Song Character Analysis Worksheet - The University of North ...

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expectations will form a base for creating an original interpretation of a role through the character’s songs. The criteria of gender in musical performance will be considered through the traditions of popular singing styles and the power of individuality in the voice. I shall outline a methodology of character and song analysis which will then be applied to preparation for two specific songs from Show Boat: “Make Believe” and “Can’t Help Lovin’ ‘dat Man.” Gender and Performance Gender has always been a subliminal presence in the language of musical performance. Music has been described in connection with a feminine domain since its earliest recorded history. Gender in performance was present in the harem ensembles of singers and instrumentalists that lauded the ancient Egyptian Pharaohs, as well as the “Song of Miriam” that praised Yahweh for the successful deliverance of the Israelites from those Pharaohs. The all-female academy of poetry and music directed by Sappho, (sixth century B. C. E.) was a society for gender and performance practice. Another example is the original Greek definition of “musician”: one educated in the language of the Muses (the nine daughters of Zeus) and the worship of Euterpe as the goddess of music. The feminine pronoun has also referenced music throughout the history of western civilization. The ancient Greek philosophers, particularly Plato and Aristotle, wrote of the mimetic quality of music that allows glimpses of Truth, the unobtainable “ideal” of society. They also argued against music’s power over the senses (emotions), and the 83
possibilities for manipulation and abuse by performers. Plato’s writings are most vehement in his distrust of musicians to subvert the status quo. These arguments established the debate between cerebral logic (a masculine attribute) and emotional feeling (a feminine attribute) made manifest in musical interpretation and reception that continue today. 4 Feminist criticism argues against this traditional duality of mind and feeling for building social constructs, such as musical performance. According to Wayne Bowman, such “patriarchal thought . . . tends to depersonalize experience” and results in the “binary opposition” of self and other. 5 This debate has already been discussed in Chapter Three regarding societal gender roles. A modern philosophy of music as feminine and, therefore, subversive to traditional gender roles is found in John Shepherd’s Music as Social Text. He identified sound as a tactile sensory stimulus that “stresses the integrative and relational”; sound surrounds us and provokes a reaction. 6 This challenges the hegemonic experience for that is “essentially a visual experience.” A visual response to art allows distance and separation, with objectivity and contemplative scrutiny. A sound experience, however, requires an embodied response. It is “fundamentally tactile: touching, probing, intruding, 4 See Wayne D. Bowman, Philosophical Perspectives on Music (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998). Chapter 2 is a summary of Greek philosophy regarding music’s mimetic qualities and a description of the transformative powers and gendered identity of the “honeyed muse.” 5 Bowman, 361. Sets of binary oppositions that reflect the spiraling associations in building personal reality constructs are listed as male/female, reason/emotion, mind/body, good/evil, and culture/nature. These associations ultimately result in the assessment of “under control/out of control” with its implicit gender prejudices. See Musicology and Difference: Gender and Sexuality in Music Scholarship, ed. Ruth Solie (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 11. Another patriarchal binary system is the perpetuation of hegemonic gender roles through musical interpretation and aesthetic. Heide Göttner-Abendroth proposed a counter “matriarchal aesthetic” in The Dancing Goddess: Principles of a Matriarchal Aesthetic, trans. Maureen T. Krause (Boston: Beacon Press, 1991). 6 “Music and Male Hegemony” (Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 1991), 159. 84
Page 1 and 2:
LEWIS, ANNE, D.M.A. An Examination
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APPROVAL PAGE This dissertation has
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TABLE OF CONTENTS iv Page ACKNOWLED
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for research, this paper will explo
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MacDonald, labeled musical theatre
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The musicals that have entered the
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and individually as handwriting.”
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Methodology The base of research fo
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Feminine Character in Selected Libr
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from the 1920s, they are timeless i
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e helpful to recognize the specific
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as a Cinderella-type heiress who ma
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Vereen described the “blackface c
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Casino Theatre in Manhattan. The re
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functional sets, and an eleven-piec
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The History of the Musical, Show Bo
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amount of instrumental music, the d
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Ferber’s novel begins with the na
Page 37 and 38: Act II begins four years later as G
Page 39 and 40: CHAPTER III SOCIETAL STEREOTYPES OF
Page 41 and 42: communion.” 5 This bias continued
Page 43 and 44: children, however, did allow mother
Page 45 and 46: unhealthy, sub-human environments.
Page 47 and 48: dominated by masculine traits in ap
Page 49 and 50: magazines, including Ladies Home Jo
Page 51 and 52: Nineteenth Century Stereotypes of W
Page 53 and 54: usiness. She was responsible for th
Page 55 and 56: gender) inequality forced them inst
Page 57 and 58: The 1920s was the Jazz Age, a time
Page 59 and 60: CHAPTER IV THEATRICAL STEREOTYPES O
Page 61 and 62: peoples . . . to save us from our o
Page 63 and 64: separate seating arrangements). The
Page 65 and 66: Feminine Aesthetic in Theatre Any a
Page 67 and 68: gossip columns. 17 Exploitation on
Page 69 and 70: means to economic or career advance
Page 71 and 72: Florenz Ziegfeld, reportedly, was q
Page 73 and 74: in a subservient role as a domestic
Page 75 and 76: looked, Magnolia decided, as if the
Page 77 and 78: When he holds me close, Close as we
Page 79 and 80: In the novel, Parthy Ann is a three
Page 81 and 82: opens her handbag and takes out a p
Page 83 and 84: “hero”) and the piano player (t
Page 85 and 86: the nineteenth century’s gender r
Page 87: of that time. Performance practice
Page 91 and 92: order while the musical number repr
Page 93 and 94: “Finding in that sound all the ki
Page 95 and 96: often distorts vibrant voices, rend
Page 97 and 98: elationships with other characters
Page 99 and 100: Finally, the process includes a mus
Page 101 and 102: any other theater music heard up to
Page 103 and 104: een presented in previous chapters,
Page 105 and 106: “Though the cold and brutal fact
Page 107 and 108: [Bridge]: When he goes away dat’s
Page 109 and 110: angelically while caught in the act
Page 111 and 112: The song appears twice more as a pl
Page 113 and 114: CHAPTER VI CURTAIN CALL The musical
Page 115 and 116: theatre performance practice. They
Page 117 and 118: BIBLIOGRAPHY General Sources Burkho
Page 119 and 120: Long, Mary Anne. “‘All Our Girl
Page 121 and 122: Kerber, Linda K., and Jane Sherron
Page 123 and 124: Levine, Lawrence W. The Opening of
Page 125 and 126: Song Title: Show Title: Lyricist: C
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