The American Theatre Wing announced today that the 2019 Jonathan Larson Grants recipients are Julia Gytri & Avi Amon (book, music and lyrics), Emily Gardner Xu Hall (book, music and lyrics), Andy Roninson (music and lyrics), and Ben Wexler (music and lyrics).
Four prestigious grants of $10,000 each, as well as additional support in the form of residencies, concerts, and recording grants, totaling over $50,000, will be presented on Monday, March 19, 2018 at a private event at the WNYC Greene Space. The event will feature special performances of the recipients’ work.
This year’s recipients were selected by an expert panel consisting of Music Director/Arranger/Composer Annastasia Victory (Once On This Island, Don’t Bother Me, I Can’t Cope), Music Director/Arranger/Writer Jason Michael Webb (Choir Boy,The Color Purple) and Producer Alia Jones-Harvey (Ain’t Too Proud – The Life And Times Of The Temptations, American Son).
“The Jonathan Larson Grants are one of the annual highlights at the Wing. The young artists we have selected this year represent the next generation of theater makers, helping to shape our cultural dialogue for years to come. Along with our Andrew Lloyd Webber Initiative and the National Musical Theater Songwriting Challenge, these Jonathan Larson Grants demonstrate our serious commitment to developing and nurturing courageous, bold new voices in the industry,” said Heather Hitchens, President and CEO of the American Theatre Wing.
All four 2019 Jonathan Larson Grants recipients will also receive a $2,500 Saw Island Foundation Recording Grant. The Saw Island Foundation seeks to empower innovative and high-impact institutions to improve existing programs; it has created this enhancement to provide artists with additional support to help arrange for the production of new demo recordings to more fully represent the musical theater writer’s vision.