Download The musical or musical theatre

The musical or musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken
dialogue, acting, and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical are
communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the
entertainment as an integrated whole. Although musical theatre overlaps with other
theatrical forms like opera and dance, it may be distinguished by the equal
importance given to the music as compared with the dialogue, movement and other
elements. Since the early 20th century, musical theatre stage works have generally
been called, simply, musicals.
Although music has been a part of dramatic presentations since ancient times,
modern Western musical theatre emerged during the 19th century, with many
structural elements established by the works of Gilbert and Sullivan in Britain and
those of Harrigan and Hart in America. These were followed by the numerous
Edwardian musical comedies and the musical theatre works of American creators
like George M. Cohan.
Some of the most famous and iconic musicals through the decades include Show
Boat (1927), Of Thee I Sing (1931), Oklahoma! (1943), West Side Story, (1957), The
Fantasticks (1960), Hair (1967), A Chorus Line (1975), Les Misérables (1985), The
Phantom of the Opera (1986), Rent (1996), The Producers (2001) and Wicked
(2003).
Musicals are performed around the world. They may be presented in large venues,
such as big-budget Broadway or West End productions in New York City or London.
Alternatively, musicals may be staged in smaller fringe theatre, Off-Broadway or
regional theatre productions, or on tour. Musicals are often presented by amateur
and school groups in churches, schools and other performance spaces. In addition to
the United States and Britain, there are vibrant musical theatre scenes in continental
Europe, Asia, Australasia, Canada and Latin America.
Questions
1. What distinguishes the musical from other theatrical forms?
2. When did modern musical theatre emerge?
3. Name 5 musicals
4. Where are musicals performed?
Popular
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rz8P2eNb0r0
Was the texture of this piece monophonic or homophonic?
For Good
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEnQY_66GZc
What type of texture is used in part of this piece that is different from the last?
The Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the
experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The
performers may communicate this experience to the audience through
combinations of gesture, speech, song, music, and dance. Modern Western theatre is
heavily influenced from ancient Greek drama, from which it borrows technical
terminology, classification into genres, and many of its themes, stock characters, and
plot elements. Theatre today, broadly defined, includes performances of plays and
musicals, ballets, operas and various other forms.
The theater played a major role in the growth of popular music. American popular
music can be located in the thriving New York theatrical scene in the decades
around 1900. Then, as now, the New York City theater district was located at, and
known as, Broadway.
Broadway
Broadway is a road in the U.S. state of New York. Perhaps best known for the
portion that runs through the borough of Manhattan in New York City. Broadway is
known widely as the heart of the American theatre industry.
Broadway theatre commonly known as Broadway, is a term used to describe
theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500
or more seats located in the Theater District and Lincoln Center along Broadway, in
the New York City borough of Manhattan. Along with London's West End theatres,
Broadway theatres are widely considered to represent the highest level of
commercial theatre in the English-speaking world.
The first theatre piece that conforms to the modern conception of a musical, adding
dance and original music that helped to tell the story, is considered, arguably to be
The Black Crook, which premiered in New York on September 12, 1866.
Questions
1. What is modern theatre influenced by?
2. Theatre helped what kind of music grow?
3. What is Broadway?
4. What is the equivalent (similar to) of Broadway in England?
5. What is said to be the first modern musical?
Operetta
Broadway was first of all home of operetta, a very popular European genre of light
opera in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Operettas employ spoken
dialogue between the musical numbers—light, attractive tunes and plenty of dances.
Their plots are amusing and farfetched. Operettas are usually shorter and are
considered less serious than operas.
Musical Comedy
It was around 1910 that the American popular theater picked up its characteristic
accent. It was a musical accent, and it came from jazz. Although Broadway did not
employ actual jazz, it used jazz syncopation and swing. As projected by theater
bands and carried over into popular songs, this jazz accent contributed more than
anything else to the appeal of the musical. The rise of the musical in the 1920s and
1930s was closely tied to the great outpouring of popular songs in this era. The theater
provided songwriters with an extra fee and gave songs invaluable exposure. Theater
songs were popularized by the very successful movie musicals of the 1930s as well as by
radio and 78-rpm recordings. Two principal composers of early American musical
comedy were Jerome Kern and George Gershwin.
Opera vs the musical
A musical is a play where both spoken dialogue and singing/songs are used to
further the story along. Traditionally, most musicals are comical, though there are
many that have serious themes. Musicals are a much newer idea than opera, and are
generally much more light-hearted and humorous.
Opera, however, uses nothing but singing to convey the story. The script is flowing
and poetic, just as lyrics to a song. In an opera any dialogue that would normally be
spoken by one character at a time is sung. Today there are many operas written in
English and many great operas have been translated to English to widen the
prospective audiences. However, the beginnings of opera date back to the ancient
Greeks, and the beginnings of modern opera happened in Europe before English was
prominent, so most great operas are traditionally in foreign languages. Operas are
usually very dramatic and, while offering bits of comic relief, have rather serious
story lines.
Questions
1. What is the difference between operettas and operas?
2. From which music did musical theatre get its characteristic accent?
3. How were theatre songs popularized?
4. Name one way in which the musical differs from opera
Rigoletto
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8A3zetSuYRg
Operetta
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDRLxm5iwI8