Drama Desks Reinstate Orchestration Award

Following an overwhelmingly less-than-friendly response to omitting the “Outstanding Orchestrations” category from their 2011-2012 nominations, the Drama Desk Executive Board has reversed its controversial decision, announcing the nominees for that award on Monday afternoon.

The nominations for “Outstanding Orchestrations” are as follows:

Bill Elliott, “Nice Work If You Can Get It”
Larry Hochman, “Death Takes a Holiday”
Martin Lowe, “Once”
John McDaniel, “Bonnie & Clyde”
Michael Starobin, “Queen of the Mist”
Danny Troob, “Newsies The Musical”

The initial decision to exclude the Orchestrations category this year met with a healthy amount of protest, Back Stage reported on Monday morning. The petition to reinstate the category racked up more than 3,000 signatures, while Drama Desk and Tony Award-winner Jason Robert Brown’s blog calling for this year’s nominated composers to boycott the award ceremony made the interweb rounds.

Commenting on the reversal, Drama Desk President Isa Goldberg stated:

“The Drama Desk prides itself on celebrating New York’s rich theatrical community. Our Executive Board appreciates the forthright and passionate response to our nominations announcement and have taken your comments to heart. The Executive Board is very happy to reinstate the Outstanding Orchestrations category and honor the dedication and hard work of this season’s talented orchestrators.”

The 57th Annual Drama Desk Awards will take place on Sunday, June 3 at 8 p.m. at The Town Hall in New York. As of 4:20 p.m. today, the Drama Desk website had not been updated with the revised list, but you can check out the original list of nominations here.