Kate Rockwell, Justin David Sullivan and More Join GET WHAT YOU WANT: THE SONGS OF MICHAEL FINKE

CENTER STAGE RECORDS will release Get What You Want: The Songs of Michael Finke in streaming and digital formats on Friday, September 12. Showcasing the rising musical theater composer and lyricist heralded for his soaring ballads and unconventional story songs, the album weaves a tapestry of stories and characters fighting for what they want most out of life. 

Get What You Want features an all-star cast, including Emily Afton (Hadestown), Ari Axelrod (Fiddler on the Roof), Donna Lynne Champlin (“Crazy Ex-Girlfriend”), Alex Goley (Big River), Alan H. Green (The Preacher’s Wife), F. Michael Haynie (The Heart of Rock and Roll), Tommy Kaiser (Rent), Sarah Naughton (The Sound of Music), Kyle Taylor Parker (Kinky Boots), Jelani Remy (Back to the Future), Kate Rockwell (Mean Girls), Analise Scarpaci (Mrs. Doubtfire), Justin David Sullivan (& Juliet), Talia Suskauer (Parade), and Matt Wood (Saturday Night).

Produced by Robbie Rozelle and Michael Finke, and co-produced by Yasuhiko Fukuoka, the album features arrangements and orchestrations by Nils-Petter Ankarblom. The album features liner notes by Grammy and Tony Award nominee Nathan Tysen (Paradise Square, The Great Gatsby).
 
The album release will be celebrated on Friday, September 12 with a concert at Chelsea Table + Stage at 9:30 PM, featuring performers from the album and new singers, with musical direction by Yasuhiko Fukuoka. Tickets are available HERE.
 
“I have loved Michael’s music from the first minute I heard it, and have been championing an album of his for over a decade,” says album producer Robbie Rozelle. “Six years ago, we crowd-funded the project, only to have it paused by the pandemic. We are so proud of this incredible recording, and so grateful to the many artists who collaborated with us on it.”
 
Michael Finke is a New York based musical theater writer. He’s written the book, music, and lyrics for full-length musicals such as Reporting Live, Caroline and George, Surrounded By the Water, and Powerline Road which recently completed a developmental Off-Broadway production at the A.R.T./New York Gural Theater. His work has been developed at regional theatres across the country including Merrimack Repertory Company (Lowell, MA), New Musicals Inc. (Los Angeles), Musical Theatre Heritage (Kansas City), and OutVisible Theatre (Detroit), as well as collegiate institutions like New York University, Pace University, Long Island University, and Columbia College of Chicago.
 
Other projects include the musical short Dead Flowers, which is licensed by Music Theatre International in both English and Spanish. He also wrote the one-act musical comedy Movies Are Not Dead as well as music and lyrics for the solo musicals Christmas in Afghanistan and A Single Vibration, both of which were commissioned for the Veteran’s Project with New Musicals Inc. Upcoming projects include the Untitled Kansas Project (developed by Theatre Now) and the Broadway-bound 161st Street, written with Andrew David Sotomayor (developed and produced by Holey Shirts Productions). 
 
Michael’s had songs and concerts of his work performed at the Lincoln Center Library, Signature Theatre, the Czech National Symphony Orchestra in Prague, 54 Below, Joe’s Pub, the Green Room 42, the Laurie Beechman Theatre, and many more. His original Christmas song “Hope is Born” was broadcast nationwide on the Christmas Day telecast on ABC. For the past two decades Michael has been on the artistic staff of Lovewell Institute for the Creative Arts, having led over 40 musical theatre writing workshops in Ohio, Florida, New York, Kansas, Nevada, Sweden, and Italy. 
 
Michael is a current and original member of the Theatre Now Musical Theatre Writer’s Lab. He’s a winner of the 2015 New Voices Project with Walt Disney Imagineering and New Musicals Inc., a Dramatists Guild Fellowship and Jonathan Larson Grant finalist, a Creative Capital Grant finalist and is a proud member of ASCAP and the Dramatists Guild. 
 

Get What You Want:  The Songs of Michael Finke – Track List