In Broadway Musicals you get the stories and the music—in expertly played examples, rare recordings of groundbreaking artists, and recorded interviews that take you behind the scenes of some of Broadway's biggest hits and most memorable moments.
Great American Music: Broadway Musicals
Take a journey through Broadway’s past with this fun and interesting course that explores a critical part of our nation’s musical heritage.
Overview
About
Professor Bill Messenger studied musical composition, on scholarship, at The Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University under Louis Cheslock. He attended a master’s class in 1963 with Nadia Boulanger, the teacher of Roy Harris, Virgil Thompson, and Aaron Copland. Professor Messenger has two master’s degrees, both from Johns Hopkins University. He has done additional graduate work in musicology at the University of Maryland.
Professor Messenger has taught composition, music history, and music theory at Goucher College in Baltimore and a number of community colleges. He regularly lectures on American music at The Peabody Institute and Towson State University Elderhostels.
Professor Messenger is the author of several books, including The Power of Music: A Complete Music Activities Program for Older Adults, which has been called "a landmark in music activities."
His musical career includes studio work on many early rock 'n' roll recordings. He has accompanied many nationally known performers during his years in the music business, including Lou Rawls and Cass Elliot, and he worked as an opener for Bill Haley and the Comets. He was also a pianist with the acrobatic rock'n'roll group, The Rockin’ Maniacs. As a jazz pianist, he has played in ragtime ensembles, swing bands, Dixieland bands, and modern jazz groups. In 1983 he was voted Baltimore’s best piano player by Baltimore magazine.
01: The Essence of the Musical
This lecture previews the topics of the course, then introduces the essentials of musical theater: the songs, the libretto, song placement within the show, the opening, dance, and special effects.
47 min
02: The Minstrel Era (1828–900)
Although its existence is embarrassing to us today, the minstrel show is also the ultimate source of all truly American music. This lecture looks at the structure of the minstrel show, its features, and some of its greatest performers, songwriters, and promoters, as well as the business side of minstrel shows and the legacy of minstrelry.
46 min
03: Evolution of the Verse/Chorus Song
This lecture examines types of songs, their construction, and the evolution of song structure in American musical theater, culminating in today's verse/chorus structure.
46 min
04: The Ragtime Years (1890–1917)
Ragtime's popularity began around the turn of the 20th century as a youthful rebellion against the moribund music of an older generation. It also opened doors for black performers and gave America a rhythmic vocabulary that became a permanent part of the Broadway musical.
45 min
05: The Vaudeville Era (1881–1935)
Before moving pictures learned to talk, vaudeville was America's most important form of entertainment. Fifty-week circuits of entertainment constantly filled 2,000 theaters across the country and served as a never-to-be-seen-again training ground for musicians, dancers, singers, and comedians.
45 min
06: Tin Pan Alley
For more than a century, the music publishing industry and the New York theatrical industry worked in tandem to create the hit songs of the day. During the heyday of this collaboration, the music publishing business in New York City, referred to as Tin Pan Alley, produced song after song of sheet music to be marketed to the millions of middle- and upper-class households that owned pianos.
44 min
07: Broadway in Its Infancy
This lecture examines forms of musical theater in the decades before the advent of the "book musical," beginning with America's first blockbuster, "The Black Crook," a show as far from the concept of a book musical as one could get, and concluding with our first look at an American original, George M. Cohan.
44 min
08: The Revue versus the Book Musical
We take an interlude to examine the idea of the revue, a form that makes no pretense at integrating a show's songs with its plot—though it might be built around a theme and that continues to be a vital part of American musical theater.
44 min
09: Superstars on the Horizon
These years produced songwriters who would eventually become giants of the musical theater. We examine several remarkable shows, along with the early careers of some of its best-known performers and songwriters, including Al Jolson, Cole Porter, and Jerome Kern.
44 min
10: Transition into the Jazz Age (1916–20)
The end of World War I gave an excuse to kick up heels and rebel against the past. From 1916 to 1920, society went through a dramatic breakaway—not only in clothing styles, acceptable public behavior, language, and visual arts, but also in the kind of music Americans created and listened to.
44 min
11: Irving Berlin and Jerome Kern—Contrasts
In this lecture, we learn more about the lives and music of two towering icons. Although their lives and careers make an interesting contrast, they also have one thing in common: They made a lasting impression on American popular music.
45 min
12: George Gershwin’s Legacy (1919–1935)
George Gershwin, by incorporating the musical ideas of blues and jazz into his concert and stage works, became a living symbol of the Jazz Age. With the exception of Jerome Kern, no other theater composer of the 1920s equals Gershwin in importance. This lecture examines his singular contributions, including his most important stage work, "Porgy and Bess," a show that was politically incorrect even in its own time, but remains, nonetheless, a masterpiece.
43 min
13: Rodgers and Hammerstein Era (1940s)
If 1927's "Show Boat" represented the beginnings of modern musical theater, the 1940s saw this art form, the book musical, firmly take root and declare its supremacy for the rest of the century. With "Oklahoma!," "Carousel," and "South Pacific," it was a decade that belonged to Rodgers and Hammerstein.
46 min
14: Golden Age of Musical Theater (1950s)
Rodgers and Hammerstein shared the bountiful 1950s with Lerner and Loewe, Leonard Bernstein, and Frank Loesser. Many observers of the Broadway scene consider this decade—the era of "My Fair Lady," "The King and I," "West Side Story," "The Music Man," and "Guys and Dolls" the golden age of the Broadway musical.
45 min
15: Rock n Roll Reaches Broadway (1960s)
The 1960s on Broadway began with "Bye Bye Birdie" and ended with "Hair," the former a spoof of rock 'n' roll and the latter an homage to it. In between came a number of shows that offered greater variety and introduced trends that would dominate musical theater for the remainder of the 20th century.
45 min
16: Big Bucks and Long Runs (1970s–Present)
This final lecture examines several of the trends that closed the 20th century and ushered in the 21st, including the concept musical; the European influence on the American stage; a continuing interest in darker subject matter; the revival of old film musicals on Broadway; and the return of shows with a lighter touch.
46 min
