Broadway Musicals
stoic, you have a huge treasury of music to explore. Don't limit yourself to the last ten or fifteen years. Check out some of these.
*George and Ira Gershwin. Many of the shows they wrote songs for are forgettable but the songs aren't. Songs like "The Man I Love" and "Someone to Watch over Me."
Their magnum opus was surely "Porgy and Bess" which was written as an opera but is usually performed nowadays as a musical. George also wrote "Rhapsody in Blue" and an "America in Paris." He even wrote a great piano concerto.
Check out the film " Funny Face" with Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire.
Tragically he died at the age of 38.
*Jerome Kern. Again, many of the shows he contributed to are best forgotten. "Showboat," however, is one of the classics of the American theater. It had not only great music but dealt with interracial marriage long before the civil rights era. This was in1927!
His songs were nominate 7 times for Oscars and won twice.
*Cole Porter. The wittiest man to come from Peru, Indiana. Yet again, many of the shows he wrote for have died. Let them rest in peace. A few, however, are worth noting. "Can Can", "Silk Stockings", "High Society" and, especially "Kiss Me Kate." All of these have been filmed.
There have been two movie biographies. One with Cary Grant which blithely ignored the fact that Porter was gay. "De-Lovely" with Kevin Kline was a dreary film but had a scene with gay overtones where Porter (Kline) teaches John Barrowman to sing "Night and Day." You can find the scene on You Tube.
*Richard Rodgers. Wrote hundreds of songs for over 40 shows, first with Larry Hart and later with Oscar Hammerstein.
Larry Hart was every bit as sophisticated and witty as Cole Porter. Sadly, he was a man tortured by the inability to accept his own gay sexual orientation. He suffered from alcoholism and depression which seems to have lead to his death from pneumonia at the age of 48.
Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote several of the greatest musicals ever, including "Oklahoma" and "South Pacific."
*Leonard Bernstein. Don't stop at "West Side Story." Check out "On the Town" and "Wonderful Town" as well. He also played for our team, whether as gay or bi, who knows?
*Stephen Sondheim. The master. Witty and urbane. Openly gay. Has written lyrics or music and lyrics for a wide variety of musicals, chamber operas, plays and films. He wrote the movie "The Last of Sheila" with Anthony Perkins. His only film appearance, as far as I know, was a cameo as himself in a pleasant little film (with a gay storyline) from 2003 called "Camp"
If you need more pointers, I'm sure I can come up with a few. Sorry if this comes off like the first class in a college course called Musical Theater 101. College is the only place I know where you can be two months behind after the first day of class
I guess music taste changes over time :rofl:
entary.
