As
most people know, I love exposing my boys to a wide variety of music. I take a lot of pride in the fact that we
listen to everything from "Sit Down John" from the musical “1776” and
in the same session, A Tribe Called Quest’s “Scenario”. Or on some days our playlist includes tracks
that take us all over the musical map: City and Colour’s “The Grand Optimist”
or the band Typhoon’s song “Common Sentiments”.
The
boys' musical interests have recently evolved from the pop-singer songwriters
of Gavin DeGraw, Shawn Mendes and Ed Sheeran to pop-themed musicals. I believe there is still room on their
playlists for the new Jason Mraz song “Have it All”, but right now their heads
are filled with the lyrics of “Dear Evan Hansen”, “Rent”, “Wicked” and a
musical you may have heard of about the life of an American Founding
Father. A majority of the songs from
these shows are far more progressive than I would have ever given credit. I grew up listening to what I would call
traditional musicals, “The Music Man” and “Bye Bye Birdie” and then for a brief
period there was “Grease” but like many
families fully immersed in “Hamilton”, I am learning that if writing a
ground-breaking musical was easy, almost everyone would do it.
As
I listened to some of the songs from these soundtracks for the 4,000th time, I
am finally realizing that these musicals are a new form of pop music. The songs are catchy, short, simple and
melodic. They are generally between 2 ½ and 5 ½ minutes long and aim to satisfy
a broad audience.
When
asked by John Istel in the publication 'American Theatre', "Do you see
your music as part of the American musical theatre tradition?" Jonathan Larson the songwriter behind the
musical “Rent” responded, "My whole thing is that American popular music
used to come from theatre and Tin Pan Alley, and there’s no reason why
contemporary theatre can’t reflect real contemporary music, and why music
that’s recorded or that’s made into a video cannot be from a show." ‘Rent’
opened on Broadway in 1996 and is known as the “original rock musical” – a
modern retelling of Puccini’s “La Boheme”.
Lin-Manuel Miranda channels that same energy with 2015’s
“Hamilton”. And just like Larson’s
character Roger’s “One Song Glory” can be a conduit to Jon Bon Jovi’s 1990 song
“Blaze Of Glory” (which went to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and the
Mainstream rock chart in 1990), when I listen to Hercules Mulligan’s rap in “My
Shot”, I can hear Busta Rhymes in Leaders of the New School and their song
“What’s Next” (which peaked at No. 1 on the Hot Rap Singles chart in 1993).
I
am not sure where my boys’ musical tastes will segue-way from this point in
their lives, but they have been enjoying some 1990s alternative rock
recently. In heavy rotation in my car is
Buffalo Tom’s “Big Red Letter Day”.
The record clocks in at just over 41 minutes and with 11 songs that
comes out to approximately 4 minute songs.
Thanks
for reading!
