Dramatists Guild of America Teams with Kyle Ewalt and Michael Ian Walker for DG Conservatory Today

For the first DG Conservatory of the new year, the Dramatists Guild is thrilled to team up with the writers who created Behind the Music-al, Kyle Ewalt and Michael Ian Walker, today, February 11, 2014, at 6:00 p.m. The event will take place at the Dramatists Guild's New York office, in the Frederick Loewe Room, 1501 Broadway (between 43rd and 44th Streets), Suite 710. This free seminar is opening a limited number of seats to the public and reservations are required.

Originally presented at 92YTribeca, Behind the Music-al is an exciting behind-the-scenes look at the next generation of musical theater composers. Special guests discuss how songwriting teams collaborate, showcase exclusive songs performed by some of Broadway's hottest young stars and dish about the back-story on your favorite musical numbers. Using a particular theme for each presentation, Behind the Music-al lets you in on the process of putting together tomorrow's next big hit. The theme for the February 11 session is Behind the Music-al Goes Behind Closed Doors.

In Behind the Music-al: Goes Behind Closed Doors, composer/lyricist Georgia Stitt will moderate a conversation about how emerging musical theater composers are exploring hidden worlds, and using the genre to give audiences a window into often obscure or closed off communities. What are the challenges a writer faces in researching and bringing a unique culture to life on the stage? What are the rewards of finding such a rare subject? Songwriters Rosser & Sohne, Stephanie Salzman & Deborah Brevoort, and Ewalt & Walker look at their latest projects, and how each strives to teach an audience about a world they may not be familiar with and create a compelling musical.

For reservations, e-mail reservations@dramatistsguild.com. To enter the building at 1501 Broadway, you will need to present photo ID. For further information, contact Tari Stratton at tstratton@dramatistsguild.com, or call (212) 398-9366, ext. 20.

If you are unable to attend this exciting event in person, Behind the Music-al will also be Livestreamed. Tune in to watch them LIVE. Visit: Livestream.com/NewPlay, and send any questions via Twitter at #newplay.

Participants bios: Georgia Stitt (moderator): Composer/Lyricist; wrote Big Red Sun (NAMT 2010, Arlen Award 2005 with John Jiler); The Water (with Jeff Hylton and Tim Werenko); The Danger Year (with Jamie Pachino); Mosaic (for Inner Voices with Cheri Steinkellner) and Samantha Spade: Ace Detective (for TADA! with Lisa Diana Shapiro). She has released three albums of her music: This Ordinary Thursday: The Songs Of Georgia Stitt, (2007), Alphabet City Cycle (2009) and My Lifelong Love (2011). Her songs and arrangements are represented on the solo albums of Susan Egan, Lauren Kennedy, Kate Baldwin, Robert Creighton, Stuart Matthew Price, Caroline Sheen, Daniel Boys, Kevin Odekirk and composer Sam Davis, as well as several Broadway Cares albums. Her choral piece with hope and virtue (using text from President Obama's 2009 inauguration speech) was featured on NPR as part of Judith Clurman's Dear Mister President cycle, and her orchestral piece, Waiting for Wings, co-written with husband Jason Robert Brown, was commissioned by the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra and premiered there in 2013 with conductor John Morris Russell. Georgia has degrees from Vanderbilt University's Blair School of Music and NYU's Tisch School for the Arts. She is on the theater faculty at Pace University and is the composer-in-residence at Pasadena Presbyterian Church. www.georgiastitt.com

Stephanie Salzman (Composer/Lyricist/Songwriter) is a 4th generation New Yorker, recorded multi Platinum, Grammy nominated songwriter, composer/lyricist, and vocal producer. Recording credits include: Whitney Houston, 3LW/Cheetah Girls, Gretchen Espina (Philippines Idol winner), Miki Howard (Grammy nominated), etc. TY/Film credits: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Shield, etc. Awards/scholarships include NAPM, Hammerstein/Tisch Foundation, ASCAP, Meet the Composer and PENN Writers' Society. Her NYU Musical Theater MFA program thesis musical was directed by Tom O'Horgan. Current projects: Crossing Over, an Amish hip hop musical written with Deborah Brevoort which received a USA Artist studio recording budget through USA Artists. Crossing Over was recently selected for the inaugural 2013 ASCAP New Musical Theater Festival at the Lied Center in Nebraska. There will be a reading of the entire musical at Lied in March 2014. Left To Our Own Devices, a high energy, pop/rock dance musical for young audiences written with bookwriter EllaRose Chary, was named a 2013 Ronald M. Ruble New Play Festival Finalist with readings at the Caryl Crane Youth Theater and Momentum New Works Festival, NYC.

Stephanie directs Power Pitch Music Studios where she coaches, co-writes, vocal produces and develops young artists. For more info, reviews (NY Times, Rolling Stone, Billboard), etc. please visit: www.powerpitchmusic.com

Deborah Brevoort is best known for her play The Women of Lockerbie, which is performed throughout the United States and internationally. She is a two-time winner of the Frederick Loewe Award in musical theatre for King Island Christmas with David Friedman and Coyote Goes Salmon Fishing with Scott Richards. She wrote the opera librettos for Embedded (composer: Patrick Soluri), commissioned by the American Lyric Theater and Steal a Pencil for Me (composer Gerald Cohen.) She also wrote a new adaptation of Die Fledermaus for the Anchorage Opera. Other musical works include Blue Moon Over Memphis, a Noh drama about Elvis Presley. Her plays include The Poetry of Pizza, The Comfort Team, The Blue-Sky Boys, The Velvet Weapon and others. Her work is published by Dramatists Play Service, Samuel French, and Applause Books. No Passport Press will publish two anthologies of her plays in 2014. Brevoort is an alumnus of New Dramatists and a member of ASCAP. She teaches at Goddard College and NYU's Graduate Musical Theatre Writing program. For more information on Crossing Over, visit www.crossingoverthemusical.com.

Tim Rosser and Charlie Sohne are finalists for the 2013 Ebb Award. Their most recent show was The Boy Who Danced on Air (2013 NAMT Festival of New Works, 2013 Rodgers Award Finalist, developed through The Lark's Monthly Meeting of the Minds and Roundtables). Previously, they wrote The Profit of Creation (2011 Yale Institute for Musical Theater, one of ten finalists for the O'Neill Music Theater Conference 2011 and 2012, developed at The Lark and through ASCAP's 2010 Johnny Mercer Songwriters Program) and the short musical Political Speeches (The Culture Project's IMPACT Series). Their work has been seen in a sold-out 54 Below Show, Cutting Edge Composers at Joe's Pub, NYTB at the D-Lounge, NEXT's Emerging Composers Series, and The Holiday Concert at the Lincoln Center Library. They were both members of the Advanced Class of the BMI Workshop. www.rosserandsohne.com

Ewalt and Walker are currently at work on two commissions; one from Broadway Across America, and Pumped, a fashionable new musical about the world of designer shoes. Their show, Bromance: The Dudesical was most recently performed in sold-out concerts at Joe's Pub and Caroline's on Broadway, and has been developed by GroundUp Productions. Other shows include Separate: Battle Songs of Youth, selected by Ars Nova for ANTFEST 2010, and The Making of Madeline Moore (The Merc NYC 2009). Their work has been seen in Michigan, Toronto, and London, and in New York at Playwrights Horizons, Joe's Pub, Theater Row, Galapagos Art Space, 92YTribeca, and as part of the We Are the Song Benefits for the After the Storm Foundation. They are also the curating producers of the musical theater series Behind the Music-al, now produced with The Dramatists Guild of America, which has featured songwriters including Adam Guettel, Stephen Flaherty, Duncan Sheik, Larry O'Keefe, Ryan Scott Oliver, Kerrigan & Lowdermilk, Joe Iconis, and Adam Gwon, amongst many others. www.ewaltandwalker.com