OKLAHOMA! at St. Francis Auditorium at NM Museum of Art

A legend from the time it opened on Broadway in 1945, OKLAHOMA! Is set in 1906 in farm country outside Claremore in what was then Indian Territory.  Farm girl Laurey Williams is being courted by two rivals – cowboy Curley McLain and the sinister farmhand Jud Fry, with a secondary love story between cowboy Will Parker and his flirtatious fiancée, Ado Annie.  The first true "book musical," it was also Rodgers & Hammerstein's first musical partnership, although each had written with other talents with great success.  It was recognized from the start as a watershed event in which song, story, dance, and setting brought the story to moving excellence. Their collaboration (music by Richard Rodgers, book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II) would light up Broadway for the next 25 years with a legendary list of great American musicals.  Truly, the "Hamilton" of its day and still considered the greatest of all Rodgers & Hammerstein musicals.