Talk:Songs for a New World

Musical Breakdown
It seems to me that this section is POV and needs references and to be reworked. -Broadwaygal 18:42, 19 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I took out some of the POV language and changed the heading. It's a start on an analysis of the piece.  More could be said about the musical styles.  A section could be added describing the main themes and characters discussed in the songs.  Of course there could be more on how the piece came to be written, and more about productions.  A google search should turn up more references with information.  -- Ssilvers 01:40, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

This Phrase doesn't ring true..."The music of Songs for a New World is heavily influenced by a broad range of musical genres, including pop, gospel, jazz and classical music, making the work an example of musical pastiche." I disagree in that I don't think a work influenced by other styles makes it ipso facto a "pastiche" 70.18.63.191 (talk) 23:36, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Musical Numbers
I am wondering if anyone has an opinion about describing the "plot" of this piece? Each song is self-contained. I am wondering if each description should go next to the song, or in its own separate section? Thanks --Broadwaygal 18:04, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Opera/Operetta
Material in section Analysis (formerly History) starting with "Songs for a new world is also often considered and grouped with being a musical theater production and while it meets the requirements for this title, it also meets the requirements of a opera..." was added on April 1, 2012. I have left the material as is, but added an Original Research template to the section. (I moved everything else in that section to Production, and deleted the duplicate material.)

I do not know enough about opera/operetta to have an informed opinion, but when a reviewer writes "...a musical revue that shows Brown to be a capable songwriter of the Alan Menken school: commercial show-tune pop with palatable sentiment and easy-to-take melody.... 'Songs for a New World' seems to contain more cabaret convention and pianobar posing than any one revue should have to withstand." (Variety in Production section), that says to me that this is probably NOT an opera/operetta. Thoughts?

I also note that the Musical numbers section is very hard to read (fro me) and certainly contains A LOT of description of the songs...thoughts??

(Will be in and out all week, may get back to this by April 7 or 8.)Flami72 (talk) 14:58, 2 April 2012 (UTC)
 * RE Musical numbers section: I moved Act 2 to follow Act 1 but otherwise did no editing.
 * RE opera/operetta question, I added a reference from guidetomusicaltheatre and also a link to Brown's own liner notes for the recording, neither of which says anything at all about this being anything close to an opera/operetta. Flami72 (talk) 21:04, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

I would suggest the label Song Cycle rather than opera or operetta. While the line between musical theater and opera is fairly fluid, I can't think of any piece that less resembles an opera than "Songs for a New World." There's more to an opera than just a Musical that doesn't have dialogue: I think it's about things like the style of composition, the size of the voices and orchestra, the way it uses music to tell a plot. There are small operas, of course, and plenty of operas have dialogue (such as The Magic Flute by Mozart) but operatic musicals are generally huge things like "Sweeney Todd" and "Les Miserables", and (as much as it pains me to admit it) "The Phantom of the Opera". As for "Operetta", the classic definition is a comic opera that may be operatic in scale but features more musical theater elements (such as characters intended to be purely comic relief.) A good example is something like Oklahoma!: it's an epic show that calls for a huge cast but can also be done very small, and the material runs from very musical comedy stuff for Ali Hackem and Ado Annie to more classical styles for Laurey and Curley. Just because "Songs for a New world" has no dialogue does not make it operatic...I'd call it more of a musical review or, since all the songs are thematically related, a song cycle. The lack of a of connected plot in "Songs for a New World." Thus, I'm deleting the opera references in the analysis. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.42.240.5 (talk) 00:20, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Copy violation
The Synopsis added on June 17, 2013 by User talk:‎74.102.50.82 was a cut-and-paste from the MTI Shows synopsis at [], and a copy violation. I deleted that synopsis per WP:COPY and will notify the IP. (This is the 4th article I found from this IP, with a cut-and-paste Synopsis from MTI Shows.) Flami72 (talk) 10:57, 18 June 2013 (UTC)