Musical Theatre
A Brief History – Part 1
Early Influences
Early Influences - English ballad opera
The Beggar’s Opera – 1728; Flora – 1735
 No historical scenery or costumes
 Spoken play with preexisting popular songs amid dialogue
Musical parody - Late 18th, early 19th century
 Satire of famous story or performer – burlesques
 Pantomime with songs and dances for entertainment and
variety
 1828 – Hamlet
The Beggar’s Opera – 1728
by John Gay & John Christopher Pepusch
Music Clip "Fill Every Glass"
Early Influences - Minstrel Show
 First major contribution to theatre by blacks in America
 Product of black slave culture mingled with white colonial
potpourri
 Dan Emmet, composer “Old Dan Tucker”, “Blue-Tail Fly”,1843,
brought Virginia Minstrels to NY – touring show
 Three part show performed in “blackface”
1- Fantasia - The Walkaround (Cakewalk) singing & dancing
2 - Olio – snappy banter, jokes, solo musical
(banjo, fiddle, tambourine, singing, bone castanets)
3 - Burlesque (parody) – one-act vignette; satire of plays or carefree
life on the plantation
Blackface performer
The Cakewalk
1929 audio recording that follows the classic format of a
minstrel show
“Camptown Races” by Stephen Foster - Al Jolson performing
Early Influences - Minstrel Show
 Ed Christy Minstrel Show – featured
Stephen Foster, composer “My Old
Kentucky Home” – touring show
 Olio grew into variety or vaudeville
show
 Fantasia became Broadway Revue
 Satire became used as themes for
later musicals
Christy Minstrels - 1847
Part 2 – The Olio
Early Influences – New York City
 Shift from rural to city life created a demand for permanent
theatres and pleasure gardens
 1866 – The Black Crook – used theatrical effect and sensual
pleasures to become a theatre extravaganza
 Showed producers and investors that frivolity could substitute
for dramatic and musical substance (as in European opera)
 1874 – Evangeline was first to use an original musical score –
first musical comedy
 1879 – The Brook used a common locale or event to interweave
stories (like a sitcom/serial) – first desire for meaningful story
 Mulligan Shows – 1880’s was a burlesque on the common
people of NY – tales of the ordinary became important
The Black Crook – 1866
First American Acting Troupe Using Women - 1893
Early Influences - Operetta
 1890’s – 1920, European
Operetta was an instant
success as it toured U.S.
 Gilbert & Sullivan’s satirical
operetta was especially
popular
 Gave way to American
imitations (Sousa)
HMS Pinafore “Captain of
the Pinafore” 9:30
Musical Theatre
A Brief History – Part 2
American Influence
American Influences
– 1918-1929
 U.S. was the economic world leader
 U.S. was victorious after WWI
 Optimistic society – an American not European culture
was developing
 Development of American Writers and Performers
 Women and Black performers allowed onstage
 Revues/Follies were dominant form of entertainment
American Songwriters
 Wrote for major music publishing
houses in New York City (“Tin Pan
Alley”) – before the phonograph,
people used to purchase sheet
music to sing around the piano
 The rise of Tin Pan Alley—as music
and institution—depended on the
mass immigration of East
European Jews to New York
beginning in the early 1880s
Tin Pan Alley 1910
Birth of American
Songwriters
 Also the historical shift of America's
black population from South to North
where cultures interacted informally in
neighborhoods, music halls and
businesses created a new American
sound
 Wrote swinging optimistic melodies –
“Take Me Out to the Ballgame”, “In the
Good Old Summertime”, “By the Light
of the Silvery Moon”
Songs of Tin Pan Alley
1911
George M. Cohan
1919
George Gershwin
1911 Irving Berlin
Early Composers
 Victor Herbert – Irish/German - continued American
Operetta style – Babes in Toyland 1903
 George M. Cohan – Little Johnny Jones 1904
 Irving Berlin – Russian/Jewish songwriter
 George Gershwin – American born songwriter
 Rudolf Friml – Austrian - brought European Opera
style – Rose-Marie 1924, The Vagabond King 1925
American Revues – the Follies
 Featured stars of the day and a chorus of beautiful
women in elaborate costumes and scenery such as
in the
(1907-1931) and George
White’s Scandals (1919-1939)
American Musical Comedy
 Showed a picture of contemporary America
 Had a shallow insubstantial look
 Had happy endings
 Music and plot were not integrated - Songs were
recycled and moved from one revue to another
 In 1924, ASCAP (co-founded by Herbert, Cohan,
Berlin, Kern and others) won a long battle to give
American composers creative control over their
stage scores.
Vincent Youmans
1898-1946
 Influenced by popular music; worked as a rehearsal
pianist for many songwriters
 Wrote the most produced musical in the 1920’s “Tea
for Two” and ” I Want to Be Happy” from: