In this special 5 minute segment, I talk about our latest Bracket Challenge now in its fifth edition. This time we are featuring Broadway shows from “The Golden Age” which we are here defining as beginning with Oklahoma! in 1943 through the year 1964. Consider it like a ‘People’s Choice Award’ where you determine the criteria. You can base it however you see fit – like best production, songs, story, or any combination of factors. You might even choose your favorite based on a special experience you had while seeing the show or listening to the cast album.
You can take a look at the complete 64 show seedings comprising 4 regions and vote on your favorites.
TRANSCRIPT:
Welcome to this special edition of On Broadway on Broadway is the podcast of soundsofbroadway.com. You 24/7 online Broadway radio station playing the best from off Broadway, Broadway and the London stage music. You are familiar with well known tunes, but also music from obscure shows or maybe shows you’re not that familiar with. If you have not listen to Sounds of Broadway. Give it a try. My name is Stuart Brown and for this special edition of on Broadway, I’m gonna be talking about our current bracket challenge and that is what is your favorite musical from the Golden Age?
So, what is a bracket challenge? Well, think of the NCAA men or women’s national championship tournament. You have 64 teams and they’re all seeded four different regions. Well, that’s what we’ve replicated for our bracket challenge. We have four regions. We have 64 musicals from the Golden Age and I’ll talk about the Golden age in just a second. So we have 193 teams. We go down to 3216, 84 and then the final pairing to come up with. What is your favorite musical from the golden era? The bracket challenge will run through the second week of April.
For information. Just go to soundsofbroadway.com. Right on the front page of the website is a link to the bracket challenge. I’m gonna talk a little bit more about it, but all the pairings are right there and you can see what you are in store for. So far. We have had a lot of great comments from participants. I hope you will too. So each week you’ll pick the winners in head to head matchups again, just like March Madness until we come down to our ultimate pairing for the purposes of our bracket challenge.
We are defining the Golden age of musicals beginning with the Rogers and Hammerstein Classic, Oklahoma in 1943 going through about 1964. So consider this like a People’s Choice Award, you determine the criteria you can base it on however you see fit best production, the songs, the story, any combination of factors. We’ve also linked to the play Bills for each of the teams and also to youtube where you can listen to the cast recording for all the shows that have been selected. So I’ve been mentioning the golden age. What exactly am I talking about?
Well, I’m gonna be quoting from a Broadway world. com article that appeared online on February 22nd, 2022. So the Golden Age is widely regarded as the greatest period of growth for musical theater as an art form. We all know that musicals existed long before the golden age with operettas and vaudeville style shows being some of the most popular forms of entertainment of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Showboat broke that mold in 1927 when it introduced a more narrative style storytelling, integrating its book with its musical elements.
For the first time, song and dance were weaved into the plot, furthering the story or character development. Instead of just stopping the action for a musical interlude, it took another decade for this book musical revolution to fully catch on ushering the start of the Golden Age of the Broadway musical. During this period, musical theater took center stage in popular culture, rapidly gaining visibility worldwide and influence on television, film and popular music. As I said, I’m starting off with Oklahoma in 1943. And I think most people agree that that was the beginning of the Golden Age of the Broadway musical.
That show ran for an unprecedented 2212 performances and triggered a change in musicals that would remain for decades to come. Broadway boomed in post World War Two America as audiences were looking for escapism and could finally afford it. On the other side of the Great Depression, this outlook shaped the style of musicals of the Golden Age, which had become known for their lush orchestrations, dreamy dance sequences and generally happy endings as attitudes changed in the 19 sixties. So did Broadway usher in the time of the concept musical or one in which a concept or theme takes precedent.
And the end of the Golden Age fiddler on the roof, which opened on Broadway in 1964 is widely considered to be the final musical of Broadway’s Golden Age and Fiddler is included in our bracket challenge. So go to soundsofbroadway.com. Take the bracket challenge, tell us what you think are the best musicals of the Golden Age. Again, we have brackets that are unveiled each week. Share your thoughts with us on social media. Tell us why you voted for the winners or what you think of our bracket seedings.
We’d also appreciate for you to spread the word to your friends and fellow enthusiasts. We have a feedback form on the bracket challenge so you could also let us know. And lastly if you wanna stay up to date with everything that goes on. In soundsofbroadway.com, you can subscribe to our weekly E newsletter. You can get the latest on what cast albums we have added to our playlist. Any revisions or additions to our programming schedule, new features we have on Sounds of Broadway. You can do that by going again to our web website, soundsofbroadway.com. There’s a link on that front page to sign up to our weekly E newsletter. So that’s it for this special edition of on Broadway. Hope you enjoy the bracket challenge. Let’s see what your favorite is. And if that’s gonna be among our final two pairings, my name is Stuart Brown. I hope you will join me each day on soundsofbroadway.com where you hear the best from off Broadway, Broadway and the London Stage. No business, like show business, like no business. I know everything about.
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