Musicals a world full of music


Musical theatre overview

Musical theatre is a form of theatreis a good example). While an opera singer is
combining music, songs, spoken dialogue andprimarily a singer and only secondarily an
dance. The emotional content of the pieceactor, a musical theatre singer is usually an
– humor, pathos, love, anger –actor first, who can at least hold a tune and
as well as the story itself, is communicated"put over" a song, but is often not a
through the words, music, movement andprofessional singer as such. Composers of
technical aspects of the entertainment as anmusic for musicals often have to take the
integrated  whole.limitations of such performers into account,
and theatres staging musicals generally use
Musical theatre works, usually referred to asamplification of the actors' singing voices
"musicals", are performed around the world.in a way that would normally be disapproved
They may be presented in large venues, suchof  in  an  operatic  context.
as big budget West End and Broadway theatre
productions in London and New York City, orIn isolation, at least, none of these
in smaller Off-Broadway or regionalfeatures is truly "defining", and in practice
productions, on tour, or by amateur groups init is often difficult to distinguish among
schools, theatres and other performancethe various kinds of light musical theatre,
spaces. In addition to Britain and the U.S.,including "operetta", "comic opera", "light
there are vibrant musical theatre scenes inopera", "musical play", "musical comedy",
Germany, Austria, France, Canada, Japan,"burlesque", "travesty", and even "revue".
Eastern  Europe, Australia, and other places.Some works (e.g. by Leonard Bernstein and
Stephen Sondheim) have received both "musical
Some famous musicals include Oklahoma!, Thetheatre" and "operatic" treatment. Similarly,
Sound of Music, West Side Story, Lessome older operettas or light operas have had
Misérables, Cats, The Phantom of themodern productions or adaptations that
Opera,  Rent,  and  The  Producers.treated them very much as musicals. Sondheim
said, "I really think that when something
The three main components of a musical areplays Broadway it's a musical, and when it
the music, the lyrics, and the book. The bookplays in an opera house it's opera. That's
of a musical refers to the "play" or story ofit. It's the terrain, the countryside, the
the show - in effect its spoken (not sung)expectations of the audience that make it one
lines; however, "book" can also refer to thething or another." This article primarily
dialogue and lyrics together, which areconcerns musical theatre works that are
sometimes referred to (as in opera) as thedistinctively "non-operatic", but there
libretto (Italian for “littleinescapably remains some overlap between
book”). The music and lyrics togetherlighter operatic forms and the more musically
form the score of the musical. Thecomplex or ambitious musicals: a grey area,
interpretation of the musical by the creativein which production values are almost as
team heavily influences the way that theimportant as actual musical or dramatic
musical is presented. The creative teamcontent in defining into which artform the
includes a director, a musical director andpiece  falls.
usually a choreographer. A musical's
production is also creatively characterizedAs with a well-crafted operetta or opera, a
by technical aspects, such as set, costumes,"book" musical's moments of greatest dramatic
stage properties, lighting, etc. thatintensity are often performed in song.
generally change from production toProverbially, "when the emotion becomes too
production (although some famous productionstrong for speech (or recitative) you sing;
aspects tend to be retained from the originalwhen it becomes too strong for song, you
production, for example, Bob Fosse'sdance." A song is (ideally at any rate)
choregraphy  in  Chicago).crafted to suit the character (or characters)
and their situation within the story;
There is no fixed length for a musical, andalthough there have been times in the history
it can range from a short one-actof the musical (e.g. the 1920s) when this
entertainment to several acts and severalintegration between music and story has been
hours in length (or even a multi-eveningvery  tenuous.
presentation); however, most musicals range
from one and a half hours to three hours.A show very often opens with a song that sets
Musicals today are typically presented in twothe tone of the musical, introduces some or
acts, with one intermission ten to 20 minutesall of the major characters, and shows the
in length. The first act is almost alwayssetting of the play. Within the compressed
somewhat longer than the second act, andnature of the musical, the writers must
generally introduces most of the music. Adevelop the characters and the plot. Music
musical may be built around 4-6 main themeprovides a means to express emotion. However,
tunes that are reprised throughout the show,typically, many fewer words are sung in a
or consist of a series of songs not directlyfive-minute song than are spoken in a
musically related. Spoken dialogue isfive-minute block of dialogue. Therefore
generally interspersed between musicalthere is less time to develop drama than in a
numbers, although the use of "sung dialogue"straight play of equivalent length, since a
or recitative is not unknown, especially inmusical usually devotes more time to music
so-called  "sung-through"  musicals.than  to  dialogue.
Musical theatre is closely related to anotherMany familiar musical theatre works have been
theatrical performance art, opera. Thesethe basis for popular musical films, such as
forms are usually distinguished by weighing aThe Sound of Music, West Side Story, and My
number of factors. Musicals generally have aFair Lady (although some movie musicals have
greater focus on spoken dialogue (though somebeen disappointing, as compared to the stage
musicals are entirely accompanied and sungworks) or were adapted or even written for
through, such as Jesus Christ Superstar andtelevision presentations (for example Rodgers
Les Misérables; and on the other hand someand Hammerstein's Cinderella). Recently, some
operas, such as Die Zauberflöte, and mostpopular television programs have set an
operettas, have some unaccompanied dialogue),episode in the style of a musical. There has
on dancing (particularly by the principalalso been a recent revival of the movie
performers as well as the chorus), on the usemusical, such as Chicago. Similarly, India
of various genres of popular music (or atproduces numerous musical films, referred to
least popular singing styles), and on theas "Bollywood" musicals, and Japan produces a
avoidance of certain operatic conventions. Inconsiderable number of Anime stage musicals.
particular, a musical is almost neverConversely, there has been a trend in recent
performed in any but the language of itsdecades to adapt musicals from the screen to
audience. Musicals produced in London or Newthe stage, both from popular animated film
York, for instance, are invariably sung inmusicals, such as Beauty and the Beast) and
English, even if they were originally writtenlive-action films, such as The Producers and
in another language (again, LesThe Color Purple.
Misérables, originally written in French,



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