Sam Carner

Sam Carner (lyricist / book writer) won the Kleban Prize for librettists. Sam and composer Derek Gregor won the John Wallowitch Award for songwriters under 40 and the Richard Rodgers Award. They were among Playbill.com’s 12 “Contemporary Musical Theatre Songwriters You Should Know.” 13 of their songs have been nominated for MAC Awards, and their work is performed in hundreds of venues around the world every year and has been sung on all 7 continents.

Carner & Gregor’s musical UNLOCK’D played an extended Off-Broadway run at the Duke Theater in 2013, having previously won “Best of the Fest” at NYMF, and went on to be produced at Houston’s Queensbury Theatre in 2018 and the University of Southern Maine mainstage in 2019. Their musical ISLAND SONG has been produced at dozens of theaters and universities around the world since its release in 2017, including the Adirondack Theatre Festival, London’s Stratford Circus Theatre, Circle in the Square Theatre, Bologna’s Tweet Charity (in Italian), Tokyo’s Crawfish (in Japanese), Oakland University, Song and Dance Players of Singapore, Vanderbilt University, Measure For Measure Theater, and many more. Carner & Gregor’s new musical TECHIES had a workshop production at Rockford University in 2019 and is slated for several licensed productions in 2021.

Sam’s children’s musical BARNYARD FOLLIES has been produced by youth theatres around the world and won the Moonlit Wings International Playwriting Competition.

Current Carner & Gregor projects include additional songs for SHEILA LEVINE IS DEAD AND LIVING IN NEW YORK (book by Todd Graff and songs by Michael Devon, direction by Susan Stroman), which had a recent workshop with the Vineyard Theatre; a TBA musical adaptation of an ABC television show; and SECOND LINE, an adaptation of Rex Rose’s novella TOAST, which had a workshop production at the Bloomington Playwrights Project and developmental readings at Coastal Carolina University, NC State University, the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and the Pace New Musicals series.

Carner & Gregor’s short children’s musical LOVE, SPLAT has toured the country since 2013 in the TheatreWorks USA revue THE TEACHER FROM THE BLACK LAGOON AND OTHER STORIES. They have written numerous songs for revues and web series, including MY GAY ROOMMATE, REDHEADS ANONYMOUS (2016 Indie Series Award nomination for “Best Song”), and more.

Sam has been in residence at the Goodspeed Festival of New Musicals, the Johnny Mercer Colony, and Yaddo.

Sam founded the Institute for American Musical Theatre Creators, a new training program for musical theater writers based in New York City. He also teaches book writing and lyric writing at Temple University’s new MFA program in Musical Theatre Collaboration. He has taught musical-theatre history and analysis at NYU and Yale University and songwriting course at NYU’s Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program. Additionally, he has made guest teaching appearances at dozens of universities, including The University of Michigan, Elon University, Rockford University, Western Carolina University, Baylor University, James Madison University, The University of Wisconsin, The University of Maryland, Virginia Commonwealth University, The University of Wisconsin Madison, and many more.