Customer Reviews

The Musical Theatre Writer's Survival Guide

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The Musical Theatre Writer's Survival Guide is invaluable from the instant you're hit by the "Hey, let's make a musical!" idea, all the way to choosing the best font for your finished score. Spencer provides exhaustive practical answers to every question you might possibly have-and to questions you never even knew you should be asking: What makes a good libretto? Effective music? Lyrics? What about collaborators? Directors? Contracts? Put another way, to the budding builder of an Empire State Building confronted by a daunting pile of unsorted bricks and bolts, Spencer's the guy who tells you which brick to put where, and how-from the foundation all the way up to the spire. An amazingly comprehensive work, which should be in every writer's library.

In-between buying this book and finishing it, I auditioned for and was admitted to the BMI program of which Mr. Spencer writes (if everything goes well, I'll get the benefit of his wisdom in-person next year).

However, I can honestly say right now that this is THE book for everyone who doesn't have access to a workshop or specialized program, as well as those of us who do. Mr. Spencer apparently remembers everything he's ever learned about the art of making a musical and passes it on in this splendid, concise, and entertaining volume. A must-buy, and that's the plain, unvarnished truth.

First - just to be clear - I've never met David Spencer. This review is based entirely on the book.

With that out of the way - This book is a wonderful resource, an absolute gem!

There is lots of great advice in there. Great nuts and bolts stuff, great advice on collaborations, good tips on craft... the list goes on. For me, I certainly put this on the required reading list next to Dana Singer's "Stage Writers Handbook" for books that offer sound advice on business and craft of musical theatre.

If you plan on writing musicals - get this book. If you've written musicals, and even been produced - get this book and read it any time you are starting a new musical. It's a great guide, but can also serve as a refresher course for how to do things right.

Highly recommended!




Dave Hudson

I just finished this book and all I can say is "WOW". The author knows his stuff and answers so many questions you won't find in your average Music Theater Book. If you want to write musicals, if you're interested in how musicals are written and how careers are sustained, or if you want to flourish in ANY artistic career this is the book for you. As a musical theater writer, I found the articles on Agents and Submissions very helpful, particularly the sections on recording your work and formatting your scripts. There's a lot to digest here and I feel like I'll be coming back to it again and again. I think the secret of the book is that it's written FROM EXPERIENCE. It's got a lot of excellent pointers on trusting your instincts, working with directors, doing your work better and just plain sticking in there. A MUST READ for music theater composers, lyricists, and librettists! A+

David Spencer is, by his own definition, a 'midlist' writer. That is, he's done enough work to have his name 'out there' as a Serious Player, enough awards to say that he's good at what he does; but he's never gotten the 'brass ring' of a big time show on broadway. Still he keeps going. ==In getting to where he is, he's made mistakes. He's headed down a few blind alleys but always managed to recover, managed to make a living in a very difficult business.

In this book he passes along the lessons he's learned along the way from finding a partner (musicals are almost always two people things) all the way through the development phase to packaging it, formating it, and selling it to the 'suits' (producers).

This is a busines where any advise you can get just might provide the spark of knowledge you need to do the next 'Phantom.'

This is an excellent beginner's guide to the whole scene of writing musicals. Being as short as it is, it can only provide general advice, but it covers a wide range of topics. I found the most useful to be how to handle the interpersonal side of the business --- i.e, getting along with collaborators, choosing directors (VERY valuable sections), working with producers, etc. Also very useful: hints on how and why songs work and how to market your stuff. The sections on writing book and lyrics offer good counselling for some of the emotional hazards along the way, but a good text on playwriting and lyric writing would very much supplement these chapters.

But I would say this should be required reading for anybody interested in writing musicals, reading musicals (you literary managers and dramaturgs take note!), and seeing musicals. Thanks, David, for putting this out.

Anyone wishing to pursue a career in musical theatre should consider this book a staple. It is an indispensible guide that explains basic concepts clearly and thoroughly. It explores all aspects of the business, from the dos and don'ts of collaboration to essential libretto elements to formatting scripts for submissions. However, it also gets into concepts that are lesser known but no less critical to the writing life. For example, especially helpful is the section on writer's block, which asserts that its existence is a result of one of a list of inherent problems with the scene or song. I'm telling you -- you will devour this book; Spencer knows his stuff, and now your work and mine can benefit from his putting it in print.

I ordered this book based two things: I knew the writer to be smart and articulate, and second, I'm entering into my first NYC project and was feeling a little insecure. From the first chapter about collaborating, I knew my money -and my time would be well-spent. This stuff is good. It's smart and to the point and quite entertaining (like a good musical). This is the no-nonsense manual for making Musical Theatre.

THE MUSICAL THEATRE WRITER'S SURVIVAL GUIDE is, one the whole, an excellent and much-needed resource. This is not so much a book about how to write a musical, but what to do with it once you have written it. The most valuable parts for me were the sections dealing with collaboration. Author David Spencer discusses not only how to deal with writing partners, but also with the other collaborators, like the director, the producer and the designer. He also gives practical advice about the most effective way of presenting the reading and making the demo recording. He goes into great detail about what any material that you send out should look like. These parts of the book alone make it worth owning.

I felt that Spencer jumped the track toward the end with a lengthy discussion of setting up one's own recording studio, which would have been much better as an appendix, rather than in the main body of the book. My other quibbles with the book are the rather gag-inducing Sondheim worship and the author's frequent tooting of this own horn. (I found the section dealing with awards and grants depressing because it only pointed up the unlikelihood that material by a maverick like me would ever be considered.) There are a couple of minor errors (such as when he says that William Redfield played Rosencrantz in Burton's HAMLET, when in reality he played Guildenstern) and there is a glaring use of "principle" as an adjective, rather than "principal." But in general, I found this an invaluable book that absolutely needed to be written. Every serious musical theatre writer should have his own copy. This one is simply essential.

This is a great book if you're interested in the Broadway Business Industry. I was more looking for tips on how to write a Broadway Musical, Character development etc... So this was not what I was looking for. The description and reviews were not that specific about this. Everybody was mostly raving about the writer, who I think, is brilliant when you're ready to get out there and shop your play around.