World Theatre Day: A glance at the journey of musical theatre through time
Are you someone who enjoys watching live plays on the stage? Welcome to the club of millions of people worldwide who appreciate theatre as one of the most celebrated art forms. Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that has enchanted millions all over the world. Take for example Broadway’s famous Hamilton or the stage production of The Sound of Music.
Now, to celebrate all these performing arts, the International Theatre Institute (ITI), World Organisation of Performing Arts, theatre professionals, and all theatre lovers have been observing the World Theatre Day worldwide on 27th March every year since 1962. Today, on this auspicious day, let us trace the history of musical theatre.
Born in ancient Greece
As you all know, musical theatre refers to a stage performance that involves singing, dancing and musical numbers performed by the cast to narrate a story. Now, if you look into the history of musical theatre, you will find that it originated in ancient Greece, as early as 5th century BC when music and dance were blended into stage comedies and tragedies. Now, fast forward to 12th and 13th century AD when religious dramas were gaining popularity. Here too, in order to narrate a part of the story and to teach the liturgy, the performers used to sing hymns from holy books such as the Bible. However, dancing was out of the question as they were considered to be representation of profanity.
The Renaissance revival
Just like all other performing arts, musical theatre too revived during the Italian Renaissance. In fact, the ancient form evolved into two antecedents, namely commedia dell’arte and opera buffa. The first literally translated to “comedy of the profession” and basically referred to Italian comedies in English where performance was largely improvised through scripted musical dialogues, mime and ‘lazzo’ or a joke. Similarly, opera buffa referred to “comic opera.” It originated in Naples and was characterised by everyday settings, local dialects, simple vocal writing and a melodious background. La Cilla was the first opera buffa that was performed. The show continues to show till date.
At the same time, in England, court masques and short musical plays were also growing in popularity, especially as a form of evening entertainment. They involved, music, dancing, chorus singing, acting, complex stage designs and expensive colourful costumes. One of the first English musicals of the time was The Siege of Rhodes written by 17th century English poet William Davenant.
18th century musicals
With the advent of the 18th century, two kinds of musical theatres ushered in yet again. One was called ballad opera. This included lyrics and dialogues written to the tunes of popular songs of the contemporary times. English dramatist John Gay’s The Beggar Opera deserves a special mention in this regard. At the same time, comic opera or singspiel was growing in Germany, while France was rejoicing to have found comedie en vaudevilles and opera comique. Spain, on the other hand, was enjoying their own form of musical called zarzuela.
Operetta and musical theatre today
A form of musical theatre called operetta was born in the mid-19th century, in the hands of French composer Herve. It had all the earlier characteristics of a musical play and thus earned a global reception. In fact, for the first time ever, musicals entered American theatres during this time. The famous New York City Broadway theatre ran the musical The Black Crook by Charles M. Barras in 1866. Broadway became the heart of global musical theatre and has shown all kinds of musicals, be it Reginal De Koven’s Robin Hood to John Philip Sousa’s El Capitan, not to forget the longest-running one Wicked by Stephen Schwartz and The Trip to Chinatown by Charles H. Hoyt.