MIDLAND, Texas — Broadway in New York City is a multi-million dollar industry that sets the stage to theatre and music. When the pandemic hit, Broadway lost around $5 million in ticket sales.
Jordan Person, a Midland native who now lives in New York, was one of the people affected along with her husband. The theatre isn't new to her, even in Midland, she was once involved with the Midland Community Theatre before graduating from Trinity.
"Being able to come from a small town in West Texas, I shouldn't even say 'small town,' but a town that offers so much to its community, to take that and bring it to New York, is a real gift," said Person.
Now she works for an advertising and marketing agency. But last year, life wasn't easy. In the city that never sleeps, it finally did.
"That was really challenging to experience and to see good friends who were impacted by that when families were in the Broadway industry," said Person. "But the flipside, is it was incredibly heartwarming to see how the industry came together to support those who really needed it."
So what happens when there's no business like show business?
Person and her husband had an idea.
"Well it's funny because my husband to his credit has a lot of ideas, but not all of them are good! This was one we were laughing because we were making the bed and he said to me, 'I have this idea, there's Cameo, that seems popular. People love it, and there could be something like that for Broadway but maybe even more special.' Because rather than spoken message, they could sing you a song," said Person.
It's called Broadway Song Shoppe. Instead of going to Broadway yourself, Broadway comes to you.
First you select your Broadway star, choose your music style and give the details.
See the NewsWest 9 Sunrise song, performed by Nic Rouleau from "The Book of Mormon," below:
"We had a woman buy a song who was celebrating a milestone in her weight loss journey, we had a mom buy a song for her kids ready to start the first day of real school coming out of the pandemic, a woman bought a song for a friend starting her first day of a new job," said Person. "It makes you realize something coming out of COVID, we can connect with every day moments to celebrate and what better day to celebrate them than today. We can identify those little moments in our life that we want to make the people in our life feel special."
In a world that was shut down, a new one connected us again.
"The Midland community was so supportive and nurturing, and that's something that set me up to have perseverance to try things here and fail at things here and continue to persevere throughout," said Person.
You can try Broadway Song Shoppe by going to their website here.