The Rationale: The purpose of THE PITCH is to provide a venue for creative teams to explore their vision of a musical theatre piece in its earliest stages and to garner audience reactions to assist them in the development of the final product.

The Format: Three members of the creative team (composer, playwright, musical director, etc.) present a 40 to 50 minute summary version of their musical theatre piece.  Instrumentation will be on piano and or other instruments which members of the creative team may play.  The Festival will provide a piano only.  If it is a book musical, it must contain substantial pieces of at least five songs.  Solid descriptive narration or scene setting will be a critical part of the presentation.

The Setting: A maximum of twenty projects will be selected.  Each week for ten weeks (June 14- August 18, 2011) two creative teams will be invited to “pitch” their idea. Each team will have four presentations before live audiences, in the 100-seat Theater Mack located in Auburn, NY. Audience feedback will include a short face-to-face session following each presentation, as well as written surveys collected from the audience after each presentation.

Artist Support: Those creative teams invited to present their idea will receive travel expenses to and from Auburn, as well as accommodations during their one week stay. Each week, teams will arrive on Monday. The presentations will be on Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings, plus a late afternoon presentation on Saturdays. Rehearsal space will be provided for two days prior to the public presentations, as well as on each of the performance days. Creative teams will be encouraged to change the presentation as they see fit based on audience responses. 

For more information on how to submit your new musical to THE PITCH for consideration, please visit: www.fingerlakesmtf.com/submissions/the.jpgtch-musicals-in-development/ or email:submissions@fingerlakesmtf.com.