Elderland is a new verbatim musical - an exploration of the human experience of traveling through our elder years. Inspired by true stories shared with us by elders, caregivers, family members and friends, Elderland reimagines the journey into aging as a theatrical odyssey - hilarious, poignant, surreal, and defiantly hopeful. An intergenerational story about who we become when society stops seeing us, and how joy, autonomy, and identity can be reclaimed through community and imagination. . Elders Steve Allen (L) and Jan Spalding (R)..Caregiver Gloria Gantes.(Center).
In October 2022 we – composer Dan Martin and lyricist Michael Biello – 50 year life-partners and creative collaborators – spent several weeks in residence at a continuing care retirement complex where we immersed ourselves in the community and conducted 30+ interviews with residents and caregivers.
Over the next 24 months we wrote scenes and songs, merging together the stories we'd gathered with our own observations and reflections as fellow elders and caregivers.
In April 2025 we were invited by MusiCoLab, a Philadelphia non-profit supporting musical theatre creators, to present a 30 minute excerpt of our work-in-progress. The presentation was enthusiastically received by audiences, many responding personally and with deep emotion to the wisdom, humor, life lessons, and challenges of elders and those who love and care for them.
With new perspective and information gleaned from our audiences and from our performers, we reconvened to brainstorm rewrites and next steps with our core creative team:
Rachael Gallagher - an eldercare and spiritual wellness provider with deep experience supporting people through aging, transition, and meaning-making. She served as Director of Spiritual Life at a continuing care retirement community and currently works as a Spiritual Wellness Provider at Canyon Ranch in Tucson, Arizona. https://www.canyonranch.com/experts/rachael-gallagher
Over the next year, with your support, we'll work to develop and incorporate a strong theatrical spine into the musical, conduct additional interviews and write new songs and scenes inspired by the stories we gather, and ready Elderland’s script and score for a full-length developmental workshop in 2026.
We're deeply grateful for your generosity and for your belief in us and our ongoing creative work.
