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A theatrical production that combines music (singing & orchestra) acting, and dancing on stage with costumes & sets. Famous modern musicals: Les Miserables The Phantom of the Opera Wicked The Wizard of Oz The Sound of Music Many musicals are or become movies (Disney)

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Musicals developed from comic operettas (Italian for little operas) of the 1850s. Famous operetta writers: Jacques Offenbach, Johann Strauss II, Gillbert & Sullivan. Unlike opera, musicals only have around 5 main songs with spoken dialogue and dance numbers between. Music is also more popular sounding.

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Musical Theater is a multi-billion dollar entertainment industry ranging from local amateur theater productions to professional productions on Broadway (NYC), West End (London), touring companies. Broadway shows are also often later made into Hollywood movies. Occasionally, musicals start as movies and later are performed live on stage.

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W. S. Gilbert & Arthur Sullivan were a composer/ librettist team who wrote 14 operattas in the 1870s- 90s. Their operettas featured hilarious logical absurdities and biting satire on English culture. In The Pirate of Penzance, a group of local pirates attempt to steal a Major-Generals daughters for wives. At first inhibited by their sympathy (when the M-G lies and says he is an orphan like them) and then their loyalty to the Queen (which the M-G invokes as a last- ditch effort), the tables turn and they are encouraged to marry them when it is discovered the pirates are actually sons of nobles.

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http://youtu.be/jQ7SVMVrick http://youtu.be/jQ7SVMVrick

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Cole Porter was an American composer who wrote several famous musicals during 1920s-40s including Anything Goes and Kiss Me Kate. In Kiss Me Kate, the characters are putting on a production of Shakespeares The Taming of the Shrew (a play-within-a-play), with their own lives mirroring those of their characters.

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In musicals, songs are often used to express the specific emotions of a character. (Dialogue is used to move the plot forward.) In So in Love, it is the anniversary of Lois and Freds divorce. Fred sends flowers to Lois, the same arrangement as her wedding bouquet when they first got married. What different feelings do Lois and Fred experience in this song? What do they want and what do you think they will each do next? http://youtu.be/i31KAYUWRSc http://youtu.be/i31KAYUWRSc