Broadway to Main Street: How Show Tunes Enchanted America

The music of Broadway is one of America's most unique and popular calling cards. In Broadway to Main Street, author Laurence Maslon tells the story of how the most beloved songs of musical theater made their way from the Theater District to living rooms across the country. The crossroads where the music of Broadway meets popular culture is an expansive and pervasive juncture throughout most of the twentieth century--from sheet music to radio broadcasts to popular and original cast recordings--and continues to influence culture today through television, streaming, and the Internet. The original Broadway cast album is one of the most successful, yet undervalued, genres in the history of popular recording. The history of Broadway music is also the history of American popular music; the technological, commercial, and marketing forces of communications and media over the last century were inextricably bound up in the enterprise of bringing the musical gems of New York's Theater District to living rooms along Main Streets across the nation. Featuring interviews with Stephen Schwartz, Chita Rivera, Steve Lawrence, and prominent record producers and music critics, the story of this commercial and emotional phenomenon is told here in full. This updated edition--which features commentary on the repackaged Wicked cast album--is an ideal companion for all fans of American musical theater and popular music.