April Dae Okpwae is a performer, playwright, composer, librettist & community organizer who utilizes comedy to highlight the diversity of black identity while exploring the intersectionality of religion in racial, economic, & gender inequities. Her 15-character solo show, I’mma Do Me, satirically exposes the impact of poverty in America & has won several awards including Best Emerging Actress at United Solo Theatre Festival in NYC and Best Short Play at Atlanta Black Theatre Festival. Her concert credits include Poetic Theatre Production’s Feeling Good as Ritual, Musical Theatre Factory’s 4X15, and Maestra’s & Parent Artist Advocacy League’s Motherhood Concert. Her music(al) video, Be Soft Be Pretty, from her latest musical in development, Queens of Solomon, was a 2021 Hip Hop Film Festival Official Selection. As a community organizer & nonprofit leader for the past 15 years, April Dae has worked in black & brown communities throughout New York City and Detroit, MI conducting performance-based development workshops. She is a founding board member of BlackCount, an arts-based voter education, engagement, & advocacy organization. Born & raised in Detroit, April Dae received her BFA from SUNY Purchase performing in television, theatres, & universities throughout the country.

Joriah Kwamé is a composer/lyricist/librettist based in NYC. In 2019, his career was launched when he won Tony Nominee Taylor Louderman’s Write Out Loud competition for “Little Miss Perfect,” which has since grossed over 15 million views and inspired a Broadway-aimed musical of the same name. He is a recipient of the 2020 ASCAP Foundation Cole Porter Award and was one of six ASCAP writers featured in the ASCAP Songwriters: Next Generation showcase. He participated in the 2020 Johnny Mercer Songwriting Project. He has written pieces for The New York Film Academy, Prospect Theater Company, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and 54 Below. Andrew Lippa enlisted him to write a piece for the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus premiere song cycle, Songs Of The Pheonix, alongside the likes of Stephen Schwartz, Stephen Sondheim, and Ingrid Michaelson. With Pasek and Paul, he co-wrote “Top Of The World” from the upcoming Sony Picture Film Lyle, Lyle Crocodile, performed by Shawn Mendes. He has many musical projects in development, ranging greatly in style and subject matter. His upcoming work HOW TO: YOU is a 2022 O’Neil finalist and was featured in the 2022 NAMT Songwriter Showcase. He is a 2021 Jonathan Larson finalist.

@JoriahKwame

Joriahkwame.com

Julián Mesri is a New York-based Argentinean-American composer and writer who makes multilingual plays and musicals in the US and around the world. He is a current member of the Public Theater Emerging Writers Group and received a 2020-2021 EST/Sloan Commission for his musical Favaloro: A Heart in Pieces. This spring he will be writing the songs for the Public Mobile Unit’s musical adaptation for Comedy of Errors directed by Rebecca Martinez. Recent productions include Telo (Live and In Color Finalist, O’Neill NMTC Finalist), Bartolomé de las Casas Ruins My Pool (O’Neill NPC Finalist), Immersion (Ingenio Festival at Milagro Theater, Columbia/Roundabout Finalist, BAPF Semi-Finalist. Mesri has been an Emerging Artist of Color Fellow and Usual Suspect at NYTW, a Van Lier fellow at Repertorio Español, and the recipient of an ASCAP Scholarship. His adaptation of Fuenteovejuna received the HOLA Outstanding production award. He has also translated dramatic works for the Lark US/Mexico Exchange and PEN World Voices. He received his MFA from Columbia University.

Nicholas Connors is a composer/lyricist, orchestrator, and conductor. His writing spans many genres and musical styles, from an award-winning short chamber musical, Here, In The Park to a zany sci-fi romp, Space Voyage: The Musical Frontier. Nicholas is currently at work on a new folk rock musical, Ten Long Years (book by Kyle Wilson) and an untitled bluegrass-infused musical about the West Virginia Coal Mine Wars. His songs have been performed throughout the country by artists including Karen Olivo, Kyle Selig, and Jenna Ushkowitz. Nicholas is the Assistant Music Director of the new Broadway musical Almost Famous
and his past Broadway credits include Kristin Chenoweth’s For The Girls (Associate Music Director, Orchestrations) and Mean Girls (Keyboard). Nicholas was also an Associate Music Director for Kristin Bell’s Encore! on Disney+. His orchestrations have been performed at Carnegie Hall, The Metropolitan Opera, and in televised concerts by some of America’s top performers and orchestras.

Website: www.Nicholas-Connors.com
Instagram: @nick_connors

Mike Ross is a New York-based lyricist/librettist, dramaturg, and children’s book author. Working with composer Dylan MarcAurele, he has written book and additional lyrics for The Land of Forgotten Toys (2019, Greenhouse Theater Center) and book for the digital musical The Mystery of Custodia (2020, CPA Theatricals). His first theatrical credit in New York City was writing additional lyrics for The Bad Years (2016, dir. Stephen Brackett) by former DGF Fellows Kait Kerrigan and Brian Lowdermilk. He has worked as a dramaturg for off-Broadway productions at the Davenport Theatre and the Theatre at St. Clements; his own work has been presented at 54 Below, CAVEAT, and NYMF. Mike is a member of the BMI Lehman-Engel Musical Theatre Advanced Workshop. Plays include Carrie & Otis, Sorry, and Space: Four Stories In Boston. He has published two books for young readers via Scholastic, and is working on a third. www.mikerosswrites.com

Dylan MarcAurele is a composer, writer, and orchestrator. Composing credits include THE LAND OF FORGOTTEN TOYS (Greenhouse Theater, Chicago; Florida Festival of New Musicals 2019), 57TH NATIONAL MATHLETE SUM-IT (NYMF 2017; licensed through Theatrical Rights Worldwide), THAT 1770s SHOW (Harvard University). Other credits include the virtual musical THE MYSTERY OF CUSTODIA (music and lyrics, licensed through CPA Theatricals), A DOG STORY (music director, Davenport Theater), and HAMILTON (music assistant, Broadway and Chicago). Dylan was a member of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop and has served as orchestrator for the Hasty Pudding Theatricals. Dylan runs the Instagram account @RHONYmusical, where he writes/orchestrates/directs musical theater songs based on The Real Housewives, and has been featured on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen. He is thrilled to be working with bookwriter-lyricist Mike Ross to develop LEWIS LOVES CLARK. www.dylanmarcaurele.com

John-Michael Lyles is a guitar-wielding singer/songwriter from Mesquite, Texas, and a 2020 Dramatists Guild Foundation Fellow. He recently wrote additional music for Young Jean Lee’s “We’re Gonna Die” at Second Stage. His music has also been featured at Musical Theater Factory, NYMF, 54 Below, Joe’s Pub & Don’t Tell Mama. As an actor, he’s been seen Off Broadway in A Strange Loop (Playwright’s Horizons) & Sweeney Todd (Barrow Street), on TV in “The Other Two”, “Chicago PD” & “NCIS: New Orleans”. @jmlyles1 | www.john-michaellyles.com

Mx. Christiana Cole is a writer, composer, performer, and teacher. Favorite projects: Bombshell Baby (book/lyrics/music with Rachel Felstein and Matthew Anchel), about a drag queen who fights Nazis, produced at Ensemble Studio Theatre; Make the Earth Great (book/lyrics, with Rona Siddiqui) at Prospect Theater Lab; and a ton of children’s theater produced at Interlakes Family Theatre, Random Farms Kids Theater, and across Asia. Christiana is writing four original musicals: Tribe Without a God, a Neolithic comedy; Republicana, a country rock drama about a small town during a plague; Apocrypha, the untold true story of the founding of the Christian church; and with Laura Kleinbaum, Puritan/Lesbian/Witch, a time-traveling coming out musical. Winner of NPR’s The MOTH Story Slam. Dramaturg for the opera Invisible Cities (nominee: Pulitzer Prize). BM in classical voice: Manhattan School of Music. Member: BMI Advanced Songwriting & Librettists Workshops, Maestra, and Ring of Keys. Christiana is Philip Glass’ private studio singer and Joanna Gleason’s backup singer. Their vocals are featured on the soundtrack of hit film The Farewell, and their album “A Cozy Christmas with Christiana Cole” is available on all major steaming platforms. Christiana teaches voice lessons and writing. Www.christianacole.com

Aya Aziz is a writer, performer, and composer from New York. Her musical, Eh Dah? Questions for my Father, had a sold out run in New York Theatre Workshop’s 2019 “Next Door” series. An earlier iteration of the show, then a one-woman musical, ran at the New York Musical Festival (NYMF) in 2016 where it won awards for Most Outstanding Book and Outstanding Individual Performance. Aya is a 2020 NYFA grant recipient and is currently working on her debut album. She is also a current fellow of the 2020 Emerging Writer’s Group (EWG) at The Public. Her notable concert credits include Signature Theatre, Cherry Lane, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Joe’s Pub, and Disney’s Women of Broadway. She is honored to be among the DGF fellows this year!

David Gomez is a composer, lyricist, and librettist who hails from the plains of Kansas but is based in NYC. His songs have been shared at Joe’s Pub, 54 Below, and Musical Theatre Factory’s 4×15 series. Upcoming projects include the lyrics for MISS HAVISHAM’S WEDDING (with Jude Obermüller and Laura Barati) and LAUNDRY DAY: a queer musical mural (Latino Arts Festival.) David is invested in continuing the storytelling tradition of letristas y corridos in order to preserve personal narratives which celebrate Latinx stories. MFA: NYU’s Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program.