Adjudicating Music Theater Singing
2012; Routledge; Volume: 68; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2769-4046
Autores Tópico(s)Theater, Performance, and Music History
ResumoHAVE YOU HEARD? NATS is sponsoring its first-ever national music theater singing competition, which will culminate in Orlando, Florida at our 2012 Conference! As Chair of the NATS Music Theater Advisory Committee, I am extremely excited about this event, since it will acknowledge and embrace nationally an important musical art form as well as expand our organizations sphere of musical influence. At the same time, I am well aware that this event challenges the Associations historic roots of supporting NATSAA (National Association of Teachers of Singing Artist Awards) as being our featured and only singing competition. Our actions might be perceived as similar to a prestigious and respected national dance association which, after sponsoring a long-running ballet competition, suddenly includes simultaneously a hip hop competition. Our NATS Music Theater Competition (NMTC), however, did not just come out of the blue. Music theater has been around for well over one hundred years, and NATS chapter and regional events throughout the country have recognized MT's popularity and value by including a Music Theater category in their Student Auditions. Thanks in large part to Dr. Scott McCoy's vision, recent NATS national conferences have celebrated diversity in the singing genres, including those in music theater, and have explored the pedagogies that support those genres. Many NATS members have responded enthusiastically to the variety of singing styles featured, while others have lamented the diluting of our heretofore primarily classical focus. Despite these dissenting voices, the call for a NATS national music theater competition has been heard and acted upon. So how do we get ready for the party? NATS's sponsorship of this historic event should prompt a closer examination on how we adjudicate music theater singing on the local, regional, and national levels. The primary challenge is with the category itself since there is no one specific music theater singing genre. Unlike classical, which has a more standardized voice production (a variety of apples, if you will), music theater has apples and oranges, peaches and pears, watermelons and kiwis-in other words, a veritable fruit salad of singing styles that include pop, rock, jazz, blues, gospel, classical, folk, R & B, punk, country, big band, emo, hip hop, soul, rap, salsa, legit, and reggae. Broadway singing embraces at one end of the spectrum the character Christine and her classical-like, CT-dominant (head voice) legit singing in Lloyd-Webber's Phantom of the Opera, and at the other end, the character Elphaba and her pop/rock, TA-dominant (chest voice) belt singing in Schwartz's Wicked. A potential dilemma in the adjudication process is that classically informed NATS judges without much music theater experience might be inclined to value, all things being equal (i.e., talent, musicality, voice quality, stage presence, acting skills), Christine's singing over Elphaba's singing since Christine matches more closely the classical aesthetic. If this bent in judging carries up to and through the national finals, the NATS Music Theater competition could end up sounding like a NATSAA clone reflecting more the Golden Age of musicals past rather than the current Broadway scenario, which is literally Bach to rock. How then can we level the adjudication playing field so that the great variety of MT vocal sounds can hold similar if not equal value? Fortunately for some in NATS, the playing field is already fairly level, and most styles are listened to with an informed aesthetic that can delineate among other things, healthy and unhealthy voice production, weak and strong interpretation, and appropriate and inappropriate style choices within each music theater singing style. …
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