Curtains is an audience pleasing, traditional show-biz kind of musical with a large cast and impressive effects. I have been involved in two productions, one with an extremely small stage, and another in a large state-of-the-art proscenium space. If you are doing the show on a tight budget or in a small space, you’ll have to think creatively to replace the technical elements that are embedded in the plot. If you are doing the show with all the bells and whistles, it is logistically a big lift!
As always, in this blog, I’ll start by talking about the show in the context of other shows in the history of the work of the authors and American musicals in general and then I’ll move on to very specific tips and advice for music directors: How to navigate the materials from the licensing agencies, what to bring up in the production meetings, what to watch out for as you teach the parts, and how to conduct the show.
Before You Start:
- Listen to the 2007 original cast recording.
- Have a look at this explanation of the show’s history by the dramaturg of our Villanova production Nic Ecker.
- Don’t watch this video which definitely isn’t Curtains.
Some Background:
If you’ve followed my Before You Start instructions, you’ve already looked at Nic Ecker’s rundown of the history of the show. It took a very long time to get to Broadway, and it underwent many iterations and configurations before reaching the version now licensed and performed.
I’d like to devote the first part of this post to Kander and Ebb, since this is the first of their shows I’ve covered on this blog.
Kander and Ebb: Do they have a personal voice?
In his important 1972 book Words With Music, Lehman Engel wrote these rather uncharitable words about Kander and (by extension) Ebb:
“I would like to speak for a moment about the wavering musical style of a very talented theatre composer named John Kander. I do this because I respect him, care a great deal about the danger I think he is in, and I want to see him go as far as I believe he can go, provided….
Look at three consecutive Broadway scores by John Kander. I cannot understand why so much of Cabaret sounded like Kurt Weill. Was it because Weill’s widow, Lotte Lenya, was cast as the old lady? Was it because the setting was Berlin? Either explanation contains a worldful of fuzzy reasoning. The Berlin of Weill was about fifteen years earlier than the period of Cabaret and nearly half a century before this production. What has casting to do with the style of a musical score? Why also did the Zorba score make a pale attempt at imitating Greek music? In the end, this sort of thing must fail since at best it is only an imitation, as is the “Spanish” music of Man of LaMancha. In the case of Zorba, the sound more nearly resembled Israeli music. The Happy Time sounded like an imitation of French-Canadian folk songs.
It’s time that John Kander began to find John Kander, who, in my belief, is infinitely worth finding. Let’s never forget that style should be the property of the copyright owner and said owner should not pretend he is the pianist for a silent-screen performance- changing from cowboys to Indians to Chinese with the greatest of ease and with the same unimportant results that one has in unwinding a roll of toilet tissue. While these elements- personal style, suggestions of time and place- may make contributions to all shows, personal style is of greater importance. This is because without a distinctive musical personality and a special manner of expressing things musically and lyrically, the end product must lack characteristics which differentiate the work of this writer from that of all writers now living or long dead.”
Lehman Engel is a very important figure in American Musical Theatre. His insights into how musicals are constructed and function were revolutionary in their time, and the workshop that bears his name has birthed countless writers and pieces. But I think with more than 50 years of hindsight, we can see that he is fundamentally mistaken about Kander. A page later in the same book he writes:
“Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Le Nozze di Figaro, both set in Spain, are as Spanish (nor did their composer even dream of their being) as the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna.”
He’s conveniently leaving out Carmen, also set in Spain, which tried very hard to sound Spanish at every turn and succeeded to the extent that for quite a long time, Carmen’s musical vocabulary became the de-facto definition of Spanish music, even though Bizet was French, writing at a time when many accomplished and actually Spanish composers were living and writing good music. I think by the definition of most people, Carmen is a successful piece of lyric theatre.
He’s also mistaken about Cabaret. The musical is based on Isherwood’s Berlin Stories, which are set from 1930-1933 in Berlin. Cabaret’s musical vocabulary largely comes out of The Threepenny Opera, which starred Lotte Lenya, and premiered in 1928 in Berlin, The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, which premiered in 1930 and The Seven Deadly Sins, which premiered in 1933. Weill fled Germany in 1933. So it’s a very sensible connection to use Weill’s musical language for a piece set exactly at the height of Weill’s early success and with his most famous collaborator (and wife) in the cast. And to a certain extent, Cabaret would do for Weimar republic Germany what Carmen did to Spanish music.
Kander was intentionally trying to absorb the flavor of Weill’s music. Stephen Citron quotes him saying,
“I listened and listened and listened and then put them away and forgot about them. So when it came to writing the songs I didn’t think in terms of writing pastiche or imitations. Somehow or another, the flavor had soaked in just enough.”
But was he too close to Weill? Citron further quotes Kander:
“I remember telling Lenya that I never intended to imitate Mr. Weill at all. She took my face in her hands and said, ‘No, no, darling. It is not Weill. It is not Kurt. When I walk out on stage and sing those songs, it is Berlin.’ And I thought if she felt that way, to hell with everyone else.”
I went through my score of Threepenny looking for direct links to Cabaret and the ‘Weill’ sound of Kander and Ebb when I was writing this blog, and was surprised that I could find very few direct stylistic links. Weill’s harmonic sense, which is truly distinctive and unclassifiable in his German work, doesn’t reallly figure into the Kander and Ebb sound. The modernistic German angle on American Jazz we find in Weill’s work with Brecht is refracted in Kander’s music back through the lens of American jazz to regular rhythmic formulas in an aggressive but very accessible synthesis of ideas. For most of us trying to conjure up in our minds a musical voice of Berlin in the 30s, Kander’s score to Cabaret comes to mind, even though it’s essentially a fantasy of Kander’s impressions of Weill’s work. Further, Weill’s music is itself a very particular and idiosyncratic subset of a much larger musical ecosystem that was active in the Weimar republic. All history is editorial. In this case, Kander was the unwitting editor.
But Engel’s argument is really just fleshing out his larger point; that the musical voice of the author is more important to the success of a piece than any particular flavor of time or place in the musical itself. For my part, I think an author’s ‘personal voice’ is very real but impossible to pin down. Engel is essentially saying that he doesn’t hear anything particularly interesting in this music, and that what he does hear sounds like somebody else. Allowing that people will always differ in matters of taste, I argue that Kander and Ebb do in fact have a distinctive musical voice. When one hears the scores of Cabaret, Chicago, or even minor works like The Rink or 70, Girls, 70, we do hear something that registers as Kander-and-Ebbness.
I don’t agree with Mark N. Grant about everything, but I think he’s speaking for many musical theatre fans when he writes:
“The songwriting style of John Kander and Fred Ebb is a rebuke to Lehman Engel. In almost every Kander and Ebb show virtually every song is some variant of camped-up neo-Jolson razzmatazz, no matter what the specifics of character or situation. In defiance of Engel’s wisdom, they have written revue songs for book shows, they have de-constructed the golden-age writing style, and they have been one of the consistently successful teams of the last quarter century”
Complicating the matter is something I haven’t heard folks talk about very much. Kander and Ebb were involved with two visionary trailblazers, Hal Prince and Bob Fosse. Prince and Fosse were driven by big ideas and personal vision. I think musical theatre fans naturally assume that Kander and Ebb were driven to create work with the same deeply personal, inimitable voice, since their output is so intimately connected with other idealistic creators. They’re thought of in a way as a more show-biz centric, less cerebral version of Sondheim. But I think it’s better to believe Kander and Ebb themselves when they explain that they just loved working together. Do they have a distinctive sound? Of course. But whereas creators like Stephen Sondheim, Bob Fosse, Leonard Bernstein, or Jerome Robbins were dedicated to blazing brand new trails, the voice of Kander and Ebb grows out of who they are, what they loved, and what they discovered organically together. They found their voices while doing what they loved most: writing songs and hanging around theaters.
So even though Cabaret and Chicago are the most culturally significant shows in their work list, in another way Curtains is most strongly representative of the Kander and Ebb world, unencumbered by the darkness of their collaborators in their more ‘important’ work, and thereby freed to express their joy of working in the theatre without the darker admixture of Fosse and Prince. It’s strange that though Curtains has the most murders of any of their shows, it is perhaps also the least cynical.
The Beating Heart of Curtains
Watch the cued part of this interview with Kander and Ebb.
Then consider this section of I Miss The Music, music and lyrics written by Kander, after the death of Ebb.
Kander was unable to satisfactorily complete the song until he realized he needed to write it about Ebb. He commented in a Playbill interview in 2007:
“I didn’t know that’s what was doing when I was writing it. When we came to New York, I expanded it. First I had to recognize that, yeah, it really was about Fred, and then I could write the rest of the song.”
In a preface to an anthology of their music, Ebb answers the age old question Cioffi asks in Curtains (which comes first, the words or the music?):
“We work in the same room at the same time. I can improvise in words and John can improvise in music. Out of that improvisation comes our product. We work in the same room at the same time. When we walk into our music room, I am Fred Ebb, and he is John Kander. When we come out, we are Kander and Ebb.”
These are two men who put up with all the nonsense of musical theatre production for the pleasure of being with one another and writing songs together. And that’s why at the center of a piece that might evaporate into a whirlwind of clichés, the most compelling part of the show is really the most old-fashioned part; writers who want to write together, singers who want to sing, producers who want to produce, and an audience that wants to watch a show succeed.
That’s why even though the show treats its many murders rather cavalierly, it can avoid being cynical by focusing on the wide eyed wonder of the characters, who I believe reflect the wonder of Kander and Ebb themselves. ‘Can you believe they let us do this?’ That may not be as sexy or as transgressive as the more prominent and critically acclaimed work they are most remembered for. And yet, I think it might reflect more of their essence as creators.
As Ethan Mordden wrote in a New York Times piece on Steel Pier in 1997: “At the center of their art lies a love of the talent-take-all wonder of entertainment.”
Some Musical Markers of Kander and Ebb
It’s difficult to articulate what constitutes a musical voice. Because Kander and Ebb start with an idea and arrive at form together, they don’t fall into the same patterns of formal construction that other writing teams often do. But contributing to the Kander and Ebb sound are a number of devices one encounters again and again. I’ll lay out some of them below.
One of my favorite Kander and Ebb devices is an interior line that sneaks up by half steps from the 5th of the I chord through the 7th, which leads to the IV. It’s rather like what Richard Rodgers does in his big ballads, but pared down to the essentials. Kander and Ebb reserve this harmonic move for the big yearning or resigned number.
Maybe This Time from Cabaret
Funny Honey, from Chicago
Nowadays, also from Chicago
Here heading to the ii area instead of the IV chord, in But The World Goes Round from New York, New York
You’ll notice that in each of these examples, the melodic line is insistently repeating a motive that releases, with the accompaniment line adding tension against a static pedal bass which resolves at the release of the phrase. In two of the four examples, the melody also includes the rising line as part of the contour. When you hear any of these examples, you are immediately aware of the Kander and Ebb world. Kander doesn’t actually do this trick in Curtains, although he comes close in Thinking of Him.
Many of the tunes in Curtains circle around a few half steps
Here in What Kind of Man
Here in the Verse to Show People
Which later morphs using the same pitches into the main melody:
It’s a little less obvious, but the E D# and C# B# half steps drive the melody of Thataway!
Half steps are also the thrust of the accompaniment.
If you’re not convinced yet, try the melody for It’s a Business, nearly all half steps:
Some of you skeptics might counter that everybody uses half steps; does the end of the bridge of Castle on a Cloud sound like Kander and Ebb? But sample these:
From Cabaret:
From Chicago:
From The Rink:
From Woman of the Year:
From Funny Lady:
I could go on, but I think you get the idea.
A lot of Kander’s tunes also get in a rut, but a rut that’s really exciting to park in
From Cabaret (note the minor second melody here too):
From Chicago:
From The Rink:
Sometimes the tune stays the same while the harmony goes somewhere interesting
Like this bit from Zorba:
There isn’t a lot of this in Curtains, but we get a taste at the end of He Did It when the 3 part canon occurs, or the ‘Stomp, hop slap step slap step stamp stomp’ section of A Tough Act To Follow.
Vamps are really important to Kander and Ebb
Ethan Mordden wrote in the New York Times:
“There is a strutting profile to a John Kander vamp, a show-off’s entrance music. It’s so endemic to the Kander and Ebb sound that the vamp becomes as familiar as the vocal melody. Think of the musical intros to ‘Willkommen,’ ‘All That Jazz’ or ‘New York, New York.’ This is music that has the hots for itself: alive, needy, working it.“
The vamp is essentially the way in for the creation of the song itself. Watch Ebb describe that process here:
We’ll discuss some important vamps in this show later. (heck, there’s even a 5 measure piece entitled: Vamps) But the fact that you can probably in your head immediately think of the vamp for Cabaret, All that Jazz, or New York, New York without me including a notated musical example is proof of Kander’s overwhelming skill at creating these introductory earworms.
Quarter note triplet melodies are common in downtempo numbers.
This feature you really don’t notice until you compare a number of Kander and Ebb Ballads, but quarter note triplets often intensify an emotional moment or emphasize an idea:
From Cabaret
From Zorba
Also from Zorba
From Chicago
From New York, New York (film)
From The Rink
From Steel Pier
From The Skin of Our Teeth
In Curtains, we find this at play in Thinking of Him
Notice that in many of these examples, we see the repetition of an idea, and how in more than half of the examples, the melody includes flat 6th and/or 7th scale degrees.
Ragtime and Stride piano parts abound in Kander’s scores
Kander must be quite a good stride pianist, because stride figures occur all over his scores.
From Cabaret:
From Chicago:
From The Act:
From Woman of the Year:
From The Rink:
From Steel Pier:
A few from Curtains:
Notice the accented, often rolled downbeats and Earl “Fatha” Hines style right hand tremolando. Stride piano sections of Kander and Ebb songs often speed up gradually or dig in spectacularly. Many times these moments are meant to evoke old-fashioned ideas or ‘show-biz’, but Kander obviously understands and enjoys these sounds, and you can feel that he must enjoy playing these shapes. It’s also worth noting that Kander has found many different shades of stride. One hears great subtlety in their deployment, stride is a vocabulary, not a placeholder.
To tag and identify these few of many markers of ‘Kander-and-Ebb-ness’ is not in any way to reduce what they are doing to a bunch of show biz clichés. Musical theatre is a culture with a vocabulary, and mastery of that vocabulary was the most important skill for writers in the heady days of the 60s and 70s. Kander and Ebb are among the greatest masters of this deep vocabulary.
Should Your Organization do this Show?
This is a BIG show. I played it in a tiny theatre once and it was a blast, but the folks who did it had to be really creative to work around the technical difficulties the show presented, like hanging someone from the fly space, trapdoor, falling globes, and characters and cats coming out of the pit. There are a lot of chorus parts, which is awesome if you’ve got lots of people, but remember that you have to costume them. If you have a few really good chorus people, that’s great, but they’ll be running all over creation and changing costumes a lot. So count those costs before you start.
It’s also a show with a lot of parts, mostly for guys, although there are two outstanding women’s parts and a number of smaller male parts that could easily be re-gendered or made gender non-binary.
From the audience perspective, the main issue is the length. This is a murder mystery, and that necessitates a lot of talking; monologues for the detective, lots and lots of monologues. The show feels long, but it won’t help to cut songs, the musical part of the show is a very normal length. It’s all the scene work that takes so much time. And that scene work is moving forward a pretty complicated plot, so if you cut it down, you might make it a senseless story.
So if you have an audience that loves classic style book musicals, a large group of talented performers, and lots of technical resources, you’ll have a great time with this fun piece.
As You’re Casting:
Lt. Frank Cioffi:
This is the role built around David Hyde Pierce. It plays to Pierce’s comic strengths, so a good candidate needs to be immediately likeable by the audience, sing ‘well enough’, have a very strong memory and a good sense of how to pace long speeches. In the audition, you might hear the beginning of Cioffi’s part in Show People, to see if those lower notes ring, in addition to some of the other important solo sections
Range:
Niki Harris:
Needs to dance well, sing well enough, and make sense opposite your Cioffi in terms of age. A good sense of comic timing is important. Niki should be able to hold a harmony part, so hear In The Same Boat #1 at auditions with singers on all three parts, and hear Tough Act To Follow.
Range:
Georgia Hendricks:
Georgia has one of the heavier lifts in the show. She has to play comedy and more serious scenes, she dances and sings quite a bit, and needs to be able to hold a harmony part, so hear In The Same Boat #1 at auditions against the two other parts in addition to one or two of the bigger solo moments.
Range:
Carmen Bernstein:
This is a part for a strong singer and personality. The low E flats at the beginning of It’s A Business might prove too low for some singers, you may want to hear it in the auditions in addition to a section or two of the larger numbers Carmen has to carry.
Range:
Aaron Fox:
If possible, this actor should be able to play the piano, although there are ways to work the piano playing to bring it within the range of a pianist with only moderate abilities. Plays both comic and serious scenes, and has an important ballad that you should certainly hear at callbacks.
Range:
Christopher Belling:
Belling is really about the personality, the singing demands are moderate.
Range:
Bambi Bernet:
Comic actress, singer and strong dancer. Needs to be able to hold a harmony part, so hear In The Same Boat #1 in the audition.
Range:
Oscar Shapiro:
Oscar is an important part, but not a large one, and the singing demands are minimal.
Range:
Bobby Pepper
Bobby needs to be able to dance, and should also be able to carry a three part harmony. Hear In The Same Boat #2 at callbacks
Range:
Jessica Crenshaw
Jessica has to sing very badly, but I think the part should be played by a belter who actually can sing. They just sing the part very out of tune. As I point out below, this is harder than you may expect.
Range:
Randy Dexter
Needs to be able to carry a three part harmony, so hear In The Same Boat #2. Randy has a pretty extensive solo at the top of Kansasland that you’ll want to hear. (but be sure you use the alternate text)
Range:
Harv Fremont
Needs to be able to carry a three part harmony, but this is the least demanding of the three smaller featured male roles. Hear In The Same Boat #2 with the other 2 roles.
Range:
Sasha Iljinsky
This blog is for music directors. If you’re music directing and conducting the show, congratulations, this character is you. I don’t see any reason why Sasha couldn’t be a person of any gender.
Range:
Johnny
Johnny actually has a sung line in The Man Is Dead, even though the name isn’t listed in the range section of the score. B below middle C to B flat. Could be played by someone of any gender.
Chorus
This is a matter of personal preference, but I think the setting of this show in 1959 requires a period vocal production, not a brash 2022 Broadway belt with no body in the sound. Compare the original Broadway cast recording of Curtains with the sound of the chorus in Destry Rides Again, Saratoga, or Redhead. It’s still a forward placed sound, but it has more weight, and more legit sounds from everyone involved.
If you’re looking for a musicianship test for the chorus, you might do well to teach the round at the end of He Did It and run auditioners against each other.
When you teach all the chorus parts, I strongly recommend you teach all the various versions of In the Same Boat, He/She/They Did It, Wide Open Spaces, Thataway and so forth back to back. It’s not just a time saving device, but you want to really make it clear how they differ from each other. There are quite a few large splits in the chorus parts. I go through how to trim those divisi down in the breakdown below.
This is the table I made for myself to prepare for the audition process and the first rehearsals. There may be some discrepancies between the ranges as listed in the score, because I tried to track down all the places the characters sang. (and I may have made some mistakes) I don’t know that I used all these sides, but they may be useful for you as you plan your casting:
| Numbers | Range | Callback Piece | Notes | |
| CHORUS WOMEN | 2, 2b, 2c,4,5, 6, 13,15, 16,18,19, 22d, 22e,23, 24,25,26a,27,29 | Middle C to 4th space E(higher Ab or Bb above the staff) | 16 mm. 143-168 | |
| CHORUS MEN | 2, 2b, 2c, 4,5, 6, 13, 15,16,18,19,22d, 22e,23, 24,25,26a,27,29 | Middle C to 4th space E (higher G or Bb above the staff) | 16 mm. 143-168 | |
| Jessica | 2b, | Tone deaf, irrelevant | ||
| Carmen | 3,5,6,16,17,26,29 | E flat below middle C to 4th space E | 17 mm. 1-12,171-end | 21 for chemistry with Aaron? |
| Aaron | 3,4,5,10,11,16,21,29 | G below middle C to G flat above the staff | 10, all11 38-79Check G flat. | Piano? Fake Piano? |
| Georgia | 3,4,5,6,8,9,13,16,24,24,25,26a,29 | G below middle C to 4th space E | 4, mm 25-459 (all) | Close Harmony |
| Oscar | 3,5,6,16,29 | G below middle C to 4th space E | 6, 118-134 | |
| Bobby | 5,16,16a,24,29 | D above middle C to 4th line D | 16a | Close Harmony |
| Nikki | 5,9,16,22,22a,24,27,29 | B below middle C to 4th line D | 9 (all)Middle6, 118-134 | |
| Christopher Belling | 5,6,16,29 | B below middle C to F above | 6, 118-134 | |
| Johnny | 5,16,29 | B below middle C to Bb | 6, 118-134 | |
| Bambi | 5,9,16,24,29 | D above Middle C to 2nd space A | 9 (all) Lowest | Close Harmony |
| Cioffi | 6,7,16,22a,24,27,29 | Ab below middle C to 4th space Eb | 7, mm.29-49 | |
| Sasha | 15,29 | B below middle C to 4th space C | IT ME! | |
| Randy | 16a,18,24,29 | 16a, 18? | Close Harmony, Rap at the top of Kansasland | |
| Harv | 16a,24,29 | 16a | Close Harmony |
A Few Things to Note About the Music Director’s Materials:
The Piano/Vocal Score
This is a very playable book, giving important information about instrumentation where appropriate but mostly geared toward playing rehearsals. You can’t really play the keyboard book in the show from here, and I wouldn’t anyway unless I hired very few players. If you were conducting the show and not playing, you wouldn’t want to use this book.
The Piano Conductor Score
This is also a well constructed book, but it isn’t as playable as a rehearsal piano part, and unfortunately also isn’t playable as a keyboard book from which you play and conduct. I did, however, play the show once from this score, in a production with a really small pit in which I was improvising a second keyboard book. I played from the non-keyboard instruments as they appeared, switching patches on the fly from my old RD700. If you’re doing things like that, this book is great because it has almost all the notes.
If you’re not a full-score kind of person, you could well conduct from the piano conductor score, but the full score is much better for that purpose, if you know how to navigate it. If you were trying to play the keyboard from the full score, you’d turn pages too frequently for it to be worth your effort.
Unfortunately there are a number of small discrepancies between the two piano based scores, and I’ll let you know the ones I found as I come to them.
The Full Score
The full score is very well laid out, and it comes in 4 volumes, to be printed on 8.5×14 paper. If you print it on 8.5×11, you’ll be squinting a lot. Oddly, book 2 doesn’t end at the act break. I printed mine as a reference, and my only gripe is that 1) I couldn’t really bind it or get it into a binder, and loose leaves in the pit was tricky and 2) The dialogue cueing is inconsistent and pretty small, so if I were to conduct from it, I’d need to get a pen and write all the cues in larger.
Keyboard Programming available through licensor
The patches are really well put together, and they advance perfectly. In some spots, they have the last patch of a song as the first patch of the next, but you’ll find all those easily, because they’re marked, as in the graphic below. I found the tack piano patches much too loud in comparison to the other patches and too garish to actually read as a honkeytonk piano. Here’s how to edit those sounds in Mainstage:
In the Workspace area of Mainstage, Select Tack Piano as circled on the left. I adjusted the volume of output 1-2 to around -10 to bring it roughly to the level of the other patches. Then select ScanVib on the right to access the sounds in question. This is what you’ll see:
Play with the parameters to choose the sound you like. I went with this:
There may in fact be a faster or better way, which somebody will tell me in the comments, but this was how I managed it. I went through each individual Tack Piano patch and edited. If someone is aware of a way to edit them globally for an entire act, I’d love to hear how.
Going Through the Score Number by Number:
1. Overture
Cueing the top of the overture is tricky when you’re also playing the keyboard book, because you have to give the beat in your left hand while you white hand glissando in the opposite direction with your right. Best to give a full measure ahead of time, reminding everybody that NOTHING happens in the first beat. Lock in the tempo you want for measure 8, the earlier passage makes sense a little slower, and then you’re stuck.
The balance in 8-11 is poor, you just can’t really balance xylo and piano against the rest of the orchestra. (this is probably why the piano is marked ff with a ‘loud’ indication)
The transition into the softshoe at 82 can be tricky. It may help to think of the 4/4 as basically a l’istesso from the old tempo, with the new quarter note being equal to the old half note. The poco ritard. right before it muddies those waters a bit; but you might ignore that rit. and go straight on. Woodwind 4 can be a little sluggish on the bari sax, cut those measures if they bog down the new tempo.
There is an error in the piano book in measures 111 and 112; the fourth note in each measure should be a B.
The horn rip at 115-116 is really evocative, ask the players to bring it out.
The keyboard strings make one wish for a real section, in a way that they don’t in the rest of the show. I actually made a book for a single violinist, which played along with all the string patches, and it really added a bit of verisimilitude to the patches. And since the score has mostly pads and pizzicato passages, the violin book turned out to be fairly easy, notwithstanding the show keys.
2. Wide Open Spaces Opening Vocal
If you’re playing the keyboard book, you’ll be playing the last measure of the overture, and you’ll have no time to switch to the two-beat. But it’s the same tempo, really, so just tell everybody to keep the tempo going. This makes it pretty important that you be in the wide open spaces tempo from 109 in the overture.
The bass book has an error in measure 45. The last beat should read F, not Bb.
You should work carefully to disambiguate the various versions of the number as you teach the vocals. It happens over and over and over again, with slight variations each time.
2A. Wide Open Spaces Opening
This is pretty easy going. If you didn’t hire a guitarist, this will be very bare, you’ll have to reassign the comping to the keyboard and leave the string patch out. The gunshot cue is in the patches that come from the licensing organization, but you may prefer to leave it to the sound designer. They have to do a gunshot anyway at the end of the Kansasland Dance, so you’re not really adding more work.
2AA. Robbin’ Hood Revealed
In the piano vocal score, measures 2 and 6 are laid out oddly. I moved the G flat into the left hand and crossed it out in the right. It’s laid out more sensibly in the Piano-Conductor score.
2B. Wide Open Spaces Reprise
I recommend cutting the highest tenor part here. It’s seconds against the altos and doubles the soprano part. You won’t miss it, and you won’t have parallel major seconds to tune.
Jessica has to sing badly out of tune here; it isn’t really enough for her to sing wildly erratically, the joke works only when it’s almost right. It turns out it’s actually pretty hard to sing intentionally out of tune. You may want to have your singer find a pitch to start on and then sing that same note even as the melody changes.
A big dynamic drop at 43 with a steep crescendo works really well.
The four part split at the end may be a little ambitious. If you’re cutting notes, I’d cut the A in the tenors and basses in measure 46 and the E in 47 through 49. In the Sopranos and Altos, I’d cut the Fs in 46 and the G in 47-49. Always best to have the space close to the bottom of the male voicings and have the chord in close position in the sopranos and altos.
The rit. symbol in measure 45 is in a different place in the piano conductor score and the piano vocal score. I think the piano vocal score is correct. (this also agrees with the placement in the full score)
2C. Wide Open Spaces Bows
This is one of the places where you will need to be paying close attention as the production is being blocked. Ideally “That was the conductor” comes right before the crescendo in measure 29.
Again, if you didn’t hire the guitar book, you’ll need to figure out who is going to comp. I rewrote the beginning of the number in our tech rehearsal because the staging change required more time. The dialogue times out pretty well from measure 14, but if the scene change before that takes more time, there isn’t a safety to delay measure 30, and you’ll step on the punch line. A natural solution is to repeat 6-9 and 10-13, but when vamped, that music wears out its welcome quickly. Just be aware that timing may be tricky, and train the chorus to come in no matter what in measure 30.
2D. Exit Music (Thatway)
The Piano vocal has fermatas on the first three notes, but the piano conductor does not, and neither do the full score or parts. It’s easier without the fermatas, unless you’re trying to stretch that transition for some reason.
Again, you may have trouble with this timing, because it segues directly into 2E. Here, though, there are natural places to build in vamps.
2E. Vamps
Measures 2 and 4 are listed as fermatas in the Piano Conductor score and in the full score, but not in the Piano Vocal. The measures don’t really need a fermata, and it’s actually more confusing to play them as such, because the measures don’t last long enough to warrant one. I’d try to get the actors to deliver their lines in the spaces without losing time, and tell the players to cut the fermatas.
3. What Kind of Man
This is a really fun number that the audience enjoys. It was one of the numbers written early in the development process that stayed in the show in each iteration. Kander remarked in an interview that the original lyric was “much longer and much more disgusting”
The cutoff in measure 11 is fun to try and time out.
The only real vocal challenge is remembering the difference between measures 9-10 and 18-19.
Check which lyric your director wants at 33-34.
At measure 47, the lower part is played on the bass clarinet in an awkwardly high register, and the percussionist has to switch instruments and play 3 notes on the xylo with very little time to change. This is an intentionally goofy fun-house sound, but it is a scary moment, and you may want to just add the cue for all of it to the toy piano 2 measures earlier so you’re sure it lands.
The subito piano in measure 58 is a great touch.
4. Thinking of Him
This is another of the songs that was written early and has stayed in through multiple drafts.
Aaron’s piano part is not impossible for an amateur pianist to play. If it proves challenging, have Aaron play the top (melody) line of the introductory accompaniment and have the pit pianist play the rest of it.
It took me too long to realize that Aaron is cueing Bobby’s entrance in at measure 46. It’s a nice dramatic moment too, because it’s Aaron both acting as composer and telegraphing that he still loves Georgia.
The chorus ending here is comes out of nowhere. The piano vocal has it, with the women’s part cued on the bottom and the men’s on top, which feels odd. The Piano Conductor score has it laid out the way we’re all used to. It doesn’t appear in the Script/Vocal book, so you’ll want to copy that one page out of the piano conductor score before you teach it.
5. The Woman’s Dead
This is another of the songs that have been in the show since the earliest drafts.
The Piano Conductor Score is missing the hairpins on the oo passages. The Piano Vocal and the Full Score have them.
Ask your director which lyric you’re using. There are two options in measures 30 and 32-34. The audience’s opinion of you as a music director/conductor will rise or fall based on the cutoffs to the last 4 measures. A crisp ‘d’ with a shadow vowel after it will work like a charm. If you’re conducting from the piano, you can leave out the keyboard part here, all the notes are well covered elsewhere, and your hands will be better used coordinating the cutoffs.
6. Show People
This is another of the numbers that went into the show early and stayed through multiple iterations.
We’re in Cabaret territory here, but with a twist:
The upper example is from the intro to the title song from Cabaret, transposed into F minor for comparison. The lower example is the vamp from Show People. Notice that it’s essentially the same gesture, but with the hard edges shaved off. One dynamic lower, fewer accents, a genteel thumb-line added in the left hand and a less dissonant version of both the tonic and the dominant-functioning chords. This is an example of what I referred to earlier about a vocabulary of gesture. This idea is capable of lots of different kinds of expression. Kander is capable of shading it to his needs at a given moment; here it is aggressive, commanding, but not terrifying, as we needed it to be in Cabaret.
The opening passage of the number proper is pretty low if your Cioffi is a tenor, but there isn’t much to be done about it, since the whole number keeps going up and up, so you can’t just move it into higher territory without causing other problems.
Again, ask your director which lyric you are using in measure 43. Start the tempo at measure 45 very moderately; it will make the accelerando much more effective.
Ask your director which version of measure 44 lyrics you’re using.
Measures 205-212 will take some getting used to for your orchestra. Obviously it’s much easier when you’re conducting. The l’istesso tempo at 213 is very easy once you learn to feel it, but you will crash and burn the first time you run this with the players.
This is also one of the spots in the show where there’s a big rallentando into a kickline tempo. This can be tricky, particularly if you’ve never conducted one from the piano before. (If you’re conducting with a baton, you may have an easier time of it)
Head-bob folks, try and develop a little extra head bump to subdivide the 2/4 beat, and practice coming out of the piano part into measures 224-225.
Baton people, remember that bigger isn’t always clearer. Subdivide the beat and be crisp, not big.
There are fermatas on the last two notes of 224 in the Piano Vocal, but not in the Piano Conductor scores. The rallentando situation isn’t identical in the two scores either there, but it all amounts to the same thing.
Drill the chorus in dropping that dynamic at 241 way down. Again, the crescendo will be much better coming from a very quiet dynamic. Don’t let all your sopranos sing the high A at the end.
7. Coffee Shop Nights
This is a number where you really wish the orchestra had strings, but the winds are beautifully scored here, and the combo of bass, guitar, marimba, and fake Pizz strings is a really lovely sound in the mellower sections.
It’s on the cusp of being in 4 or in 2. If your singer tends to rush, conduct it in 4. If your singer drags, conduct it in 2. Or do whatever you want!
8. Georgia Can’t Dance
The faster the better really. Teach the chorus this section right after you teach ‘Thataway’, so they can hear the difference between this and the same spot in Thataway from 242-250.
This will probably land better if you give a full measure of prep.
9. In The Same Boat #1
This is such a fun little number for the trio. The tighter the ensemble, especially in rhythm, cutoffs, and dynamics, the better this gem will hit.
10. I Miss The Music- Intro
It is preferable for the actor to actually play the piano. The part can be simplified, or you can play the tough parts from the pit and let the player get the easy parts from the stage. Even people who don’t really play can be taught a version of those arpeggios hand-over-hand. Some of the larger left hand stretches can be brought into close position up an octave and made much more playable.
The piano vocal score is missing the woodwind parts in measures 22 and 23. Piano-Conductor score has it.
At the end, I find the railroad tracks (caesura) sort of contradicts the segue as one direction, and chose to just ignore the caesura. The dialogue doesn’t really fill up the 3 measures at the top of the next number, so you will want to get things moving.
11. I Miss The Music
The B section of this song is the heart of the show, and it’s a very similar accompaniment to the opening of Coffee Shop Nights, a connection I can’t quite make sense of. If you’ve read my introductory paragraphs you know how poignantly the lyric describes Kander’s partnership with Ebb. What I’ve left out until now is how it musically references that partnership. In measures 47 and 48, Aaron plays 2 measures that strongly suggest Kander and Ebb’s first great success together:
What a lovely and touching tribute.
Measure 39-41 in the marimba in the Full Score is terribly laid out and makes no sense. In the part, though, it’s exactly as it is in the piano vocal score right hand.
47 and 48 are easily playable by almost any actor who is playing this part.
Measure 86 has a very acrobatic piano part, but you can get it if you work it a little bit. (if you’re looking at the piano conductor score, the right hand octaves are played with two hands) Since we’re in G flat here, if you hit a black note octave in each hand, you can be wrong and still sound pretty good there! Heck, you could even do a big black key gliss up and down the piano. But that would be tasteless.
12. Before Thataway
No surprises here, just a fun dance number. Keep it fast.
You can simplify the piano part in 22 and 26 by dropping the lower octave on the last 3 notes of the measure and keeping it in basically one hand position.
The saloon piano is fun to play once you get your hands around it.
13. Thataway
Again, start nice and slow so that the accelerando can be gradual and meaningful.
The straight/swung eighths marking is inconsistent.
Straight eighths appears in 16 and 17 in all the conductor and piano scores and for the WW 2 and 3 (the only players who have eighths)
After that, the markings seem to be aimed at clarity for each player, but not clarity overall.
As I understand it, basically, the woodwinds have dotted-eighth-sixteenth style swing where we’re supposed to swing, and straight eighths otherwise. The brass have swung eighths all the time (even where the piano vocal indicates otherwise). The piano vocal keeps changing the swing feel, and none of the other parts include these changes. In measures 28 and 62 the top 3 woodwinds are clearly playing the same figure as the brass, notated 2 different ways at the same time.
The piano vocal score marks:
Swing eighths at 26
Straight eighths at 32. (not marked in brass)
Swing eighths at 60
Straight eighths at 66 (not marked in brass)
Swing eighths at 70 (not marked in woodwinds)
Straight eighths at 84 (not marked in bones, but reiterated in woodwinds)
Swing eighths at 108 (not marked in brass)
Straight eighths at 114 (not marked in brass)
The truth is that your band will hear the rhythm section and adjust accordingly. But if you’re a stickler, you should go through and make decisions, maybe before you send out the books.
This number is where you’ll miss the banjo if you didn’t hire the guitar player.
You’ll want your drummer to have 4 temple blocks for mesures 8 and 9. If they don’t have it, ask if they can get 4 different sounds on different rims or by other means.
35 through 50 is one of the harder piano parts in the score and it’s very exposed. One night I accidentally advanced two patches and made a hash of this section, so atone for my sins by practicing that transition assiduously.
At 118, really drill the closing consonants and rhythmic accuracy for the tenors and basses. It’s a very effective passage.
Unless you’re a really good stride pianist, you may struggle with 134. But the bass is covering the lowest part, so you can play the off-beats instead if that makes it playable. It’s the right hand that’s important.
The piano passage at 184 is also tricky; budget some time to woodshed it.
The voice distribution at 223 and 224 is goofy. The high tenor part is the same as the women’s part. Unless you have crazy numbers of tenors, eliminate that top line and split the men’s part 3 ways instead of 4.
At 253 and 254, if you’re looking to cut down the divisi, cut out the top note in the men’s part, and the second note from the top in the women. Or just cut the second note from the top for everybody, if they’re having trouble hearing it. The piano conductor score is missing the Rit in 253, which is a critical marking! It’s a rall. in the full score, hiding down above the guitar part, so if you’re conducting from the full score, write it in on the top of page 61! This is the second big rit into a slower tempo and my comments in show people also apply here. You could conduct with your right while you play the left on the piano, or you can leave it up to the 4 instruments playing that line.
Conduct 255-258 in 4, speeding up to 259, where you switch to being in 2 again.
Again, if the cluster chord at the end gives you trouble, cut the second note from the bottom. Or cut the second note from the top for the men and the second note from the bottom for the women. It’s the parallel seconds in adjacent parts that are the trouble.
You have a line here. After Cioffi says “…Union Oyster House”, you say “Is it Manhattan?” to Cioffi.
13A. Act One Curtain
Boy is this fun (and funny).
Let the actor actually cue the band, they come in on the ‘eight’ of ‘five-six-seven-eight’.
If you’re doing what the script indicates, you’ll have to fly an actor, which means you’ll play this a bunch of times in tech as they get the lift figured out. Without making an ass of yourself, remind folks that the curtain is really supposed to hit the ground at the bottom or the left hand line, and be fully up at the top. Depending on your theatre, this may be easier said than done.
ACT II
14. Entr’acte
It wouldn’t be the end of the world to cut this Entr’acte, if for no other reason than that the show runs long. But it is a nice arrangement, and does a good job of building excitement after the intermission. You also don’t save that much time by cutting it; it’s very short.
The passage at measures 5 and 6 isn’t easy, particularly if you’ve been conducting and have to close off your fermata while playing and establishing the new tempo. It may take quite a bit of rehearsal. If your bari sax and guitar can’t feel the new tempo, cut them and have everyone come in at measure 7. If the part just won’t fit under your hands, there are a couple of ways to keep the exact sound and drop a note or two.
15. The Man is Dead
The singer is you. Be very involved in the production meetings to determine where you’re singing this, and how you’ll get there. If you perform it as written, you will cut off the fermata from the entr’acte, establish the new tempo, and have 4 measures to stand up and turn around, in my case to climb a ladder and get in position to be seen by the audience from the pit. You could also delegate someone to conduct the entr’acte without you, but that may present other problems.
Sasha is presumably Russian, but in the original cast recording, the accent is not really definable, except that it’s foreign. At any rate, the lyric doesn’t give you a lot of sounds that you can ‘Russify’.
If you’re playing the keyboard book using the patches they sell you as you conduct, you’ll have to delete the 3 sounds you don’t use when you’re singing or advance past them
In Jennifer Ashley Tepper’s book, The Untold Stories of Broadway, David Loud talks about this number.
“At the top of the second act, I would rise up on this podium and turn around and sing a song! It was such a funny idea that I would always get great laughs, even though I wasn’t particularly funny. The idea was so clever, and Scott Ellis, our director, and Rupert Holmes, our writer, made it so unexpected and delicious.”
16. He Did It
He Did It went into the show in the second draft.
Coming out of your solo in The Man is Dead, you will need to establish the new tempo: fortunately it’s l’istesso from the previous movement, so you can let the orchestra start it without you until you get back.
The trickiest thing about this number is getting out of the vamps. Depending on the staging, you should be able to get through with only 2 times through each vamp. It’s better to end early than late. If there’s music after the last line in each section, it spoils the effect. Drill the chorus that an actor says, “he/she/they did it” then the three notes of the ⅜ measure happen, and everyone says “Ah!” on the downbeat of the following measure. If you do it enough times, it will be foolproof.
There’s a caesura (railroad tracks) in the piano-conductor score and full score between measures 6 and 7 that isn’t in the piano vocal score. I don’t know whether it’s important really, but you’ll want to know about it in blocking rehearsals so you can tell the band whether to play it or not.
You’ll also want to be part of the staging discussions on is the Surprise! Sections in 13, 57, and 101. The ‘shock’ moment needs to come on the loud hit, and the blocking relates to that. Again, the ‘surprise’ marking and the cues to start the dialogue are in the Piano vocal score, but not in the Piano-conductor.
The arco bass solo at 50 is HARD! You may decide you want to give it to another instrument.
In measure 94, the parts and full score all have a fermata. The piano vocal and piano conductor scores do not. (and I don’t think it needs one)
Lots of diction/consonant drills for the chorus sections, get that whispery tone quality and mind the crescendos.
Do your best to split the chorus groups into even numbers for the last section, and drill each part of the round with the accompaniment, and then adding them together, starting with the first, doing groups one and two, then all three. It’s not as hard as it sounds, but you do really have to know the part and hold it against the others.
16a. In The Same Boat #2
Musically this In the Same Boat again reminds me of Cabaret. If I’m not mistaken, this song was originally written early in 1967 for a 1968 Ford Motors event, immediately on the heels of Cabaret, which had opened late in 1966. This might feel like a stretch, but this comparison really points up how some of the ideas in Cabaret are really more vaudeville than Weimar.
I’ve transposed the Cabaret example for comparison:
The little cymbal splash/choke makes that vaudeville flavor really pop.
17. It’s A Business
This number went into the show early and stayed through subsequent drafts.
There are a lot of words to memorize here.
The trombone 2 glissando coming from 12 into 13 is important. Here’s my recommendation. After the caesura (railroad tracks), give a downbeat in the tempo of the cut time you’re about to go into. The trombone gliss, which is technically beat 4 of the old tempo, is a half a measure worth of the new tempo. Once you do it, it’ll make sense. Giving 3 in the old tempo and then switching immediately after one beat to a new tempo seems needlessly complicated.
The vamp at 77-80 looks easy enough on the page, but it can be confusing from the standpoint of the pit players. You might actually set a number of repeats for measure 77 and go on deliberately to vamp 79 and 80 in the normal way. It sounds like the bass that changes in 78 is the last time through the pass, and that could cause your trumpets to come in wrong in the following measure.
The stagehand parts are not a walk in the part, particularly where they’ve split into 3 parts. If you’ve cast any female stagehands, (and I think you should) you’ll want to get creative about how to assign parts. Having women sing that E flat up high in head voice isn’t really the vibe, but the low G might not have a lot of body if you have them sing it in the lower register.
In the Piano/Vocal version of the score, the right and left hand step on each other in measures 206 and 207. Just play the right and the descending bass there, leave off the back-beats.
The Ka-Ching sound effect that comes with the mainstage files you buy from the licensing people is really cool, and is on the A and B at the bottom of the keyboard. You’ll have to get the band to cut off really short at the top of 210 if you want the audience to hear it. You also have to let your banjo player and your first trumpet know that you need beats 2 and 3 clear, because the banjo has a gliss and the trumpet has a doit, which both players may instinctively start before beat 4.
18. Kansasland
Another place where you wish there was a fiddle in the pit.
The harmonica patch in the keyboard book is really fun to play, and the combo at 41 is one of the most delightful sounds I’ve ever gotten to play in a pit.
I’m not interested in getting into arguments here, but I strongly advise you to use the alternate text for Randy and eliminate the Native American character in the dance break. The lines they send you don’t line up exactly with the original text, you’ll need to make some choices about how they go.
Then this Saint Louis Woman came a-knocking at the door
A former farmer’s daughter gussied up in Haute Couture.
At first the mounted cavalry thought she was hot to trot
She picked bad guy Rob Hood to tie his noose or tie the knot.
(it’s that last line that doesn’t really scan right. Bad Guy sits wrong on the stress of the measure, especially at speed)
18A. Kansasland Dance
This is a great dance break, but if you find it’s too long, there are plenty of places to make sensible cuts, because it organizes itself into very discrete sections.
19. She Did It (Reprise)
This is one of my favorite reprises; it’s such a fun joke.
20. I Miss The Underscoring
Again, we wish we had real strings. Very straightforward cue.
21. Thinking of Missing the Music
Yet another spot where we wish we had some strings!
Note that the lyric is ‘the music I make with you’ this time around.
22. A Tough Act to Follow
This number is a cousin of Singin’ in the Rain. (transposed for comparison, transcription is mine, the iconic intro for the Gene Kelly version is not in the published sheet music)
Tough Act to Follow went into the show early and stayed through multiple drafts. I think they were fond of this number because it is included in the 2004 Kander and Ebb anthology as the only song from Curtains, which was then in development.
The various scores disagree in notating swung eighths versus dotted eight-sixteenth note swing. The effect is the same.
Our Cioffi found the opening of this number too low, so I moved it up a step, switching back to the show key at 22A. If you do that, though, Niki has to sing C# for the first note of 22A.
22A. A Tough Act to Follow Dance
This really is a beautiful dance sequence, very fun to play and well orchestrated. The sax choir at 149 is terrifically scored.
The transition into 3 at 100 will take some getting used to, both in dance rehearsal and with the orchestra. If you’re conducting from the piano, The harp figure that leads into 100 is probably a two handed affair, which will leave you with only a head nod to get the point across. If I’m not mistaken, though, the new quarter is pretty close to the old eighth, if that helps your players.
At 121, it says dictated, but unless the choreography is trying to hit something very particular that need to be out of tempo, I’d just conduct it really clearly in 4, to set up the tempo primo at 123 correctly.
From 147-169, the keyboard part is in that classic piano obbligato a la Ferrante and Teicher. If you are an improviser, there are some ways to open these out a little even, provided you stay in the spaces the orchestrator has made for these phrases.
The chorus vocals at the end are mislabeled in the parts. They are correctly labeled in the Piano Vocal score, with the women on the top part and the men on the bottom. You’ll save yourself a lot of time in the music rehearsal if you tell them to relabel that right away.
We found this choral part a little difficult, because we didn’t have a huge chorus, and this section needs a big MGM sound. If you have the resources to put backstage voices on this, you should, but of course this show is huge and you’ll probably be strapped for mics as it is. They’ll need to be on monitor to be in time. Just another of the many places you’ll want to be really engaged in the production meetings.
If you choose to cut a note here and there from the harmony, I recommend taking a note from one of the seconds. Obviously, if you have the voices (and the ears) it’s better to have all the parts covered.
Stomp, Hop, slap, step, slap, step, stamp is really tough to say! Make it part of your warm-up!
22B. Eerie Sounds from the Pit
It isn’t important that the actual sounds you hear from the pit are the ones listed. You can have fun here, as long as you don’t overdo it. Ideally you have a pit with access from the back, technically an actor should emerge from there.
22C. Johnny’s Death
Clarity is important here. Don’t be afraid to cut a player if they can’t play the passages cleanly; there’s a lot of doubling. If you’re conducting from the keyboard, you might leave out the organ chord in the first measure and try for a clean beat instead.
22D. In the Same Boat #3
This is supposed to be pre-recorded. It’s a better effect if you do, but you’ll have to do it at an orchestra rehearsal, and that will require some legwork you’ll need to bring the sound person in on. Again, another thing to bring up early in a production meeting. It’s only the drums, piano, bass, and chorus, so you could in fact bring the drummer and bass player in early and do it without the other pit players there.
22E. In the Same Boat #4
This will also need to be pre-recorded. See notes above.
23. In the Same Boat #5
It’s tough to establish the new tempo at measure 3. Get your drummer on the same page and hope for the best. Again, if you’re conducting from the keys, you might lay out for at least the first two measures to make the tempo clear.
23. Something Fast
Another brief number with a ridiculous premise. Play as fast as you can play cleanly. The piano part could come in the second time to add some variety if you liked.
24. In The Same Boat- Complete
Kander at one point commented that this number does double duty as the 11:00 number for both Cioffi and the show within the show.
If you have Cioffi sing what he’s assigned on the page, it’s the most difficult part of the show for him, and quite difficult to remember, particularly in context with all the other things he has to remember. But you could also just have him improvise bringing everything together. He’s essentially toggling back and forth between all the various versions. You’ll have to break them into 2 parts at 84. I chose to put the sopranos and tenors on group 1 and the altos and basses on group 2, for range reasons. If you’ve taught the earlier versions well, these parts should fit together like a glove, except at the modulation point at 114. That will take a little drilling.
25. Wide Open Spaces-Sung Bows
This is similar, but not identical to the other versions. For one thing, Georgia sings it correctly!
25A. The Company Exits
The timing of this underscore takes a little finessing; it doesn’t quite line up with the landmarks the way it appears on the page. There’s very little happening at 9, it’s easy to get disoriented somehow. From 25 on, particularly at 40, the balance with the guitar is tricky to manage. When the piano comes in at 44, playing a viola pizz patch, you’ll feel like it’s barely holding together. I like an underscore that stays in the background, but this one is so minimalist, you might feel like it isn’t there at all.
After the number is over, you have a line.
“We are excused, Inspector General?”
26. Show People Reprise
That opening note may just be in the brain of your Carmen, but if not, you’ll need to find a way to cue it subtly.
26a. Transition to Stage
This is pretty straightforward. Your brass will feel like that MGM passage up top needs to be big, but you’re trying to stay under the dialogue. If that proves impossible, put a fermata on the timpani roll in the first measure with an fp marking, and just delay measure 2 and following a little to clear the dialogue and give Cioffi more time for his costume change.
In measure 49, the timing is different for the chorus.
There’s another gunshot cue in measure 64 you may want the sound people to take care of.
26b. Robbin’ Hood Revealed
Very very similar to 2aa, except for one odd trombone measure in the middle, and the substitution of Trombone 2 for Reed 4 to make time for an instrument change.
27. A Tough Act Finale
Again, there’s ways to cut notes, particularly in measures 8, 23, and 24. You can cut the bottom note for the tenors and basses in measure 26 a d the top note in 27 and 28 if you like.
The timing for the chorus here is unfortunately not the same as the other version, so you’ll have to work to get those two versions straight.
TOUGH ACT DANCE:
YOU and I
WE could be a
TOUGH act to follow
(rest) can’t you see?
TOUGH ACT FINALE
(one) You and I
(one) We could stay a
TOUGH (rest) act (rest) to follow
(rest) in every way!
If you run these back to back, particularly in the week before you open, things will go much better.
28. Bows (short Version)
I remember the first time I conducted a group of pros in a pit and I came across one of these woodwind passages like we have here at the beginning of this number. I chose a midtempo because it looked hard to me. An old pro said, “You know, Peter, we play this lick all the time, it’s really easy. Go ahead and do it fast”. The nice thing about a cliche is that everybody knows it.
These bows are set up to go with characters. The characters are listed in the Piano Vocal and not in the Piano Conductor Scores or Full Scores. Record this and let your director or choreographer know who is supposed to come in where. You can cut from 115-123 if your Cioffi isn’t a household name. 9 measures is a long time to bow if you’re not David Hyde Pierce.
29. Bows Vocal
The transition from 28 into 29 can be daunting. Everyone is amped up and they may miss the cue. You’ll want to drill measures 129 and 130 in no. 28. 129 is a big set of four upbeats to the big downbeat on 130. But remind the chorus that there’s one more note, in the bari sax, timpani, and floor tom on beat 2 before they come in.
The last long note is one of the spots where I play the chord and tell everyone to pick a note in the chord that feels good and sing loud.
30. Exit Music
Fast is best!
Measure 41 is hard for the pianist, but if you can improvise at all, there’s other things you might do here. 45 is fun if you do it hand over hand.
Pit Orchestra Considerations:
For Villanova’s production I was fortunate to be able to hire all the books for this show. Or perhaps I should say almost all the books. My keyboard 1 player took another job at the last minute and I had to conduct from the piano. This is totally doable, but if you are using the patches the Keyboard 1 book requires, you will have to cobble together a new score from the part and the piano conductor score, because the piano conductor score does not contain every note and patch change included in the keyboard book, and the keyboard book does not contain a great deal of the information you need to cue the show. It took me about 3 hours with the copy machine, tape, and scissors to make my book. If you don’t hire every other book, though, you will need to enhance the part to fill in some of the missing parts.
The drum book is essential, but the percussion book is not critically important. We rented a malletkat, because bringing in all the mallet instruments would have taken up a third of the pit space. An acoustic bass is also pretty important in a dance show like this. Although the guitar book enhances the rhythm section considerably, particularly when the banjo comes in, the show would work pretty well without it. Reed 1 and 3 are full of very important things. Reed 2 and 4 are less critical. Reed 4 has bassoon in it, and reed 2 has oboe and english horn. I tried very hard to get doublers in Philly but couldn’t contract anyone, so I moved the oboe and english horn to clarinet and the basson into bass clarinet. I transposed them for the players, and I’m pretty quick, but it took a while. The books work well that way, but we miss that classical sound of the double reeds, especially in the absence of any strings. Someone out there is wondering why I didn’t ditch the clarinets and saxes in those books instead, but this show is really a sax clarinet show with a smattering of double reeds for character, not the other way around. If you were to hire two extra players to play the double reed parts of those books, they’d be very bored for most of the show. Trombone 2 has some important slides in various places, and although it’s marked to have a tuba doubling, that is in no way necessary. The horn parts are colorful and have some characteristic rips in the Kansasland sections. As always, you have to think about the brass as a unit; you don’t want a trumpet blasting away up high without anyone filling in things below. The balance is bad.
I hope you have as wonderful a time in your production as we did!
Music Directing the School Musical 