Michael Finke is a New York based musical theater writer. He’s written the book, music, and lyrics for full-length musicals such as Reporting Live, Caroline and George, Surrounded By the Water, and Powerline Road which recently completed a developmental Off-Broadway production at the A.R.T./New York Gural Theater. His work has been developed at regional theatres across the country including Merrimack Repertory Company (Lowell, MA), New Musicals Inc. (Los Angeles), Musical Theatre Heritage (Kansas City), and OutVisible Theatre (Detroit), as well as collegiate institutions like New York University, Pace University, Long Island University, and Columbia College of Chicago.
Other projects include the musical short Dead Flowers, which is licensed by Music Theatre International in both English and Spanish. He also wrote the one-act musical comedy Movies Are Not Dead as well as music and lyrics for the solo musicals Christmas in Afghanistan and A Single Vibration, both of which were commissioned for the Veteran’s Project with New Musicals Inc. Upcoming projects include the Untitled Kansas Project (developed by Theatre Now) and the Broadway-bound 161st Street, written with Andrew David Sotomayor (developed and produced by Holey Shirts Productions).
Michael’s had songs and concerts of his work performed at the Lincoln Center Library, Signature Theatre, the Czech National Symphony Orchestra in Prague, 54 Below, Joe’s Pub, the Green Room 42, the Laurie Beechman Theatre, and many more. His original Christmas song “Hope is Born” was broadcast nationwide on the Christmas Day telecast on ABC. For the past two decades Michael has been on the artistic staff of Lovewell Institute for the Creative Arts, having led over 40 musical theatre writing workshops in Ohio, Florida, New York, Kansas, Nevada, Sweden, and Italy.
Michael is a current and original member of the Theatre Now Musical Theatre Writer’s Lab. He’s a winner of the 2015 New Voices Project with Walt Disney Imagineering and New Musicals Inc., a Dramatists Guild Fellowship and Jonathan Larson Grant finalist, a Creative Capital Grant finalist and is a proud member of ASCAP and the Dramatists Guild.