THE POP UPS began as a personal challenge for two Brooklyn musicians looking to make something that their friends could feel good about enjoying with their young families. Jason Rabinowitz and Jacob Stein set the bar high when they decided to write and record a really good album in just a week in Jason’s home studio. Calling themselves The Pop Ups, they distributed the demos to friends and were overwhelmed by the positively exuberant responses from both parents and kids.
They self released the record, titled OUTSIDE VOICES and the album was recently recognized with a National Association of Parenting Publications Award (NAPPA) for best music, was on the ballot to be nominated for a GRAMMY, and is on the Top Ten of 2010 lists of The Washington Post, Time Out New York Kids, The Fids and Kamily Awards, Out with The Kids, Zooglobble, and more. The Pop Ups also recently were recognized with a Parent's Choice Award for their contribution to the Craig Taubman curated album Celebrate Jewish Lullabies.
OUTSIDE VOICES was commissioned into a musical. The fellas wrote and star in PASTA! A Pop Ups Puppet Musical, a high-energy educational, comic, and musical adventure through the magical land of Brooklyn
PASTA! includes live-drawing, dance-beats, colorful puppets, animals, trains, guitar riffs, mermaids, gardens, instruments, vegetables, sparkles and rocking interactive dance numbers that catapult the audience out of their seats.
Selling out in it's opening run in Los Angeles, PASTA! was brought back to the east coast where after another sold out opening, the show is in an extended ongoing run in NYC. It has been performed at The Kennedy Center, excerpts as the "Super Music Friends Show" with Yo Gabba Gabba Live, and has upcoming performances at BAM, Symphony Space, and The Jewish Museum in NYC. The Pop Ups have been also been featured in The Wall Street Journal, and CNNMoney.com.
JASON RABINOWITZ is a composer, producer, educator, actor, and multi-instrumentalist from New York City. Throughout his career, Jason has created specialized content for early childhood music programs in New York City. He began his career as an artist-in-residence in dozens of New York City public schools and spent five years creating arts-in-education projects for grades pre-K through 8. For half a decade, he taught extensively with noted early childhood music program Little Maestros, and co-authored and produced three of their major-label records. He had his Broadway debut in Little Maestros Live at The Nokia Theatre.
Through his many years as a singer and performer in NYC's indie rock community he has gotten to record duets and sing with the likes of Regina Spektor, Britta Phillips, members of The National, Beirut, Luna, Rilo Kiley, and Northern State, among others. He has also shared the stage with the likes of Suzanne Vega, Mike Doughty, Kimya Dawson (of Moldy Peaches/Juno soundtrack fame), Ra Ra Riot, Scritti Pollitti, I'm From Barcelona, Jeffrey Lewis, and many others. He is the founder and principal songwriter of The Bloodsugars, a synth-pop outfit from NYC who released their critically acclaimed debut album “I Can’t Go On I’ll Go On” in Nov 2009.
JACOB STEIN has been blending music and visual art for adults and children since 2001. He is the creator of the wildly successful Bim Bom Musicfest, an early childhood music class now in it’s 8th year at the Jewish Community Center Project in NYC.
In 2007, Jacob premiered his Hanukah puppet musical 'The Hammer & The Candle' at Stephen Wise Synagogue and in 2008 his Passover musical 'The Mystery of the Disappearing Afikoman', commissioned by the Jewish Community Project received its premier at the Museum of the Holocaust at Battery Park.
With a B.A. from Yale and M.F.A. in Visual Art from Columbia, Jacob comes from a very musical family. His father is a Grammy award-winning children's musician and Cantor, his mother is a singer and both of his brothers are professional musicians on the West Coast. They perform together as the Rolling Steins.