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cahnSo there's one thing that really frustrates me a lot about the musical Hamilton, and that is the same thing as what I think is one of its great and wonderful strengths: I have become convinced that Lin-Manuel Miranda doesn't think in terms of melody. As someone whose musical traditions are a) classical, particularly classical violin, and b) 80's Broadway, with the Phantom/Les Mis blockbusters being the ones most strongly imprinted in my brain, I find it very hard to wrap my head around it. (And more relevant to my everyday life, it is very hard to belt out the songs to my baby, which is one of the big things I'm looking for in a musical right now, and as I have cheerfully done with Les Mis, Scarlet Pimpernel, Gilbert & Sullivan, and Beauty and the Beast, and others I can't think of right now.)
What I mean by "not thinking in terms of melody" is this: in the Hamilton songs, even the ones that aren't rap, melody is downplayed like crazy, and the melodies that are there are… flattened out. They don't tend to be super lyrical or frame exciting chord progressions. Take for example "Wait for It," one of my personal favorites, one that is a favorite of many fans, one that LMM's characterized as one of the best songs he's ever written. The chorus ("Love doesn't discriminate…") has a range of rather less than an octave. In fact, the majority of the notes used are… two pitches, a whole step apart (re mi). It's all pretty strictly single-key major scale, with no accidentals or chord progressions hinting at other keys. [1] There isn't really much in the way of chord progressions, period. Try singing "Wait for It" in an over-the-top histrionic ~Broadway~ voice. Does Not Work.
Contrast, for example, Les Miserables. (I'm going to use Les Mis as an example a lot because it's the musical I know the best, so it's easy for me to pull examples. Plus which LMM has specifically called it out as an influence on Hamilton, so it's instructive to look at the differences.) "Do You Hear the People Sing" is a relatively simple song, not particularly the best one in the musical or anything, not one where the composers were trying to be fancy at all. And even that simple song, in its chorus, has more than an octave's range and one accidental from a couple of chords in the progression. It lends itself beautifully to loud and over-the-top belting ("Then join in the FIGHT that will give you the right to be FREEEEE!") and it's not even the best belting song in the musical by a large margin.
So now you're asking, "cahn, why is this song one of your favorites, then? Why is it so endlessly interesting to you, now that you've taken the time to tell me what it's not doing?" Well! For now, let's lay aside the amazing lyrics, which e.g.rachelmanija has talked about here, and just talk about the music, which is also brilliant. LMM doesn't think in terms of melody or chord progressions (which are, of course, super related ever since before Bach) or modulation. (More about modulation later.) BUT! He thinks in terms of harmony and ensemble, to a degree that I'm not used to, particularly in Broadway songs. "Wait for It," I firmly believe, does not exist in his head in terms of a single melody, a single line sung by Burr; it's always been in terms of the harmonies splitting out in that last time through the chorus, with Burr singing above the ensemble, the ensemble itself splitting into thirds, so that you're unsure of just which of them is singing the melody.
(This is, of course, a corollary to Hamilton folding in rap and hip-hop and R&B and who knows what else; it's a bit of a tautology to say that rap of all genres isn't about the melody. But LMM did it, he made it work.)
Almost all the songs are like this. The Schuyler sisters harmonize and counterpoint each other. Jefferson and Madison and Burr are the backup singers to Alexander in the second half (e.g., in "Reynolds Pamphlet"). Jefferson's got his own ensemble in "What'd I Miss." In fact, I can think of only one song that doesn't have some kind of ensemble (whether it be duet or small group of major cast or whole company) diffracting the harmonies: "Burn" I think is the exception that proves the rule, as an actual solo, and I think it's meant to be solo to underscore Eliza's isolation.)
You can see that part of what is going on here is a real emphasis on the chorus as an integral part of the musical. I mean, this isn't exactly new in the history of plays ever — there's a reason it's called a Greek chorus — but as far as I know it's a new thing to have it be such an integral part of a Broadway musical, which is traditionally about melody and therefore about solos (and occasionally duets or small-group numbers). Yes, there are big group numbers in musicals like Les Mis, and Les Mis also has the students, but… really, there are group songs ("At the End of the Day," "Red and Black," "Drink With Me") and then there are solo songs ("On My Own, "Who Am I"), and although there is slight mixing between the two groups, they are pretty distinct.
But in Hamilton, almost all the "solo" numbers, like "Wait for It," have ensemble support underneath. Again, this is a corollary to Hamilton bringing in all these other genres where ensemble singing underneath is a common thing (after all, not having backup singers in some of these genres would be the oddity); but what the Broadway element adds is a sense of this ensemble being part of the narrative, adding to the narrative. [2] "Hurricane," which is Alexander's only big "solo" number? (It's actually notable because it's the first time we've really heard Alexander sing a sustained line by himself, in a play which is all about him.) Has the refrain "Wait for it!" pressed upon us by the ensemble. (Which is, of course, incredibly resonant as a thematic element, pointing up the Hamilton/Burr divide and that in this circumstance Hamilton should have waited for it (but could not, given his personality).) The ensemble in "Say No To This" says all the "No!" and "Go!" that we, the audience, want to say to Alexander.
And — and — part of the amazing genius of "It's Quiet Uptown" is that it's a story about grace and forgiveness, super integral to the plot and character and thematic arcs of the musical -- that is carried almost entirely by singers who are not the center of the story, who are onlookers. Eliza has one line in this song. Three words. It's quiet uptown. And she is the center of the song, and it is the most heartbreaking and uplifting moment I have ever heard in a musical.
No one else on Broadway would have written the reconciliation like this. In any other play it would have been an impassioned duet reprise (or Alexander solo) with a belted super-loud high note at the end. You know I'm right. (Let us pause here to offer a prayer of thanks that Frank Wildhorn never read the Chernow biography of Alexander Hamilton.)
In general LMM needs the melodic line to be flat because he is always weaving the different songs together, as a sort of meta-ensemble, so that, for example, "History has its eyes on you!" comes back in "Non-Stop," is whispered into "Hurricane." The duel counting and Philip's counting, doubled. (AUGH.) "The Room Where It Happened" calls back to the "Wait For It" refrain, the "If you stand for nothing, Burr…" question. "Look around, look around, how lucky we are to be alive right now" has all sorts of callbacks and threads through the various songs (I had forgotten until looking back through lyrics that it's in "Take a Break," among other places). Then there's "I am not throwing away my shot!" and all the ways it echoes and ricochets through the musical and finally doubles back upon itself as one shot is thrown away and another is not. And, of course, there's the non-stop weaving of practically all the tag ends of the first act together in "Non-Stop," only the first time I listened it didn't even strike me as all that different from the rest of the musical, because I think whenever he comes up with a line of music he's already thinking about how it's going to weave in to all the other lines of music.
Les Mis really does this kind of weaving only once, in "One Day More"; Phantom does it in "Notes." Both are more-or-less self-contained (the "One day more" theme never comes back after that song) and not thematic the way that Hamilton's themes are woven in because they are thematic. In both the Les Mis and Phantom cases it's in a very self-conscious way, like, "Look at me! I'm doing this cool thing!"
I don't get that sense at all from Hamilton; it seems to be a natural outgrowth of the way LMM thinks rather than a self-conscious pat-me-on-the-back look-what-I've done. I mean, he just does it all the time!
You know where I get that self-conscious feeling in Hamilton? "Farmer Refuted," where there's this very self-conscious key modulation by Seabury, so self-conscious that Alexander literally points it out. That "Refuted" modulation is one of very few modulations in Hamilton. (Compare Les Mis, where Broadway-esque modulation happens in practically every song, without any real self-consciousness.) Interestingly, "Take a Break" and "Say No to This" both feature modulation — "Say No to This" clearly to mark out the place where Alexander, uh, stays. "Take a Break," I think, is to set up the Schuyler sisters musically for the last song:
The last song. In "Who Lives Who Dies," LMM busts out everything and uses the meta-ensemble technique AND modulation to pull everything together. "History Has Its Eyes On You" comes back, its refrain pulled out, and all the "Time" repetitions, all the new music, is folded into the musical framework of "History" (and there are echoes of "Burn" as well, which again is possible because the melodic lines are so flat as to fold in nicely). The other actors (Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Burr) come back to frame, although some of it is spoken. But it is the ensemble that brings it to Eliza.
(Eliza!)
(I may have burst into tears when I re-listened to this to write this post.)
And now, here, we get the modulation that LMM has not really been putting in the other songs. Eliza sings about telling Alexander's story, and then it modulates as she opens it up into the wider world: raising funds for the Washington Monument, speaking up against slavery, and — and the ensemble, the chorus, introduces the orphanage before she herself does.
And the last lyrics are, fittingly, all sung ensemble: a counterpoint weaving the "Who lives, who dies?" and "Time" motifs together, coming together to a harmony-to-unity "Who tells your story?" at the very end.
(So, in conclusion: I love it. But until I can afford a backup chorus to carry around with me, it does make it harder to sing the Hamilton songs solo to my baby :) Ah well, maybe I'll stick to the raps.)
[1] There are major/relative-minor shifts (keeping the same scale tones, e.g. C minor / E-flat major) throughout Hamilton. I believe there are also major/minor shifts (C major <-> C minor) as well, but I'm too lazy to go back and check right this second. But these are by far the majority of the key shifts, not a true key modulation.
[2] I think there has been a move towards the ensemble way of looking at things since the 80's, and LMM to some extent has inherited that. See e.g. The Secret Garden, which is one of my favorite musicals ever, not least because it manages to combine both lyrical melodic lines and the ensemble approach. But still, LMM takes the ensemble formulation a step farther, in my opinion. ETA 3-4-16:lokifan pointed out Legally Blonde! How could I forget it?! Legally Blonde definitely does the whole ensemble thing, with very very few solos, although it does not do all the interesting things that Hamilton does.
What I mean by "not thinking in terms of melody" is this: in the Hamilton songs, even the ones that aren't rap, melody is downplayed like crazy, and the melodies that are there are… flattened out. They don't tend to be super lyrical or frame exciting chord progressions. Take for example "Wait for It," one of my personal favorites, one that is a favorite of many fans, one that LMM's characterized as one of the best songs he's ever written. The chorus ("Love doesn't discriminate…") has a range of rather less than an octave. In fact, the majority of the notes used are… two pitches, a whole step apart (re mi). It's all pretty strictly single-key major scale, with no accidentals or chord progressions hinting at other keys. [1] There isn't really much in the way of chord progressions, period. Try singing "Wait for It" in an over-the-top histrionic ~Broadway~ voice. Does Not Work.
Contrast, for example, Les Miserables. (I'm going to use Les Mis as an example a lot because it's the musical I know the best, so it's easy for me to pull examples. Plus which LMM has specifically called it out as an influence on Hamilton, so it's instructive to look at the differences.) "Do You Hear the People Sing" is a relatively simple song, not particularly the best one in the musical or anything, not one where the composers were trying to be fancy at all. And even that simple song, in its chorus, has more than an octave's range and one accidental from a couple of chords in the progression. It lends itself beautifully to loud and over-the-top belting ("Then join in the FIGHT that will give you the right to be FREEEEE!") and it's not even the best belting song in the musical by a large margin.
So now you're asking, "cahn, why is this song one of your favorites, then? Why is it so endlessly interesting to you, now that you've taken the time to tell me what it's not doing?" Well! For now, let's lay aside the amazing lyrics, which e.g.
rachelmanija has talked about here, and just talk about the music, which is also brilliant. LMM doesn't think in terms of melody or chord progressions (which are, of course, super related ever since before Bach) or modulation. (More about modulation later.) BUT! He thinks in terms of harmony and ensemble, to a degree that I'm not used to, particularly in Broadway songs. "Wait for It," I firmly believe, does not exist in his head in terms of a single melody, a single line sung by Burr; it's always been in terms of the harmonies splitting out in that last time through the chorus, with Burr singing above the ensemble, the ensemble itself splitting into thirds, so that you're unsure of just which of them is singing the melody.(This is, of course, a corollary to Hamilton folding in rap and hip-hop and R&B and who knows what else; it's a bit of a tautology to say that rap of all genres isn't about the melody. But LMM did it, he made it work.)
Almost all the songs are like this. The Schuyler sisters harmonize and counterpoint each other. Jefferson and Madison and Burr are the backup singers to Alexander in the second half (e.g., in "Reynolds Pamphlet"). Jefferson's got his own ensemble in "What'd I Miss." In fact, I can think of only one song that doesn't have some kind of ensemble (whether it be duet or small group of major cast or whole company) diffracting the harmonies: "Burn" I think is the exception that proves the rule, as an actual solo, and I think it's meant to be solo to underscore Eliza's isolation.)
You can see that part of what is going on here is a real emphasis on the chorus as an integral part of the musical. I mean, this isn't exactly new in the history of plays ever — there's a reason it's called a Greek chorus — but as far as I know it's a new thing to have it be such an integral part of a Broadway musical, which is traditionally about melody and therefore about solos (and occasionally duets or small-group numbers). Yes, there are big group numbers in musicals like Les Mis, and Les Mis also has the students, but… really, there are group songs ("At the End of the Day," "Red and Black," "Drink With Me") and then there are solo songs ("On My Own, "Who Am I"), and although there is slight mixing between the two groups, they are pretty distinct.
But in Hamilton, almost all the "solo" numbers, like "Wait for It," have ensemble support underneath. Again, this is a corollary to Hamilton bringing in all these other genres where ensemble singing underneath is a common thing (after all, not having backup singers in some of these genres would be the oddity); but what the Broadway element adds is a sense of this ensemble being part of the narrative, adding to the narrative. [2] "Hurricane," which is Alexander's only big "solo" number? (It's actually notable because it's the first time we've really heard Alexander sing a sustained line by himself, in a play which is all about him.) Has the refrain "Wait for it!" pressed upon us by the ensemble. (Which is, of course, incredibly resonant as a thematic element, pointing up the Hamilton/Burr divide and that in this circumstance Hamilton should have waited for it (but could not, given his personality).) The ensemble in "Say No To This" says all the "No!" and "Go!" that we, the audience, want to say to Alexander.
And — and — part of the amazing genius of "It's Quiet Uptown" is that it's a story about grace and forgiveness, super integral to the plot and character and thematic arcs of the musical -- that is carried almost entirely by singers who are not the center of the story, who are onlookers. Eliza has one line in this song. Three words. It's quiet uptown. And she is the center of the song, and it is the most heartbreaking and uplifting moment I have ever heard in a musical.
No one else on Broadway would have written the reconciliation like this. In any other play it would have been an impassioned duet reprise (or Alexander solo) with a belted super-loud high note at the end. You know I'm right. (Let us pause here to offer a prayer of thanks that Frank Wildhorn never read the Chernow biography of Alexander Hamilton.)
In general LMM needs the melodic line to be flat because he is always weaving the different songs together, as a sort of meta-ensemble, so that, for example, "History has its eyes on you!" comes back in "Non-Stop," is whispered into "Hurricane." The duel counting and Philip's counting, doubled. (AUGH.) "The Room Where It Happened" calls back to the "Wait For It" refrain, the "If you stand for nothing, Burr…" question. "Look around, look around, how lucky we are to be alive right now" has all sorts of callbacks and threads through the various songs (I had forgotten until looking back through lyrics that it's in "Take a Break," among other places). Then there's "I am not throwing away my shot!" and all the ways it echoes and ricochets through the musical and finally doubles back upon itself as one shot is thrown away and another is not. And, of course, there's the non-stop weaving of practically all the tag ends of the first act together in "Non-Stop," only the first time I listened it didn't even strike me as all that different from the rest of the musical, because I think whenever he comes up with a line of music he's already thinking about how it's going to weave in to all the other lines of music.
Les Mis really does this kind of weaving only once, in "One Day More"; Phantom does it in "Notes." Both are more-or-less self-contained (the "One day more" theme never comes back after that song) and not thematic the way that Hamilton's themes are woven in because they are thematic. In both the Les Mis and Phantom cases it's in a very self-conscious way, like, "Look at me! I'm doing this cool thing!"
I don't get that sense at all from Hamilton; it seems to be a natural outgrowth of the way LMM thinks rather than a self-conscious pat-me-on-the-back look-what-I've done. I mean, he just does it all the time!
You know where I get that self-conscious feeling in Hamilton? "Farmer Refuted," where there's this very self-conscious key modulation by Seabury, so self-conscious that Alexander literally points it out. That "Refuted" modulation is one of very few modulations in Hamilton. (Compare Les Mis, where Broadway-esque modulation happens in practically every song, without any real self-consciousness.) Interestingly, "Take a Break" and "Say No to This" both feature modulation — "Say No to This" clearly to mark out the place where Alexander, uh, stays. "Take a Break," I think, is to set up the Schuyler sisters musically for the last song:
The last song. In "Who Lives Who Dies," LMM busts out everything and uses the meta-ensemble technique AND modulation to pull everything together. "History Has Its Eyes On You" comes back, its refrain pulled out, and all the "Time" repetitions, all the new music, is folded into the musical framework of "History" (and there are echoes of "Burn" as well, which again is possible because the melodic lines are so flat as to fold in nicely). The other actors (Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Burr) come back to frame, although some of it is spoken. But it is the ensemble that brings it to Eliza.
(Eliza!)
(I may have burst into tears when I re-listened to this to write this post.)
And now, here, we get the modulation that LMM has not really been putting in the other songs. Eliza sings about telling Alexander's story, and then it modulates as she opens it up into the wider world: raising funds for the Washington Monument, speaking up against slavery, and — and the ensemble, the chorus, introduces the orphanage before she herself does.
And the last lyrics are, fittingly, all sung ensemble: a counterpoint weaving the "Who lives, who dies?" and "Time" motifs together, coming together to a harmony-to-unity "Who tells your story?" at the very end.
(So, in conclusion: I love it. But until I can afford a backup chorus to carry around with me, it does make it harder to sing the Hamilton songs solo to my baby :) Ah well, maybe I'll stick to the raps.)
[1] There are major/relative-minor shifts (keeping the same scale tones, e.g. C minor / E-flat major) throughout Hamilton. I believe there are also major/minor shifts (C major <-> C minor) as well, but I'm too lazy to go back and check right this second. But these are by far the majority of the key shifts, not a true key modulation.
[2] I think there has been a move towards the ensemble way of looking at things since the 80's, and LMM to some extent has inherited that. See e.g. The Secret Garden, which is one of my favorite musicals ever, not least because it manages to combine both lyrical melodic lines and the ensemble approach. But still, LMM takes the ensemble formulation a step farther, in my opinion. ETA 3-4-16:
lokifan pointed out Legally Blonde! How could I forget it?! Legally Blonde definitely does the whole ensemble thing, with very very few solos, although it does not do all the interesting things that Hamilton does.
