A Bobby Short Celebration Featuring Paul Wilborn

The Studio transforms into an elegant Manhattan style social club in tribute to performer Bobby Short.

A Bobby Short Celebration

Bobby Short billed himself as a “Saloon Singer” and starting in 1968, his saloon was the elegant Café Carlye on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. On Friday, Nov. 14, for one-night only, the Studio @ 620 will double for the Carlyle as we celebrate what would have been Bobby’s 40th anniversary at the club. Pianist Paul Wilborn and his Blue Roses trio, along with special guest vocalist Eugenie Bondurant, will perform some of Bobby’s favorite songs. Along with stories from Bobby’s life, you’ll hear classics from Cole Porter, Fats Waller and Andy Razaf, George and Ira Gershwin, Walter Donaldson and Gus Kahn, Rodgers and Hart, and many more stars of the Great American Songbook. The evening won’t just be elegant – it will be swellegant!

About Paul Wilborn

Paul Wilborn is the Executive Director of the Palladium Theater at St. Petersburg College. The Palladium features an 850 seat theater and a 150-seat nightclub and presents the best in opera, chamber music, jazz, blues, Americana, and much more.

Paul is also a popular cabaret entertainer and band leader. His American Songbook Series programs – which feature music along with commentary - have recently focused on Cole Porter, Peggy Lee, Frank Sinatra and other composers and singers from the golden age of American songwriting. He continues to perform in clubs and in concert with his trio, Blue Roses, and his large band, Paul Wilborn and the Pop Tarts.

Paul was a founding member of Ybor City’s Artists and Writers Group, which presented the legendary Artists and Writers Ball. He was also a co-founder of Guavaween, which attracts more than 100,000 people annually. He is also a founder of Arte 2005 and 2007, and is helping to plan Arte 2009, Tampa Bay’s Festival of Latin American Arts.

Prior to joining the Palladium, Wilborn worked for Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio as Manager of Creative Industries. Major accomplishments included increasing community support for artists and arts organizations, connecting the arts and the economic development communities, and directing Arte 2007. 

Before joining the city, Wilborn was an award-winning reporter and columnist for the Tampa Tribune, the St. Petersburg Times and the Associated Press in Los Angeles. He was a member of the St. Petersburg Times' Editorial Board for two years. His writing was recognized nationally and statewide with numerous awards. In 1996 he was named Florida’s Reporter of the Year by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 1998 he was among 16 international journalists chosen for a Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellowship at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor that included a $70,000 stipend.

He is a graduate of the University of South Florida and a Tampa native.