David Spencer

 

DAVID SPENCER is an award-winning composer-lyricist, lyricist-librettist, author and musical theatre teacher. He has written music and lyrics for the Richard Rodgers Development Award-winning musical The Fabulist, which also contributed to his winning a Kleban lyrics award and several Gilman & Gonzalez-Falla Theatre Foundation grants. 

 

He is also lyricist-librettist for two musicals with composer Alan Menken: Weird Romance (WPA 1992, York 2004, Original Cast Album on Columbia Records and Materworks Digital on Demand); and The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, which had its sold out, extended world premiere in Montreal in Summer 2015 (Segal Centre for Performing Arts, Original Cast Album on Ghostlight Records, CD and digital). Further major productions are currently being negotiated.

 

Spencer made his professional debut in 1984 with the English Adaptation of La Bohéme at the Public Theatre; and he has since written music and lyrics for Theatreworks/USA’s all-new, award-winning Young Audience versions of The Phantom of the Opera (1996) and Les Misérables (1996 and 1999 respectively, book and direction for both by Rob Barron). Currently he is writing book, music and lyrics for a musical based on the iconic Russian novel The Golden Calf. 

 

Spencer’s published books include the original Alien Nation TV series tie-in novel Passing Fancy (Pocket, 1994); The Musical Theatre Writer’s Survival Guide (Heinemann, 2005), an industry standard that has remained in print since its publication; and the script of Weird Romance (Samuel French, 1993). He is on faculty and teaches at the BMI-Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop and has taught at HB Studio, the Workshop Studio Theater and Goldsmith’s College in London. His primary professional affiliations are BMI, The Dramatists Guild and The International Association of Media Tie-in Writers.