Musical Theatre is a genre which I have for a long time looked at with a certain disdain. As much as I grew up enjoying the campiness of Rocky Horror and the surreal childlike-creepiness of Nightmare Before Christmas, most musicals got the phooey from me. The songs seemed predictable, corny, and everyone sings with that shit-eating tone of voice. Recently however, I have become aquainted with the works of Broadway Musical composer Stephen Sondheim, whose musicals are to musical theatre what Rush is to AC/DC.
His most well known works, such as "Sweeney Todd" and "Into the Woods" are lyric operas, in which the majority of the dialogue is sang rather than spoken. But this is no "Luck be a Lady Tonight" singing. This is operatic melodrama. Highly stylized phrasings, with characters singing over each other in the most interesting ways. For fans of music's nerd-potential, most definitely a listen is in order. Sondheim uses counterpoint like Bach, but his sense of lyricism and storytelling are very post-modern.
Check his stuff out and you'll surely see that there is a progressive direction in musical theatre that has certainly swayed my cynicism and may change your mind too.
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