A New Musical - Part 6 - The Vegetable Song

As I wrote before, there is no formula to writing a musical (at least not for me.) I'm not working in a linear fashion, from the beginning of the show to the end. It's more circular, with one idea leading to another, then back again as a theme becomes a song, which becomes a reprise, etc. 

This is what happened with "The Vegetable Song." I had lyrics, but no melody. So I reworked the lyrics; still no melody. I wanted a song that was light, fun, and danceable. I pictured Peter Rabbit singing a love song to vegetables, with giant vegetables dancing with him on stage. I wanted kids to know that vegetables are wonderful! But all my ideas fell flat until...

"What are about Rabbit Chase?" I thought. "Would it work?!"

Take the sped-up ragtime, slow it down to a normal ragtime speed, tweak it a bit, and... voilà! It works! I'm delighted with the result.

So what was an incidental piece became the theme for Peter Rabbit. "The Vegetable Rag", as I now call it, is reprised three times in the show by Peter's cousin, Benjamin Bunny!

(Listen for two bits in the song that are nods to two of my favorite musicals, Godspell and The Sound of Music!)

 

A New Musical - Part 5 - A Chase!

When it comes to writing a musical, I don't have a formula, but I do have a method.

But when it comes to writing a song, I don't even have a method. I start with whatever inspires me the most, whether it's a lyric, a melody, or an image.

Still, sometimes you just get stuck.

If you've read the story of Peter Rabbit, you know that Farmer McGregor chases Peter all around the garden. But how to show this on stage without it getting boring? 

Add music, of course!

My choices were to either write a song to be sung by Peter and Farmer McGregor as they run around, or write incidental music (also known as underscore.) I chose the latter, so I really needed to think about the feel I wanted to convey in this scene. Frantic? A little. Scary? No. Silly and fun? Maybe.

But how to convey this with music?

I was stuck.

Then... an idea. (You really never know from where inspiration will arise!)

I had written a ragtime piece earlier and it sat on my piano without a name. Or at least, I thought it was on my piano. I looked for it, and was almost in a panic when I thought to look behind the piano. Ah, there it was.

And it was the exact feel I needed! I could picture the chase in my mind, like I was watching a black-and-white Charlie Chaplin film–sped up, goofy, exciting. I looked up when ragtime music was popular, and it was right around the time when Beatrix Potter wrote Peter Rabbit–even better!

So the piano piece finally got a name, "Rabbit Chase," and it became the underscore for the chase scene in my musical. And, what's even more amazing is that that little piece of music, initially not written with the musical in mind, has inspired more music in the musical! I'll share more about that in my next posts!

My New Book!

 A year ago, I wrote about writing my "memoir of sorts".

I felt prompted to write a memoir of sorts, but without knowing what I would do with it. I just wanted to put my memories down on paper, to sort through some details and record them before I forgot.

But I still wasn't sure what I would do with it once it was done. Writing a memoir is scary. It's my life on paper. But at the same time, it feels pointless. I'm no one special. This isn't going to the autobiography of Julie Andrews or Ghandi or something. Who would read it?

MAYBE YOU! 

What started as a collection of memories became something much more meaningful to me. It is most definitely a way to understand me, but it is also a way to understand other people, especially people of other cultures.

So if you'd like to read my book, you can purchase it here:

On Belonging - A Memoir of an Immigrant

A New Musical - Part 4 - The Opening Number

This post is more video than writing. I feel that the video covers everything I want to say, plus cover musical things that are easier to show on a video than to describe in a paragraph. Here is the explanation video:

My little daughter interrupted me as I was filming, so here is take 2 (actually take 3 or 4) of the end of the video:

And finally, here is the song itself:

A New Musical - Part 3 - Putting It All Down

One of the most important steps in writing a musical is putting everything down in a legible form. You've seen my scribbly notes (in a previous blog post). No one is able to interpret that except me. 

So once I have the script and music in a state that I'm happy with, I start typing up the words and entering the music on Musescore. This is not very exciting (believe me) but doing this also helps me see with better clarity and make decisions on the details, like the piano part and harmonies. (Sometimes, my favorite thing to do is to just sit at a piano and sing and play, and not worry about every little note!)

To show you what this all looks like...