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Broadway Bookshelf

Biographies, show books, musical scores, history, and must-read theatre books.

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Latest Broadway Books

Man of LA Mancha (Vocal Score)

(1965)

Includes 21 songs: Abduction Aldonza La Mancha Barber's Song The Combat Dubbing Dulcinea Golden Helmet of Mambrino I Really Like Him I, Don Quixote I'm Only Thinking of Him The Impossible Dream (The Quest) It's All the Same Knight of Mirrors Knight of Woeful Count Little Bird Little Bird A Little Gossip Moorish Dance Overture To Each His Dulcinea We're Only Thinking of Him What Does He Want of Me.

Man of LA Mancha (Vocal Score) Cover

Carousel: Vocal Score

(1987)

This exciting revised edition was created to convey in complete and correct form the musical score and lyrics of this beloved Rodgers and Hammerstein musical as performed in the original Broadway production. Includes: Ballet * Blow High, Blow Low * Geraniums in the Winder/Stonecutters Cut It on Stone * The Highest Judge of All * Hornpipe * If I Loved You * June Is Bustin' Out All Over * Mister Snow * Prologue (The Carousel Waltz) * A Real Nice Clambake * Soliloquy * What's the Use of Wond'rin' *...

Carousel: Vocal Score Cover

American Song: The Complete Musical Theater Companion, 1900-1984. Two volumes

(1985)

These companion volumes to Bloom's important American Song: The Complete Musical Theatre Companion (LJ 7/96) and Hollywood Song: The Complete Film and Musical Companion (LJ 3/15/95) focus on popular songs from the early 1890s to 2000, defining "Tin Pan Alley" broadly to incorporate tunes ranging from George M. Cohan's patriotic gems to "easy listening" (e.g., Henry Mancini, Burt Bacharach). Rock, country, folk, and other genres are not treated here. Although these works are presented as Volumes ...

American Song: The Complete Musical Theater Companion, 1900-1984. Two volumes Cover

A Connecticut Yankee: The Musical

(1984)

A Musical based on the novel by Mark Twain. Includes: * Can't You Do a Friend a Favor * I Blush * I Feel at Home with You * Thou Swell * You Always Love the Same Girl and others.

A Connecticut Yankee: The Musical Cover

Performing in Musicals

(1988)

Here is a basic acting textbook written especially for singers, actors, and dancers who want to work in musical theater but have little or no experience in the area. 'Performing in Musicals' provides novice performers with the information they need to audition, prepare a role, rehearse, and play the part. Taking a practical, systematic approach, Elaine Novak discusses virtually every aspect of musical theater: its history and development, basic elements (book, lyrics, score, and dances), pr...

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British Musical Theatre: 2 Volumes Volume 1: 1865-1914 Volume 2: 1915-1984

(1987)

From the pre-Gilbert and Sullivan 1860s to the 1980s, this important reference surveys more than a century of British light musical theatre, including its writers and composers. Gänzl provides a wealth of information on the book, lyrics, and music of over 800 London musicals, including contemporary reviews, cast lists, performances, plus pertinent notes gleaned from a study of surviving scores and libretti. Volume 1 traces the development of the genre between 1865 and 1914, describing its roots...

British Musical Theatre: 2 Volumes Volume 1: 1865-1914 Volume 2: 1915-1984 Cover

Broadway's Prize-Winning Musicals: An Annotated Guide for Libraries and Audio Collectors

(1993)

Broadway’s Prize-Winning Musicals is an indispensable guide for collectors of audio recordings of Broadway’s award-winning musicals. It presents, for the first time in one volume, shows that were recipients of Tony Awards, New York Drama Critics Circle Awards, Pulitzer Prizes, or Grammy Awards. Also featured are the recordings of shows selected on the more subjective basis of listening enjoyment or budgetary considerations. This comprehensive approach helps librarians and fans compile a well...

Broadway's Prize-Winning Musicals: An Annotated Guide for Libraries and Audio Collect Cover

Love & Science

(1993)

Richard Foreman founded the Ontological-Hysteric theatre in 1968. The theatre is currently in the historic St. Marks Church, where he rehearses and produced one of his new plays each year, each play performing for 16 weeks every winter.

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Musical Openings: Using Music in the Language Classroom

(1992)

This book explores the ways in which instrumental music can be introduced in the language classroom and the effects of using music to inspire student enthusiasm and creativity. It is aimed at teachers who love music, whatever their knowledge of experience of it, and demonstrates with step-by-step activities how the power of music can be exploited in a learning environment. The book draws on diverse musical sources and cultures and is accompanied by a cassette of musical excerpts linked to variou...

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Musical Notes: A Practical Guide to Staffing and Staging Standards of the American Musical Theater

(1986)

“The entries in this `Guide' are arranged alphabetically, providing information on authorship and original production, a substantial synopsis of the story-line, notes on the production of the show (which include Tony Awards, ideas on technical and costume requirements, possible pitfalls, and budget suggestions), a list of songs of special interest, and details of instrumentation. A supplementary section on `Concept, Rock, Nostalgia and Others' differs from the main body of entries in providin...

Musical Notes: A Practical Guide to Staffing and Staging Standards of the American Mu Cover

More Broadway Musicals: Since 1980

(1991)

In the decade since Abrams published the bestsellingBroadway Musicals, some of Broadway's biggest all-time hits have appeared--Cats, 42nd Street, Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables--and set new standards, begun new trends, and entranced new audiences. More Broadway Musicals presents the stories behind the major productions in this fascinating volume sure to delight those who have seen the shows, as well we those who know them only through recordings. 200 illustrations, 75 in full color.

More Broadway Musicals: Since 1980 Cover

Broadway Musicals

(1986)

A colorful tribute to the great Broadway shows of our time. 395 illustrations, 112 in full color.

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With an air debonair: Musical theatre in American 1785-1815

(1991)

Even before reading this record, one is struck by the beautiful layout and clarity of reproductions found within. This most comprehensive piece of research fills a scholarly gap on the early history of musical theater in the United States. Not just a chronicler of musical theater, Porter (music history, Ohio State Univ.) provides fascinating information on all aspects of 18th-and 19th-century musical production: personnel, technical effects, musical composition, and orchestra. In addition to the...

With an air debonair: Musical theatre in American 1785-1815 Cover

Opera--Dead or Alive: Production, Performance and Enjoyment of Musical Theatre

(1972)

Playwright, director, and critic Ronald E. Mitchell offers general readers a richer understanding of traditions, terms, styles, and staging techniques of musical theater, including an introduction to seventeen examples of operas and musicals, from baroque and romantic operas to Gilbert & Sullivan, from proletarian dramas to Broadway shows like Oklahoma.

Opera--Dead or Alive: Production, Performance and Enjoyment of Musical Theatre Cover

Ganzl's Book of the Musical Theatre

(1989)

The worldwide proliferation of musical theater makes its documentation in a single volume impossible, but Ganzl's Book of Musical Theatre is a most impressive selection from this wealth of material. Companion to the respected Gustav Kobbe's Complete Opera Book (Putnam, 1954; Amer. Biog. Serv., 1987; reprint of 1963 ed.), whose form it follows, it offers information on some 300 musicals from the current world repertoire and many important works that are no longer performed. Each entry includes a...

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Broadway Babies: The People Who Made the American Musical

(1988)

Vividly recreating the unique pleasure of experiencing a song-and-dance show, Broadway Babies spotlights the men and women who made a difference in the development of American musical comedy. Mordden's account features such show people as Florenz Ziegfeld, Harold Prince, Bert Lahr, Gwen Verdon, Angela Lansbury, Victor Herbert, Liza Minnelli, and Stephen Sondheim, and such musicals as Sally, Oh Kay!, Anything Goes, Show Boat, Oklahoma!, Follies, Chicago, and countless others. While theatrical h...

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Broadway Stories: A Backstage Journey Through Musical Theatre

(1993)

This treasure trove presents focused narratives by men and women (one as young as 12 years old) who have made the Broadway musical theater their home. Sixteen chapters chronicle the hits and misses inherent to the musical stage, recounted by an actor or member of the creative team. With his "fly-on-the-wall" perspective, author Bell clearly captures the thespians' love for their work and respect for the musical theater tradition. Not a retrospective, this volume discusses musicals from the recen...

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Stage It with Music: An Encyclopedic Guide to the American Musical Theatre

(1993)

A one-stop, up-to-date source for information on the history of the American musical theatre, Stage It with Music packs an astonishing quantity and variety of facts as well as insights and anecdotes into a convenient dictionary format. Coverage extends from the genre's nineteenth century beginnings to the present day, from The Black Crook (1866) to Jelly's Last Jam (1992). Included are entries on over 300 individual shows, musical series, performers, composers, lyricists, librettists, directors,...

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Black Musical Theatre: From Coontown to Dreamgirls

(1989)

Black Musical Theatre begins its historical survey with Clorindy, the Origin of the Cakewalk and A Trip to Coontown, in 1898, and concludes with the Broadway smash Dreanigirls, in 1981. The section on the ragtime pianist and composer Eubie Blake and his popular 1920s show, Shuffle Along, attests to early black influence in American musical theater. Prior to the 1920s, black musical theater was enriched by Walker and Williams, Cole and Johnson, Miller and Lyles, and Ernest Hogan. White producers ...

Black Musical Theatre: From Coontown to Dreamgirls Cover

The Broadway Musical: Collaboration in Commerce and Art

(1992)

Three out of four Broadway-bound musicals fail to get there, and many of those that do, ultimately fail. The Broadway Musical takes an engrossing look at the industry's successes and failures in an effort to understand the phenomenon of mass collaboration that is Broadway. The authors investigate the complicated machinery of show business from its birth around the turn of the century through its survival of the cost explosions of the 1980s. Through interviews with many of Broadway's top produce...

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The World Of Musical Comedy

(1984)

Acclaimed through three editions for its uniquely informative and entertaining style, this fourth edition of Stanley Green’s World of Musical Comedy updates and enlarges the theatrical scope to include such recent shows as A Chorus Line, Barnum, They’re Playing Our Song, and Annie. In a format that provides biographies of all the leading figures in the musical’s development, Stanley Green manages to convey the spirit of the Broadway stage, its musical make-believe, and yet remain objective...

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Sing Out, Louise!: 150 Stars of the Musical Theatre Remember 50 Years on Broadway

(1993)

This ultimate Broadway insider's book is based on extensive interviews with hundreds of performers, including Lauren Bacall, Carol Channing, Barbara Cook, Nanette Fabray, Rex Harrison, Dorothy Loudon, Jerry Orbach, Tony Randall, Elaine Stritch, and Gwen Verdon, sharing personal recollections of dozens of shows. It's a backstage glimpse at the jealousy and heartbreak, the passion and commitment that have made Broadway the center of the American musical theatre for more than half a century.

Sing Out, Louise!: 150 Stars of the Musical Theatre Remember 50 Years on Broadway Cover

America's Musical Stage: Two Hundred Years of Musical Theatre

(1985)

Mates shows the musical stage in all its guises--from burlesque to musical comedy to grand opera--from its beginnings in pre-Revolutionary America to the present day. He deals sensitively with the recurrent aesthetic question of popular versus highbrow art and also looks at critical reactions to popular theatrical forms of musical entertainment. He introduces the reader to various types of theatrical companies, the changing repertory, and the many kinds of musical performers who have animated th...

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Theatre in the Victorian Age

(1991)

This book examines all major aspects of theater practice and dramatic literature of the Victorian period. Michael Booth's comprehensive survey explores the social and cultural context of the theater including theater management, the audience, architecture and production methods, acting and the job of the actor, as well as the drama itself. Within this framework, Booth discusses such topics as the effect on theater of population growth and the spread of the railway system, the typical organizatio...

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Great Musicals of the American Theatre

(1976)

Originally published in 1973 under the title Ten great musicals of the American theatre. Includes the librettos of Of thee I sing, Porgy and Bess, One touch of Venus, Brigadoon, Kiss me Kate, West Side story, Gypsy, Fiddler on the roof, 1776, and Company.

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Encyclopedia Of The Musical Theatre

(1980)

Drawing equally from Viennese operetta, Parisian cabaret, vaudeville, and Tin Pan Alley, the American musical theatre has thrived in an unprecedented variety of forms and styles as our truest hybrid art. From Show Boat and Oklahoma! to West Side Story, Fiddler on the Roof, and A Chorus Line, the musical has attracted our finest actors, composers, writers, directors, and choreographers. The greats and near-greats are finally brought together in this essential reference guide to over 2,000 persona...

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Auditioning for the Musical Theatre

(1988)

Proven tactics and techniques from a leading New York vocal coach on how to "act" a song, choose the right material, handle a callback, what to wear, how to use eye contact, select a voice teacher and vocal coach, and more. Includes 130 excellent yet unusual audition songs for all types of situations and performers, including juveniles and dancers.

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King Henry VI

(1891)

Henry VI, Part 1 or The First Part of Henry the Sixt (often written as 1 Henry VI) is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1591, and set during the lifetime of King Henry VI of England. Whereas 2 Henry VI deals with the King's inability to quell the bickering of his nobles, and the inevitability of armed conflict, and 3 Henry VI deals with the horrors of that conflict, 1 Henry VI deals with the loss of England's French territories and the political machination...

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Spunk

(1993)

Zora Neale Hurston was an American folklorist, anthropologist, and author during the time of the Harlem Renaissance. Of Hurston's four novels and more than 50 published short stories, plays, and essays, she is best known for her 1937 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God.

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Warsaw Visitor, Tales from the Vienna Streets: The Last Two Plays of William Saroyan

(1990)

Late in life Saroyan wrote: “In 1943 I turned my back on Broadway, but I did not stop writing plays… I wrote new plays every year… and they are part of the real American theatre, and of the real world theatre, even though they have not been produced, performed, and witnessed.” In fact, William Saroyan left some 150 unpublished plays, two of which are offered here. Typically Saroyan in their graceful, acrobatic use of language, these plays have a breadth, a universality, and a somber...

Warsaw Visitor, Tales from the Vienna Streets: The Last Two Plays of William Saroyan Cover

The Rez Sisters

(1992)

Winner of the Dora Mavor Moore Award for Best New Play Nominated for the Governor General's Award This award-winning play by Native playwright Tomson Highway is a powerful and moving portrayal of seven women from a reserve attempting to beat the odds by winning at bingo. And not just any bingo. It is THE BIGGEST BINGO IN THE WORLD and a chance to win a way out of a tortured life. The Rez Sisters is hilarious, shocking, mystical and powerful, and clearly establishes the creative voice of ...

The Rez Sisters Cover

The Real Thing

(1984)

A talented ensemble cast brings to life Stoppard's classic play featuring the loves and loves lost of playwright Henry; his wife, Charlotte; an actor named Max; and his activist wife, Annie. Featuring a play within a play, this production is superbly performed if slightly confusing in audiobook format—it's often difficult to keep track of who is speaking and to keep track of the endlessly reconfiguring relationships. Henry searches for meaning both in art and romantic relationships as he atte...

The Real Thing Cover

Harold Prince and the American Musical Theater

(1989)

This book follows the career of the producer/director of such shows as "Pyjama Game", "Damn Yankees", "Fiddler of the Roof" and "West Side Story" and who has collaborated in many productions of Stephen Sondheim's works.

Harold Prince and the American Musical Theater Cover

Plays and Stories: Arthur Schnitzler

(1982)

Arthur Schnitzler, Viennese playwright, novelist, short story writer, and physician, was a sophisticated writer much in vogue in his time. He chose themes of an erotic, romantic, or social nature, expressed with clarity, irony, and subtle wit. Reigen, a series of ten dialogues linking people of various social classes through their physical desire for one another, has been filmed many times as La Ronde. As a Jew, Schnitzler was sensitive to the problems of anti-Semitism, which he explored in the...

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The Theatrical Notebooks of Samuel Beckett: Krapp's Last Tape v. 1

(1993)

Samuel Beckett directed "Krapp's Last Tape" on four separate occasions, and this volume offers a facsimile of his 1969 Schiller-Theater notebook. The notebook contains what is probably some of the most explicit analysis by Beckett of his own work ever revealed. The revised text incorporates many of the changes Beckett made in the 1969 Schiller production, as well as subsequent changes in later productions. Professor Knowlson worked closely with Beckett over these revisions - and deviations from...

The Theatrical Notebooks of Samuel Beckett: Krapp's Last Tape v. 1 Cover

Chicago And Other Plays

(1981)

Includes: Chicago, Icarus's Mother, Red Cross, Fourteen Hundred Thousand, Melodrama Play.

Chicago And Other Plays Cover

Fortune, My Foe and Eros at Breakfast

(1993)

Robertson Davies has been called the most important Canadian playwright of the postwar period. These two plays from the 1940s prove that great writing and important themes never go out of style.

Fortune, My Foe and Eros at Breakfast Cover

On Racine

(1992)

On Racine is a brilliant, personal view of theatre in which Barthes discusses all the major tragedies of Racine as well as the range of critical views of his work.

On Racine Cover

Persecución

(1986)

Cinco piezas de teatro se unen aqui bajo un mismo tema: la persecucion. Cruel, experimental, desenfadado, ironico y poetico, este libro ademas de ser una obra de arte, es tambien una vision profunda de la eterna dualidad que parece caracterizar al ser humano: su condicion tanto sublime como terrible que lo hace victima o victimario perseguido o perseguidor. Pero la obra ademas de ser una satira del actual regimen cubano, trasciende el mismo a traves de una liberacion que, como en el principio d...

Persecución Cover

Theaetetus

(1987)

Set immediately prior to the trial and execution of Socrates in 399 BC, Theaetetus shows the great philosopher considering the nature of knowledge itself, in a debate with the geometrician Theodorus and his young follower Theaetetus. Their dialogue covers many questions, such as: is knowledge purely subjective, composed of the ever-changing flow of impressions we receive from the outside world? Is it better thought of as true belief'? Or is it, as many modern philosophers argue, justified true b...

Theaetetus Cover

The Overcoat

(1991)

The Overcoat which is generally acknowledged as the finest of Gogol's memorable Saint Petersburg stories, is a tale of the absurd and misplaced obsessions.

The Overcoat Cover

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