Pictures: Paul Torode
A bar full of musical theatre lovers, serving great food and theatre-themed cocktails, with live show tunes sung by talented performers who take requests, and even sometimes open mics and themed quizzes, in the heart of London’s West End? This all sounded too good to be true, so we sent along MTR contributor (and host of The Mayor of Musical Theatre Podcast) Ian Bowkett to investigate.
The first thing that strikes you when you enter SingEasy – a secret room located within the West End’s Piano Works bar – is the attention to detail. Next door is one of the city’s favourite piano bars with dancing, Prosecco and crowd-pleasing pop songs. With those bases already covered, SingEasy is free to lean into what makes it unique – a fanatical dedication to musical theatre. The room is decorated with show posters, the cocktails are theatre-themed, and at the centre of it all is a piano making the glorious sounds we love most: the bouncy pop of Six, sweeping Hammerstein ballads, and sometimes even those iconic chords that make you feel something has changed within you, something is not the same…
The food and drink menus are well worth an explore online. I will have to go back to sample the full selection, but I greatly enjoyed their steak and a sensible number of their theatre-themed cocktails. Of course, by ‘sensible’ I mean every single one of their theatre-themed cocktails. Musical Theatre Review trusted me to thoroughly investigate this establishment and I take my duty to our readers very seriously. All were exquisitely crafted and quite unique, which is to the credit of the hard-working bar staff.
Of course, the endless orders of complicated cocktails aren’t all the SingEasy team have to contend with. On each table is a stack of song request slips, and guests are encouraged to request their favourite show tunes for the staff to sing. If you’re concerned about hearing a difficult piece of Sondheim butchered by amateurs, have no fear: the team are all seasoned stage performers when not working in this bar, and they are backed up by a series of the West End’s best musical directors on keys.
We hear a wide selection of beloved show tunes throughout the night, from the timeless beauty of ‘Somewhere’ from West Side Story to the intricate hip-hop of Hamilton’s ‘My Shot’. And whoever requested ‘Me and the Sky from Come from Away: whether you forgot about the ending gut-punch or you actually wanted us all to get depressed about 9/11 on a fun night out, fair play to you. Like everything we hear tonight, it is beautifully performed and there will always be a more upbeat banger to bring the mood back up later.
The best test of a good night out is how difficult it is to leave. Despite having work in the morning (even Mayors of Musical Theatre have day-jobs) and intending to leave at 7:30pm, I found myself still dancing, singing along and chatting to other musical theatre fans until the midnight close. The last of those is truly the greatest selling point. Even in the queue to get into Heathers, you can’t be sure that everyone there is as show tunes-obsessed as yourself. SingEasy, however, operates on a free (free!) membership model that ensures its patrons are the sorts of objectively good people who will understand when you have a little cry at just the thought of Bernadette Peters’ performance of ‘Being Alive’ in her Sondheim, Etc. Carnegie Hall show.
With so many central London bars being busy, overpriced and – worse – not musical theatre-themed, it is always a blessing to find a new spot to hang out before an evening show or to party the night away after a matinee. Membership benefits include priority entry, drinks offers and even complementary Prosecco on special occasions, which all sounds like a pretty good deal considering it costs nothing to sign up. Maybe I’ll see you there soon?
Ian Bowkett
Details:
Wesbite: singeasy.bar
Membership: singeasy.bar/sing-easy-membership
Location: A secret room located within The Piano Works, Clareville House, 47 Whitcomb Street, London WC2H 7DH
How to get there: The nearest underground stations are Leicester Square (Northern and Piccadilly lines) and Piccadilly Circus (Bakerloo and Piccadilly lines). The nearest rail station is Charing Cross.
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