For most people, Independence Day is a time when everyone gets together and remembers what makes this country so great. While things will be playing out a little differently this year, it’s still a good time to remember the freedoms that this country has given us. Considering that we’re entering a period of potential and great change, I am eager to see what the road ahead has to offer. Maybe I won’t be able to share my barbequed hot dogs with anyone, but at least we can enjoy together the festivities in new and innovative ways.
Some things never go out of fashion, and I would argue that few traditions have kept me as upbeat as The Music Man (1962). While it’s not my favorite musical, I honestly can’t think of a movie that has captured the pageantry and celebration of America in July quite the same. It may be why TCM inevitably plays it somewhere in their rotation, getting us to sing along to the incomparable songbook by Meredith Wilson. There’s an earnestness in every note, where Robert Preston’s performance captures this delightful hucksterism, of a man learning from his follies as he befriends folks in River City, Iowa: a fictional city in all but atmosphere.
Sure you can turn to other political musicals like 1776 (1972), but I’d argue that there’s something stuffier, less interesting about them as a piece of the celebration. You’re more learning about how the Declaration of Independence came into existence than anything that it stands for. Sure it gives the best representation of compromise, but what does he have on Harold Hill’s ability to do patter songs with the best of them? Nobody has anything on The Music Man’s endless charm, and it’s the exact thing you need right now.
As I mentioned, the songbook is incomparable for a reason. Not only does it have some of the best patter songs, but there’s great barbershop numbers as well as old women quoting Balzac while acting like chickens. It may not be directly about July 4, but few shows feel as routinely American in every note, what with the seventy-six trombones and the desire to have things better.
That is why I’m looking at my personal Top 5 from the show. Whereas you can pick out the best songs from the majority of major and influential shows, The Music Man is one so crammed with great small moments that you may have trouble playing favoritism. As I prepare to watch it for the umpteenth Independence Day, I thought that I would extend the challenge out to you. Can you name your favorite song from this show? If you don’t have one, watch it again and get back to me. I guarantee that it will be worth your time.
1. “(Ya Got) Trouble”
With this song, Harold Hill entered the pantheon of great musical characters with a song that sounds like its logic is barely being held together. He must do everything to convince River City to not invest in a pool hall. How exactly do you do that and get everyone on your side? While the logic is largely null, what Hill produces in this song is a perfect character development based on the type of word association you’d expect him to play on all of his customers. How does he come to the conclusion that this is all a bad idea?
Try this line on for size: “Ya got trouble, right here in River City. With a capital ‘T’ and that rhymes with ‘P’ and that stands for pool.”
That shouldn’t work, and yet Wilson has found a way to make the fumbling an infectious, hypnotic quality. It’s because of this the rest of the show makes perfect sense. You don’t even need to see Hill’s physicality for this song. You just need to listen to an intricate web of scenarios where he’s both selling a vision and decrying another. He’s practically a preacher, telling the world how to do the right thing. It’s a lyrical blessing that even sped up does character development without having to directly tell us about Hill. He’s a huckster, and most of us are sold by that rhyme with ‘P.’
What puts the song over the top is its ability to become a full-on and convincing Broadway number with the crowds singing along. It’s the type of hysteria the show will be built on. How do you convey River City buying into this nonsense? Apparently, all you need is an ensemble reciting his dialogue like scripture, realizing that they’ve bought into this faulty logic. To place it all tonally in a realm of Americana only makes it an essential exposition song that does so much heavy lifting without saying anything significant at all.
2. “Seventy-Six Trombones”
If you asked anyone what the most memorable song from The Music Man is, there is a strong chance that this one would be at the top of everyone’s list. After all, it’s the selling point (literally) of the entire show. Harold Hill is here to sell nonexistent instruments to school children and needs to do everything to cash those paychecks. How do you hype up a product that doesn’t exist? Well, you write a song like this, where the excess becomes dazzling. You can practically picture the marching band running down the street, the rows and rows of the finest virtuosos playing with all of the enthusiasm of small-town America.
Nothing sells the vision of this show quite like the enthusiasm of this number that practically makes you want to march without accompaniment. It’s cheeseball fun and Hill is at his earnest best, making you believe in this fantasy. He has to deliver on his promise, and by this point, his salesman shtick has worked very well on the audience watching it happen. We all want those trombones. We want clarinets. Give us the spectacle. We want that parade, and we want it to be as big as humanly possible.
That may be why the show is practically centered around this song. It’s first established as an unrequited promise. By the end, it’s the thing that changes Hill into a more sympathetic man, desiring for them to get their dream. It’s again a perfect piece of character development, where the song evolves over the show and create a tonal change in how we understand these characters. By the end, it’s celebratory, leaving the audience believing in the good of humanity and the power of music as a great unifier.
3. “Rock Island”
If requested to share my personal picks for best opening songs to a musical ever, “Rock Island” would be high on that list. In some respects it’s literally the rockiest song on the soundtrack, not having the immediacy or catchiness of its peers. However, I believe with all sincerity that it captures everything that’s great about the show in its execution, where we listen to a train start up, as things begin to warm up into a fleshed-out story.
The whole show is a warm-up, of a city learning to believe in themselves and play instruments. As the gears of the train create a percussion, the vocals bop on top beginning to gossip about different aspects of the salesman's life. The way that certain vocalists seem to stumble through lines has this choppy cadence that finds them trying to find their flow. It’s building to something grander while also establishing the quirky personality that the other songs will have.
Most importantly, it introduces the myth of Harold Hill, who just seems to be out of control, able to jump off the train without getting hurt. By having the opening song be sung by characters we’ll never see again, it manages to show how much of an outsider Hill is. He doesn’t even sound like these men gossiping on the train. Every line is an infectious piece of world-building that is unlike everything else in the show and yet explains it perfectly. This is the build-up of instruments, moving from something choppy to something clear. Of course, more than any of that, it gives us one of the best lines in the show “But he doesn’t know the territory!” Well, neither does the audience. We’re just as curious to find out what is out there in River City.
4. “Shipoopi”
In a lot of respects, this is a nonsense song that exists mostly as an excuse to give characters a chance to dance. The vocals die out halfway through and we’re left with this rich orchestration that gives into the music. Of course, it’s all kinds of beautiful and an underrated part of the show. As much as Wilson’s lyrics are works of art, his ability to capture the enthusiasm and pageantry of a community is just as swell, managing to evoke the best of classic Broadway in ways that pay better tribute to the Midwest than Oklahoma!
Though if I’m being honest, it is the nonsense of it all that I personally love. It’s a song about falling in love and determining how long you should wait before falling in love. It’s jaunty, capturing something enthusiastic in the town. I don’t even know what “Shipoopi” means, but I don’t think we really need to know. It’s a nonsense love term that rings true to the goofball charm of these characters. By the time that they sing together, it’s triumphant Americana. Sure it’s all silly and maybe a bit embarrassing, but you can’t help but love how committed the whole act is.
5. “Marian the Librarian”
The song features one of my favorite pieces of orchestration in the entire show. There’s a slinking, subdued sound underneath the vocals that sounds like Harold Hill is wandering through a library, doing his best to not raise a fuss. It’s a simple, repetitive pattern, and it captures this eccentric glee in his heart, especially as the notes rise with optimism. Everything about it suggests an intimacy that works both for its location as well as its intent in the song. Marian is the one person who can’t just be presented with a full-on big number. She needs to be spoken to with a tenderness that convinces her of Hill as something genuine emotionally.
Though it does help that the lyrics are just as fun, subverting what we know from the other songs on the soundtrack. Hill has been able to convince the whole town of his game, except for her. He has no confidence that he’ll stand a chance with Marian. The way that the vocal track sounds like it rushes to the point only to slow as it’s accentuated is an infectious tool on the whole song, and its ability to fluctuate between loud and soft, fast and slow parts is an excellent design that shows Hill struggling for the first time in the show. It’s also one of the most endearing moments in the entire show.
Honorable Mention
“Till There Was You”
If The Music Man has any problem, it’s that the slower songs tend to be less interesting than the upbeat numbers. This is true for every number except this song that comes near the end of Act II. As things heat up for Harold Hill and he must determine whether to give up his charade or bail, he finds a moment for Marian to discuss her personal affection towards him. It’s a sweet moment and one whose purity captures Wilson at his best. This is a love song that could be plucked from just about any other show, and it’s just as timeless. This is especially evident in the various covers that the song has had in subsequent years, including by The Beatles and Anita Bryant. While the showier songs work because of their great energy, the best moment where that’s all stripped away shows how densely layered this show is, capable of so much more than false promises.
What are your favorite songs from The Music Man, and will you be watching it tomorrow afternoon?
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