GMTWP Alum and Adjunct Faculty Member Sean Flahaven
GMTWP Alum and Adjunct Faculty Member Sean Flahaven (Cycle 7), who last year was named the new CEO of The Musical Company, a licensing, publishing, and recording entity, and is now running Concord Theatricals, a new division of Concord Music, spearheaded the acquisition of major theatrical licensing and publishing company Samuel French, Inc. earlier this year.
Having already aquired other major musical theater licesning organizations such as Tams-Witmark and Rodgers & Hammerstein, the company established a joint venture with Andrew Lloyd Webber's Really useful Group called The Musical Company.
The Samuel French acquisition is Concord’s first foray into the nonmusical play business. Samuel French, established in 1830, has 10,000 titles, including some musicals — for example, “Fun Home” and “Grease” — but is dominated by dramas written by authors including Edward Albee, Lorraine Hansberry, Arthur Miller and August Wilson. The company not only publishes plays and musicals, but also licenses them, which means it grants permission for amateur and professional performances in exchange for a fee.
Flahaven, has been working in the theater licenings and music publishing world for many years and was the Director of Music and Marketing and then General Manager for the launch of Theatrical Rights Worldwide, another licensing agency. He was also recruited to run theatre for Warner/Chappell Music, the global music publishing arm of Warner Music Group, where over 8 years, he signed 40 of the best theatre songwriters as well as administered the catalogs of the majority of the Great American Songbook. He also oversaw theatrical licensing and producing, print/digital sheet music, and orchestral rental for Warner. At the same time, he was a producer on two dozen cast albums, 9 of which were nominated for Grammys, including Hamilton, which won a Grammy, has sold 2x Platinum, and topped the charts for over a year.
To read the NY Times Article on the acquisition of Samuel French, Inc. click HERE.