Omahans who love popular music such as Ellie Goulding’s “Burn” or N’Sync’s “Bye, Bye, Bye” might know all the lyrics to their favorite song when it comes on the radio. Those attending tonight’s performance of Postmodern Jukebox at Astro Amphitheater will likely recognize the words being sung onstage, but may be surprised at hearing these tunes, which could range from 1920s jazz to 1960s doo-wop. Those melodies are the creativity of PMJ creator Scott Bradlee.
“I would say that this is an experience,” Bradlee said. “You don’t have to feel like you know anything about jazz; you don’t need to know anything about classical music … You’re going to know [what] we’re doing, because there’s some of the biggest hits of the last 30 years.”
This is the 10th anniversary of Postmodern Jukebox, which started when Bradlee took his party trick of playing modern songs in older styles, recorded one (Lady Gaga’s “Paparazzi”), and put the video on YouTube. The video went viral, and the concept for a musical group was born. Bradlee, however, had been performing jazz for many years.
“I heard “Rhapsody in Blue,” said Bradlee, who, at that point, was a lackluster piano student. “I recognized the classical sound of it, but then there’s this other element that … really spoke to me. I later found out that it was jazz.”
Bradlee threw himself into learning everything he could about the music genre. In the before the internet, this meant heading to his local library to check out cassettes and CDs by artists ranging from Jelly Roll Morton to Duke Ellington, and reading books about the various musicians. The culmination of that self-taught jazz course has come in the form of world tours and hundreds of modern songs performed in classic styles.
And there’s no sign that Bradlee will be stopping anytime soon.
“I think there’s a lot of really interesting stuff coming out right now, especially for the younger generation from Gen Z,” Bradlee said. “I came up during the era that was really, you know, pop music was pop music. The stuff that’s coming out now is kind of the opposite. There’s kind of this return to songs that are standards.”
One thing is certain. Those going to tonight’s performance of Postmodern Jukebox at the Astro will hear a show that is anything that’s standard. From the vintage-style clothes to the dancing to the songs, Postmodern Jukebox is sure to entertain. It’s a return to a variety show in the style of Lawrence Welk productions, which Bradlee remembers his grandmother watching when he was a kid.
“There’s something that’s really interesting about the variety show format and also the way that it continually refreshes itself,” Bradlee reflected. “So every time that we do a tour, it’s a brand new show. We have a different cast of people rotate in and out—the setlist is always changing.”
Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox “The ’10’ Tour” starts at 8 pm. Doors open at 7. Tickets are available from $49-$99 through Ticketmaster at https://theastrotheater.com.
