Sam Linden wrote his first musical in the 7th grade; it was called “The Understudy” and was terrible. He’s gotten a lot better since then.
He is currently working a project with lyricist/playwright Alexandra Petri, currently titled Young Guns, based on the interconnected lives and loves of the Romantic poets. Young Guns was workshopped in September of 2015 by the Washington Rogues as part of the Kennedy Center's Page to Stage festival. Other projects include UNAMUSED: a Feminist Musical Fantasia Adapted from an Essay that was Based on a True Story About a Play that was Based on a True Story, a reimagining of one of Petri's humorous essays which was selected for a workshop performance at the 2019 Yale Cabaret Satellite Festival, and Secret Identity: A Superqueero Musical, about a group of individuals who by day are openly queer and trans people and by night are vigilante superheroes fighting the capitalist cis-hetero patriachy. His songs have been performed or workshopped with award-winning songwriters including Bobby Lopez & Kristen Anderson Lopez, Lynn Ahrens, Stephen Schwartz, Larry O’Keefe and Nell Benjamin, Suzanne Vega, Marvin Hamlisch, Deidre Murray, and Joshua Schmidt. Sam is also a proud member of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Advanced Workshop.
As a strategist for the cultural sector, Sam is committed to forging for vibrant, sustainable, and impactful arts organizations and arts ecosystems; connecting artists and institutions with audiences and communities; and rethinking the role of traditional arts and culture within modern economic realities, contemporary civic frameworks, and the digital world. He currently works at TDC, a leading management consulting firm for the nonprofit sector, where his practice focuses on arts & culture organizations and funders.
Most recently, he worked as the Associate Director of Marketing and Communications at Yale Repertory Theatre, where he strengthened digital marketing and e-commerce platforms and implemented systems for data analysis and evaluation. Previously, he's developed marketing and communications strategy for the Yale Cabaret and Yale Summer Cabaret, serving as copywriter, content director, and digital & social media manager. As the leader of the Millennials Task Force at Center Theatre Group, he designed programs and strategies to engage diverse audiences and encourage the theater's external communications to reflect its internal values. Sam has also participated in TDF/TBA's Triple Play research into new play marketing, and conducted an independent case study on Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company's Connectivity department and its intersections of community engagement, audience sustainability, and brand development. He has worked in school operations with Uncommon Schools, as a drama and music teaching artist, an arts-education non-profit administrator with LeAP and Wingspan Arts, and an overpriced SAT tutor. Sam holds an MFA in Theater Management from the Yale School of Drama, and MBA from the Yale School of Management, and a BA with honors in Music from Harvard University.
Sam spent his school years participating in youth theater, choir, marching band, and not nearly enough drug-fueled parties or reckless endangerment. At Harvard, Sam composed for various theater pieces and student films, as well the Hasty Pudding Theatricals 160th production; sang with and wrote arrangements for the Harvard Opportunes; and directed, music directed, and performed as a member of the Harvard-Radcliffe Dramatic Club. He has sung, music directed, and arranged for The Current, a contemporary a cappella group.
According to a very awkward conversation with his mother, Sam was conceived in New York City, but was born and raised in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. After time spent calling Brooklyn, NY and New Haven, CT home, Sam currently lives in Boston, Massachusetts.
He is currently working a project with lyricist/playwright Alexandra Petri, currently titled Young Guns, based on the interconnected lives and loves of the Romantic poets. Young Guns was workshopped in September of 2015 by the Washington Rogues as part of the Kennedy Center's Page to Stage festival. Other projects include UNAMUSED: a Feminist Musical Fantasia Adapted from an Essay that was Based on a True Story About a Play that was Based on a True Story, a reimagining of one of Petri's humorous essays which was selected for a workshop performance at the 2019 Yale Cabaret Satellite Festival, and Secret Identity: A Superqueero Musical, about a group of individuals who by day are openly queer and trans people and by night are vigilante superheroes fighting the capitalist cis-hetero patriachy. His songs have been performed or workshopped with award-winning songwriters including Bobby Lopez & Kristen Anderson Lopez, Lynn Ahrens, Stephen Schwartz, Larry O’Keefe and Nell Benjamin, Suzanne Vega, Marvin Hamlisch, Deidre Murray, and Joshua Schmidt. Sam is also a proud member of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Advanced Workshop.
As a strategist for the cultural sector, Sam is committed to forging for vibrant, sustainable, and impactful arts organizations and arts ecosystems; connecting artists and institutions with audiences and communities; and rethinking the role of traditional arts and culture within modern economic realities, contemporary civic frameworks, and the digital world. He currently works at TDC, a leading management consulting firm for the nonprofit sector, where his practice focuses on arts & culture organizations and funders.
Most recently, he worked as the Associate Director of Marketing and Communications at Yale Repertory Theatre, where he strengthened digital marketing and e-commerce platforms and implemented systems for data analysis and evaluation. Previously, he's developed marketing and communications strategy for the Yale Cabaret and Yale Summer Cabaret, serving as copywriter, content director, and digital & social media manager. As the leader of the Millennials Task Force at Center Theatre Group, he designed programs and strategies to engage diverse audiences and encourage the theater's external communications to reflect its internal values. Sam has also participated in TDF/TBA's Triple Play research into new play marketing, and conducted an independent case study on Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company's Connectivity department and its intersections of community engagement, audience sustainability, and brand development. He has worked in school operations with Uncommon Schools, as a drama and music teaching artist, an arts-education non-profit administrator with LeAP and Wingspan Arts, and an overpriced SAT tutor. Sam holds an MFA in Theater Management from the Yale School of Drama, and MBA from the Yale School of Management, and a BA with honors in Music from Harvard University.
Sam spent his school years participating in youth theater, choir, marching band, and not nearly enough drug-fueled parties or reckless endangerment. At Harvard, Sam composed for various theater pieces and student films, as well the Hasty Pudding Theatricals 160th production; sang with and wrote arrangements for the Harvard Opportunes; and directed, music directed, and performed as a member of the Harvard-Radcliffe Dramatic Club. He has sung, music directed, and arranged for The Current, a contemporary a cappella group.
According to a very awkward conversation with his mother, Sam was conceived in New York City, but was born and raised in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. After time spent calling Brooklyn, NY and New Haven, CT home, Sam currently lives in Boston, Massachusetts.