Richard Rodgers [Hardcover]

Geoffrey Holden Block (Author)

Book Description

Series: Yale Broadway Masters Series | Publication Date: November 1, 2003

Richard Rodgers was an icon of the musical theatre, a prolific composer whose career spanned six decades and who wrote more than 1000 songs and 40 shows for the American stage. In this book, Geoffrey Block examines Rodgers's entire career, providing rich details about the creation, staging, and critical reception of some of his most popular musicals. Block traces Rodgers's musical education, early work, and the development of his musical and dramatic language. He focuses on two shows by Rodgers and Hart ("A Connecticut Yankee" and "The Boys from Syracuse") and two by Rodgers and Hammerstein ("South Pacific" and "Cinderella"), offering new insights into each one. He concludes with the first serious look at the five neglected and often maligned musicals that Rodgers composed in the 1960s and 1970s, after the death of Hammerstein.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Geoffrey Block's book is perceptive, stimulating, sometimes provocative, and always interesting. By setting out to examine Rodgers's work rather than his somewhat dismal life, the author not only concentrates upon what is important about Rodgers but offers example after example of the composer's methods, enabling even the most musically unsophisticated reader to appreciate the subtleties of his work." Frederick Nolan, author of Lorenz Hart: A Poet on Broadway

From the Publisher

Yale Broadway Masters series - Geoffrey Block, general editor

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Yale University Press (November 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300097476
• ISBN-13: 978-0300097474
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #570,800 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A patchwork quilt of theories and enthusiasms, July 15, 2004

By 

Kevin Killian (San Francisco, CA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Richard Rodgers (Hardcover)

Geoffrey Block knows everything there is to know about Rodgers, but frustratingly this book is arranged on the lines of a patchwork quilt; if you're looking for something on a particular show (say FLOWER DRUM SONG) you're wasting your time here. Perhaps to see Rodgers through fresh eyes, Block narrows down his focus and his individual chapters pick up on very rarefied aspects of Rodgers' career. If there is just about nothing on FLOWER DRUM SONG or THE SOUND OF MUSIC, you'll find a learned monograph on the three versions of the TV project CINDERELLA. The learning's worn lightly and the writing is everywhere vivid and provocative.

As in his previous book THE RICHARD RODGERS READER, Block attempts a giant salvage operation, making a serious case for the worthwhileness, indeed the greatness, of Rodgers' final five musicals. I don't know if anyone will be convinced that TWO BY TWO or REX are great works of musical theater, but it's entertaining, just as a dip into the Bacon-wrote-Shakespeare camp might be. This is a book that will start a hundred arguments among lovers of Richard Rodgers, and there's nothing wrong with that.