Regina Spektor Performs “Prisoners” on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert”

August 19, 2020—Last night, critically acclaimed artist Regina Spektor performed her song “Prisoners” on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.” Watch the performance via the show’s #PLAYATHOME series HERE.

Accompanied by tap dancer and choreographer Caleb Teicher and directed by Daniel Ryan, the performance was filmed right after Spektor’s much-lauded Broadway run at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater during the summer of 2019. Regina Spektor: Live on Broadway ran for five nights and was hailed as “both whimsical and thunderous” by The Daily Beast.

“Prisoners” first appeared on Spektor’s self-released album Songs, recorded in 2002 by Joe Mendelson. He recorded Spektor for free on Christmas Day when no one was using the studio; she played all the songs she had written throughout the year and together they picked 12 tracks for the album.

“When I did my solo piano tour, I revisited some of the older songs. While dreaming up fun things for the Broadway shows I invited Caleb, who is brilliant at using tap as percussion, to check out ‘Prisoners,'” Spektor explains, “After the shows, we filmed the song at Roulette in Brooklyn, just to have a memory of that wonderful moment. Little did we know that being alone in a theater and on opposite sides of the stage would be where the world was heading. I await the day we can all dance and perform together- but for now I’m so glad to share this performance during a time I’ve been missing playing music for people.”

Last year, Spektor’s original song “One Little Soldier” was featured in the motion picture Bombshell, going on to win two awards at the Guild of Music Supervisors Awards. Spektor’s most recent album, 2016’s Remember Us To Life, has been the subject of extensive critical praise from the likes of NPR, Entertainment Weekly, New York Magazine, People and many more.

Born in the Soviet Union, Spektor first saw commercial success with the gold-certified LP Begin to Hope which includes singles “On the Radio” and “Better,” as well as “Fidelity” which climbed the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart. Spektor’s fifth album, Far (2009), and sixth album, What We Saw From the Cheap Seats (2012), both debuted at number three on the Billboard 200 albums chart. Involved in projects spanning music, theatre, TV and film, Spektor’s work has appeared on the Hamilton Mixtape and Netflix’s hit show “Orange Is The New Black,” as well as the Oscar-winning film Bombshell.