MAHOPAC, N.Y.—Holly Block, a 2017 Mahopac High School grad, is officially a quadruple threat. She’s a singer, dancer (and choreographer), actor and playwright.
Now, a musical Block co-wrote with her writing partner, Elizabeth Jerjian, recently had an off-Broadway showcase – a concert version of the show highlighting the songs – to attract investors and producers. The production, at Theater 511 in Manhattan’s Theater District, was sold out.
Block called it "a great success."
It’s been a long journey for Block and Jerjian to get to where they are today. Their show, “Safe and Sound,” was set to debut in 2020, but then the COVID pandemic hit. They eventually produced an online version of the show and sold tickets. It fared well, but it wasn’t as satisfying as a live performance in front of an in-person audience. So, the duo has continued to tinker with the show, doing rewrites, adding songs, removing songs, and changing the lyrics to a musical that is about healing and empowerment—a message they find more relevant today than ever.
The raw but heartwarming story dives into sensitive topics woven in with hope and compassion, Block explained. The show explores suicide prevention, mental health issues, LGBTQ+ concerns, female empowerment, military PTSD, and social justice.
The plot follows three characters who come back to who they truly are by reconnecting to love and their inner child.
Love—a character in the play—guides the three to help control their pain and heal old wounds, all while fighting against time as their paths intertwine.
While in 2021, the show “won 10 awards at the Front Row Fringe Festival, including Best Musical and the Audience Choice Award, this latest version of 'Safe and Sound,'” Block says, has an interesting new twist they’ve incorporated into the music: It's the first musical to use sound healing and Reiki as part of a show. The audience will experience intentional frequencies and vibrations that will shift their energy to an uplifted and hopeful state.
“This is the only musical to incorporate sound therapy and healing,” Block said. “There are sound frequencies that are put into the orchestration and vocal patterns are woven throughout the music that can shift [the listener’s] emotional state. There is a lot of science behind it.”
Jerjian is a Reiki healer and has already produced a sound therapy album of her own.
“The show was already written, so we added these vocal patterns and drumbeats,” Block explained. “We were using Elizabeth’s voice throughout the show, and it all came together.
“The story focuses on mental health and the healing journey,” she continued. “But I think we [as a culture] focus too much on the Band-Aid [solutions], like medicines, but we don’t focus on the healing journey and how transformative that can be.”
Block said the five-year-plus quest to get “Safe and Sound” in front of a wider audience is typical for a Broadway musical.
“It takes time to get these things developed,” she said. “You are in and out of workshops, rewriting songs, writing new songs.”
Last year, the writing duo decided to release some of the music onto streaming platforms to entice people to get tickets to the Theater 511 show. They reached out to Broadway vocalist and influencer Natalie Weiss (who sang on “The Greatest Showman” soundtrack with Hugh Jackman) to see if she would record a song.
“She was all in for it,” Block said. “We shot a video. We edited it and held our breath and put it on Instagram, YouTube and Spotify and it did better than we expected. It got 3,000 likes and more than 64,000 views. For the first song being released, that is pretty darn good. It felt good, so I knew we weren’t crazy.”
Weiss’s video performance of the song “What Now?” can be found at the website safeandsoundmusical.com.
“People don’t realize what it takes to get something on Broadway—getting people who believe in the show is a mission to get it to a really big stage,” Block explained. “It took Alicia Keys 13 years to get her show on Broadway.”
There is even more synergy between the musical and Block’s campaign to raise mental health awareness. On the show’s website, visitors can find a link to a PDF for a resource center called “We Are Love Space.”
“While we have upleveled [the show] with the sound healing, we also created an online resource center filled with resources for mental health programs,” Block said.
“If they don’t know where to start [to get help], and that is the most overwhelming part, they can come here. It felt necessary to create something like this to attach to the show. Once the show is fully realized and we can really give back, I hope we can fund the resource center and pay for healthcare services.”
Block said the seed for the idea that led to the creation of “Safe and Sound” began when she was in high school.
“The character of Erin was inspired by a friend who passed away my senior year,” Block said. “She had struggled with cancer her whole life. She loved music and performing. She represented the idea that you don’t need to live a long life to live a full life and impact people in a positive way. That is very personal to me.”
As if all the work on “Safe and Sound” isn’t enough, Block has other irons in the fire.
“Are you ever just working on one thing in this business?” she laughed.
Block is planning a “Christmas spectacular” and is currently assembling a lineup of songs and dances.
“I am just putting together a script,” she said.
She continues to write music and is contemplating recording a singer/songwriter album that she hopes to release next year.
The Mahopac grad still marvels at the fact that she is even able at all to write music, especially lyrics.
“I am dyslexic, and I couldn’t really read until I was 13,” Block said. “I never thought I could write a show. So, that is why I encourage people to keep going and not stop trying. I have learned how to manage it and now here I am.”
Learn more at Instagram @hollyblock and @safeandsoundmusical or visit safeandsoundmusical.com
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