Jeff Goldblum is swapping film sets for a bandstand on Broad Street this week, bringing his jazz group the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra to Philadelphia's Miller Theater for a show that kicks off a new concert season at the historic venue. The actor and pianist takes the stage Wednesday night at 8 p.m. at the 250 S. Broad Street theater, leading a band he started three decades ago as a way to keep making music between acting gigs.
The concert opens Ensemble Arts Philly's 2026-2027 jazz season, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer. Ensemble Arts Philly oversees major Avenue of the Arts venues including the Kimmel Center, the Academy of Music, and the Miller Theater, according to Wikipedia. The Miller Theater itself dates back to 1918, when it was built as the Sam S. Shubert Theatre, and it was renamed in 2022 after a donation from local business leader Alan B. Miller and his family, per Ensemble Arts Philly. The theater seats up to 1,840 guests.
A Side Project That Became a Second Career
Goldblum has played piano for most of his life, and he launched the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra 30 years ago as a side project squeezed between acting jobs, the Inquirer's report notes. What began as a casual outlet grew into something far more serious over the last decade, with the band now having released five albums, including its most recent, Night Blooms, which features vocal guest spots from Melody Gardot, Scarlett Johansson, Charlie Puth, Ariana Grande, and Cynthia Erivo, per the same account.
Goldblum told the paper he simply kept playing music in between film roles, and he described his approach to the keys and the microphone in strikingly personal terms. When singing, he said he tries to tell the story of a song; on instrumentals, his goal is different. “The piano,” Goldblum said, in comments cited by the Inquirer, is something he tries to make sing. He's cited a particular love for pianist Erroll Garner, whose landmark live album Concert by the Sea came out in 1955, and Goldblum has recorded his own version of the standard Misty as part of his ongoing homage to the jazz songbook he uses to introduce new listeners to the genre.
The Pittsburgh Roots Behind the Band's Odd Name
The band's unusual name has deep personal history. Mildred Snitzer was a Pittsburgh woman who lived to be a centenarian and was a friend of Goldblum's parents; his father, Harold, was her doctor, and Snitzer played bridge with Goldblum's parents, according to historical context reported by the Recording Academy.
Goldblum grew up in West Homestead, Pennsylvania, just outside Pittsburgh, and as a kid he attended Saturday Tam O'Shanter art classes at the Carnegie Museum of Art, the same program that once counted Andy Warhol among its students and was taught by Joseph Fitzpatrick, according to Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh. He also worked at cocktail lounges in Pittsburgh as a young man, a hustle that started even earlier: at age 14, he cold-called local bars out of the Yellow Pages to land piano gigs before he was old enough to legally be inside them, accompanying singers who drove him to the shows, per the Recording Academy's reporting.
From Buckaroo Banzai to Decca Records
Goldblum's musical partnership with actor Peter Weller traces back to Buckaroo Banzai, where Weller played trumpet and suggested the two start jamming at each other's houses, according to the Inquirer. Miles Davis reportedly told the pair they ought to get a gig with real, professional musicians instead of keeping it purely informal, a bit of advice that helped push the project toward a proper band featuring guitarist John Storie, bassist Alex Frank, saxophonist James King, keyboardist Joe Bagg, and drummer Kenny Elliott, per Discogs.
Before any of that recording success, Goldblum played a regular Wednesday gig at the Rockwell in Los Angeles, where his act blended jazz standards with spontaneous comedic banter, according to The Independent. That club-honed act eventually led to a 2017 appearance with Gregory Porter on the BBC's The Graham Norton Show, where Goldblum volunteered to accompany Porter on piano, after which Goldblum signed with Decca Records. The resulting debut album, The Capitol Studios Sessions, reached No. 1 on Billboard's Jazz Albums chart.
Goldblum, who has two children named River and Charlie, now brings his music to Philadelphia as the city's newest jazz season gets underway.
