My typical disclaimer: The most up-to-date information is generally in my newsletter (which you should totally sign up for at https://tinyletter.com/mariajc93 )
In the past few months, I’ve reached some milestones. I completed my second year at the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Writing Workshop, and was invited to join the Advanced Workshop, an ongoing association of musical theatre writers.
It’s really wild to think of everything that has happened in the past two years. I recorded my audition demos for the BMI Workshop by myself in my old apartment, squeezing in vocal takes between sirens and highway traffic, transcribing piano parts I had played many times but had never taken the time to formally notate before. After I passed the initial screening round, I asked a singer friend, the fabulous Racquel Williams, to sing three of my songs in the room with me for the live round of auditions at the BMI corporate office.
The energy in the audition room was friendlier than I was expecting— I had never heard a room of strangers laugh at my comedy lyrics before, for instance. Rick Freyer, one of the co-moderators of the Workshop, asked if I would be interested in joining as a composer. I replied that I would be interested in whatever role the panel thought suited me, should I be so lucky. I left the room feeling oddly hopeful. (Hours later, Racquel and I joined my sister at a massive Manhattan rooftop venue for a concert by Natalia LaFourcade, one of my singer-songwriter heroes, so it was a momentous day on several counts.)
Eventually an acceptance email arrived, followed by a flurry of train rides, collaborators, lectures, song presentations, advice taken, advice ignored, advice reconsidered, practice rooms, coffee shops, actual flurries, and of course, burnt Brussels sprouts with soy sauce. This pivoted to a flood of video conference calls, Google Drive folders, Final Cut projects, bad captions, caption instruction videos, better captions, demos with me singing every part, Messenger chat threads, cat memes, home-brewed coffee, jumpsuits, audio equipment, and painstakingly earned stamps on my local café’s loyalty card.
All in all, I clocked out from the two years of the Workshop with over a dozen songs written with nearly as many collaborators, including a ten-minute musical (“Astoria”, music by me and book & lyrics by Alex Chang) and a twenty-minute musical excerpt (“Stardust”, music by me and book & lyrics by Allison Light). I also co-wrote a maniacal Christmas song for department store tycoons, a cheerfully morbid duet for a pair of sisters, and a controversial tap-dance number for a security guard played by Laurence Fishburne, to name just a few.
Along with the skills I honed— writing music for characters, on a deadline, with clarity and humor— I gained an incredible cohort of roughly three dozen colleagues and friends whose work I enjoy and whose opinions I trust. I can’t wait to see what everyone does next!
This past winter, I was invited to attend a masterclass on lyric writing with renowned musical theatre composer-lyricist William Finn (The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Falsettos, etc.) This was another fantastic opportunity to meet different collaborators and see new work develop.
I was intrigued by classmate Jaime Jarrett’s lyric about edible cookie dough, so I asked to set his text to music. Our song “Cookie Dough” was selected for a concert of songs from the masterclass. The New York Theatre Barn streamed the concert on their YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJQRFOaUg80 Singing actor Terran Scott performed Maria and Jaime’s song “Cookie Dough” at about 18:53 in the video.
Next up for me: I’m in the middle of writing songs for a twenty-minute musical with Alison “AJ” Freeman (lyrics) and Keurim “KC” Hur (book) to present at the culmination of Across a Crowded Room 2021. This summer program through the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts allows musical theatre writers to meet and collaborate with new writing partners, and get masterclass feedback on developing work from acclaimed expert guests like David Henry Hwang, Heather Christian, and Amanda Green. AJ, KC, and I are adapting a folktale about transformation, trust, and sacrifice.
I’m sporadically posting videos on my YouTube channel, so feel free to subscribe there as well! I have posted the two short musicals I mentioned, plus many other weird and wonderful items.
photo: screenshot from a demo recording for the “Stardust” project. Maria is laughing in front of a green-screen mid-recording session, wearing headphones and standing by a microphone. She has long hair and is wearing gold eyeshadow to match her gold bolo tie, plus a light blue dress.