Arts. Theatre, Opera and Dance in the USA. The MusicalTheater of the United States is based in the Western tradition. It divides into 3 groups: 1. Broadway, Broadway Avenue, New York. 2. Off-Broadway, NY, Manhattan, elsewhere. 3. Off-off-Broadway, very small theaters, out of the way. Playwrights: Theater of the United States did not take on a unique dramatic identity until the emergence of the father of American drama Eugene O'Neill in the early twentieth century. O'Neill is a four-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for drama and the only American playwright to win the Nobel Prize for literature. After O'Neill, American drama came of age and flourished with the likes of Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams, Lillian Hellman, William Inge, and Clifford Odets during the first half of the twentieth century. After this fertile period, American theater broke new ground, artistically, with the absurdist forms of Edward Albee in the 1960s. Social commentary has also been a preoccupation of American theater, often addressing issues not discussed in the mainstream. The United States is also the home and largest exporter of modern musical theater, producing such musical talents as Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Leonard Bernstein, George and Ira Gershwin, Kander and Ebb, and Stephen Sondheim. (Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical – humor, pathos, love, anger – are communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an integrated whole.) e.g. Oklahoma! is the first musical written by the team of composer Richard Rodgers and librettist Oscar Hammerstein II. The musical is based on Lynn Riggs' 1931 play, Green Grow the Lilacs. (1943) Broadway is one of the largest theater communities in the world and is the epicenter of American commercial theater. Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text (called a libretto) and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance. The performance is typically given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble. The Metropolitan Opera (the "Met") is an opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. The company's origins were in the late 19th century as an alternative to the previously established Academy of Music opera house. The Metropolitan Opera is the largest classical music organization in North America. It presents about 27 different operas each year in a season which lasts from late September through May. Dance The United States is represented by various genres of dance, from ballet to hip-hop. USA is the home of the hip hop dance and its derivative Rock and Roll, and one of the major centers for modern dance. There is a variety of social dance and concert or performance dance forms with also a range of traditions of Native American dances. Noted Dancers:Isadora Duncan (Born in California, she lived in Western Europe and the Soviet Union from the age of 22 until her death at age 50. She performed to acclaim throughout Europe after being exiled from the United States for her pro-Soviet sympathies.) Martha Graham was an American modern dancer and choreographer whose influence on dance has been compared with the influence Picasso had on the modern visual arts, Stravinsky had on music, or Frank Lloyd Wright had on architecture.
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