see that all over
Speaker:in a, isn't that there's a realtor
Speaker:that just focuses on homes with studios, I think
Speaker:in Los Angeles. Yeah. Houses that
Speaker:rock or something like that. I don't know. I like that. Yeah.
Speaker:So do we leave any adventures out? We've covered lots of things with you.
Speaker:What have we not mentioned of your adventures? Well,
Speaker:one of the fun aspects of my adventure has been the
Speaker:opportunity to work with Dolly Parton
Speaker:because she has a series of these dinner
Speaker:arena attractions in Pigeon Forge.
Speaker:So it's the Dolly Parton Stampede and the
Speaker:Dolly Parton's Pirates Voyage. So
Speaker:I've worked off and on with that company and many know
Speaker:Dolly will write a new song. So I
Speaker:get an opportunity to work with her in the recording studio, which has just
Speaker:been a tremendous, you know,
Speaker:she has a home in LA, so. Well, I'll record her in
Speaker:and that works out. So that's
Speaker:been a big thrill.
Speaker:And then I would say the other kind of exciting thing I've gotten
Speaker:to do was I actually co wrote the title
Speaker:song for Disney's 102 Dalmatian starring Glenn
Speaker:Close. Wonderful. I really
Speaker:haven't had that much chance to work with Disney shows, but my
Speaker:first opportunity, believe it or not, was the word went out in
Speaker:LA that Disney was looking for a dog song.
Speaker:Open this movie. And a lot of people were submitting, but I
Speaker:knew somebody who knew the publisher, and she and I co wrote
Speaker:a song and it followed it all the way through and it
Speaker:was going to be the end title and they moved it, the opening title credit.
Speaker:And my first entry into Disney was like
Speaker:driving right onto the film production know and
Speaker:interfacing with them. And so that was a real thrill in my
Speaker:career and I haven't worked with Disney since, so
Speaker:it was a little OD chapter, but one I'm very thankful
Speaker:for. Very cool. What do you see heading
Speaker:mean? You're in a business that is robust
Speaker:in a changing music world where you've got
Speaker:great relationships. Is this an
Speaker:expanding space? Are you going to get into these immersive
Speaker:performance spaces, or is this just sort of a
Speaker:happy, wonderful level of life?
Speaker:Well, I would say
Speaker:this year has been tremendous and kind of really helped Kick start
Speaker:me back into show production
Speaker:and turnkey producing, and I really, really enjoy it.
Speaker:And I love the team that I've assembled to help me. So I'm really
Speaker:hoping to exploit that even more.
Speaker:There's a merger happening between Six Flags and Cedar
Speaker:Fair that should go into place in the 1 March. And so they're going to
Speaker:combine have 27 parks. So
Speaker:I'm making a lot of efforts to reach out to them. And
Speaker:I think things really, until the merger happens, it's hard for anybody
Speaker:to commit. But I'm real excited about that opportunity,
Speaker:and it's hard right now
Speaker:on. I was looking at one time of trying to look at
Speaker:writing a Broadway show and getting mounting that. But
Speaker:Broadway is so backed up with so many great properties just looking
Speaker:to get into the city that I'm seeing
Speaker:now an opportunity of large
Speaker:production shows, but not on Broadway. You're looking for other venues
Speaker:for them around the country
Speaker:to produce for. And then what I'm trying to do with my
Speaker:creative team is access the creative talent out of New York,
Speaker:because it doesn't get any better for live show
Speaker:production than the creative talent you have in New York. And just using
Speaker:that, so kind of having a Broadway experience producing,
Speaker:but looking beyond the Theater district of New
Speaker:York City. That sounds fabulous. No, everything has been upside
Speaker:down from the pandemic. And then some of the realignment wasn't just coming
Speaker:back. It's like having clogged in the arteries now where everyone's
Speaker:wanting to do things and the economics have changed so gigantically
Speaker:and people are wanting to put all the postponed shows
Speaker:and projects out. So it's an interesting time. Yeah,
Speaker:it really is. So we are nearly at the
Speaker:end of our adventure here. Okay. What have we not talked about
Speaker:that you want to make sure we talk about?
Speaker:Well, I would just say this,
Speaker:what we haven't really talked about, but is a key
Speaker:to my focus and what I want to do is that
Speaker:I'm really trying to bring joy and entertainment to people.
Speaker:And as a producer,
Speaker:as I mount a show, I will sit there like I kind of usually get
Speaker:a seat on the side of theater and just look at the audience and try
Speaker:to read the audience as much as I can, and
Speaker:that's my job, is to bring them joy.
Speaker:If I mentioned with singing in a choir is if I have a
Speaker:successful choral arrangement and the kids sound
Speaker:great, then all the parents think that's the greatest teacher,
Speaker:and the kids feel positive about themselves and performing
Speaker:music. So ultimately,
Speaker:that's my focus. That's what's most important to me,
Speaker:is bringing joy and entertainment to as many
Speaker:people as I can. And hopefully that great arrangement also makes someone
Speaker:go, gosh, this was a great experience. Maybe I'd like to go into singing or
Speaker:music when I grow up. This has been exactly positive part of my
Speaker:life. Exactly.
Speaker:That's like the subconscious or really what I'm working
Speaker:to do all the time. Bringing joy through all sorts
Speaker:of. You probably touch more people through your music
Speaker:than most other people in the music space
Speaker:because so much of your work is getting licensed into schools
Speaker:and out to people on a regular, joyful basis.
Speaker:And I spend a lot of time on YouTube, and
Speaker:because it's now with pal Leonard, my music is
Speaker:reaching around the world. And like a Christmas suite,
Speaker:which was more of a concert work that I had written, I listened
Speaker:to or looked at a production
Speaker:or being performed in South Africa
Speaker:or in Japan or Southeast
Speaker:Asia or Germany. It's just fascinating
Speaker:to see performances of your music in all parts of the
Speaker:world. It's a cool thing. It's a
Speaker:cool thing. Mark, if someone who would you like to
Speaker:reach out to you and how would you like them to reach out?
Speaker:Well, I think probably the easiest way.
Speaker:On my website, we mentioned just an
Speaker:email called Info
Speaker:info@wowentertainment.net.
Speaker:That's W-O-W Entertainment. Net.
Speaker:And that's the best way to reach out to me. All those come directly to
Speaker:my email. And I mean, it could be
Speaker:somebody who has a venue, who
Speaker:maybe wants to do a production. I have
Speaker:tremendous catalogs of shows that I could offer
Speaker:to them. And let's talk, let's get creative and see how
Speaker:we can work together. Certainly performers
Speaker:or people. Right now I'm really looking at a lot of
Speaker:specialty acts, people that trying to bring that into a
Speaker:musical theater setting with story.
Speaker:Anybody who feels inclined, if you've heard this and you want to reach out
Speaker:to me, I'm more than happy to get
Speaker:back with you, and I will. I read
Speaker:every email that comes to me and that's the great way to reach me. Very
Speaker:cool. Mark, thank you very much for joining us. And I'm looking
Speaker:forward to somewhere in this Christmas season we're doing this
Speaker:right now in December 2023, of hearing your
Speaker:music somewhere in all of these different adventures. Well,
Speaker:thank you so much, Gigi. I really appreciate it. Excellent.
Speaker:You.
