Gestures of Music Theater explores examples of Song and Dance as performative gestures that entertain and affect audiences. The chapters interact to reveal the complex energies of performativity. In experiencing these energies, music theatre is revealed as a dynamic accretion of active, complex and dialogical experiences.

This title explores examples of song and dance as performative gestures that entertain and affect audiences. The chapters interact to reveal the complex energies of performativity. In experiencing these energies, music theatre is revealed as a dynamic accretion of active, complex and dialogical experiences.

Published in France in 1987, this is the book in which Lecoq first set out his philosophy of human movement, and the way it takes expressive form in a wide range of different performance traditions. He traces the history of pantomime, sets out his definition of the components of the art of mime, and discusses the explosion of physical theatre in the second half of the twentieth century. Interviews with major theatre practitioners Ariane Mnouchkine and Jean-Louis Barrault by Jean Perret, together with chapters by Perret on Étienne Decroux and Marcel Marceau, fill out the historical material written by Lecoq, and a final section by Alain Gautré celebrates the many physical theatre practitioners working in the 1980s.

This is the third volume of the second edition of the now classic book “The Topos of Music”. The authors present gesture theory, including a gesture philosophy for music, the mathematics of gestures, concept architectures and software for musical gesture theory, the multiverse perspective which reveals the relationship between gesture theory and the string theory in theoretical physics, and applications of gesture theory to a number of musical themes, including counterpoint, modulation theory, free jazz, Hindustani music, and vocal gestures.

Theater music directors must draw on a remarkably broad range of musical skills. Not only do they conduct during rehearsals and performances, but they must also be adept arrangers, choral directors, vocal coaches, and accompanists. Like a record producer, the successful music director must have the flexibility to adjust as needed to a multifaceted job description, one which changes with each production and often with each performer. In Music Direction for the Stage, veteran music director and instructor Joseph Church demystifies the job in a book that offers aspiring and practicing music directors the practical tips and instruction they need in order to mount a successful musical production. Church, one of Broadway's foremost music directors, emerges from the orchestra pit to tell how the music is put into a musical show. He gives particular attention to the music itself, explaining how a music director can best plan the task of learning, analyzing, and teaching each new piece. Based on his years of professional experience, he offers a practical discussion of a music director's methods of analyzing, learning, and practicing a score, thoroughly illustrated by examples from the repertoire. The book also describes how a music director can effectively approach dramatic and choreographic rehearsals, including key tips on cueing music to dialogue and staging, determining incidental music and underscoring, making musical adjustments and revisions in rehearsal, and adjusting style and tempo to performers' needs. A key theme of the book is effective collaboration with other professionals, from the production team to the creative team to the performers themselves, all grounded in Church's real-world experience with professional, amateur, and even student performances. He concludes with a look at music direction as a career, offering invaluable advice on how the enterprising music director can find work and gain standing in the field.

Acting the Song offers a contemporary, integrated approach to singing in musicals that results in better-trained, smarter performers everyone wants to work with. In this new, thoroughly updated edition of the paperback, directors and teachers of musical theater will find guidance in developing and leading musical theater elements, classroom workshops, and the world of professional auditions and performances. A companion ebook specifically for students—including actors, singers, or dancers—contains time-tested advice, exercises, and worksheets for all skill levels, with links to additional resources online. Subjects for both versions cover: Singing and acting terminology Use of microphones, recording devices, and other technology Vocal and physical warm-ups, movements, and gestures Creating a character Finding subtext, interpreting music and lyrics, and song structure Collaborating with other actors Keeping a performance fresh and new Using social media and online audition sites Teachers and students alike will appreciate the sections for beginning, intermediate, and advanced performers. Covering all changes to the industry, education, music styles, and audition protocols, everyone involved in musical theater, from new students to working professionals, will benefit from this rich resource. Allworth Press, an imprint of Skyhorse Publishing, publishes a broad range of books on the visual and performing arts, with emphasis on the business of art. Our titles cover subjects such as graphic design, theater, branding, fine art, photography, interior design, writing, acting, film, how to start careers, business and legal forms, business practices, and more. While we don't aspire to publish a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are deeply committed to quality books that help creative professionals succeed and thrive. We often publish in areas overlooked by other publishers and welcome the author whose expertise can help our audience of readers.

The Music of Tragedy offers a new approach to the study of classical Greek theater by examining the use of musical language, imagery, and performance in the late work of Euripides. Naomi Weiss demonstrates that Euripides’ allusions to music-making are not just metatheatrical flourishes or gestures towards musical and religious practices external to the drama but closely interwoven with the dramatic plot. Situating Euripides’ experimentation with the dramaturgical effects of mousike within a broader cultural context, she shows how much of his novelty lies in his reinvention of traditional lyric styles and motifs for the tragic stage. If we wish to understand better the trajectories of this most important ancient art form, The Music of Tragedy argues, we must pay closer attention to the role played by both music and text.

"The New Music Theater is the first comprehensive attempt in English to cover a still-emerging art form in its widest range. This book, written for the reader who comes from the contemporary worlds of music, theater, film, literature, and visual arts, provides a wealth of examples and descriptions, not only of the works themselves but of the concepts, ideas and trends that have gone into the evolution of what may be the most central performance art form of the post-modern world."--BOOK JACKET.