The process of writing musical theatre

I've been writing music theater works since I was a child and one thing I've learned is no one can give you a blueprint, a formula or a road map. I try to go into the process with an open mind and I sometimes just let the music show the way. My guess is my colleagues would tell you that I'm not the easiest person to work with. I enjoy collaboration, but there are often disagreements. My latest work was developed with Mark Sbani and started quite some time ago.

Eigg the Musical writing team April Alsup and Mark Sbani

The intersection between music, dance and storytelling is magical. I'll never forget coming home from Scotland after a little onsite research and discussing how we should retool the whole work. My sense was we needed to set the show within the events of a Scottish ceilidh dance festival. We then focused on just a few highland tales and the traditional music provided the authentic atmosphere we were after. Fast forward through a pandemic, learning to play accordion, a lot of give and take and it all started to come together. Next month we are headed to Scotland to perform our show at the biggest performing arts festival on the planet.