The Penn State New Musical Theatre Festival will explore, encourage, and foster new works of musical theatre by today’s progressive playwrights and composers in an educational setting; giving the students of Penn State University access to the collaborative process between the artist, the art form, and the professional world of musical theatre.

About the Festival

The Penn State New Musical Theatre Festival is an annual new works festival that allows up-and-coming composers, lyricists, and book writers to workshop their originial musical theatre pieces at the Penn State University Park Campus.

Four musical theatre pieces are chosen each year to be workshopped and performed (typically as a staged reading). There is one festival in the fall and one in the spring with two works in each festival. The casting pool includes students of the School of Music and the Musical Theatre BFA students. The creative team works with undergraduate students, faculty or MFA directors, and faculty musical directors to get their piece on its feet.

At the end of the spring semester festival one of the four works are chosen to be performed at the York Theater off-Broadway in New York City. They will accompany one play chosen from the Cultural Conversations festival also held at Penn State.

Performances at PSU take place in the Pavilion Theatre, an intimate thrust performance space, the Citizen’s Bank Theatre, a state-of-the-art proscenium theatre in downtown State College, or in the Playhouse, a large proscenium theatre on campus. Please see the submissions page for information on how to submit an original work to the festival.

Admission to the performances of the new works are free and open to the public. Tickets are general admission for the date of the performance and can be obtained on a first-come, first-served basis.

Please direct any questions or comments to the Artistic Director, Raymond Sage.