MELISSA LI & KIT YAN
Musicals include Interstate (New York Musical Festival, Winner “Outstanding Lyrics”), MISS STEP (5th Avenue Theatre commission), Cancelled (Keen Company), May Day (NewYorkRep), Surviving the Nian (The Theater Offensive, IRNE Award Winner for "Best New Play" 2007), and 99% Stone (The Theater Offensive). Upcoming: BachelorX (Playwrights Horizons), Adventurephile (Keen Company), and OSF Presents (Oregon Shakespeare Festival).
Her works have received support from 5th Avenue Theatre, The Village Theater, Musical Theater Factory, Playwrights Horizons, Keen Company, Weston Playhouse, NewYorkRep, Company One Theatre, National Performance Network, and New England Foundation for the Arts, among others.
Kit Yan is a bi-coastal transgender screenwriter and playwright, born in Enping, China, and raised in the Kingdom of Hawaii. They are the 2021 recipient of the prestigious Kleban Prize for most promising book of a musical, and a recipient of the Vivace Award for big ideas in theater. Kit has been a fellow at the Dramatists Guild Foundation, Lincoln Center, MacDowell, The Playwright Center Fellow, and the Musical Theater Factory. In 2021, they are contracted to write their first movie musical for television.
Their work has been produced by the Smithsonian, American Repertory Theater, Musical Theater Factory, the New York Musical Festival, Weston Playhouse, NY Rep, and Diversionary Theater. They are currently in development at Playwrights Horizons, 5th Avenue Theater, the Village Theater, The Oregon Shakespeare Festival, San Diego Rep, and Keen Company. Their award-winning musical, Interstate opened to rave reviews at Mixed Blood Theater in Minneapolis. Kits first play Queer Heartache won 5 awards at the Chicago and SF Fringe Festivals and their second musical, MISS STEP received grants from NAMT and ASCAP to continue development.
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We contributed a movement called "Who Am I", a piece about remembering your past and learning how to appreciate the younger version of yourself. The narrator is a transgender person who returns to their childhood home and rediscovers old mementos from a time they've tried to erase. As the song progresses, the narrator realizes that without their old self they would never be the person they are today. The inspiration for this came from personal experience. During the pandemic, many of us were hunkered down at home (or returned to our hometowns) and were surrounded by photos, yearbooks, letters, etc., things we hadn't looked at in years. While our first reactions may have been to cringe at or to criticize our younger selves, the experience helped us realize that life is a journey and our memories and experiences make us who we are today.
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We have been an admirer of the work that the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus have been doing and the community they have built for years. We're also huge fans of Andrew Lippa, our mentor and friend, who suggested us for the project, so signing up for this project was a no-brainer for us. In addition, this was an exciting opportunity for us to try something new because up until this point we have written songs almost exclusively in the musical theater space. To have a chance to write something for a 250 person chorus is very cool!
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We hope that the idea of revisiting and embracing all the parts of your own history and identity will resonate with the audience. Every one of us is unique because of the specific path we traveled, and we hope to live in a world where we can be celebrated for all that we are and how we want to be seen.
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Between the ongoing pandemic, the divided political landscape, the dire state of our environment, and the struggle for social justice, it's been really inspiring to see so many people continuing to create meaningful art and care for our communities. Particularly with Songs of the Phoenix, we feel so hopeful to be part of a project that celebrates us as humans and leads with so much joy.