Mom, What's a Patter Song? Why Musical Theater Writers Love Them

 

New announcement: from time to time, I will be posting on the writing platform Medium, and will share a paragraph or two here and then give you a link to the full article. I'm excited about this change and the chance to reach a higher audience -- and I hope you are too, as it offers a new way to discover some incredible writing. My first foray into Medium is for the publication Counter Arts, which touches on a range of artistic ideas and issues. 

I first realized I wanted to write musicals while watching Pump Boys and Dinettes. The songs were catchy and warm without being precious, and rooted me in the present, which I liked much better than musicals where everyone is in long dresses and bowler hats (though I do have a thing for fedoras). What really attracted me to Pump Boys and Dinettes? The songs seemed real, instead of contrived, and because I was already half of a songwriting team in a rock band, I became curious about whether I could write a story set to music, instead of a lot of little stories in one-time-only songs.

Read more on Medium

Photo by Kyle Head on Unsplash