While many have seen finished works of musical theatre, few can say they have seen one in its early stages of creation.

The Penn State School of Theatre and School of Music have joined together to create the first Penn State New Musical Theatre Festival, which will present two new works of musical theatre.

The first work, Timeless, by composer David Cornue and lyricist Sam Holtzapple will be staged at the Pavilion Theatre tonight at 7 and tomorrow night at 5:05.

Matt Toronto (graduate-directing) will be playing the character Daniel in Timeless. Toronto said Daniel is an aging composer that has fallen in love with one of his students, Emma, who is soon to be married and is much too young for him.

"Essentially what is happening is he has a run in with time, which is a character, and basically its Daniel's struggle to battle with time in order to finally tell this girl he loves her," he said.

Each musical had five days of rehearsal for the actors to learn the piece.

Raymond Sage, professor of voice for musical theater and artistic director of Penn State New Musical Theatre Festival said the composer and lyricist worked closely together throughout the creative process to come up with the finished piece.

"I think more than not it's a way for the composer and lyricist with no money or no production from their own pocket to put up their work and to see what kind of legs it actually has," he said. "One of the benefits of the festival and what I personally thought important that it was also a bridge between the academic community and the young student artist and the young professional artist."

Sage said they had works submitted from all over the country, but Timeless and The Alchemists were selected by a committee, giving these composers and lyricists exposure and a chance to see how the public perceives their works.

"I think [Timeless] is a really unique work and what I find most fascinating about it is how the composer lyricist is working with the director and even the cast and coming up with a product," said Sage.

Rob Schneider (graduate-directing), director of Timeless said although he has directed many times before, actually having the writers present in the room has made this experience one of his most fulfilling.

"We can ask why did you write this, what does this mean, and even being so brave and daring and be like this doesn't not work, why don't we try A B and C?" he said. "And it's really exciting because you know in future years the show will have a life of its own, and you can say wow that's funny that was my idea, or I was in the room the first time they wrote that song."