From the beginning of the Republic, musical theater formed an integral part of American culture, and after the Civil War, New York City became its epicenter. By 1900, the sheet music industry centered in “Tin Pan Alley” had become a multi-million-dollar pursuit, and by the 1920s over 200 shows were running simultaneously on Broadway. The most popular musicals were lavish variety shows termed “revues,” and men like Florenz Ziegfeld made a fortune staging annual spectacles peppered with songs by composers such as Gershwin and Irving Berlin. But in 1927, Ziegfeld produced Showboat, a landmark in Broadway history, for it brought immense popularity to the “book” musical—a continuous story that dealt with a serious subject—thus heralding the beginning of Broadway’s “Golden Age.” This course examines some of the most popular “book” musicals throughout the four-decade Golden Age that changed the face of the American theater—including Pal Joey, Oklahoma!, West Side Story, and many others.Dates of series: August 6, 13 and 20. September 3.Stephen Siek, PhD, the current Director of the Emeritus College Academy, is also a Faculty Associate at ASU, and serves on the advisory board for . A professor emeritus at Wittenberg University in Ohio, he served for many years as a professor of piano and musicology and has published widely in the field of American music. In addition, he has received recognition as a pianist, and his recording of The Philadelphia Sonatas by American composer Alexander Reinagle (c.1750-1809) has been widely praised. He is the author of a highly acclaimed reference work, (Rowman & Littlefield, 2017), and the second edition of his definitive biography of Britain’s greatest piano teacher, , was published by the H. L. Marston Press in December of 2020. In May of 2019, at a ceremony at the Royal Academy of Music in London, he was made an Honorary Associate of the RAM.
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