Festival of New American Musicals
 The Festival of New American Musicals, based in Los Angeles, California, is home to full productions, staged readings, workshops of musicals in progress, cabaret events, and concerts. Now in its third year, the organizers are working in partnership with over thirty Southern California area performing arts organizations; each will produce a new American musical during the three month Festival time period, from May 16th through August 21, 2010. This year they are also introducing their first original Internet musical series, "The Sunset Players," created by one of the Southland's most talented young composers, Jordan Beck. Continuing throughout the year are major outreach and educational initiatives aimed at a diverse array of students of all ages. These include Marquez Elementary School history musicals, College of the Canyons specialized programs for high school performers, composers and librettists throughout the southland, and the Festival's own Academy for Young Professionals, which supports talented high school and college students toward careers in Musical Theatre. Since 2008 when the Festival began to celebrate the return of the musical to the mainstream of American popular culture, we've seen the reverberations grow, from WICKED and the HIGH SCHOOL MUSICALS, and SPRING AWAKENING and GLEE to... everywhere. But no more strongly than here in  Southern California. And not just in the big shows headed to and from Broadway. "Everywhere" now includes network TV, cable, the internet, smaller theaters developing more intimate forms of musical storytelling and colleges, high schools, middle schools, elementary schools and community centers where new generations of young writers, composers and burgeoning performers are expressing themselves creatively. Where a decade ago they were organizing rock bands, today they are deciding, in the good old tradition of Judy and Mickey, to "put on a show." The Festival's mission is to celebrate all of that excitement, to foster the creators, to train and showcase the performers and in the process also to help build the next generation of musical theater audience and support.The Festival recently announced a new partnership with the distinguished New York Musical Theatre Festival, headed by its Executive Director and Producer, Isaac Robert Hurwitz. Festival executive producer Bob Klein said, "We are just beginning to work with the New York Musical Theatre Festival, which has presented 232 new musicals since 2004. More than sixty of these shows have gone on to larger productions. Our new working relationship will allow us to have a broader reach to find shows for both festivals, and an exchange of ideas, especially for educational programs, on both coasts." The two festivals will take place back-to-back with FNAM in the summer months and NYMF in the Fall. THE MARQUEZ AMERICAN HISTORY MUSICALS  The first part of the exchange will bring CARRY ON!! a new musical that tells the story of Thurgood Marshall and the beginnings of the civil rights struggle, to New York as an Official Selection of the 2010 NYMF Festival. Thirty 4th through 7th grade history students at Marquez Charter School in Pacific Palisades perform CARRY ON!! and these students will be the youngest group to be a part of the NYMF festival. Last year the remarkable 5th grade American History Kids from Marquez School presented a performance of their pilgrim musical, PLYMOUTH 2.0 during the festival in Southern California, and this year are performing HELLO LOUISIANA. This may be the only program of its type in America. A recent UCLA research study concludes that these kids retain twice as much knowledge of the history they've studied as the average 5th grade history class. And it's a thrill to see sixty ten-year-olds on stage together singing and dancing. It's a great story and a remarkable new way of learning, with all credit due to Jeff Lantos, 5th grade teacher, book writer, lyricist, his composer Bill Augustine and the faculty and staff of the school. In addition to PLYMOUTH 2.0, HELLO LOUISIANA and CARRY ON!!, this series of original history musicals includes: MIRACLE IN PHILADELPHIA (focusing on the writing of our Constitution) and WATER AND POWER (about the birth of the Industrial Revolution). The Festival and the UCLA School of Education are looking for contributions and grants to help expand this program to other Southern California schools and across the nation. If you're interested in bringing this program to a school near you, contact Co-Executive Producer and Educational Director, Bob Klein at bob@lafestival.org. MUSICALS AS SOCIAL THERAPY  This year two outstanding programs designed to help solve social problems through musical theater will be showcased at the festival. At the elementary level is WE CAN'T STAND STILL 3, at the William Grant Still Center. Now in its third year, children ages 2-12 stage their own original musical especially for the Festival. They will also introduce City at Peace:Los Angeles @ Inside Out Community Arts , a cross-cultural arts-based leadership program that brings together vastly diverse teens from across Los Angeles County to create, produce, and perform an original musical based on their lives and their ideas for addressing the issues that concern them most. These students will also design and lead community action projects in the city in order to make their creative vision for change real in the world.  Bob Klein elaborates on their efforts across a broad array of interests, "We believe that Southern California is a hotbed of creative and performing talents, just waiting to be discovered. We have the talent and the interest on the part of the theaters, the schools, and from the community to become a major resource for new composers, lyricists, book writers, directors, producers, choreographers, dancers and actors -- more than 3,000 members of our musical theatre community participated in the '08 and '09 festivals. We have had six universities, nine high schools, colleges, and cultural centers performing new musicals in the festival. Our priority is to expand, inspire and engage the creative and performing talents of the youth of Southern California to develop the new American musical theater of the future as well as the new audience for that theater." Be sure to go to the Festival website and check out the Events section for the full listing and description of shows in this summer's program, as well as events and programs for 2011.  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. |
HERE'S HOW YOU CAN GET INVOLVED...
The Festival of New American Musicals is a non-profit 501c3. They need people who love musical theater to support their educational and outreach efforts. >> Donate or See a Show! >> Support the Academy We are looking for: >> Jump into THE COLLEGE COURSE - TH193 >> Stay in Touch >> Work on FNAM 2011
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