Style/Specific types of releases/Theatre: Difference between revisions

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It strikes me as wrong to credit the composer as '''[[Release Artist|ReleaseArtist]]''' for musicals. For one, composer is a distinct id3 tag. Also musicals, unlike classical music, are rarely attributed to the composer or the lyricist, they are mentioned by their title. Therefore I see it no less proper to create a fictional entity such as '''Cats''' to resolve the '''[[Release Artist|ReleaseArtist]]''' issue. -- [[User:sesam|sesam]] 2008-11-22
It strikes me as wrong to credit the composer as '''[[Release Artist|ReleaseArtist]]''' for musicals. For one, composer is a distinct id3 tag. Also musicals, unlike classical music, are rarely attributed to the composer or the lyricist, they are mentioned by their title. Therefore I see it no less proper to create a fictional entity such as '''Cats''' to resolve the '''[[Release Artist|ReleaseArtist]]''' issue. -- [[User:sesam|sesam]] 2008-11-22
: I would note several incorrect assumptions in this comment. First, "musicals, unlike classical music, are rarely attributed to the composer or the lyricist" - ever heard of Rogers & Hammerstein, Jonathan Larson, Sondheim, Andrew Lloyd Webber... to name only a few? When did you last see a performance of Cats, to use your example, where any performer got higher billing than Andrew Lloyd Webber? I'd also note that attribution by composer seems an industry standard, as shown by Playbill, IBDb, or IOBDb. Second, why would we ever, here or anywhere, create a "work-as-artist" bogus artist, when there's perfectly good artists who can be used, and can be used without fragmenting a composer's works all across piles of bogus artists? Additionally, this assumes a clear distinction between classical (ala Opera) and musical theater which does not actually exist; see Porgy and Bess for just one example of genre-overlap. [[BrianFreud]]
: I would note several incorrect assumptions in this comment. First, "musicals, unlike classical music, are rarely attributed to the composer or the lyricist" - ever heard of Rogers & Hammerstein, Jonathan Larson, Sondheim, Andrew Lloyd Webber... to name only a few? When did you last see a performance of Cats, to use your example, where any performer got higher billing than Andrew Lloyd Webber? I'd also note that attribution by composer seems an industry standard, as shown by Playbill, IBDb, or IOBDb. Second, why would we ever, here or anywhere, create a "work-as-artist" bogus artist, when there's perfectly good artists who can be used, and can be used without fragmenting a composer's works all across piles of bogus artists? Additionally, this assumes a clear distinction between classical (ala Opera) and musical theater which does not actually exist; see Porgy and Bess for just one example of genre-overlap. [[BrianFreud]]

: : Gee can't say as I agree, even though Rogers & Hammerstein or Andrew Weber may stand out in your mind, I don't think those are the majority, but they're not entirely "rarely" either. I can see the release being credited to the composer, especially when "Rogers & Hammerstein's The Sound of Music" is how it appears on the liner and movie poster. I do not think however every individual track should be credited to the composer as the artist. If we consider the days of vinyl certainly every label credited the artist in large type and the composer in smaller type, and that's true of all 45s and pop music for that matter, and really it is a significant shortcoming of MBz and cddb and the like that somehow composers aren't in the "basic" tags or prominent in the database, but why would we think "composer" should be artist always, particularly for seminole works of broadway or musical motion-picture performers, beit Julie Andrews or anyone else? I hope NOT. Perhaps the guideline could be we insist that composer AR be filled in, and like there is the "special" artist of Various Artists most likely we should build a special handling of "Cast" and "& Cast" "& Chorus" and such for the artist(s) on such works? [[drjohnnyfever_ca]]


* Possible Exception? The only valid cast artist (ie, one who should not be merged into composer) I've run across so far has been this one: [[http://musicbrainz.org/artist/29542149-a818-4167-aa91-439adc9d61f5.html | Glee Cast]]. I think the important distinction here is that there are numerous releases by an ensemble, as if it were a group, even though it's ostensibly a cast release. [[BrianFreud]]
* Possible Exception? The only valid cast artist (ie, one who should not be merged into composer) I've run across so far has been this one: [[http://musicbrainz.org/artist/29542149-a818-4167-aa91-439adc9d61f5.html | Glee Cast]]. I think the important distinction here is that there are numerous releases by an ensemble, as if it were a group, even though it's ostensibly a cast release. [[BrianFreud]]

Revision as of 06:49, 21 December 2009

Alert.png Status: This is a ProposedStyleGuideline, it is not official and shouldn't be used as such. See SoundtrackStyle.

These ProposedStyleGuidelines apply to soundtracks for musical theater or films. These are works where songs are performed by the actors as part of the work (but not operas, which are covered by ClassicalStyleGuide and OperaTrackStyle, nor live (non-theatrical) performances by musical groups). See also SoundtrackStyle and SoundtrackTitleStyle (which apply mostly to film and video game soundtracks, but do overlap this).

Basic Guidelines

  • The ReleaseArtist should be the composer, not the performer(s).
    • Where performer information is available, it should be indicated using AdvancedRelationships.
      • Except in the case of FictitiousArtists, the actual performers should be used, not the characters
  • The ReleaseTitle is just the title of the musical. The title should exclude secondary information such as "Original Soundtrack", "Music from," etc. except that
    • Performance cast (with year) may be used if required to distinguish the release from other versions of the soundtrack, for example Carousel (1956 Film Cast).

Examples

Discussion

In cases where the composer and lyricist collaborated on a number of musicals, and are generally well-known, it would probably make sense to use a collaboration artist (e.g. "Rogers & Hart") rather than the composer alone. @alex

Disagree; this would introduce yet a third category of artist attribution - performer-as-artist, composer-as-artist, now composer+lyricist-as-artist, without any clear definition for "well-known" to allow for editors to identify when, and when not, this third class should be used. Were this standard to be used, a similar argument could just as easily be made for Opera (composer + librettist); I don't recall the last time I heard anyone suggesting this there, however. BrianFreud

OperaTrackStyle has a way to represent character information for songs. Would it be appropriate to include such information in track titles for musical soundtracks? @alex

It looks to me like MusicalSoundtrackStyle and SoundtrackStyle overlap and should be merged. See also SoundtrackTitleStyle. -- JimDeLaHunt 2008-01-05

  • Actually, if I recall the recent history of this proposal, it's the reverse - stemming from the latest few discussions on soundtrack style, it was pretty much decided that yes, there are different types of soundtrack, and yes, each type has its own issues. This page handles specifically the ones for Musicals - there were rough plans for a similar page for Video Games, Scores, etc - not sure if those ever ended up being done. -- BrianSchweitzer 18:37, 06 January 2008 (UTC)

It strikes me as wrong to credit the composer as ReleaseArtist for musicals. For one, composer is a distinct id3 tag. Also musicals, unlike classical music, are rarely attributed to the composer or the lyricist, they are mentioned by their title. Therefore I see it no less proper to create a fictional entity such as Cats to resolve the ReleaseArtist issue. -- sesam 2008-11-22

I would note several incorrect assumptions in this comment. First, "musicals, unlike classical music, are rarely attributed to the composer or the lyricist" - ever heard of Rogers & Hammerstein, Jonathan Larson, Sondheim, Andrew Lloyd Webber... to name only a few? When did you last see a performance of Cats, to use your example, where any performer got higher billing than Andrew Lloyd Webber? I'd also note that attribution by composer seems an industry standard, as shown by Playbill, IBDb, or IOBDb. Second, why would we ever, here or anywhere, create a "work-as-artist" bogus artist, when there's perfectly good artists who can be used, and can be used without fragmenting a composer's works all across piles of bogus artists? Additionally, this assumes a clear distinction between classical (ala Opera) and musical theater which does not actually exist; see Porgy and Bess for just one example of genre-overlap. BrianFreud
: Gee can't say as I agree, even though Rogers & Hammerstein or Andrew Weber may stand out in your mind, I don't think those are the majority, but they're not entirely "rarely" either. I can see the release being credited to the composer, especially when "Rogers & Hammerstein's The Sound of Music" is how it appears on the liner and movie poster. I do not think however every individual track should be credited to the composer as the artist. If we consider the days of vinyl certainly every label credited the artist in large type and the composer in smaller type, and that's true of all 45s and pop music for that matter, and really it is a significant shortcoming of MBz and cddb and the like that somehow composers aren't in the "basic" tags or prominent in the database, but why would we think "composer" should be artist always, particularly for seminole works of broadway or musical motion-picture performers, beit Julie Andrews or anyone else? I hope NOT. Perhaps the guideline could be we insist that composer AR be filled in, and like there is the "special" artist of Various Artists most likely we should build a special handling of "Cast" and "& Cast" "& Chorus" and such for the artist(s) on such works? drjohnnyfever_ca
  • Possible Exception? The only valid cast artist (ie, one who should not be merged into composer) I've run across so far has been this one: [| Glee Cast]. I think the important distinction here is that there are numerous releases by an ensemble, as if it were a group, even though it's ostensibly a cast release. BrianFreud