Musicals in the Early 20th Century
In the early 20th century, this New York-based group of publishers and songwriters was central to the distribution of popular musical theater songs as sheet music.
What is Tin Pan Alley?
This Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, their first collaboration, premiered in 1943 and featured a record-breaking Broadway run of over two thousand performances.
What is Oklahoma!?
This song confronts racism head-on and was almost not included in the South Pacific.
What is "You've Got to Be Carefully Taught"?
In West Side Story, this gang represents recent immigrants from Puerto Rico.
Who are the Sharks?
This 1964 musical by Jerry Bock is set in a Russian Jewish village and draws heavily on Jewish musical traditions.
What is Fiddler on the Roof?
This technological advancement, along with radio, greatly expanded audiences for popular songs and musical theater in the early 1900s.
What is recording technology?
Set in the Oklahoma territory around 1900, Oklahoma! appealed to Americans during this global conflict and its immediate aftermath.
What is World War II?
Despite its progressive message about racism, South Pacific was criticized for using these makeup practices to depict non-white characters.
What are yellowface and brownface?
Leonard Bernstein became an overnight sensation in 1944 when he stepped in to conduct this prestigious orchestra at the last minute.
What is the New York Philharmonic?
This groundbreaking 1967 musical by Galt MacDermot portrays urban hippie life and features rock, Motown, acid rock, and folk styles.
What is Hair?
These types of musical included new popular songs and flashy dance scenes only loosely connected to a plot.
What are backstage musicals?
The fifteen-minute "dream ballet" in Oklahoma! was choreographed by this groundbreaking artist.
Who is Agnes de Mille?
This comedic musical number in South Pacific features a white man in a grass skirt and coconut bra, reinforcing racial stereotypes for laughs.
What is "Honey Bun"?
Bernstein was heavily influenced by this earlier duo, whose integrated musical style ensured that every song advanced the plot.
Who are Rodgers and Hammerstein?
Along with traditional Broadway sounds, acid rock, and folk music, Hair incorporated this African American musical style that was popular in the 1960s.
What is Motown?
This type of musical was developed in the late 1920s and is characterized by the way that all of its musical and dance numbers directly further the plot.
What are integrated musicals?
Like Show Boat before it, Oklahoma! helped shape this style of musical theater where songs and dances support the story’s drama.
What is the integrated musical?
This Vietnamese character in South Pacific is portrayed as a profiteer and is considered a one-dimensional stereotype.
Who is Bloody Mary?
In the song “Cool,” Bernstein mixes jazz styles like cool jazz and bebop with this much older compositional technique using all twelve tones.
What is fugue?
Broadway musicals of the 1960s diversified in subject and sound, a trend that continues even today. We saw a recent example of this diversification in a Lin-Manuel Miranda musical featured at the start of class.
What is Hamilton?
This musical is one of the first to exemplify the concept of the integrated musical. The plot deals with the economic and social oppression of African Americans and also comments on the hostility toward interracial marriage.
What is Show Boat?
In Oklahoma!, this female character’s dream ballet reveals her emotional struggle between two men, Curly and Jud.
Who is Laurey?
This character, the daughter of Bloody Mary, is criticized as a romanticized and overly sexualized portrayal of Asian women.
Who is Liat?
This famous play is the inspiration for Bernstein's West Side Story.
What is Romeo and Juliet?
What is a rock band?