Musical theater

Musical theater (or theatre) is a form of theatre combining music, songs, dance, and spoken dialogue. It is closely related to opera, frequently being distinguished by the use of popular music of various forms (and thus usually different instrumentation), the use of unaccompanied dialogue (though some musicals are entirely accompanied, such as Les Misérables, and some operas have spoken dialogue, such as Carmen), and the avoidance of many operatic conventions.

Related Topics:
Theatre - Music - Songs - Dance - Dialogue - Opera - Popular music - Les Misérables - Carmen

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The musical components of a musical are generally referred to as the score, with sung lines considered the lyrics and the spoken lines the book, or occasionally the libretto (a term also frequently applied to text of an opera, it incorporates the words of both dialogue and lyric).

Related Topics:
Score - Lyrics - Book - Libretto - Opera

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Many familiar musical theater works have been the basis for successful musical films, or were adapted for television presentations. While some popular television programs have set one single episode in the style of a musical as a play on their usual format (examples include episodes of Ally McBeal, Buffy the Vampire Slayer's episode "Once More with Feeling", or Oz's "Variety"), or have suddenly begun singing and dancing in a musical-like style during an episode (several episodes of The Simpsons), the television series Cop Rock, which extensively used the musical format, was not a success.

Related Topics:
Musical films - Television - Ally McBeal - Buffy the Vampire Slayer's - Oz's - The Simpsons - Cop Rock

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While musical theater works are performed around the world, they are perhaps most frequently produced on Broadway in New York and in the West End in London.

Related Topics:
Broadway - New York - West End - London

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A musical can be anywhere from a few minutes to several hours; however, most musicals are two hours to two hours and forty-five minutes; musicals today are typically presented with one intermission ten to fifteen minutes in length. A musical will usually have around twenty to thirty songs of varying lengths (including reprises and underscoring) interspersed with book (dialogue) scenes. Some musicals, however, are "sung-through" and do not have any spoken dialogue. This can blur the line between musical theatre and opera.

Related Topics:
Reprise - Underscoring

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Under the same (umbrella term) of music theater has to be understood also contemporary ("hig art") music theater which has developed intensly after WWII in Europe. Ligeti, Kagel are initiators of a theatrical musical form that is undestood either as an off-opera or anti-opera movement in the 60s and 70s, later on to be produced either by studio-stages or small state operas or in the off-scene. Other, more recent important names are H Goebbels, G Battistelli, G Aperghis among many others. The tendency of european (and non european!) composers to have rediscovered opera as a main compositional field lead to operas or music theatres with a very wide field of experimental character.

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A musical's moments of greatest dramatic intensity are often performed in song. Proverbially, "when the emotion becomes too strong for speech, you sing; when it becomes too strong for song, you dance." A song must be crafted to suit the character (or characters) and their situation within the story. A show usually opens with a song that sets the tone of the musical, introduces some or all of the major characters, and shows the setting of the play. Within the compressed nature of the musical, the writers must develop the characters and the plot.

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Music provides an excellent way to express emotion. However, on average, fewer words are sung in a five-minute song than are spoken in a five-minute block of dialogue. Therefore there is less time to develop drama than in a straight play of equivalent length, since a musical may have an hour and a half or more of music in it.

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