NYU Steinhardt Celebrates Alan Menken

On April 28 at the NYU Skirball Center, NYU celebrated one of the University’s most distinguished alumni, composer Alan Menken (ARTS ’72, HON ’00), for an evening of music and storytelling.

With a career spanning Broadway and film, Menken’s legendary works include classic Disney songs like ”A Whole New World,” ”Beauty and the Beast,” ”Part of Your World,” and ”Under the Sea,” as well as Broadway hits from Little Shop of Horrors, Newsies, Aladdin, and Sister Act, among many others.

“This was an unforgettable evening of music and storytelling that honored Menken’s extraordinary legacy,” says Jack H. Knott, Gale and Ira Drukier Dean at NYU Steinhardt. “The event also highlighted how, through its programs and faculty, NYU Steinhardt continues to educate and inspire the next generation of composers and conductors for Broadway, film, and theatre.”

The evening featured performances of Menken’s most beloved compositions performed by the NYU Broadway Orchestra, directed by Ted Sperling, music adjunct faculty in NYU Steinhardt’s Department of Music and Performing Arts Professions (MPAP). This first-of-its-kind orchestral program is specifically geared toward NYU students who are interested in the music of and perhaps a career on Broadway; several alumni from the orchestra are currently playing in shows.  

“One of the important things about Alan’s work is that he’s transferred the American musical tradition of Broadway to film, which is crucial in preserving the legacy of the American musical,” says Marilyn Nonken, professor of music and music education and chair of MPAP. “What was once very localized to New York City is now reaching massive audiences and becoming much more accessible to so many people, teaching new and younger audiences this important and distinctive American art form and culture.”

“In the late 1960s, making a musical film out of a Broadway show had fallen out of favor, but Alan and his collaborators brought Broadway back to the movies,” says Sperling. “When Disney started making essentially book musicals on film, like Beauty and the Beast, it started a revival, and the music also made an easy transition to Broadway.”

In addition to the orchestral performances from Menken’s repertoire, the event also included participation by past and present Menken Scholars, whose studies are supported through a scholarship endowed by Menken for highly talented students in NYU Steinhardt’s music composition programs.

“The role we play as we grow older is to blaze a path for the young people who will follow us, and this scholarship is a way for me to give back,” says Menken, whose music assistant and right-hand man, Aaron Kenny (MM ’14), was a Menken Scholar. “NYU became the cocoon from which my career started, and it’s now allowing me to become a catalyst for some incredible composers, lyricists, and arrangers, and it’s very gratifying to see their journeys.”

“Being able to meet Alan and his incredible team through the Menken Scholars program was surreal,” says Tatyana Richaud (BM ’26), one of this year’s recipients alongside Miles Tobel (BM ’26), Josh Conway (MM ’26), and Johnum Palado (MM ’26). “I grew up on Alan Menken’s music and I am so interested in the world of musical theatre. It was fascinating to work with him.”