Why don't I like musicals?

[Gary Blanchard]

There is something about a large amount of songs from musicals that really grates on me, but I find it hard to put it into words. Part of it is the tunes, part the lyrics, and part is the performance.

I love choral music, I love Opera, and I like a variety of styles of vocal music, yet I have this strong, averse reaction to musicals.

Can anyone provide some type of rational explanation why this particular style of music should seem different to me? Or is it just some irrational fear due to an early experience seeing Carol Channing on TV? I'm not trying to be nasty, I just want to understand this. Thanks all.

[Krummhorn]

Well, Gary ... I've got to agree with you about Carol Channing ... her singing grated on my nerves too.

Perhaps part of the reaction could be in which manner whatever you saw was presented. If it were a live performance and there was an inordinant amount of audience din during the presentation, we might remember more about the disturbances than we recall about the music being performed.

Locally we attended a stage production of Oklahoma!, and it was outstanding. The Sound of Music musical film was great, too, although the lip-sync was all too abvious when one of the Nuns sang.

Maybe I saw too much of Ms. Channing in my yougtful years . Locally we did see the stage presentation of Oklahoma!, and I found it quite enjoyable. Guess the bottom line is to perhaps give it a try again, possibly something on the lighter side (comedy) and work into the more serious ones.

Kh

[Gary Blanchard]

I've tried lighter ones and more dramatic ones, by amatuer and professional troupes and just can't get into it. There is something that just grates and I can't quite figure it. I find the lighter ones (to me) are by far the worst. I guess it's something else to talk to my shrink about.

[Krummhorn]

or Carol Channing ... LOL

[Nullifidian]

That's an interesting question, and I think it would be worth asking what musicals you've seen and what operas you generally like, since there's a strong correlation between the two art forms (and no, I'm not talking about The Phantom of the Opera ). Die Zauberflöte has spoken sections, as does the original Carmen, and yet these are considered classic operas.

Perhaps you need a more operatic type of musical. I'd suggest Sondheim instead of any others, since he generally writes with a more sophisticated aesthetic, coming close to classical, IMO. In fact, I sincerely believe that Passion is actually a chamber opera that's just not been staged correctly yet.

Sweeney Todd is very operatic, with leitmotive and an almost completely through-sung score. In fact, if you look at a score (I was Signor Pirelli in one production in San Diego), it's almost entirely notated with only a few connecting sentences between musical numbers.

I'd also recommend Passion, as mentioned above, a beautiful look at love, from the easy to slip into (and perhaps thereby too easy to slip out of) and the downright prickly, scary, and obsessive.

And perhaps also Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George, which I think is his finest work. The score shimmers with harmonic coloration reminiscent of late Debussy (like La Mer), although it doesn't mind being prickly at times as well.

All of the above are easily available on DVD.

Lastly, there's A Little Night Music which is very much in the operetta style, and is a favorite of light opera companies and has even been performed at the Los Angeles Opera, among others. There is a movie of this directed by the stage director, Harold Price, but it has been justifiably neglected as one of the worst film versions of a musical ever made.