I didn't write an overture for my musical. In my mind, the curtain opens to reveal actors posed like an oil painting, and when the first note is played by the piano, the actors magically come alive.
But the theater we are in doesn't have a curtain. And KW, the director, wanted a different way to (literally) set the scene... by introducing the audience to the townspeople first.
And so, she asked me to write an overture, to which I happily obliged.
For those of you not familiar with the term, an overture is the piece of music that happens before the actual story begins. Oftentimes, there is no action on stage; the overture is the time for the orchestra to shine. The lights in the theater dim, the overture begins, and the audience knows that it's time to quiet down and settle in for the show. An overture usually introduces the audience to themes from each song, while giving its listeners an idea of what the overall tone of the show will be. When musicals moved from theaters to movie theaters, the overture was kept and sometimes used as background for the beginning credits. But some time after the 1960s, overtures in musicals became old-fashioned.
I grew up watching musicals with overtures and without. Most often, if I was watching a movie with an overture, I would just fast-forward through it to get to the action. At my young age, I didn't appreciate the composer's masterful way of weaving the different themes together into one piece. Then I discovered Into the Woods, where the story starts immediately with the actors on stage. And this became the basis for the beginning of Five Children and It.
But... like I said before, this musical is only half-done. It is still in the process of finding itself, and adding an overture is not difficult. I just needed to find the right tone and decide how to work in the themes.
It helped that KW already had in mind what she would like to see: different groups of townspeople coming on stage at different times, each in character and portraying an aspect of town life. She didn't need it to be long, so I knew right away that I didn't need (or want) to write an overture that was 5 to 10 minutes long. I just needed to find the right tone, something that is light and bouncy like the first song, but not exactly the same. I decided on the instrumental background to "Hilary St. Maur Devereux Albert William," a song from the second act. I tried playing snippets of other songs on top of that background, and it worked! A recognizable 4-measure bit of one song here, followed by another 4-measure bit there. Then I alternated the melodies between the glockenspiel and violin, so that a whimsical, staccato phrase was followed by a more serious, legato phrase. This was the perfect background for the different personalities on stage.
The final step was crafting a beginning and an ending. I could start the song immediately with the "Hilary" sound, but I wanted something quieter, as a way to ease the audience into this magical world. Since I hadn't used any of the slower songs in the overture, I picked the sweet ending of "Castle Siege" to start everything off. Then for the end, I took the chorus of the first song, "Fairy Palace", changed the melody a bit, then repeated it, with the melody in cut-time to create a ritardando (slow down) effect. The final overture is a little over a minute long; I was happy with the end result.
I was glad to hear that KW was happy with it too! She immediately blocked the opening, and I was able to see it today! I loved how the "children" scamper onstage during the lighter melodies, then while they are acting, the "adults" come on and open their shop, etc. I'm excited to now announce that the show has an overture, and that we now have an opening scene!
Addendum: At one point in the rehearsal, a singer asked if they were to sing the beginning of a phrase that was meant to be interrupted by the soloists. Originally, I had only the soloists sing the phrase, but the question made me think. I didn't favor one way or the other, so I asked the ensemble what they thought. I just think it's so fun having the cast be directly involved in the creative process, even if it's for one musical phrase. Also, an actor asked if we will be doing an "original cast" recording. If we could pull that off, it would be an AMAZING opportunity!!
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