It could have been excruciating: a historical epic told through rap and show tunes. But Lin-Manuel Miranda’s show became a sensation and its million-selling cast album is a triumph in its own right
You don’t have to have an implacable loathing for musicals to find Hamilton – or indeed the very concept of hip-hop-based musical theatre – a slightly troubling concept, at least on paper. You just have to have a working knowledge of the musical’s historically strained relationship with pop music. Musical theatre is a pretty genteel and august tradition, which has spent the last 50 years struggling, and usually failing, to co-opt pop music successfully: from Hair – the kitschy sound of a well-meaning but galumphing auntie trying to grasp the late 60s counterculture – to the excruciating moment during Starlight Express when the roller-skate-sporting cast start rapping, to umpteen horrendous jukebox musicals, crowbarring the hits in by any means necessary.
Related: Soldier, financial guru and hip-hop legend: who was the real Hamilton?
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