David Gomez News

The Kurt Weill Foundation for Music has identified the twenty rising singer-actors who have advanced to the Lenya Competition's semifinal round.

Together, they're the leaders of The Allman Betts Band, a supergroup anchored by sharp songwriting, fiery fretwork, and a historic legacy. Inspired by the classic sounds of the group's family tree, The Allman Betts Band makes timeless rock & roll for the modern world, blurring the boundaries between blues, Americana, and southern soul.

The rock ‘n’ roll recording artists and longtime friends along with their talented band mates – Matt Grundy (bass), John Lum (drums), David Gomez (percussion, sax), Jackson Stokes (guitar) – just completed the challenge with their final, celebratory performance in California at BeachLife Ranch, the second annual coastal country SoCal festival.

The Atlanta Opera has announced that five creative teams have been selected to participate in the second annual 96-Hour Opera Project, a composition competition and showcase that pairs composers and librettists to write ten-minute operas. Bringing their completed works to Atlanta, the teams will workshop and rehearse their productions over four days from June 9–12, with travel, housing, singers, pianists and rehearsal space provided.

Paper Mill Playhouse has announced the nominations for the 2023 Rising Star Awards!

Musical Theatre Network, Mercury Musical Developments and Oxford Playhouse has announced details of the 29 musicals that will be showcased in BEAM2023.  

The revival of the Tony Award-winning The Secret Garden - The Musical has just opened at the Ahmanson. Sierra Boggess heads the large cast directed and choreographed by Warren Caryle. I had the chance to chat with John-Michael Lyles who plays Dixon, a most pivotal influence on the central character Mary Lennox.

The American Playwriting Foundation and Building for the Arts will present the inaugural Relentless Musical Award on Monday, February 27, 2023 at 8:00 pm at Theatre Row.

The American Playwriting Foundation and Building for the Arts have announced that Shayok Misha Chowdhury and Laura Grill Jaye, professionally known as Grill and Chowder, have won the Relentless Musical Award for their new musical How the White Girl Got Her Spots and Other 90s Trivia.

Musical Theatre Factory, New York's developmental hub for changemaking new musicals, will present selections from Shoot for the Moon, a new musical featuring book, music, and lyrics by David Gomez and John-Michael Lyles, music direction by Remy Kurs, and directed by raja feather kelly, at Harlem's Silvana Cafe on October 3.

The Bret Adams and Paul Reisch Foundation has announced the recipients of their 2022 Idea Awards for Theatre; three categories of grants awarded to adventurous new voices in playwriting and musical theatre, as well as the visionary playwrights who have inspired and blazed trails before them.

The Latiné Musical Theatre Lab, a new organization that develops and advocates for new Latiné-written works of musical theatre in order to radically change who gets to tell musical stories on stages across the country, is presenting its first ever Benefit Concert. 

The Green Room 42 has announced their line-up through the holidays and New Year’s Eve. Located inside YOTEL Times Square (570 Tenth Avenue, Fourth Floor), The Green Room 42 is Broadway's newest, most spacious, and funkiest cabaret club.

Prospect Theater Company has announced two special one-night-only concert performances of new musical theater work at NYC’s Symphony Space (2537 Broadway at 95th Street). On Tuesday, October 26 at 7:30pm the company presents REIGNITE, an evening of new songs from works-in-process by an exciting lineup of emerging and established writers.

The 5th Avenue Theatre announced today the five writing teams representing BIPOC writers of all gender identities, women writers, transgender writers, gender non-conforming writers, and non-binary writers that have been selected to receive a First Draft Commission in the second cycle of its new musical development program, First Draft: Raise Your Voice.

The Johnny Mercer Foundation and the American Music Theatre Project at Northwestern University will continue their partnership with the 16th annual Songwriters Project.

Celebrating its 10th anniversary, Rhinebeck Writers Retreat will host nine weeklong in-person residencies for 23 musical theatre writers of nine new musicals between June 27 and August 29.  Writers include Tony-nominee Beth Malone, Emily Saliers of Indigo Girls; Jonathan Larson winners Avi Amon, Sara Cooper, Ty Defoe, and Anna Jacobs and more.

Celebrating its 10th anniversary, Rhinebeck Writers Retreat will host nine weeklong in-person residencies for 23 musical theatre writers of nine new musicals between June 27 and August 29.

Originally released on CD by Olympia’s Chainsaw Records, queercore/riot grrrl legends Longstocking’s debut Once Upon a Time Called Now LP will be available digitally and on vinyl for the first time this Friday via Jealous Butcher Records.

If you're under the age of 26, and you're writing for musical theatre, New Musicals Inc. would love to hear from you.