Chris Chiesi puts his royal-style songwriting skills to use in "Prince Harry: Live! at Coachella"

Times of Discover News: Cranston and Los Angeles native Chris Chianesi uses his creative skills in a variety of facets. He has extensive experience in musical theater, improv, and sketch comedy media, and in recent years he has turned that toward songwriting. Chianesi has collected hundreds of comedic songs and recently released a concept album about a member of the royal family.

Titled "Prince Harry: Live! Coachella," the Duke of Sussex has reinvented himself as a mainstream pop star. The full-length record was released on October 18, and already boasts Chianesi's massive social media following.

We recently talked about how the idea for the album came about, his theater experience in Rhode Island, and how he wanted to connect with people after hearing "Prince Harry: Live! Coachella."

Rob Duguay: How did you originally come up with the idea to do this Prince Harry-centric musical? Does he find humor in pop culture portrayals of the royal family or otherwise?

Chris Chianesi: The show started out without a script. His book "Spare Parts" came out about two years ago and I was seeing it in the news a lot. She did a special on Oprah [Winfrey] and she has this show with Meghan Markle on Netflix, so I'm curious because I see all the clickbait online about the sexist things she talks about in the book, all the family drama and all the stuff it touches upon", he said. "I didn't really know that much about the royal family before I read the book, so I started reading. I'm a singer and I do musical comedy and I've been a resident of New York for many years playing in clubs, writing songs about pop culture and current events.

When I read the book, I realized it had so many great songwriting moments. It's so full of drama, musicality and the possibility of musical comedy, so I started writing songs on my own, without any goal. I was recently hanging out with a friend who lives in Los Angeles and she told me she went to the Hollywood Fringe Festival last year. That was the first moment I thought I should put these songs in front of me and see if there's anything special in them. At that point, I was writing a few songs, maybe three or four, but I was on the fringes of Hollywood by then.

I got into theatre and everything, but the show wasn't written yet, so I signed up to join the festival. I did a pretty good job in a short amount of time and the festival started in June.' At this point, in January, I signed up to join the festival and set a goal of writing a song a week and putting it together with track lyrics and everything. While I was writing the song, I came up with the idea of ​​Prince Harry performing as a pop star at Coachella. I adapted the show based on this concept and in a matter of months my show was on its feet at the Hollywood Fringe.

I have tickets sold for every performance of ours and I don't know how it will be received because it's a very weird show. Making Prince Harry a popstar was a crazy idea, but I did it by putting on a red wig and acting like me. Great response and really great performances.

RD: What was the atmosphere like during your performance at Hollywood Fringe and how did you create the album after that?

CC: The theater is set up like a concert experience at Coachella and the audience is free, having fun the whole time and they're dancing and doing things like that. After Hollywood Fringe, I sang the song again at another festival in Santa Monica. I rewrote it, wrote some songs and performed it in Hollywood last January. Afterwards, I decided I had every song for the show, at that time it had 17 songs. People have been asking me to release an album of it because they love the songs so much, so this summer I started working on it.

I record all my songs at home. I have a home studio setup with my microphones where I write and produce everything myself. I recorded the album from May to July, then mixed it and it was ready to come out into the world. I'm excited to finally release it.

CC: Oh yes, I was always into Weird Al growing up, I loved his music, his sound and his vibe. I came to musical comedy from the world of musical theater and sketch comedy. I won't go away

RD: That's great. As of November 2018, you have written, performed and produced over 175 comedy songs, including the ones mentioned above, which have garnered millions of views on Instagram and TikTok. What do you think inspired you to pursue this art form? When I think of comedy songs I think of Weird Al Yankovic, so does his career play a role in this?