Donald Smith

Donald Smith has been actively involved with the world of cabaret for over forty years. Indeed, The OaklandTribune recently and gratefully described him as “the man who has done more than anyone else to keep cabaret alive.”

For more than two decades, he worked closely with his great friend Mabel Mercer — arguably the supreme cabaret artist of the twentieth century — and arranged for her performance seasons in (among other locations) New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. He also organized her dramatic, triumphal return to her native England after a forty-one year absence. Additionally, Mr. Smith has managed, promoted, and nurtured the careers of the acclaimed Andrea Marcovicci, Michael Feinstein, and Steve Ross. In one capacity or another, he has also represented (among many others) Julie Wilson, Margaret Whiting, KT Sullivan, Craig Rubano, Jeff Harnar, and Sylvia Syms.

It was Donald Smith who, in 1981, brought cabaret back to The Oak Room of New York’s legendary Algonquin Hotel; for ten years, he produced and promoted every one of their cabaret engagements. For five years, Mr. Smith was Artistic Director of the hugely successful “Cabaret Comes to Carnegie” series at Weill Recital Hall, as well as Executive Producer of the popular “Cabaret at The Russian Tea Room.” He was artistic consultant and talent producer for the WNYC radio series, “New York Cabaret Nights” and — for more than two decades — booked talent for London’s celebrated Pizza On the Park.

Donald with Mabel Mercer, 1975

In 1985, Mr. Smith’s efforts led to the formation of the not-for-profit arts organization, The Mabel Mercer Foundation, to both perpetuate the memory of its extraordinary namesake and to give an ongoing visibility to the fragile and endangered world of cabaret. With Donald Smith as Executive Director, The Foundation has presented an annual, week-long “Cabaret Convention” for the past fourteen years, selling out New York’s Town Hall at every engagement and showcasing well over eleven hundred singers and entertainers since 1989. (The 2003 program elicited ticket orders from thirty-seven states and six foreign countries.) The fifteenth convention plays from October 18-24, 2004; one of its highlights will be an event cited simply as “Family,” in which the actual family members and relatives of well-known cabaret performers will gather onstage for a glorious demonstration of their musical heritage across the generations.

Additionally, The Mabel Mercer Foundation has produced Cabaret Conventions on three occasions in San Francisco, at two engagements in Chicago, and at events in Palm Springs, Philadelphia, and Washington, D. C. In February 2004, they debut the premiere London Cabaret Convention at The Greenwich Theatre as the gala finale of a two-week Musical Voices “celebration of the singing voice in all its forms”; later in the year, they return to East Hampton for their second annual appearance on Long Island. The signal success of The Foundation recently won them the sobriquet “American song’s best friend” from The San Francisco Chronicle.

Other events produced by The Mabel Mercer Foundation include the one-hundredth birthday anniversary celebration of Noel Coward, Mad About the Boy, which jammed New York’s Carnegie Hall to capacity in December 1999. They have also begun a Young People’s Series to introduce the great classic popular songbook to new audiences.

Mr. Smith’s long term goals for the organization now focus on the establishment of a Mabel Mercer Foundation Center, which would provide both a permanent home for their activities and free or low-cost rehearsal and varied performance spaces for cabaret entertainers. Such a Center would offer as well a musical library and archive, listening rooms, and exhibition areas. As The Foundation’s Executive Director, Donald Smith is also developing a film and series of television programs on the world of cabaret as it exists today. “This music is a part of America’s great heritage,” he proclaims. “It must be heard!”