Songwriters of the American Musical Theatre A Style Guide for Singers

From the favorites of Tin Pan Alley to today’s international blockbusters, the stylistic range required of a musical theatre performer is expansive. Musical theatre roles require the ability to adapt to a panoply of characters and vocal styles. By breaking down these styles and exploring the output of the great composers, Songwriters of the American Musical Theatre offers singers and performers an essential guide to the modern musical. Composers from Gilbert and Sullivan and Irving Berlin to Alain Boublil and Andrew Lloyd Webber are examined through a brief biography, a stylistic overview, and a comprehensive song list with notes on suitable voice types and further reading. This volume runs the gamut of modern musical theatre, from English light opera through the American Golden Age, up to the "mega musicals" of the late Twentieth Century, giving today’s students and performers an indispensable survey of their craft.

1. English Language Light Opera 2. 1910s Contemporary American Songs 3. The Great Songwriters of Tin Pan Alley 4. The Great Wits and Sophisticates 5. The Great Jazz Composers 6. Writers of the Integrated Musical 7. The Composers of the Golden Age of the American Musical 8. Stephen Sondheim - Sui Generis 9. New Sounds 10. The Mego-Musical 11. Musicals of the 1990s and 2000s 12. Popular Styles - The Jukebox Musicals

Nathan Hurwitz is a tenured associate professor of music theatre at Rider University, USA. He is the author of A History of American Musical Theatre: No Business Like It (2014).