Musical Theatre Script and Song Analysis Through the Ages

How many times have you experienced a musical that was fabulous or just didn't work at all but you had no idea how to communicate why? How do you differentiate between a flaw in the performance portrayal of a character to a structural flaw in the musical itself? How do you analyse musical theatre songs that are so subjective in its very nature? Is there even a common link of analysis between musicals from the Golden Age and musicals from the present day?<br/> <br/><i>Musical Theatre Script and Song Analysis Through the Ages</i><i></i>answers these questions and gives students of musical theatre the tools they need to understand and articulate how musicals work.<br/> <br/>At the heart of any musical lie its music and lyrics yet it is this area that is least understood. This book offers a brand new terminology of analysis that gets to the core of what holds a musical together: the libretto music and lyrics. Through identifying methods of lyric and musical analysis and applying these to ten different musicals throughout history students are able to ask questions such as: <i>why</i>does this song sound this way?; <i>what</i>is this<i></i>lyric doing to identify character purpose?; and <i>how</i> is a character communicating this feeling to an audience?<br/><br/>From classroom analysis through to practical application this text guides readers through a structured approach to understanding disseminating and more importantly articulating how a musical works. A perfect tool for students of musical theatre its practical benefits of understanding the form and realizing that it can be applied to any age musical will benefit any theatre person<i></i>in helping articulate all of those abstract feelings that are inherent in this art form. It offers a roadmap to the musical's innermost DNA.