stew
STEWDIO ZERO #1
Songs & Singing
Stew STEWART & Heidi RODEWALD
Candaceia CHARLES singing
Marlon CHERRY playing
Shayna DUNKELMAN playing
KJ HARDY lighting/sounding
Adam BASCO-MAHIEDDINE singing
Kamilah MARIAM seeing
Mike McGINNIS playing
LeRoi RICHARDSON singing
Emma ROGERS singing
Jasmine "Jenie" SURILLO singing
Charley RAIFF playing
Diego STEWART playing
Eve WOLDEMIKAEL singing
Max SEDACCA assisting
Stew Stewart is a Tony Award and two-time Obie Award winning playwright/performer, a critically acclaimed singer/songwriter, and veteran of multiple dive-bar stages. He is Professor of the Practice of Musical Theater Writing at Harvard University, where his classes are hothouses of multi-disciplinary, self-challenging experimentation, where he strives to demystify the creative process for his students.
Stew’s work has been featured on multiple occasions at joints like Harlem Stage, Lincoln Center, the United Nations, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, the Getty Museum, Hammer Museum, UCLA Live, Seattle Repertory Theater, NPR, and Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, among others.
In 2024 Stew debuted High Substitute for the Head Lecturer (2024) at Harlem Stage, a meditation/mediation on Amiri Baraka. In 2015, Stew, along with artistic partner-in-crime, Heidi Rodewald, created and performed Notes of a Native Song, a concert-collage of songs, text, and video inspired by James Baldwin and commissioned and produced by Harlem Stage.
Stew’s works include High Substitute for the Head Lecturer (2024) Maybe There’s Black People in Fort Green and A Clown with the Nuclear Code, written for Spike Lee’s TV show She’s Gotta Have It (2018 & 19); Resisting My Resistance to the Resistance, Metropolitan Museum of Art (2017); Mosquito Net (NYUAD Arts Center, Abu Dhabi (2016); Notes of a Native Song (2015); Wagner, Max!!! Wagner!!! commissioned by and debuted at Kennedy Center, DC (2015); Chicago Omnibus commissioned by & debuted @ Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; California Analog (2013) Commissioned by the University of California, Los Angeles; Brooklyn Omnibus (2010) Commissioned by & debuted at the Brooklyn Academy of Music; Making It (2010) commissioned by and debuted at St Ann’s Warehouse.
Spike Lee’s Passing Strange (2009)
Tony for Best Book of a Musical. Broadway. 2008
Obie: Best New Theater Piece & Best Ensemble. Public Theater (2007)
PASSING STRANGE: World Premiere. Berkeley Repertory. (2006)
Stew & The Negro Problem have released 14 critically acclaimed albums between 1997 and the present. Stew is the composer of Gary Come Home of Sponge Bob SquarePants fame, which, honestly, is all anyone cares about anyway.
Heidi Rodewald is the Tony Award-nominated, Obie Award-winning co-composer of the musical Passing Strange, which transferred from The Public Theater to Broadway in 2008 and then was made into a film by director Spike Lee. Rodewald joined the band The Negro Problem in 1997, where she began a longtime collaboration with singer/songwriter, Stew, and with him released ten critically acclaimed albums. Theatre includes: Passing Strange (The Public Theater, Belasco); Brooklyn Omnibus (BAM Next Wave Festival); Making It (St. Ann’s Warehouse); Family Album (Oregon Shakespeare Festival); Notes of a Native Song (Harlem Stage); Wagner, Max! Wagner!! (Kennedy Center); The Total Bent (The Public Theater). Composer with librettist Donna Di Novelli: The Good Swimmer (BAM Next Wave Festival); A Lifesaving Manual (UCLA's Center for the Art of Performance). TV includes: SpongeBob SquarePants (Nichelodeon); She’s Gotta Have It (Netflix). Film includes: Passing Strange (40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks and Apple Core Holdings Production); Criminal (The New Yorker); Over The River & Through The Woods (Contemptible Ent); Reprieve (The Interval); I Dream Too Much (77 Films, Attic Light Films, Pantheon of Women).
Candaceia Charles
Candaceia is a multi-hyphenate artist from Brooklyn, New York. She’s no stranger to the theater, having previously directed Frenchman at The Tank and Cycles at The Chain. As a performer, her favorite Theater credits include Addy and Uno at Theatre Row and Columbus is Happening at Joe’s Pub. She’s also had the honor of performing behind powerhouse artists such as Jennifer Hudson, and Andra Day at Billboard Women in Music and George Lucas’ Christmas party. Candaceia is deeply grateful to God for every opportunity that has brought her to this moment. Endless thanks to her village: too many to name, but you know who you are. Your love sustains me.
Marlon Cherry
Marlon is a multi-instrumentalist/ composer who has performed and created music for dance, film, and theater and has worked with a variety of musical artists, including Stew and the Negro Problem, Baba Bibi, Terre Roche/The Roches, Odetta, Pete Seeger, Eszter Balint, Syd Straw, Chris Cochrane, John S. Hall, and Susan Hwang. He's a member of the NY/LA artist collective, The Secret City and a staff accompanist for Barnard College's dance department. His latest solo CD, "Fever Dreaming In Lo-Fi" is available at marloncherry1.bandcamp.com, Spotify, Amazon, iTunes, & other streaming suspects.
Shayna Dunkelman
Shayna is a musician, percussionist, and composer based in New York, recognized for her versatile techniques and innovative use of electronics. She performs and tours internationally with acclaimed artists, including Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Du Yun, Puerto Rican band Balún, Grammy-winning Attacca Quartet, and Pakistani singer Ali Sethi. Dunkelman is also one half of the percussion duo NOMON with her sister, Nava Dunkelman. Born in Tokyo to an Indonesian mother and an American father, she became a multi-instrumentalist performing alongside her mother. Throughout her career, Dunkelman has collaborated with avant-garde luminaries such as Yoko Ono and Thurston Moore, further solidifying her reputation in the experimental music scene.
KJ Hardy
Resident Lighting Designer for 54 Below (2011-2025) & Joe’s Pub (2003-2011). Numerous off broadway and regional credits as a designer, , associate, & assistant. Love to Stew & Heidi. Let’s make some art and move some hearts.
Adam Basco-Mahieddine
Adam is a Moroccan/Filipino-American actor, writer and singer from Flushing, Queens, New York. He graduated with his Bachelors in Theatre from Queens College. Prior to Queens College he attended LaGuardia Community College where he also studied Theatre. During his LaGuardia days he was part of the inception of Columbus Is Happening, an original musical devised by Stew Stewart and LaGuardia students. Later he would join Stew and his classmates to debut it at Joe’s Pub at The Public Theatre. Adam is currently a member of Kinding Sindaw, a New York-based dance theatre company that asserts, reclaims and preserves the unwritten history of the Philippines through orature, indigenous dance and martial arts.
Kamilah Mariam
Kamilah is a multi-hyphenate theatre artist based in NYC. She holds a BFA from Occidental College in Theater and Performance Studies, and Critical Theory & Social Justice. Her work aims to straddle a Black past, present, and future simultaneously in order to reimagine all three. She views each of her mediums, from directing to stage management to sound design, as a means to that end. She is currently working on Room 204 at The Walker Hotel and T. Alexandra Holloman's Eva's Eye. Other recent credits include Minstrel??? at The Tank and Colder by the Water at Theater for the New City.
Mike McGinnis
Clarinetist/Saxophonist/Composer Mike McGinnis has worked with some of today’s most innovative and influential artists including Anthony Braxton’s Trillium E Orchestra, Steve Coleman's Aquarius Ingress (Ravi Coltrane, Tony Malaby, Miguel Zenon and Chris Speed), the Lonnie Plaxico Group, Stew & Heidi (of Passing Strange/the Negro Problem), Fela! On Broadway (saxophone soloist), Art Lande, Yo La Tengo, the Ohad Talmor/Steve Swallow Sextet, Alice Coltrane, sculptor Martin Kersels (Whitney Biennial 2009) and the Losers Lounge among others. He has released several recordings as a leader and/or co-leader with the four bags, OK|OK, DDYGG and Between Green.
LeRoi Richardson
LeRoi is a multidisciplinary storyteller working across music, theater, and film. He is a honorary member of Stew + The Negro Problem. He sometimes goes by Augusto Leon, his Rap persona. A sonic explorer with a deep-rooted love for Hip-Hop, Jazz, and Soul, his work blends the rhythms of Black musical traditions with bold narratives that examine identity, history, and cultural memory. He holds a BFA from Marymount Manhattan College, where he double-majored in Musical Theater and Writing for the Stage. He’s working on multiple projects right now, including workshopping his play Frenchman, his response to LeRoi Jones’ Dutchman and adapting Alice in Wonderland into a crime drama universe.
Emma Rogers
Emma is a singer, dancer, actress, songwriter, and playwright specializing in musical theater performance. A recent graduate of Harvard College in Theater, Dance & Media, she is currently studying Writing and Production for Musical Theater at Berklee NYC. At Harvard, Emma was a cast member of The Hasty Pudding Theatricals, the oldest theater company in the country. She was also a member of The Harvard Callbacks a cappella group and the Harvard-Radcliffe Modern Dance Company. Emma would like to thank Stew for this opportunity and his mentorship over the years!
Jasmine Surillo
Jasmine is a Puerto Rican/Dominican Singer, Songwriter and actress from Far Rockaway, Queens New York. She’s been able to go on and create songs played on the BET Series TALES and have her music played on other connecting networks. She's also had the pleasure of performing for venues such as Joe’s Pub and BAM. Jasmine continues to create and hopes to expand her talents on a greater level. Instagram: @Jeniemagic
Charley Raiff
Charley is a pianist, composer, and theater writer from New York City. Raiff started working with Stew as musical assistant during the Total Bent at the Public Theater (2016). He is the composer/producer and lyricist of viral comic musical media content (No Cap On Israel), jingles (GSK, Grey, and AFW), and has recorded with an eclectic mix of award-winning recording artists, including Nick Littlemore (Empire of The Sun, Pnau) and Jon Batiste (Soul, The Late Show). Raiff recently signed with Lisa Dozier (Be More Chill, It’s Kind of A Funny Story, Not Ready For Primetime) to produce a development workshop of Raiff’s musical Luxury Problems, a satire on wealth inequality and elitism centered in a Park Avenue apartment building, slated for direction by Danny Goldstein (Unknown Soldier, Godspell, Come From Away, and Row) in early 2026.
Diego Stewart
Diego was born in Manhattan in 2010. He likes hanging out with friends, playing soccer, and collecting sneakers, clothes, and art. Diego will pursue a career in fashion design. He also has a crested gecko named Schmecky, and a dog named Samus. Diego loves traveling. He also enjoys making art and designing clothes. Some of Diego’s favorite music artists are Tyler the Creator, XXXTENTACION, and Danny Brown.
Eve Woldemikael
Eve is a writer, singer, songwriter and creator who also dabbles in filmmaking and various other crafts. Her current projects focus on indigenous wisdoms and storytelling, galactic and oceanic inspired essays, and whimsical songs about both the ordinary happenings of life and the unknowable mysteries of the universe. As an Eritrean-American, she proudly represents the village of Adi Baro and draws from her African roots and ancestors in her work and life. Eve believes in the power of creativity and the joy of art-making to transform the way we relate to our world, the environment, and each other. Eve also holds an MDiv from Harvard Divinity School.
Max Sedacca
Max is an actor, playwright, songwriter, designer, and storyteller originally from Dallas, Texas. There he attended Booker T Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts and worked at Dallas Theater Center and Soul Rep Theatre Company. He attended Sarah Lawrence for college and that is where he took Stew’s class for 3 years. Since then, Max has worked around the city on and off Broadway and at the Museum of Broadway. He is so thankful to Stew for being an amazing mentor to him throughout the years and giving him this opportunity. He would also like to thank his family and his other mentor Guinea Bennett-Price.