{"id":9131,"date":"2021-07-27T07:57:01","date_gmt":"2021-07-27T11:57:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=9131"},"modified":"2021-08-12T07:38:34","modified_gmt":"2021-08-12T11:38:34","slug":"singing-in-the-theater","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=9131","title":{"rendered":"Singing in the Theater"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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A new class under way at Washington DC\u2019s Theatre J is on what to listen for in the songs of musical theater. It\u2019s being taught by Felicia Curry, who in August will appear in Nina Simone: Four Women<\/em> for The Berkshire Theatre Group<\/a> (Stockbridge, Massachusetts). Curry is a Helen Hayes Award winner (and nine-time nominee). Each week she\u2019s guiding my zoommates and me through the deconstruction of a single song\u2014reading the lyrics and hearing the music both without vocals and with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A number of years ago, I saw the Tony-award winning Yasmina Reza play Art <\/em>at Papermill Playhouse. Bear in mind that Art<\/em> ran for 600 performances on Broadway and for eight years in London. So, a significant work, but maybe a stretch for Papermill\u2019s bill, which at that time, anyway, tended toward lighter fare. At intermission, I overheard the woman sitting behind me say, \u201cI like it when they sing.\u201d While my first reaction was a bit of an eye-roll, I thought, \u201cWait a minute. I<\/em> like it when they sing too.\u201d We all do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So how are we to think about the choices that make musical theater such a delight? There are choices about the lyrics, of course, the mood they establish and the literal (and figurative) meaning of the words. Are the songs integrated with the story\u2019s action or just pasted in? You may wonder like I do how a song written for one musical can be lifted out and plopped into another story altogether. Then, the music. Is it in sync with the words\u2014not rhythmically, but in tone? Add to that the choices the singer\/actor makes, with the director\u2019s oversight. Is the performer owning the meaning or just getting the tune right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For our first class, Curry picked a truly meaty song\u2014Stephen Sondheim\u2019s \u201cChildren Will Listen\u201d from Into the Woods <\/em>(lyrics here<\/a>). You may recall the hit Barbra Streisand<\/a> had with this. Streisand really belted it out in a couple of places, but to me, the song is so full of actual and potential regret, it suggests a more wistful touch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A couple of my favorite lines were \u201cWishes come true not free.\u201d If you get your wish, there\u2019s a cost. And \u201cHow can you say to a child who\u2019s in flight, \u2018don\u2019t slip away and I won\u2019t hold so tight?\u2019\u201d As parents, haven\u2019t most of us felt the almost irresistible desire to hold on? It was a brilliant song to put in a play about fairy tales, because reading fairy tales aloud to children is (was?) such a universal of childhood. And they carry some pretty grim (Grimm) messages. The context is ideal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oddly, the song stumbled into its placement in the show\u2019s Finale. Initially, it was a section of a long song near the end of Act I, which ultimately was cut, but the \u201cChildren Will Listen\u201d portion was salvaged and molded into its familiar form. Theatre J<\/a> continues to offer interesting and intimate classes for theater lovers. Hope to see you there!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new class under way at Washington DC\u2019s Theatre J is on what to listen for in the songs of musical theater. It\u2019s being taught by Felicia Curry, who in August will appear in Nina Simone: Four Women for The … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Singing in the Theater - choices made in presenting the songs of a musical. ","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[269,61,207,104,147],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-actor","category-character","category-music","category-the-morgue","category-theater"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2nh","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9131"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9131\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9133,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9131\/revisions\/9133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}