The University of Kansas
School of Fine Arts
Lawrence, KS 66045
785.864.3421
Photos courtesy of University Archives, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas
“Musical Theater in 1957”
A Symposium Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of Murphy Hall
Sponsored by:
KU Department of Music & Dance and
Department of Theatre & Film
With additional funding from:
The Hall Center for the Humanities
The Office of the Provost
Hosted by:
Paul Laird, Professor of Musicology
John Staniunas, Chair of Department of Theatre & Film; Associate Professor of Directing, Acting, Movement and Musical Theatre
Friday, 9 November 2007:
8:30 – 10:30 AM
“The Music Man in History and Practice” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Ketty Wong (University of Kansas), moderator
Paul Laird (University of Kansas), “Broadway in 1957 and The Music Man”
John Staniunas (University of Kansas), “Notes on a Production of The Music Man”
Carol Dunevant (Frank Simon Band), “And There He Stood With His Piccolo: Meredith Willson and the American Concert Band”
Roberta Freund Schwartz (University of Kansas), “Iowa Stubborn: Repetition and Recitational Song in Meredith Willson's Musical Characterization of his Fellow Iowans”
10:30 – 10:45 AM
Break
10:45 AM – 11:45 PM
“Rodgers and Hammerstein and the Musical in 1957” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Mechele Leon (University of Kansas), moderator
Jim Lovensheimer (Vanderbilt University), “’When The Children Are Asleep’: Carousel in 1957”
Graham Wood (Coker College), “Ten Minutes, Fifty Years, and Sixteen Measures Ago: Musical Structures and Narrative Threads in Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella”
11:45 AM
Lunch
1:00 – 2:45 PM
Masterclass for Singers with Leslie Bennett, Assistant Professor, Department of Theatre & Film (The Robert Baustian Theatre)
1:00 – 2:45 PM
“Vignettes in the Musical Theater in 1957: Session 1” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
John Staniunas (University of Kansas), moderator
Thomas Riis (University of Colorado at Boulder), “Frank Loesser’s The Most Happy Fella: Broadway Musical or Broadway Opera?”
Judith Sebesta (University of Missouri at Columbia), “Ziegfeld, Bagley, Sillman, and Cranko: The Revue in 1957 (It Only SOUNDS Like a Law Firm!)”
William Harvill (University of Kansas), “Li’l Abner: From Comic Strip to Stage”
3:00 – 4:45 PM
Masterclass for Singers with Julia Broxholm, Assistant Professor, Department of Music & Dance (The Robert Baustian Theatre)
3:00 – 3:45 PM
Recital of Music by Leonard Bernstein (Swarthout Recital Hall)
University of Kansas Chamber Choir – John Paul Johnson, director
Stephanie Zelnick, clarinet; Ellen Bottorff, piano
Russell Ronnebaum, piano
3:45 – 4:00 PM
Break
4:00 – 5:30 PM
“The Musical Theater of Leonard Bernstein” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Paul Laird (University of Kansas), moderator
William Everett (University of Missouri-Kansas City), “Candide and the Tradition of American Operetta”
Mandy Whitaker (Jenks, Oklahoma), “Bernstein and Theater Dance in West Side Story”
Elizabeth Wells (Mount Allison University), “Mambo! West Side Story and the Hispanic”
5:30 PM
Reception (Outside of Swarthout Recital Hall)
7:30 PM
The Music Man (Crafton-Preyer Theatre)
Saturday, 10 November 2007
8:45 – 10:15 AM
“Vignettes in the Musical Theater in 1957: Session 2” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Roberta Freund Schwartz (University of Kansas), moderator
Jennifer Oates (Queens College, CUNY), “Brigadoon: Lerner and Loewe’s Scotland”
Ann Sears (Wheaton College, MA), “It Could Only Happen in Paris: Gershwin + Astaire + Hepburn = Funny Face”
Jessica Sternfeld (Rhode Island College), “Damn Yankees and the 1950s Man: You Gotta Have (Integrity, Loyalty, An Escape Clause, and) Heart”
10:15 – 10:30 AM
Break
10:30 AM – 11:30 AM
“Vignettes in the Musical Theater in 1957, Session 3: A Roundtable Discussion of Other Shows” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Paul Laird, moderator, with brief presentations by members of MUSC 940, a seminar on the Broadway musical in the 1950s, meeting Fall Semester 2007.
11:30 AM – 12:30 PM
“Leonard Bernstein, Session 2” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Charles Freeman (University of Kansas), moderator
Tony Bushard (University of Nebraska at Lincoln), “From the Waterfront to the West Side”
Erica Argyropoulos (University of Kansas), “Broadway, Bernstein, and Brandeis University”
12:30 PM
Lunch
1:30 – 3:00 PM
Keynote Address and Discussion (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Carol J. Oja (William Powell Mason Professor of Music, Harvard University)
(Sponsored by the Hall Center for the Humanities)
Introduced by Jasonne M. Grabher, Associate Director, Hall Center for the Humanities
“On the Edge of the Sixties: Looking Back at West Side Story and The Music Man”
Carol J. Oja is William Powell Mason Professor of Music and Acting Chair of the History of American Civilization at Harvard University. She is at work on a book titled Bernstein on Broadway, to be published by Yale University Press in the “Broadway Masters” series. Her book, Making Music Modern: New York in the 1920s (Oxford University Press, 2000), won the Lowens Book Award from the Society for American Music and an ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award. Her other books include: Aaron Copland and His World (co-edited with Judith Tick for the Bard Festival; Princeton University Press), Colin McPhee: Composer in Two Worlds (University of Illinois Press), A Celebration of American Music: Words and Music in Honor of H. Wiley Hitchcock (co-edited with R. Allen Lott and Richard Crawford; University of Michigan Press), and American Music Recordings: A Discography of 20th-Century U.S. Composers (ISAM Monographs). She was one of the directors for Harvard’s “Leonard Bernstein—Boston to Broadway,” a conference and festival that took place in October 2006.
3:00 – 4:00
Voice Recital – “Music Theater of 1957” (Swarthout Recital Hall)
Paul Laird, host
Leslie Bennett, soprano; John Staniunas, tenor (Dept. of Theatre & Film)
Julia Broxholm, soprano; Genaro Méndez, tenor (Dept. of Music & Dance)
Mark Ferrell (Dept. of Music and Dance)
5:00 PM
Re-Dedication of Murphy Hall for the Fiftieth Anniversary (Murphy Hall Courtyard)
7:30 PM
The Music Man (Crafton-Preyer Theatre)
Paul Laird is Professor of Musicology at the University of Kansas and Director of the Musicology Division. He teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in music history and directs the Instrumental Collegium Musicum. His books include: Towards A History of the Spanish Villancico (Harmonie Park), Leonard Bernstein: A Guide to Research (Routledge), and The Baroque Cello Revival: An Oral History (Scarecrow). With William Everett, he has co-edited The Cambridge Companion to the Musical (to appear in second edition in 2008) and co-written The Historical Dictionary of the Broadway Musical (forthcoming from Scarecrow). Laird won a KU William T. Kemper Teaching Award in 2002 and is active as a Baroque cellist, playing with the Spencer Consort.
John Staniunas is the Chair of the Department of Theatre and Film at the University of Kansas and an Associate Professor of Directing, Acting, Movement and Musical Theatre. He is a professional director and choreographer with a long list of credits from regional and university theatres. He has staged over 100 musicals and plays from original works to classics. Credits include directing/choreography at Milwaukee Repertory Theatre and Madison Repertory Theatre in Wisconsin, The Willows Theatre and the Sacramento Theatre Company and Contra Costa Music Theatre in California, The Hippodrome State Theatre in Florida and the Gaslight Theatre in Tucson, AZ. John is also a professional actor and a 20 year member of A.E.A., the Actor’s Equity Association. He is currently writing a book on musical theatre performance techniques entitled Sing Me a Story, Tell Me a Song: Notes on Musical Theatre.
