The Composers

Sam Cardon

Composer, First Freedom

Sam Cardon—the Emmy Award-winning composer for “Good Morning America” and ABC sports—is no stranger to history. His vast body of work includes scores for numerous episodes of “The American Experience”—PBS’s acclaimed series on American history. These include scores for “American Prophet” (featuring Gregory Peck), “Trail of Hope,” and “Sacred Stone” (both featuring Hal Holbrook) and “Sweetwater Rescue.” Beside his work for PBS, Sam composed the theme music for “National Geographic Explorer” and the score the National Geographic’s acclaimed 2002 documentary, “Lewis & Clark: Great Journey West”—featuring Jeff Bridges.

Anyone who has had the pleasure of viewing history on the screen of an IMAX Theatre is familiar with Sam’s work: he composed the musical scores for most of the films produced by IMAX, including “Hearst Castle: Building the Dream,” “Zion Canyon: Treasure of the Gods,” “Mysteries of Egypt” (featuring Omar Sharif), and “Shakleton's Antarctic Adventure” (featuring Kevin Spacey).

Sam’s work has also been a part of history: he composed three hours of music for the 1988 Winter Olympic Games in Calgary, and he composed the score for the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games.

As a critically acclaimed jazz pianist and composer, Sam has worked with some of greats from the history of American popular music, including Gladys Knight.

Sam’s most current work includes the score for the 2009 theatrical release, “The Velveteen Rabbi,t” starring Tom Skarrit and Academy-Award winning actress, Ellen Burstyn.

Despite more than two decades of work on award-winning historical films and features, Sam was apprehensive when first approached with the possibility of composing the score for “First Freedom.” Once he read the script, however, Sam praised it as that rare literary work that makes history “sexy.”

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I was probably like a lot of people hearing for the first time about a new patriotic play—and we’ve all seen really bad ones—so my enthusiasm wasn’t sky high, shall we say. It just seemed like it had the potential for being another ‘snooze fest.’ I’ve seen many like that, and didn’t have a great deal of enthusiasm to be involved—until I saw the script. The script was such a literary, clever, brilliant piece of work that it was very obvious very quickly that it was something I wanted to be involved in…">—Sam Cardon

…The story of Madison has a classic dramatic structure: it’s the story of an underdog who rises against all challenges and is victorious. We all love seeing the underdog win, and he certainly does. I think the audience response [to the 2006 workshop production] is a testament to that fact; I think that people very much enjoyed themselves. I’ve had many people come talk to me who shared their enthusiasm for what happened and who were very much excited to see this [show] launched in a bigger venue—as we are.”—">—Sam Cardon

Rick Rea

Assistant Composer/Vocal Arranger, First Freedom

Rick was born in Gilroy California, and raised in American Fork, Utah from the age of 6. From age 4 he studied piano, and began writing songs shortly thereafter. In his junior high and high school years, he stepped away from the piano to play the acoustic and electric basses in both classical and jazz ensembles, including the Crescent Super Band. Also at this time, he started acting on stage in musicals in plays and developed a passion for musical theatre. He finally came back to the piano in high school as an accompanist for his musical theatre classes, and found that his newfound passion for theater fused with his musical abilities. In 2005, he began his schooling at Western Wyoming college as a musical theater major, both acting and music directing productions. In Fall 2006, the production of his first musical theatre writing collaberation was produced: "First Freedom." He served as assistant composer and vocal arranger to Emmy-award winning composer Sam Cardon and NY-based award winning playwright/lyricist Rob. Lauer. In Feb. 2007, he wrote the full musical score and additional lyrics for a new version of the musical "Little Women" (working title: "My Jo") with lyrics and book by Rob. Lauer. The production had an extremely positive response. Rick and Robs next musical endeavor, Geeks and Gangsters, is about the two unlikely creators of what is perhaps the country's greatest pop-culture icon—Superman. The production was produced and directed by Rob. at Western Wyoming College in March 2007.