Drew Jansen ('83)
Drew Jansen (SJU ’83) is a comedic singer, composer, playwright and lyricist. He is known for the Minnesota-based musicals he wrote including How to Talk Minnesotan: The Musical (1996) which was Minnesota’s longest-running homegrown musical. Church Basement Ladies (2005) was another play by Jansen; it went on a 50-city tour. This musical had a few sequels, such as Away in the Basement, A Church Basement Ladies Christmas, which earned him a mentioned in the Star Tribune in 2017.
While he was a student at SJU, Jansen participated in many music events. He ran his own segment on KSJU radio, a student-run radio that is ad-free and made to serve CSB+SJU students. When Jansen worked at KSJU in 1980, it had been on the air for thirty years. On Fridays from 2:30-5:15 pm Jansen hosted a “Music and Comedy” show which was an interpretation of professional radio.
A few years after college, Jansen joined the Dudley Riggs troupe aided by fellow alum Peter Staloch (SJU ’81), who had joined the troupe in 1984. Jansen worked on almost all the music for the Dudley Riggs’ Brave New Workshop which took serious material such as Shakespeare and spoofed it to make a comedic show. Staloch worked there on creating comedic sets. Jansen worked on the songs for the show, The Vice Man Cometh. Staloch also worked on this, and both improvised in acting and in the music. Jansen prepared music to play during each show beforehand but also improvised on the spot. As Jansen stated in an interview with SJU Alumni Magazine, “If an actor lets on that he or she is watching television, and I know the theme, I’ll play it to set the mood.” Following the show, audiences would throw out suggestions to the performers, including Staloch and Jansen, who work to make pieces on the spot. In 1987, Drew was a musical director at Dudley Riggs’ Brave New Workshop in Minneapolis. He held this position for five years.
Jansen worked as a staff writer for one season of Comedy Central’s show Mystery Science Theater 3000 in 1995. He also played Ernie Jansen the announcer and a musical composer for two seasons on Let’s Bowl in 1998 and 2001. He reprised his role as Ernie Jansen in Factory Accident Sex in 2002.
Jensen most recently worked as a voice actor in the short film, The Brave Locomotive.