StLJN Saturday Video Showcase: 2016 St. Louis Cabaret Festival

This week, it's time to take a look at some of the performers who will part of the 2016 St. Louis Cabaret Festival, which will feature performances by touring headliners on Wednesday, July 20; Thursday, July 21; and Friday, July 22 at the Sheldon Concert Hall.

(A final performance on Sunday, July 24 at the Ferring Jazz Bistro will showcase participants from the St. Louis Cabaret Conference, an annual week-long event that encompasses the festival as well as daily educational programming for both aspiring and experienced cabaret performers, professional development, networking, and more.)

This year's festival will feature return appearances by several performers who have been well-received in years past, including longtime St. Louis favorite Ann Hampton Callaway and Kansas native Marilyn Maye, the amazingly spry 88-year-old who's been called the "grande dame of cabaret." They'll both be featured along with pianists Billy Stritch and Tedd Firth on Thursday night's show, titled "Marilyn Maye and her Piano Men".

Also returning for an encore appearance will be Broadway star Faith Prince, who was part of the event in 2014. This year, she'll team up with singer and actor Jason Graae on Wednesday night for "The Prince and the Showboy," which they first did together in 2012 in New York City.

New to the event in 2016 is singer and pianist Tony DeSare, who will be featured on Friday night. Though this is his first year as part of the Cabaret Festival, DeSare has played in St. Louis before, in 2007 at the Bistro and in 2011 at the Sheldon. You can see him in the first video up above, singing "Baby Dream Your Dream," a song from the Broadway musical Sweet Charity, at a gig in March of this year in Las Vegas.

After the jump, you can see DeSare performing his original song "Chemistry" in a recording made at the same Las Vegas gig.

Below that, there are a couple of examples of impromptu interaction between Ann Hampton Callaway and Marilyn Maye, as they're featured in two audience-made clips (one from 2010, the other undated) improvising a bit of blues and playing around with "Our Love Is Here To Stay".

(For more videos of Maye and Callaway, together and separately, plus a clip of Billy Stritch, see StLJN's preview of the 2014 fest. There also are a couple of nice clips of Maye in the preview post from 2015.)

You'll also find a couple of videos of Faith Prince in that 2014 post, and you can see her and Jason Graae in today's fifth clip, which excerpts from and promotes the NYC run of "The Prince and the Showboy".

Last but not least, the sixth and final video features Tedd Firth playing a solo piano version of "When A Woman Loves A Man," a song recorded by both Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holliday, as well as many others.

You can see the rest of today's videos after the jump...