FEB
28

Putting the Sound of Music in Your Production

By Edith Weiss 

Edith Weiss is the author of several published children’s plays, including six with Pioneer Drama Service.  A lot of Edith’s writing time goes into her stand-up comedy routine, which has taken her all over the country and on three overseas military tours.  Besides writing, she also acts and directs in both children’s and adult theatre. 

Want to add something special and different to your production that costs next to nothing?  Sound too good to be true?  Not at all!  Make your production much richer and more professional by adding music.

No, I’m not talking about producing a musical; I’m talking about adding music to your non-musical production to make it original, exciting and truly yours.

Music can be added before the play ever starts.  Choose pre-show music that helps put the audience in the mood you want them in and that suits the play you’re doing.  It doesn’t have to be loud; in fact it specifically shouldn’t be.  People should be able to easily talk over it.  They might not even consciously notice the music, but it still helps define the tone of the show they’re about to see while enriching your environment.

You can use music within a play in two ways.  One way is to add it as underscoring, as is done in movies.  Underscoring is music played very quietly under dialogue.  Again, it enhances the mood you are trying to create while being almost subliminal in its presentation.  Of course, you must be careful that the audience can still hear the dialogue clearly.

The other technique for adding music to a non-musical is to use it during moments of the play without dialogue:  the top of the show, scene changes, chase sequences, scenes that have more action than dialogue, curtain call, etc.  Just be careful you don’t overdo it because you don’t want to shift focus away from the play or overshadow your actors.

Adding music in this second way helps define the time period of your show.  Say you are doing Cinderella.  Are you putting her in the middle ages?  Then find some renaissance music written in the 14th, 15th or 16th centuries.  This music might work well to start the show, to introduce the Fairy Godmother, at the ball and at the end of the play.  You can use the same or different music for the curtain call.  Doing a show that uses kings and queens from “once upon a time” and want to set it in the 17th century?  If you use Baroque music, you immediately give the flavor of those times, as well as a little education for your audience.

Besides defining an era, music can help establish place.  For instance, if you’re doing something set in Africa or Asia, use authentic music that comes out of those regions to add to the integrity of your production.

Using either of these techniques with music can set the tone and emotion of particular scenes.  For instance, in Cinderella, the music can be light and energetic as the stepsisters go off to the ball, which would contrast with Cinderella’s mood and poignantly show what is denied her as she is left behind.  Fading out on upbeat music and immediately fading up on more somber music is hugely effective at conveying a change of tone and emotion onstage.  This becomes all the more effective if you don’t have sophisticated lighting to convey the shift in mood.

One word of caution:  make sure that any music you use is in the public domain, is labeled “royalty free” or is an original composition.  Contemporary music played on the radio is strictly copyrighted and cannot be played at a public performance without permission.  You do not have the right to play Beach Boys music just because your play is set in the 1960s.  Instead, be creative.  Chances are you have some talented member of your ensemble who has always wanted to write original music!  Or, check with Pioneer Drama.  They already sell a CD of Royalty Free Theme Music with a fairy tale genre, and I know they plan on developing similar royalty free CDs with other themes in the very near future.

As long as you make sure your musical additions complement the performance without upstaging the actors, you can greatly enrich your non-musical production with very little, if any, cost.  If you don’t have the time, you can involve another student or parent in the production by appointing a “music director” to be responsible for finding suitable music selections and recommending places in the script to enhance with music.

Get creative and have fun adding the sound of music to all your productions from here on out!