(Front row, L-R): Michael Bush, BMI’s Jean Banks, Jane Smulyan, Randy Klein, Kristin Maloney, Adam Matthias, Rick Freyer, Raymond Bokhour, Phoebe Kreutz, David Spencer, Robert Yarnall, Sara Wordsworth, Andrew Sherman; (Back Row)Jack Lechner, Andy Monroe, Robert Maggio, Diane Daltner, Nancy Golladay, Pat Cook, Doug Katsaros, Frank Evans, Dan Irsael, Ben H Winters, Robert Sislen, Chris Boal

The evening began with composer Brad Alexander and book writer/lyricist Adam Mathias’s See Rock City & Other Destinations, winner of the 2008 Richard Rodgers Award and 2007 BMI Foundation Jerry Bock Award. Anthony Rapp (Rent) and Jill Abramovitz (Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me) performed two songs from the show, followed by Jenifer Foote, currently in the Broadway revival of a Chorus Line, who performed the title song from BMI Foundation Harrington Award-winning writer Stephen Sislen and Ben H. Winters’ Room 16.

Pat Cook presents retirement award to Advanced Class moderator Richard Engquist.

The showcase continued with selections from The Dirty Hippie Jam Band Project, with a performances from Sandie Rosa and Bret Carr; Pleasantville, an adaptation from the film of the same title; The Kid, based on the book by Village Voice columnist Dan Savage; The Thing About Joe, with a performance of “Some Girls” by Kevin B. McGlynn; Shall We Dance, featuring an ensemble performance of “He Needs Me”; Drive, created by composer/lyricist Andy Monroe; China Doll Overdrive, with a performance from Workshop composer Adam Overett and Mick Bleyer; My Blue Heaven, created by composer Andy Karl and lyricist Diane Daltner; National Geographic, spawned from author Chris Boal and Grammy Award-winning composer Andrew Sherman; and The Suicide, with a performance of “Hold the Pity Pudding.”

Anthony Rapp performs “See Rock City”.

Pat Cook, artistic coordinator of the Workshop, presented an award to Richard Engquist on his retirement as the moderator of the Advanced Workshop. Engquist has been moderating the Second Year and Advanced classes for 25 years.

The finale of the showcase featured Anthony Rapp, star of the original cast of Rent, singing the title song from the BMI Foundation Jerry Bock Award-winning musical See Rock City.

Writers previously showcased include Best Musical Tony winners Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx (Avenue Q); Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning Edward Kleban (A Chorus Line); triple Tony Award winner Maury Yeston, (Nine, Titanic, Grand Hotel); eight-time Oscar-winner and nine-time Grammy-winner Alan Menken (The Little Mermaid, Little Shop of Horrors); Drama Desk winner Carol Hall (Best Little Whorehouse in Texas); Tony Award recipients Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty (Ragtime, Seussical); Tony and Grammy winners Judd Woldin and Robert Brittan (Raisin); Tony nominees Michael Korie and Scott Frankel (Grey Gardens; and Tony nominee Jeff Blumenkrantz (Urban Cowboy).

The event will be directed by the Manhattan Theatre Club's Michael Bush; producers are Workshop Artistic Coordinator Patrick Cook and Workshop Special Events Coordinator Frank Evans. BMI will host a reception immediately following the performance.

Deemed "the Harvard of musical theatre" by The New York Times, the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop was founded in 1961 by BMI and the late Lehman Engel, dean of American musical theatre, to create a setting where new writers could learn their craft. It is the birthplace of such classic musicals as A Chorus Line, Nine, Little Shop of Horrors, Beauty and the Beast, and current Broadway favorite Avenue Q. The Workshop was recently honored with a special 2006 Drama Desk Award for "nurturing, developing and promoting new talent for the musical theater," and also received the 2005 Drama League Award for Excellence in Musical Theatre.

The showcase will feature new works and writers including Calvin Berger, a hip update of Cyrano by Barry Wyner, winner of the BMI Foundation's 2005 Jerry Bock Award for Excellence in Musical Theatre. The story is about 12th grader Calvin Berger, who grapples with his insecurity about the size of his nose. Lacking the courage to ask out the girl of his dreams, he instead communicates his feelings to her through the handsome new kid in school, which only makes him want her more. The new musical will have a full production at Gloucester (Maine) Stage this summer.

The Third Miracle by Jeff Hughes and Scott Ethier, is based on the film of the same name and examines the spiritual awakening of a priest who is beginning to doubt his faith when he is sent to investigate a "miracle" in the borough of Queens. The Tragic and Horrible Life of the Singing Nun, by Andy Monroe and Blair Fell, is a paean to Jeanine Deckers, the Belgian nun known as Soeur Sourire, who became a chart-topping one-hit wonder with the song "Dominique" in 1963, and how her singing career - and her life - devolved into a nightmare of addiction, depression, betrayal by the church, and a tragic end in 1985.

Rhonda, Queen of the Amazon, by Peter Morris and Mat Eisenstein, is a musical comedy about a New York City "princess" who finds herself selling cosmetics door-to-door in the jungles of South America. Wanda's World, by Beth Falcone, the BMI Foundation's 2006 Harrington Award winner, and Eric Weinberger (Class Mothers) is a "tween" musical set in a contemporary high school setting. 2005 Harrington Award winners Jill Abramovitz and Aron Accurso are writers of The Dogs of Pripyat, based on the play by Leah Napolin. The musical is set in a town less than two miles from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. Tony-nominated actor/composer/lyricist Jeff Blumenkrantz (Urban Cowboy) will perform "Toll" from his recently published "Jeff Blumenkrantz Song Book."

The showcase will also feature two songs from Iznogoud - The Musical, based on the French comic books by Goscinny and Tabary, written by Marc Schubring and Phoebe Kreutz. Carried Away, based on the play The Curious Savage, is a new musical comedy with book, music and lyrics by Jim Coleran. The Fisher King, by Steve Routman and Joy Son, is based on the film of the same name.

Dysfunctional Fables has lyrics by Sean Hartley (2004 Drama Desk nominee for Cupid and Psyche) and Sam Davis. Queen Esther is from 2006 Drama Desk nominees Joshua Salzman and Ryan Cunningham, the writing team of I Love You Because.... How to Murder Your Wife is an adaptation of the film by Alisa Klein and Stephen Sislan, composer of Slut! The Musical, which played earlier this season Off-Broadway. Children's Hospital is by Larson Award-winning lyricist Alison Loeb and composer Bob McDowell.

Two BMI Workshop writers will be showcased on October 24: Beth Falcone, composer-lyricist of Wanda's World, and Louise Beach, composer of Sabina. Barry Wyner and his musical Calvin Berger take the spotlight on Monday, November 7.

Wanda's World, which composer Falcone describes as a "tween musical," focuses on the adjustment a young teenager makes when she moves to a new town. But Wanda has more to overcome than merely being a newcomer. Wanda's World had a 2004 workshop in Toronto and was selected for the BMI Musical Theatre Master Class. The musical's book is by Eric Weinberger, who wrote the Off-Broadway tour-de-force for Priscilla Lopez, Class Mothers. Falcone is a Jonathan Larson Memorial Fellow.

Sabina is a musical adaptation of the critically-acclaimed play by Willy Holtzman about a Russian-Jewish woman who influenced both Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. The musical was seen last summer at the Madison (Wisconsin) Repertory Theatre. Lyrics are by playwright Darrah Cloud, whose adaptation of Willa Cather's O! Pioneers was filmed for the PBS American Playhouse. Holtzman's Hearts was short-listed for the Pulitzer Prize and he has an impressive catalogue of plays, screenplays including teleplays for the BBC and HBO and the musical Blood Brothers. Beach is the 2002 Guggenheim Fellow and winner of the National Art Song Competition for Songs at Dusk.

Barry Wyner's Calvin Berger, a hip update of Cyrano, chronicles 12th grader Calvin Berger as he grapples with his insecurity about the size of his nose. Lacking the courage to ask out the girl of his dreams, he instead communicates his feelings to her through the handsome new kid in school...which only makes him want her more. The musical is winner of the 2005 Jerry Bock Award for excellence in Musical Theatre, selected personally by the Pulitzer and Tony Award winning composer of Fiddler on the Roof. Wyner's original musicals include Sugar Plum (produced at Company Carolina and Gloucester Stage), Something to Say (reading, Manhattan Theater Club) and Kelleher Was Dumbstruck (produced at Access Theater, NYC). His emerging career and involvement with the BMI Workshop was chronicled on a Japanese state television documentary (NHK Network) last spring.

The Calvin Berger cast includes Celia Keenan-Bolger, 2005 Tony nominee for her performance as Olive Ostrovsky in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Robb Sapp, currently starring as Boq in the Broadway production of Wicked, Nicholas Belton (My Life With Albertine, The Talk of The Town at the Bank Street Theatre) and Deborah Lew (Cupid and Psyche off-Broadway and Candide at City Opera).

The two evenings of musical theatre are co-produced with Musical Mondays Theatre Lab (MMTL), Bick Goss, Artistic Director and Frank Evans, Producing Director. MMTL most recently produced Songsmiths of Broadway: The Best of the BMI Workshop at 59E59 Theatres, a concert that featured performances by Maury Yeston (Nine), Jeff Blumenkrantz (Urban Cowboy), Nancy Ford (I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking it on the Road) and the team of Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx (Avenue Q).

Since its inception in 1998, Musicals Tonight!, headed by Mel Miller, has revived more than 25 musicals in a manner affordable to most audience members. Musical Mondays, founded in 1999 by Bick Goss, has presented over 50 evenings of new works for the musical theatre. To date, 11 of the works developed by this process have gone on to other venues (off-Broadway and regional theater) and four of the writers (or writing teams) have been commissioned to write new works for both not-for-profit and the commercial theater.

Now entering its fifth decade, the BMI Workshop -- deemed "the Harvard of musical theatre" by The New York Times -- is the launching pad for musicals such as A Chorus Line, Little Shop of Horrors, Nine, Avenue Q and most recently Musical of Musicals! - The Musical.

The event is part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival (a three-week celebration from September 12 to October 2) and features the performing talents of Maury Yeston, two-time Best Score Tony Award winner for Nine and Titanic, and writers Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, 2004 Tony winners for Avenue Q. Composer Judd Woldin (Best Musical Tony for Raisin) performs with lyricist Richard Engquist (Drama Desk Award for Kuni-Leml) from their recent off-Broadway musical Little Ham.

Drama Desk Award winner Gerard Alessandrini, whose Forbidden Broadway is now in its 21st season, hosts the event. Nancy Ford, lyricist with composer Gretchen Cryer for the current American Girls Revue, will perform her standard, "Old Friend," introduced in her long-running I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking It on the Road. David Spencer is performing "And I Knew" from Weird Romance, his collaboration with Oscar and Golden Globe winner Alan Menken.

Jeff Blumenkrantz, nominated for a Tony for his work on Urban Cowboy, will be performing his own work, as will Jonathan Larson Fellow Beth Falcone. Composer Barbara Anselmi and lyricist Will Randall reprise their hit from the last BMI Showcase, "It Shoulda Been You" from The Wedding Project.

Jerry Bock Award winner Frank Evans is represented with songs from War Brides, which will be featured as part of the NYMF Festival on September 27 at BMI. Patrick Cook, Workshop Artistic Coordinator and his composing partner Rick Freyer, who co-wrote the Drama Desk nominated Captains Courageous, will be singing songs from their new musical version of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.

The BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop, recently honored with the 2005 Drama League Award for Excellence in Musical Theatre, was founded in 1961 by the late Lehman Engel, dean of American musical theatre, to create a setting where new writers could learn their craft. Since its inception, the Workshop has been operated by BMI free of any cost to participants; admission is based on merit.

Dedicated to discovering new work and new artists, the New York Musical Theatre Festival celebrates the diversity, creativity and future of musical theatre. NYMF is a flagship program of the National Music Theater Network, a 501(c) (3) not-for-profit organization, and is America's largest annual musical theatre event. NYMF is produced in association with Cadillac and Virgin Megastores and proudly supported by amNewYork, the Village Voice, WB11, Receptasign, King Displays, Rosco Lighting, Scharff Weisberg Inc, Dodger Stages, TheaterMania.com, BroadwayWorld.com, broadway.com, HX, Next and Manhattan Living.

Pictured after the "Smoker" are (seated) Workshop writers Jihwan Kim, Barbara Anselmi, Jill Abramovitz, Alison Loeb, Joy Son, (standing) Adam Overett, Sean Hartley, Phoebe Kreutz, Carla Rose Arnone, Bruce Mc Rae, Carey Lovelace, Brad Houghton and Aron Accurso, Smoker producers Frank Evans and Pat Cook, Workshop writers Beth Falcone, Jeff Blumenkrantz, Steve Routman and Jack Lechner, and BMI's Jean Banks. Photo by Gary Gershoff

]]> 2005-03-16T17:00:00-05:00 http://www.bmi.com/news/entry/233678 Artists, Blumenkrantz, Jeff, Evans, Frank, Freyer, Rick, Hubbard, Alison, Oler, Kim, Musical Styles, Musical Theatre

Pictured after the performances are BMI's Jean Banks; Michel Ogborn; Pat Cook, co-moderator of the First Year / Artistic Coordinator of the Workshop and co-producer of the evening; Beth Falcone; Jeff Blumenkrantz; Kim Oler; David Arthur; Alison Hubbard; Frank Evans, co-producer of the evening; Andy Monroe; Adam Overett; Rick Freyer, co-moderator of the First Year and co-producer of the evening. Other writers who presented their work at the cabaret included Jason Coll, Martin Fernandi, Kark Kissin and Susan Murray.

photo by Eric Miller
]]> 2003-03-17T17:00:00-05:00 http://www.bmi.com/news/entry/233092 Artists, Blumenkrantz, Jeff, Cook, Patrick, Engel, Lehman, Green, Amanda, LaChiusa, Michael John, Lopez, Robert, Marx, Jeff, Menken, Alan, Yeston, Maury, Musical Styles, Musical Theatre, Type, Important In celebration of the 40th anniversary of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop, the theatre world gathered on March 11 at the famed Manhattan Theatre Club for a spectacular showcase of new and developing works from the prestigious workshop. This special event was created by MTC's Associate Artistic Director Michael Bush and Patrick Cook, the BMI Workshop's Artistic Coordinator. It was the first time the two organizations have joined forces.

The cast and writers who participated in the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop 40th anniversary showcase gather onstage after the performances. photo: Gary Gershoff

The workshop, founded by and named in honor of late BMI composer/conductor Lehman Engel, began with casual meetings in the 1960s and has since welcomed hundreds of composers and lyricists to what Playbill On-Line calls "an important crucible of craft leading to the creative marriages of writers and the creation of new musicals."

Headed by Jean Banks, BMI's Senior Director of Musical Theatre & Jazz, the workshop boasts such notable "graduates" as the late Edward Kleban (A Chorus Line), Alan Menken (Beauty and the Beast, Little Shop of Horrors), Steven Flaherty & Lynn Ahrens (Ragtime), Michael John LaChiusa (Marie Christine, The Wild Party) and Carol Hall (The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas), as well as current workshop teacher Maury Yeston, Tony Award-winning writer of Titanic, Nine and Grand Hotel.

Featured songs and selections included the Sesame Street parody Avenue Q: Children's Television for Twentysomethings by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, winners of the 2000 Kleban Award and the 2000 BMI Foundation/Jerry Harrington Musical Theatre Award; Baby Case, a musical fantasia based on the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, by composer/lyricist/librettist Michael Ogborn; The Night of the Meek, a Christmas musical by Frederick Freyer and 2001 Kleban Award winner Patrick Cook; and "I Won't Mind" from The Other Franklin with lyrics by Annie Kessler and Libby Saines and music by Jeff Blumenkrantz, who appeared in the Broadway production of A Class Act, the biographical musical about the life of Edward Kleban that takes place in the BMI Musical Theatre Workshop.

The showcase also featured performers including workshop writers Jenny Giering and Amanda Green, Randy Graff, Ann Harada, Pam Isaacs, Joseph Kolinski, Steven Skybell, Jim Stanek, Eric Stein and Sarah Uriarte-Berry.

This year’s winners, chosen by the Workshop Steering Committee, include First Year Workshop student Timothy J. Mathis, Second Year student James Allen Ford, Advanced Workshop student Jeff Blumenkrantz and Librettists Workshop student Craig Fols.

Established through the BMI Foundation by Harrington’s longtime friend and colleague, BMI Assistant Vice President and Counsel Evelyn Buckstein, the awards are given each year in Harrington’s honor to celebrate the late attorney’s lifelong love of musical theater.

The BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop was established in 1961 by the late Lehman Engel, dean of American musical theater, to create a setting where new writers could learn their craft. Consisting of approximately 200 members, most of whom are actively writing for the musical theater, the Workshop is a highly competitive and selective teaching environment designed to provide hands on opportunities for theater composers and lyricists. An innovative program at its inception, the Workshop continues to flourish and is considered to be the foremost training ground for new writing voices.

Founded in 1985 by BMI Senior Vice President Theodora Zavin, the BMI Foundation, Inc. offers grants which make possible the continuation and development of creative programs for the composition of new music and the performance of these new compositions. With the aid of the distinguished writers, composers and publishers who serve on the Foundation’s Advisory Panel, the Foundation’s grants offer a platform of support that fosters the growth of young composers and ensures the continuation of the heritage of American musical ingenuity for generations to come.

'A Class Act' Puts BMI Theatre Workshop Center Stage
by Frank Evans

Maury Yeston offers his insights to a current class of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop.

Ed Kleban (second from right) and Alan Menken (right) are pictured at a BMI Musical Theatre Workshop session during the mid-’70s.

A Class Act, which opened March 11 on Broadway to a sheaf of rave reviews, is a biographical musical about Ed Kleban, the BMI writer who wrote the Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning lyrics for A Chorus Line. And eight times a week Broadway theatre-goers are getting an insider's look at the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop at Broadway's Ambassador Theatre.

The new show comes to Broadway directly from its critically-acclaimed, sold out run at the Manhattan Theatre Club. The original cast recording on RCA Victor was released while the Broadway show was in previews.

The ensemble cast participates in a highly stylized version of the workshop as it was run when Lehman Engel, often called "The Dean of Broadway Conductors," ruled the workshop and Kleban was one of his star writers. Kleban joined the BMI Workshop as a composer but was encouraged by Engel to write lyrics as well. Kleban's classmates in the workshop included a number who went on to establish themselves firmly in the mainstream, among them Alan Menken (Beauty and the Beast, Little Shop of Horrors), Maury Yeston (Nine, Grand Hotel, Phantom and Titanic), Judd Woldin (Raisin) and Carol Hall (Best Little Whorehouse in Texas).

After mastering the craft of lyric writing at the BMI Workshop, Kleban was hired to collaborate with Marvin Hamlisch to create the score for A Chorus Line and the rest is theatrical history. The show played 6,137 performances in New York, went on to win the Olivier Award in London and inspired a spate of books about the making of the show.

The BMI Workshop is more than a setting for A Class Act: It is virtually a character in the show. Not only is Kleban on stage (played by director and co-librettist Lonny Price) but the venerable curmudgeon, Lehman Engel, is also represented (and portrayed by Patrick Quinn, who, during offstage hours, is President of Actor's Equity). Co-librettist Linda Kline, who contrary to popular belief did not meet Kleban at the BMI workshop where both were honing their writing skills, claims there is a little bit of herself in every one of the female characters she created with Price for this part-fact/part-fiction theatricalization of Kleban's life.

After Engel's death on August 29, 1982, several of the BMI Workshop members got together and concluded that nothing would honor this master of the theater more than keeping the workshop alive in his honor. The BMI Workshop was re-christened The BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop and moved into a new era. Kleban actively served the Workshop, preserving its integrity and refashioning the workshop's thrust along with his then-colleagues and fellow members Yeston, Menken, Richard Engquist (Kuni Leml), Ellen Fitzhugh (Grind, Paper Moon, Herringbone), Walter Edgar "Skip" Kennon (Time and Again, Herringbone, Feathertop) and David Spencer (La Bohme, Weird Romance, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, Theatreworks USA versions of Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserables). The workshop would continue to flourish, encouraging more new voices in the theatre such as Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty (Ragtime, Seussical) and Michael John LaChiusa (The Wild Party, Marie Christine, Hello Again).

Maury Yeston recalls that Engel "provided loving attention to writers who otherwise would be separate and alone and without the foggiest idea how to get ahead or how to pursue their craft. He was really one of a kind. He created a forum for friendly criticism and he offered it in the most avuncular and giving way. He brought into being a marvelous thing. And we refused to let it die with him."

Kleban's life was cut short at the age of 48 by cancer. But before his death, he took pains to establish the Kleban Foundation, an entity independent of the Workshop, which gives yearly grants of $200,000 to lyricists and librettists for the musical theatre. (Kleban believed that composers had plenty of awards to apply for, but that lyricists and librettists were a much- neglected breed in this regard.) This year's prize has been awarded in part to Patrick Cook (Captain's Courageous), who serves as moderator of the BMI Lehman Engel Workshop's First Year Program; last year, part of the prize went to Committee member and Newsletter editor David Spencer as well as Advanced Workshop members Jeff Marx and Robert Lopez.

A Class Act is exposing dozens of previously unheard Kleban songs, unless you were fortunate enough to be a member of the BMI Workshop, where almost every song in the show was demonstrated by Kleban himself. Kleban also insisted upon thus presenting every number from the then-developing "A Chorus Line," over Marvin Hamlisch's initial objections. (And actor-songwriter Jeff Blumenkrantz, who portrays Hamlisch in "A Class Act" is not only a current BMI workshop writer, but has had his work performed and recorded by Audra McDonald.)

A Class Act may well have two break-out hit songs: "The Next Best Thing to Love" was written for the last Michael Bennett show, Scandal, and "Better," a joyous song of celebration, was originally recorded by Barbra Streisand but not released. Phyllis Newman, however, did include and record the song in her one-person show and CD Madwoman of Central Park West. (And to complete the circle, Amanda Green, daughter of Newman and her husband, lyricist-librettist Adolph Green, is a current member of the BMI Workshop.)

As for A Class Act's balance of fact with fiction, one of Lehman Engel's guiding principles was to ignore the truth of historical situations, when it made for dull theatre. Engel would undoubtedly be pleased that he outlives Kleban in the musical, when in fact he predeceased Kleban by five years. (The short, round, bespectacled Engel might be even more pleased to find himself played by a tall, dashing, young man, a casting contrast to real life not unlike that of Cary Grant as Cole Porter in the whimsically "biographical" film Night and Day.)

RCA Victor-BMG has released the original cast recording of A Class Act, and it is currently available in stores.

It might be parenthetically noted that Kleban's former career at Columbia Records was not as dreadful as the musical makes it out to have been. He and Thomas Sheppard (also a member of the BMI Musical Theatre Workshop and now one of the most accomplished producers of cast albums) were being groomed by Columbia president Goddard Lieberson to take over the Original Cast Division. Kleban produced the albums of Hallelujah, Baby, Jaques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris and Herschel Bernardi sings Fiddler on the Roof (a novelty bestseller featuring Broadway's third Tevye, that he was especially proud of, citing that, as a rule, "Re-creation albums never make money") as well as some of the first albums by Gretchen Cryer and Nancy Ford. (Ford, by the way, is currently an active member of the Workshop.)

Rarely does an advanced workshop session go by without Yeston or another veteran from the Kleban years citing a rule of Kleban's creation. Kleban had rules for writing and rules for life. At one point Ed declared that there were three certainties in life. And the character of Ed onstage at the Ambassador would no doubt concur that:

1) Actresses leave you.

2) Culture abhors a resort.

3) The rich die in their private planes.