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[0:00] Martín Acuña: Hi, everyone. I am Martín Acuña, and you are listening to Backstage Talk.

[0:10] Martín Acuña: Hello, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Backstage Talk. Today's guest is someone that I really looked up to, and he blew up my TikTok a couple of months ago with his musicals.

[0:29] Martín Acuña: I have here with me Jorge Rivera-Herrans. We call him Jay. He is a playwright, songwriter, and actor raised in Dorado, Puerto Rico. And after spending his upbringing studying for a life in medicine with songwriting as a hobby, Jorge found his passion for musical theater during his college years. He just released a studio cast recording of an album called My Heart Says Go, but you would probably have heard about him or his work on TikTok with Epic, a sung-through musical inspired by The Odyssey by Homer, where he has developed an online community that is massive. You probably must have heard the audio snippet of You Are Athena. Well, that is his work. So, Jorge, I am so happy to have you over. Welcome to Backstage Talk.

[1:30] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh, my gosh. Thank you so much for having me. It's such an honor to be here. It's so cool. This is awesome.

[1:37] Martín Acuña: So, you were born and raised in Puerto Rico, but then you went to the University of Notre Dame. What else do we have to know about you? Tell us a little bit more about yourself.

[1:44] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: That I am not a winter person. I did not ever experience winter before going to Notre Dame, and I thought it was like sticking your head in the fridge, right? I thought it was like, oh, it can't be worse than that. I got there. It was freezing. I'm still not a winter person. I'm getting through it. But yeah, yeah, like you said, a lot of my life was spent preparing for a career in medicine. I really thought I was going to be like a cardiologist, right? And then I got to the University of Notre Dame, and I realized that my real passion and what really gets me excited is songwriting. And so I love songwriting. I love acting. I like singing. I like music in general. And so without telling my parents, I kind of switched majors in my first year.

[2:32] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh, my God. Oh, yeah. And I love them so much. They were not happy about that. They were not, you know, because like my whole life, it was like, like I was shadowing surgeons at Manatee Medical Center before I was a senior in high school, you know? So they, I was like, oh, no, I'm going to. And when I went to University of Notre Dame, it was, I was in the pre-med track. And so I think when I switched, it was just a big hit to my family, to everybody, like what happened, right? And so I think at first I was a little overwhelmed, just because I was like, oh, my gosh, what am I doing? And I felt like the only way for me to really cope with that or to really process what was happening was to write a song. And so I started writing a musical called My Heart Says Go.

[3:22] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: And My Heart Says Go, it's about a guy who drops out of med school to become a songwriter. So it's not at all inspired by me at all. Oh, yeah, not at all. Yeah, yeah. And this guy, Indigo is his name. He has some, his relationship with his father weakens a little bit because his father really wanted him to stay in a career of financial stability, whereas Indigo really wanted to follow his dreams. And so, yeah. So when I first started that, that was called Stupid Humans. At the time I had a totally different name, right? And I started writing that in my freshman year at the University of Notre Dame. So not only did I switch major, got there, did my first semester and then immediately switched. I was like, I need to do theater, you know.

[4:08] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: And the thing was, every single night I was thinking about writing songs. Every single morning I was thinking about writing songs and I would be like in chemistry and my notebook instead of having chemical equations would have lyrics. Right. So I was just I was just all over the place not doing anything like doing like only music things. Right. And yeah, eventually I met Professor Matt Hawkins at the University of Notre Dame during my sophomore year. And he had an assignment in his class because I was taking two of his classes. And one of his assignments was to sing a song from any musical. And I was like, any musical? He's like, yeah, any musical. So I kind of showed up with a song from my musical and I sang it.

[4:54] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: And he we met after the class. He was like, oh, so you wrote this? And I'm like, yeah. He's like, that's really cool. I'd like to see if we can find a way to produce this and to develop and produce it at the University of Notre Dame. And so fast forward a year, we're developing the thing. We have like a workshop class and we produce Stupid Humans at the University of Notre Dame. After that, we continue developing it. He came on as a co-writer. We changed the title so it's more positive. So we're no longer saying Stupid Humans. Now it's called My Heart Says Go. Right. And yeah. So recently we released the cast album, the studio cast recording for that.

[5:29] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: And that was a lot of fun. Which is star studded with Broadway stars. I mean, you have Javier Munoz, you have Jesse Mueller, you have John Cardoza. I mean. Oh, my gosh. It was so funny because like there was a time I for there was a time where we were there and, you know, they're so professional. They're so great. And they show up knowing their stuff and they're amazing. They don't miss a beat. Right. And so I think it was like, but this has happened to like one time, Jesse Mueller saying like she's saying a piece of smile away and she just she nailed it. It was perfect. Right. So she finished. She's like, all right. Do you have like any notes? And I'm thinking. No, I mean, me giving notes to you. I was like, what am I going to tell you? You did it amazingly. You should be giving me notes.

[6:20] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: So, you know, it was so surreal to to be meeting all these people. And Ruben Carvajal, he is so great. It was funny because I had actually met him before in auditions for Hamilton because I was doing callbacks for John Lawrence and Philip at the time. This is like five years ago. And so eventually they brought me and a friend of mine, Armando, to see like rehearsals backstage. And so he was playing John Lawrence at the time. So I got to meet him before my heart says go. And so years later, when they're like, oh, who can we pick? My heart says go. And I saw his name on the list of potential for the people. I was like, oh, my gosh, he's amazing. And I've met him once. Right. So when we all showed up to the studio, I literally went to him.

I was like, hey, I don't know if you remember this. And I pulled out my phone like a dork. I was like, this is us like four years ago because I took a picture with him at the thing anyways. But yeah. So it was a great time. They're all super nice. They're so professional and so talented. It was really an honor to get to work with them all.

[7:26] Martín Acuña: Tell us a little bit more also about Epic, this musical that you also wrote and it blew up on TikTok. It really went viral with every video that you posted. And also you started doing like this casting exercise with people around TikTok, like come sing with me. Here are your lyrics. Here's the music. You do you. I'll do me.

[7:47] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Yeah, it was. Oh, my gosh. I very I'm very thankful and very lucky for the way that things have turned out with Epic on TikTok because I have been recommended by several friends like, hey, there's a theater community on TikTok. You've been working on Epic for a couple of years because I've been working on Epic for, I think, like two years and a couple of months before I had put it on TikTok. And I was so nervous to put it on TikTok. I was like, oh, but it's not finished. And they're like, put it on anyways. Oh, but I got to rewrite this and that. Put it on anyways. Right. Like, OK, fine. And I put the first video on TikTok. And it's a video of me doing like a rap section that's not even in the show anymore. Right.

[8:28] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: And I kid you not, I cried that night. I posted that. And then like I was like because I was just so stressed because I have just like been a hermit for a couple of years just working on Epic that when I posted that first video, the stress was just like, oh, my gosh, they're going to hate it. I'm going to get canceled. I don't even know why I get canceled. I'm going to get canceled for writing this. And at first it was like the at first there was, you know, it was mixed bag overviews. But thankfully, there were a lot of people that were giving feedback and like positive feedback. Like, you know, there are people there are people that would be like, this sucks. This is a rip off of something else.

Right. And, you know, I try to like, you know, push that away from my mental space. But there are also people like, hey, I really like this. And I feel like in this song or in this section here, you're really like find your own voice. Right. And that's really helpful because you kind of figure out what clicks with people on like a large scale.

[9:23] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: And so. Yeah. And so I started just posting progress updates about it, even if it was something as simple as like, I can't figure out the song, that's the progress update, you know, or if it was something like I am working on song 27 out of 40 now or something. Right. And it was really cool because I sort of I just kind of started documenting the journey of writing this this musical about the Odyssey. And so ironically, it's become its own odyssey to write the thing because I'm now like four years in and I'm still like fixing up the last few songs, you know. But, yeah, I'm very thankful that there's a there's such a positive and kind and supportive community around it. And oh, my gosh, I don't know if you've seen the discord by any chance, but I hang out on the discord all the time. Like we'll hang out in the VC. There's like memes. The memes are hilarious. They're also great. They're so fun.

[10:15] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: And yeah. Yeah. I'm hoping I'm on the last two songs. I'm really hoping to nail the ending. You know, they're taking me a while, but I just really want the ending to have like I want the themes and everything to be right. I want it to be coherent. I want the songs to be emotionally heartfelt. Oh, yeah. Funny story. I have two friends that loved that love Percy Jackson and love Greek mythology. And I remember one day one of them texted me like, have you seen this Tick-Tock.

[10:50] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh, it's amazing. I love that. Thank you for sharing that with me. It makes me so happy. I love hearing stories of how people found out about Epic. Or recently, I was at a family reunion, and I was with my cousin. And I hadn't seen him in years. We were super close when we were younger, but just time and college and stuff, family members go a few years without getting to see each other. And he had told me he was listening to Epic without knowing that it was me. Wow. If I remember correctly, I think his girlfriend was showing him, he's like, yeah, this is really good. And then he reads the name. He's like, this is my cousin. She's like, what? And so we get to the family reunion and he's telling me, dude, I didn't know that was you on it.

I was listening to it. And then I looked at who sang it. I was like, oh my God. So it was so cool. It was such an awesome experience. Yeah, I'm very thankful with how it's turning out. I still got some work to do on the end of it. I really want to come out well, but I'm very happy and proud of it.

[12:26] Martín Acuña: I love that. So how has your heritage impacted or influenced your artistry?

[12:33] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh, that's a great question. Growing up in Puerto Rico, there's a lot of, there's such a rich culture and a variety of music. So there's salsa, bachata, merengue. They're so beautiful. And I just think of so many times where without realizing it, I was just downloading music. Every time my mom is cooking and she's playing Juan Luis Guerra or Ruben Blades. Or every time we're in the car ride to the school and Pedro Navaja is playing. So many times where I think it took me a while to really appreciate like, oh my gosh, the lyrics in these are gorgeous. Have you heard Juan Luis Guerra's songs? They're like poems. They're gorgeous. It's literally poems. It's so great. And so I think that I grew up listening to music like salsa, merengue, bachata, but also listening to a lot of just like pop music, whether it's from the US or from Europe.

And I think that just having tons of different kinds of music has helped me really appreciate music. One of the things I try really hard to do specifically in Epic is while it all feels, I try to make it so that it all feels like it's in the same realm of music, like big grand epic wise. But I try to make it so that there's a bunch of different styles throughout the thing. So Poseidon, for example, he has, his music has a lot of triplets. So it's like one, two, three, one, two, three, right. But it's like this grungy rock thing, you know, but then Circe has like this very regal pop style. But then in the last song of, because sorry, Epic is divided into sagas. So Poseidon has his own thing. Circe has a saga, right.

And in the final song from the Circe saga, there's a guiro, there's bachata in this part. So I'm really thankful that I've been exposed to just different kinds of music that have allowed me to take from each of them and put them into my own music. I'm thankful that I get to be inspired by such a wide variety of things, whether it's electronic music, or if it's like orchestral, or if it's some blend in between.

[14:47] Martín Acuña: And you can listen to that in your work. You can listen to all those influences that you just mentioned. And it's a beautiful thing, because it honestly reminds me a lot of what Lin-Manuel has done with In the Heights and Hamilton, that he usually does mix a lot of rhythms in one single song, and you have a lot of things and you're like, wow. Because if you listen to each part separately, it's a masterpiece in its own. But when you listen to the whole thing, you're like, this is a big masterpiece. This is amazing.

[15:21] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh my gosh, yeah. He's amazing and such an inspiration. I don't know if I've ever... There are very few people that I think that I've heard that are like, oh, they're like a wordsmith. And I'm just like, I hear and immediately agree. And he's so amazing.

[15:27] Martín Acuña: So what is the best thing about being a Latin artist?

[15:46] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh, best thing about being a Latin artist. Oh, being able to understand songs in Spanish, easily the best part, because there are songs like, oh my gosh, I know I keep going to Juan Luis Guerra, but he's just my favorite. I think of songs like Todo Tiene Su Hora, or Mi Bendición. And there's the lyrics in that, they paint such a vivid picture. They're so evocative and they're so gorgeous. And I feel like, thankfully, being able to speak Spanish, I guess I actually appreciate that in its language, because when you translate it, it doesn't always sound the same. It sounds different. It doesn't hit the same way. So yeah, definitely just getting to sing and understand songs in Spanish, definitely the best part. Love it.

[16:36] Martín Acuña: So who would you say is your biggest Latin inspiration?

[16:41] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Juan Luis Guerra. Without a doubt. Well, it's hard. Okay. It's hard because I went to a Ruben Blades concert with my mom and dad recently. And oh my God, that was amazing. That was so amazing. Like it was like, oh my gosh, you know, and then I would die to go to a Juan Luis Guerra concert, but I haven't been able to go to that one yet. My parents went to Sin Bandera recently. And I didn't know that they were going and I had already made plans that day, so I didn't get to go. Right. But I would have killed to go to that one. And yeah, it was just, oh wait, sorry, what was the question? I totally forgot.

[17:12] Martín Acuña: No, no worries, because you're talking about your Latin inspiration.

[17:16] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh, perfect. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah. If I had to choose one, I'd have to say Juan Luis Guerra, but everybody else is so close, but I'd have to say Juan Luis Guerra just because like, I listened to those lyrics and they're so, they're so gorgeous and they're so poetic and like, tú no sabe que la luna no se queda sola. In English, it's like, it doesn't hit the same way, but even then it's like, you don't know that the moon isn't alone. That's so badass. That's so cool. Like what? I want to walk up to someone and be like, you don't know though, then the moon is not alone. So you're fine. It's like, oh, you know.

[18:00] Martín Acuña: I love it. And yeah, I agree with you. Juan Luis Guerra has a lot, a lot of amazing songs.

[18:05] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Yeah. And oh my gosh, I didn't like, it's, it's like generational too, because, or sorry, what I mean is it transcends generations too, because like my mom and dad were listening to that when, to him when they were young, you know, and he was still killing it then. Right. So songs like, uh, like my mom loves a, a, what, uh, me sube la biliruila. La biliruila. Yeah. That one. Oh my gosh. She loves that one. We played in the car and yeah. So it's, it's, it's fun. It's so much fun. I would love to go to a concert with his.

[18:33] Martín Acuña: Oh yeah. We need to. I haven't been either, but we need to.

[18:36] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: We do. It'd be so fun.

[18:41] Martín Acuña: So last question, what are your top five favorite musical theater shows?

[18:45] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: My top five favorite musical theater shows. Okay. Well, sorry. I don't know why I completely blanked on every single musical after getting asked that. Does that ever happen to you? You get asked something like, oh, it's your favorite movie and suddenly you haven't never seen a movie? Yeah. Um, okay. Well, first one into the woods, I'd have to, so this is a no particular order, right. Uh, into the woods, because it was my first ever actual musical that I did. I think it was in sixth grade and I played Prince Charming. That was a lot of fun. I did it at Tassi Storado. Um, my, my, I think that my director and my teacher at the time was Madeline Gomez. She's so great. Such a fun experience. And then I, oh my gosh, Hamilton.

Yeah. Hamilton, of course. Um, it's just, it's, it's in so many ways, it's a masterpiece. And of course it like revolutionized the game in theater and what a musical can be and what genres can be a musical theater and methods of storytelling, you know, a phantom of the opera. Cause it's my sister's favorite. And, uh, one day, I don't know how just a dream of mine, but one day I want to play the phantom, right. Somehow that'd be cool. It's her favorite character or sorry. It's her favorite, like show favorite character. Uh, it would make her dream come true. If I did that one day, I'll figure out something one day. Um, and then Hadestown. I saw that one recently. Oh my gosh. So, so gorgeous. The music and everything, everybody in that is great.

What did I mention? So into the woods, Hamilton, phantom. Here's the thing though. I was sleeping on Les Mis for a while because I, because for a while, I guess I just like, maybe, maybe I only saw the movie or maybe I just like, had it like really looked into it. But for me, Les Mis was great, but it was never like in my favorites. And then I saw it live. I saw it live in South Bend, Indiana. Right. And Oh my gosh, within 10 minutes I was bawling. And then 20 minutes later I was bawling, just crying all over. And then like, I've never cried more times in a single show that I did for Les Mis in South Bend, Indiana. It was like the touring, I think it was a touring cast. Yeah. It was so, so good. Oh man. I love them. I love them all.

[21:04] Martín Acuña: Jorge, thank you so much for being here. It's been amazing talking to you, sharing your work, you sharing your story. I cannot wait to see where My Heart Says Go and Epic go. Thank you so much for being here.

[21:16] Jorge Rivera-Herrans: Oh my gosh, of course. It was so fun. It was so great to talk to you. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much.

[21:22] Martín Acuña: Thanks everyone for listening to this new episode of Backstage Talk. Remember to follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Backstage Talk Podcast.