Edited by Azizi Powell
(Revised November 21, 2016)
This post provides excerpts from five online articles and posts about Lin-Manuel Miranda's 2015 Broadway musical Hamilton.
Five videos of songs from that play as well as a link to annotated lyrics for that play's album are also included in this post.
The content of this post is presented for socio-cultural, entertainment, and aesthetic purposes.
All copyrights remain with their owners.
Thanks Lin-Manuel Miranda for writing and starring in Hamilton. Thanks also to the the original cast of Hamilton and the producers of that play. In addition, thanks to all those who are quoted in this post and thanks to the publishers of this videos on YouTube.
****
FEATURED VIDEOS
These videos are presented in chronological order based on their publishing date on YouTube with the oldest dated video given first.
Video #1: Hip-hop and history blend for Broadway hit ‘Hamilton’
PBS NewsHour, Published on Nov 20, 2015
He’s on the $10 bill and he died in a duel, but what else do you know about Alexander Hamilton? Now his life is the subject of a cutting-edge hip-hop Broadway musical, created by Lin-Manuel Miranda. Jeffrey Brown talks to the celebrated writer and performer about updating the history of one of the Founding Fathers to reflect and engage today’s America.
View the Full Story/Transcript: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/hip-hop-and-history-blend-for-broadway-hit-hamilton/
****
Video #2: Video #3: "Hamilton": A founding father takes to the stage
CBS Sunday Morning, Published on Mar 8, 2015
When Lin-Manuel Miranda sings about the drive of the "young, scrappy and hungry" immigrant, he's not singing about just any immigrant. He's singing about the man on the ten dollar bill, Alexander Hamilton. As Mo Rocca reports, Hamilton's musical journey to the stage is as revolutionary as the young revolutionary who helped create the America we know..
****
Video # 3: Hamilton cast performs "Alexander Hamilton" at White House
CBSN, Published on Mar 14, 2016
President Obama and the First Lady hosted the Broadway cast of the musical “Hamilton” at the White House Monday for a workshop and Q&A session with area students. President Obama delivered remarks on the history behind "Hamilton," and the cast performed “Alexander Hamilton," the opening song of the play, live for the attendees.
-snip-
The Hamilton cast performance begins at 9:03 of this video.
****
Video #4: Hamilton cast performs "My Shot" at White House
CBSN Published on Mar 14, 2016
The cast of the hit Broadway musical "Hamilton" performed the song "My Shot" at the White House Monday for an audience that included President and Mrs. Obama, Vice President Biden and local students.
****
Video #5: Lin-Manuel Miranda Monologue - SNL
Saturday Night Live Published on Oct 8, 2016
Host Lin-Manuel Miranda commemorates his first time hosting SNL with a remixed version of Hamilton's "My Shot."
-snip-
Click http://www.thewrap.com/snl-lin-manuel-miranda-whips-out-not-throwing-away-my-shot-parody/ for an article about Lin-Manuel Miranda's monologue on the American comedy series Saturday Night Live.
Also, click http://www.cnn.com/2016/11/18/politics/mike-pence-hamilton-musical/ and http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/theater/2016/11/19/social-media-explodes-over-hamiltontrump-duel/94129798/ for articles about Donald Trump's tweets about the play Hamilton.
****
EXCERPTS FROM VARIOUS ONLINE ARTICLES ABOUT HAMILTON (MUSICAL)
These excerpts from articles, posts, and a page for the annotated album lyrics are given in no particular order and are numbered for referencing purposes only.
Excerpt #1
From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamilton_(musical)
"Hamilton is a musical about Alexander Hamilton, with music, lyrics,[1] and book by Lin-Manuel Miranda. The show was inspired by the 2004 biography Alexander Hamilton, by historian Ron Chernow.
The musical made its Off-Broadway debut at The Public Theater in February 2015, where its engagement was sold out.[2] The show transferred to Broadway in August 2015 at the Richard Rodgers Theatre. On Broadway, it has received enthusiastic critical acclaim and unprecedented advance box office sales,[3] as well as a Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album. The Off-Broadway production of Hamilton won the 2015 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Musical as well as seven other Drama Desk Awards out of 14 total nominations."...
****
Excerpt #2
From http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hamilton-musical-fans_us_56c34d45e4b0c3c55052a5cd
" “Hamilton” is a Broadway musical.
More specifically, it is a wildly popular musical about “a scrappy young immigrant who forever changed America.” That scrappy young immigrant from the Caribbean is the titular Alexander Hamilton, played by prolific composer/lyricist/rapper (also a MacArthur “Genius Grantee” and, swoon, the show’s writer) Lin-Manuel Miranda.
On stage, Miranda is supported by a hyper-talented and racially diverse cast of singers, rappers and dancers who deftly act out the highs and lows of Founding Fathers-era America. Together, they offer an unlikely, hip-hop-inspired retelling of the United States’ revolutionary history, punctuated by dramatic, character-driven stories of ambition and revenge, all influenced by Miranda’s serendipitous decision to read a Hamilton biography while on vacation....
3. Lin-Manuel Miranda is a godsend.
He’s a MacArthur Fellow, so you know he has credentials. The New York City-born writer and performer, of Puerto Rican descent, created the Tony Award-winning musical “In The Heights” when he was just a sophomore in college. He starred in that production, too.
Oh, and he rapped his acceptance speech at the Grammys.
4. But, so is the rest of the cast.
While Miranda kills it as Alexander Hamilton, the other characters are hardly second-rate. “Smash” star Leslie Odom Jr. plays Aaron Burr, the man who killed Hamilton in an unforgettable duel...
5. You really, really, really don’t need to love history to get into “Hamilton.”
Sure, the play is inspired by non-fictional events — Hamilton really did grow up in the British West Indies, Burr really did kill Hamilton in a bitter duel. But the musical is just as much about pop culture as it is about history. As Rebecca Mead noted in The New Yorker, “Hamilton also reminded Miranda of Tupac Shakur, the West Coast rapper who was shot to death in 1996.”
Be prepared for references to theater staples like Rodgers and Hammerstein, Stephen Sondheim, and “West Side Story,” as well as nods to hip-hop icons: Biggie Smalls, the Fugees, even Jamie Foxx."...
****
Except #3
From http://genius.com/albums/Lin-manuel-miranda/Hamilton-original-broadway-cast-recording
Hamilton (Original Broadway Cast Recording) (2015)
"Hamilton Written By Lin-Manuel Miranda
[album] Release Date September 25, 2015
[This is] The Grammy award-winning cast recording to the hit Broadway musical, Hamilton, written by Lin-Manuel Miranda. It blends musical theater, hip-hop, rap, R&B, jazz, pop, and American history to dramatize the life of founding father Alexander Hamilton, based on the biography by Ron Chernow. Despite depicting historical figures, the show practices colorblind (more like purposefully colorful) casting. As countless promotional materials state, Hamilton aims to depict “America then, as told by America now.
This record was the first album to ever receive a 5 star review on billboard.com.”...
-snip-
This genius.com page contains annotations by Lin-Manuel Miranda and others of the lyrics for all the songs in "Hamilton". This page also includes a write up about how this musical was composed.
****
Excerpt #4:
From http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/no-the-hamilton-casting-call-for-non-white-actors-is-not-reverse-racism_us_56fd2c83e4b0daf53aeed9b9 No, The ‘Hamilton’ Casting Call For ‘Non-White’ Actors Is Not Reverse Racism 03/31/2016 12:30 pm ET | Zeba Blay Updated Mar 31, 2016
..."There is, of course, a case to be made for the importance of colorblind casting, the practice of choosing actors for parts based solely on their ability and not on race or ethnicity. And if you think about it, “Hamilton” is perhaps as colorblind as castings come — when else would black and Latino actors get to play the Founding Fathers?
But what makes “Hamilton” work so well is the fact that it’s a commentary on America’s past through the prism of America’s present, its future. It works because the historically white, male founding fathers are being played by a predominantly non-white cast of blacks and Latinos (there are also plans to cast women in the roles of men).
Now, what would the musical look like if Alexander Hamilton wasn’t played by Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Aaron Burr wasn’t played by Leslie Odom, Jr, but instead the characters were played by two capable, talented white actors? The show would likely still be entertaining, but the context and the conversation would change. It’s like suggesting that “For Colored Girls...” or “The Color Purple” have an all-white cast. It’s a completely different show."...
****
Except #5
From http://www.buzzfeed.com/jeremymccarter/saving-america-from-itself#.frJwYd2wRj
Why Hamilton Matters; The story of Hamilton’s journey from concept to cultural phenomenon, as told by someone who has been in all of the room(s) where it happened. Even in Obama’s White House. posted on Apr. 10, 2016 by Jeremy McCarter
..."It is May 5, 2009, and Lin-Manuel Miranda is listening at the back of the East Room for his cue. The administration of the newly elected president, Barack Obama, has invited him to the White House to perform a song from In the Heights, his Tony Award–winning Broadway musical. The organizers figured he would be a bright addition to an evening of spoken word, poetry, and hip-hop — so bright, in fact, that they asked him to close the show...
Miranda tells the audience he’s writing a hip-hop concept album about the life of Alexander Hamilton, which makes the audience laugh, because that’s a ludicrous combination of words, and then he starts rapping, which makes them laugh even more, because it really is a funny notion — a young Nuyorican spitting verses about the nation’s first Treasury secretary (in the East Room, no less, the chandeliers and gold drapes, George and Martha looking down) — but then Miranda raps faster, and with more conviction, and now nobody is laughing, because they see that he’s not joking, that he’s very serious, that this fusion of unlike parts is yielding something new and potent, something amazing, and when he’s done they leap to their feet, cheering as one, the president leading the way.
Those highly implausible four minutes are a pretty good distillation of what has happened to Miranda’s Hamilton idea ever since. The audience’s cycle of laughing, then listening intently, then breaking into wild applause has been repeated many millions of times. Hamilton has become the hottest ticket on Broadway, which is just about the least interesting thing about it. Its actors have become celebrities. Its catchphrases have crept into common usage. Its cast album just went gold. Less than a year into its run on Broadway, it has become a once-in-a-generation cultural phenomenon."...
****
ADDITIONAL LINKS
Click http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hamilton-white-visit-was-so-important_us_56e82e9be4b0860f99da64dd Why The ‘Hamilton’ Cast’s Trip To The White House Was So Important
Lin-Manuel Miranda’s trip to Washington, D.C., was a big win for arts education advocates.
by Katherine Brooks, 03/16/2016 09:35 am ET | Updated Mar 17, 2016
Also, click http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/04/10/1511835/-Casting-and-color-Hamilton-and-Broadway-history "Casting and color: 'Hamilton' and Broadway history" By Denise Oliver Velez, 016/04/10.
That post includes an excerpt of remarks by President Barack Obama at "Hamilton at the White House" [March 14, 2016] and a link to the full transcript of those remarks.
****
Thanks for visiting pancocojams.
Visitor comments are welcome.
No comments:
Post a Comment