Broadway's 'Rock of Ages' Band, coming to State Theatre, recreates '80 hits with guitarist who played them

EASTON, Pa. — When Broadway's "Rock of Ages" band performs at the State Theatre at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 28, it will play 1980s hits by acts such as Night Ranger, Whitesnake, Foreigner and more.

And if those songs sound especially well done, it should be no surprise: The guitarist playing them also played them in the actual bands during actual concerts.

Joel Hoekstra over the past 20 years has been lead guitarist in all those bands, as well as for Cher, Trans-Siberian Orchestra and even for his own bands. He has an album due out Friday, Feb. 27, and two others in the works.

But starting with the Tony Award-nominated Broadway run of "Rock of Ages" in 2009, Hoekstra also has found himself playing those hits from the theater stage.

“I think people just associate that era with fun. Having a good time — 'nothing but a good time,' if you will," Hoekstra said, with a laugh, referencing a Poison song that's also in the show.

"I mean, it’s just kind of a fun era and style of music. And we have a great time playing it," he said in a phone call from New York City, where he lives.

"And people are genuinely feeling they’re at a party.”

The show coming to the State Theatre this weekend features the musicians from the Broadway show playing what it calls "the greatest rock hits from the glam metal bands of the '80s."

Tickets, at $44.75-$65.50, remain available at the State Theatre website and at the box office at 453 Northampton St., Easton.

'Remembered me as being a rocker'

Just as the show is an exercise in the audience reconnecting with hits of the past, the Broadway's "Rock of Ages" band is something of a career retrospective for Hoekstra.

Early in his career, as a "local Chicago-area musician," Hoekstra was in a band with Jim Peterik, who founded the band Survivor, supporting other acts.

"That gave me the opportunity to play with a lot of well-known artists," Hoekstra said, including Kevin Cronin of REO Speedwagon, Don Barnes of .38 Special, Alan Parsons, Kip Winger, Rik Emmett from Triumph and others.

"It’s a very long list," Hoekstra said. “So that helped me build up my resume a little bit.

Starting in 2000, he released three solo albums — one of "finger-style acoustic" playing and "two of them were what you’d describe as rock fusion; primarily instrumental albums, much like you would expect from a solo guitar player," he said.

But by 2009, Hoekstra said he sometimes subbed for a friend who was "a traditional pit musician" guitarist in theater shows.

"I took that on as more for my skills, for reading, ‘cause I hadn’t been doing a lot of music reading on any of the rock gigs," he said.

“So I would just learn whatever score he had, where I could do a show and sub for him, and I subbed for him on several shows," the last of which was "Tarzan."

Hoekstra said the keyboard player from that show got hired as the music supervisor for "Rock of Ages" and, while assembling a band, "he remembered me from the pit ... he remembered me as being a rocker."

By then, Hoekstra also had joined Night Ranger, after connecting with drummer Kelly Keagy in Peterik's house band.

Night Ranger's 1984 hit song "Sister Christian" was in "Rock of Ages," as were songs from Whitesnake and Foreigner, with whom Hoekstra also would play.

“So next thing I knew, I was offered this position and I think most of us thought, ‘This show probably won’t run very long,’" Hoekstra said, laughing.

"And we ended up having a six-year run."

'Becoming more well-known'

"Rock of Ages" hit Broadway in 2009, as a musical built around classic rock songs from the 1980s, especially by glam metal bands.

It became among the Top 40 longest-running shows in Broadway history, finally closing in 2015. It spawned a 2012 movie, in which Hoekstra also appeared, as well as several touring shows.

Even during the run of "Rock of Ages," Hoekstra continued to play in Night Ranger. And that ended up giving him the opportunity to play in another band, as well.

In the early 2010s, Night Ranger toured with Foreigner, whose founder and guitarist Mick Jones was dealing with health problems. So Hoekstra often would replace Jones for shows.

"I was asked to fill in ... and that was on very short notice," Hoekstra said with a laugh. "I had a couple of days to get that together, literally."

One of those was for a headline show at Allentown Fairgrounds grandstand in 2011.

“And so that was, like, a short-lived opportunity to go in and, literally, fill in temporarily," Hoekstra said. "Great opportunity and, again, becoming more well-known during that time, I suppose."

As if that wasn't enough work, Hoekstra also became lead guitarist for Trans-Siberian Orchestra, the neoclassical metal band known best for its Christmastime shows.

Hoekstra joined that band in 2010, and except for a couple of breaks has played with it since, including performances at Allentown's PPL Center nine times since 2015, and once held the record for the fastest-sellout there.

"People in Allentown know me from being a part of that," Hoekstra said.

Courtesy dmk Publicity

/

'Work with a legendary singer'

Hoekstra's most recent membership in a classic rock band was as a member of Whitesnake, perhaps best known for its 1987 No. 1 hit "Here I Go Again," which closes the "Rock of Ages" first act.

Hoekstra joined that band in 2014, and played on two of its albums, including its last, 2019's "Flesh and Blood," and continued until playing on its farewell tour in 2021.

“Joining Whitesnake was something, I suppose, that was more or less a decision where [there was] a great catalog, [and] obviously an opportunity to work with a legendary singer, David Coverdale," Hoekstra said.

Hoekstra also co-wrote with Coverdale on six songs on "Flesh and Blood."

“It was really nice of David to involve me in that," he said. "Not everybody from the band was afforded that luxury, and I’m very grateful for that.

"He basically came to the table with a lot of choruses, and would want me to build out. So very quick — one of those writers where kind of the first thing you come up with instinctually, he’ll go, right away, ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ You go really quickly and don’t labor over it.

“And that’s typically the way the better songs are written anyway. ... You go, ‘Wow, we wrote the hit song in 15 minutes, and we write the track that nobody cares about over the course of seven hours or something," he said with a laugh.

Courtesy

/

"Rock of Ages" Band

Cher, and his own music

While Coverdale was having knee-replacement surgery in 2017, Hoekstra reached out to friends seeking opportunities and heard from Justin Derrico, who plays guitar for Pink and on TV's "The Voice."

Another "The Voice" guitarist, Dave Berry, was Cher’s longtime guitar player, but needed someone to replace him.

Hoekstra ended up being Cher's guitarist 2018-20, during her residency in Las Vegas and tours of the United States, Europe and Australia.

He also played at her Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in 2024 and backed her on the "Saturday Night Live 50th Anniversary Special" last year.

"I began as a fill-in with Cher, and then that turned into more of a full-time situation than I had anticipated," he said.

Being so diverse and flexible has "begun to pay off" as far as far as releasing his own music, Hoekstra said.

"I have a little bit more freedom to decide what it is I have a good time doing," he said.

He has released four albums with his band Joel Hoekstra's 13 — the most recent, "From the Fade," is to be released today, Feb. 27.

The band's other members all also have played elsewhere — drummer Vinnie Appice in Black Sabbath and Dio; bassist Tony Franklin in The Firm; and keyboardist Derrick Sherinian in Dream Theater.

The lead singer, Girish Pradhan, came to the United States to be on "America’s Got Talent," and went viral for covering pop songs in a heavy metal style.

Hoekstra has another project, Iconic, with drummer Tommy Aldridge and bassist Marco Mendoza — who both worked with him in Whitesnake — that also has an album almost ready to come out.

And yet another band, Revolution Saints with Jack Blades of Night Ranger, Deen Castronovo of Journey and Doug Aldrich of Whitesnake, also is working on an album.

Even with all those other projects, Hoekstra said the "Rock of Ages" band gives him the opportunity to "have a great time doing these gigs."

"The band has chemistry," he said. "We worked together six years on Broadway, and now we’ve been doing this since 2014. So it’s kind of crazy that we’ve been doing this ... longer than we did the show."

'It's just fun'

Hoekstra said the Broadway's "Rock of Ages" Band started out as something "to do periodically, and that’s kind of how it’s remained. It never really turned into kind of a full-time thing.

"But it’s just something that gave the band an opportunity to get together and play in a setting where it sounds more like a real band.

“For the music, we don’t use the arrangements from the show, per se, where things were heavily shortened and edited for dialog. We just play the full-length versions of the songs."

Unlike a formal band, “this has a little bit more of a casual feel to them," he said. "The show is a good show because you get to hear really nothing but hits from that era.

"If you like the music from that era, you’ll really enjoy coming to the gig. I mean, the songs are played well, with a bit of freedom where we put our own spin on them."

He's not the only player in the band with rock credibility. Drummer Jason Gianni has played with Kansas, and bassist Winston Roye with Soul Asylum, Shakira, Lauren Hill and Jewel.

"It's a little bit more of a, I guess, a fun night," Hoekstra said. "It’s not really presented as anything, I guess, as formal as a Broadway show.

“I guess it’s a little bit more just a chance to let your hair down, have a good time. And that attitude basically aligns with, I guess, that style of music and that era. It’s just fun.”