Project MUSE®: Americas: A Hemispheric Music Journal - Latest Articles
https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792
Project MUSE®: Latest articles in Americas: A Hemispheric Music Journal.daily12026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00text/htmlen-USVol. 29 (2020) through current issueLatest Articles: Americas: A Hemispheric Music JournalTWOProject MUSE®Americas: A Hemispheric Music Journal2768-18582690-2214Latest articles in Americas: A Hemispheric Music Journal. Feed provided by Project MUSE®Introduction: America's Magical Musical Machine
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933270
<p></p>
The jukebox musical is having a moment. A mishmash of existing popular songs often hooped around a thin storyline, the jukebox musical fits comfortably in the postmodern assemblage culture of the last few decades while also comfily jettisoning American musical theater to the pre–Golden Age world when cohesive plot lines took backseat to entertainment. The moniker itself feels charged—the jukebox emerges as a machine capable of connecting listeners to all sorts of music on demand, itself named for the subversive juke joints so frequently populated by the marginalized and the forsaken. At the same time, it evokes bygone eras, outmoded musical technologies, and nostalgic songs. And of course, the musical, an emblem of
... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276">Read More</a>
Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792/image/coversmallIntroduction: America's Magical Musical Machine2024-07-25text/htmlen-USIntroduction: America's Magical Musical Machine2024-07-252024TWOProject MUSE®228602026-05-14T00:00:00-05:002024-07-25Agreeability, Accessibility, and the Jukebox Musical
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933271
<p></p>
Aboard a gently rocking cruise ship docked in Doha, Qatar, I performed a series of jukebox shows each night for an audience from every corner of the globe. They had arrived in Doha to attend the FIFA World Cup, but between games they attended music theater productions aboard their floating nightclub and hotel. These shows had stirring names like Disco Inferno and promised raucous entertainment accompanied by popular music. My time spent doing two shows per night for eight months led me to ruminate over the many ways jukebox musicals contribute to the craft of musical theater.Since the opening of Mamma Mia! the jukebox musical has become a fundamental aspect of modern musical theater, and its popularity continues to
... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276">Read More</a>
Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792/image/coversmallAgreeability, Accessibility, and the Jukebox Musical2024-07-25text/htmlen-USAgreeability, Accessibility, and the Jukebox Musical2024-07-252024TWOProject MUSE®160282026-05-14T00:00:00-05:002024-07-25I've Heard This One Before: A Paradigm Shift in Musical Theater Writing?
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933272
<p></p>
Jukebox musicals can be contentious. There are those that will advocate for them, identifying them as an important and valuable subgenre of the musical theater form. Others, often composers of musicals, will argue that the jukebox musical represents the death of proper lyric-writing craft and nuanced storytelling.I fall somewhere in the middle. As a writer of musicals, I'd always prefer an original score to a repurposed one. But the jukebox musical is not only here to stay but, I'll admit, may be doing musical theater some real favors. Indeed, the commercial success and prevalence of jukebox musicals means that the impact on the form should not be underestimated. As a musical theater writer, what I'm interested in
... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276">Read More</a>
Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792/image/coversmallI've Heard This One Before: A Paradigm Shift in Musical Theater Writing?2024-07-25text/htmlen-USI've Heard This One Before: A Paradigm Shift in Musical Theater Writing?2024-07-252024TWOProject MUSE®210662026-05-14T00:00:00-05:002024-07-25Doing It Their Way: Insights on the Jukebox Revue—An Interview with My Way Creators David Grapes II, Todd Olson, and Vince di Mura
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933273
<p></p>
While a number of jukebox musicals have gained notice in recent years as a result of well-financed Broadway productions and national tours (Jersey Boys, MJ, Tina, Beautiful), many more jukebox musicals and revues find their greatest successes on smaller regional, community, and university stages. For example, My Way: A Musical Tribute to Frank Sinatra, created by David Grapes II and Todd Olson, with music arrangements by Vince di Mura, has found consistent programming across the United States, with more than five hundred productions since 2001 in theatres in all fifty states. This four-person, one-set revue caters to a niche market that includes not only large professional organizations but also those that do not
... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276">Read More</a>
Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792/image/coversmallDoing It Their Way: Insights on the Jukebox Revue—An Interview with My Way Creators David Grapes II, Todd Olson, and Vince di Mura2024-07-25text/htmlen-USDoing It Their Way: Insights on the Jukebox Revue—An Interview with My Way Creators David Grapes II, Todd Olson, and Vince di Mura2024-07-252024TWOProject MUSE®309512026-05-14T00:00:00-05:002024-07-25"Work Is a Dirty Word Around Here": Jimmy Buffett's Escape to Margaritaville and Escapist Leisure in Jukebox Musicals
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933274
<p></p>
After writing a scathing review of Jimmy Buffett's 2018 jukebox musical Escape to Margaritaville, New York Times critic Jesse Green made the uncommon move of penning a follow-up article in response to reader backlash.1 Claiming "the Parrotheads are after me," Green cites no less a literary titan as Oscar Wilde in defending his "moral duty" to pan a show that is as "objectionable and cynical" as Buffett's musical, which ran for only 124 performances at Broadway's Marquis Theatre between February and July 2018.2 Comments posted on the original review passionately rush to the defense of not only Buffett but the medium of jukebox musicals on the whole. "Everything doesn't have to be Hamlet or Sondheim," one commenter
... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276">Read More</a>
Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792/image/coversmall"Work Is a Dirty Word Around Here": Jimmy Buffett's Escape to Margaritaville and Escapist Leisure in Jukebox Musicals2024-07-25text/htmlen-US"Work Is a Dirty Word Around Here": Jimmy Buffett's Escape to Margaritaville and Escapist Leisure in Jukebox Musicals2024-07-252024TWOProject MUSE®840082026-05-14T00:00:00-05:002024-07-25Leader of the Pack: The First Jukebox Musical
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933275
<p></p>
Leader of the Pack, the fourth of only six new musicals in one of Broadway's weakest seasons on record, premiered on April 8, 1985. Most reviews of that opening-night performance included such withering comments as "It's scarcely a Broadway musical" (Clive Barnes, New York Post), "a particularly impressive fiasco" (Frank Rich, New York Times), and "a big smelly lump of idiocy" (Michael Feingold, Village Voice). Yet even with such extensive disparaging criticism, Leader of the Pack was nominated days later for the Tony Award for Best Musical of Broadway's 1984–85 season. The show did not win that or any other awards, however, and Leader of the Pack closed less than three months later, with a complete loss of its
... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276">Read More</a>
Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792/image/coversmallLeader of the Pack: The First Jukebox Musical2024-07-25text/htmlen-USLeader of the Pack: The First Jukebox Musical2024-07-252024TWOProject MUSE®1216052026-05-14T00:00:00-05:002024-07-25"The Only Thing That Matters Is That That Man Gets Up on That Stage Tonight": Elvis, the Biographical Jukebox Musical, and the Recording Artist as Worker
https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276
<p></p>
This essay considers how Baz Luhrmann's 2022 biopic Elvis uses the relationship between Elvis Presley and his manager, Colonel Tom Parker, to reinvent the biographical jukebox musical, a subcategory of the jukebox musical. Kevin Byrne and Emily Fuchs argue that the biographical jukebox musical has two requirements. First, the majority of songs must be related to a particular solo recording artist or group. Second, the plot must focus on the life story of that recording artist or group. Byrne and Fuchs point out that, while the styles and eras and personalities vary, the structure of biographical jukebox musicals is "remarkably formulaic in their construction and execution in how they parcel out moments of triumph
... <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/933276">Read More</a>
Project MUSE®https://muse.jhu.edu/2026-05-14T00:00:00-05:00https://muse.jhu.edu/journal/792/image/coversmall"The Only Thing That Matters Is That That Man Gets Up on That Stage Tonight": Elvis, the Biographical Jukebox Musical, and the Recording Artist as Worker2024-07-25text/htmlen-US"The Only Thing That Matters Is That That Man Gets Up on That Stage Tonight": Elvis, the Biographical Jukebox Musical, and the Recording Artist as Worker2024-07-252024TWOProject MUSE®925222026-05-14T00:00:00-05:002024-07-25