continuation...Theater music1

continuation...Theater music

The German composer Kurt Weill's score for Der Silbersee (1933; The Silver Sea) was the last major musical contribution to a serious play requiring a full orchestra and chorus. Thereafter, for economic reasons, the dramatic theatre had to equip itself with small-group music or prerecorded tapes. The orchestra and chorus became the prerogative of stage musicals and films. The more these were commercially debased the more they came to rely heavily on the clichés of 19th-century music, to the exclusion of newer musical developments.

Producers of stage musicals, the choreographers of dance, and the directors of drama need to be wary of the properties of music. It is more demanding of attention than is often thought, and its use should ideally be confined to circumstances where it can provide something that none of the other theatrical elements can offer. The more its qualities are understood and respected, the better it can be guided to an effective theatrical purpose.