It wasn’t just another Friday night at the Social last week.. This was a Friday night with the dueling piano duo, randy and Jason.
Randy Keith and Jason James have become the popular mainstay at the Social NPR, a new addition to downtown New Port Richey, that features dueling pianos every Friday night.
All summer long, a rotation of talented piano players from Premier Piano shows performs on the Social NPR stage, but the team of Randy and Jason makes for a truly unique combination that the contingent and the staff at the Social loves.
Randy Keith is the owner of Premier Piano Shows, the company that provides the variety of different dueling piano players every week to New port Richey.
“When you have a unique entertainment concept like dueling pianos every week, people like to see a little bit of variety,” Keith says. “So aside from myself and my regular partner Jason, we bring in players from all over the state. Some of them are freelance musicians that perform dueling pianos all over the country, and others are regular players at piano bars like Universal Citywalk’s Pat o’Briens.”
One of the main unique features of a dueling piano show are the audience requests. Last Friday night became an evening of a wide repertoire.
Just in the first few minutes of the show, requested songs played included Scott Joplin’s “The Entertainer,” as well as some Elton John and Billy Joel classics, and recent hit “Old Town Road” featuring Billy Ray Cyrus. Throughout the night, the crowd sang along with classic rock, country sing-alongs and much more, culminating with Lizzo’s recent hit, “Truth Hurts.”
“That’s the thing I love about dueling pianos,” says Premier Piano Shows owner Randy Keith. “You can start with classic hits, then take a complete left turn into dance or rap music for the millennials, and then jump back to hits like ‘Great Balls of Fire’ and ‘Sweet Caroline,’ which everyone ends up singing along to.”
Another facet of dueling pianos, aside from audience singalong, is the concept of the “calldown.” Every night at our dueling piano shows, we invite people to request songs specifically if they have someone in their party celebrating a special occasion — a birthday or anniversary, or maybe just any excuse to embarrass one of their friends.
Last Friday, it was a group of ladies that were celebrating birthdays (ranging from their 20s to 50s) that came onto the stage to perform their childhood classic “Head Shoulders, Knees and Toes.” It’s always s fun sobriety test to bring up the people celebrating a fun occasion on Friday night. The audience loves it because when people come up to the stage it becomes about the audience and not just about a performance onstage.
The dueling piano show is professional, but the concept is all-inclusive. It includes people of all ages and constantly engages the crowd, not like a normal concert or band performance.
The fun continues again this and every Friday night at the Social NPR in Downtown New Port Richey!