Welcome to the Virtual StageStruck! Home Page
A warm welcome to this digital conference on Rethinking the Golden Age Musical, in which Broadway performers, authors, academics and archivists will celebrate the most treasured period in Broadway history–but take a critical approach to its troubled past. In a conference honoring the career of Kim Kowalke, Emeritus Professor at Rochester and the President of the Kurt Weill Foundation, we are thrilled to play host to scholars from across the globe, including Canada, Italy, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, South Korea, the United Kingdom, and the US, as we take stock of existing scholarship on the Golden Age musical and explore ways forward.
We are particularly pleased that Broadway performers including Shereen Ahmed, Victoria Clark, Melissa Errico, Ali Ewoldt, Judy Kuhn, Ephraim Sykes and Kristin Yancy, as well as West End actors Jalisa Andrews and Dominic Sibanda, will join us to participate in sessions focusing on race and gender, which will acknowledge the problems of this beloved repertoire, while new archival research will shed new light on lesser-known works. 5-time Grammy nominee and founder of the Great American Songbook Foundation, Michael Feinstein, will introduce the conference and participate throughout to showcase the materials housed in the Songbook Archives that allow scholars to continue their research of musical theatre.
A full schedule of live panel discussions is available via our digital program book (also available to download) and on-demand presentations are accessible below. Please make sure you have registered to attend the conference to receive a Zoom webinar link to your email inbox prior to the live sessions. If you have not already done so, please REGISTER HERE.
If you are having trouble viewing our digital program book or prefer to download a single-page, printer-friendly version, please click here.
Technical Assistance
If you have questions or need assistance accessing any of the presentations or live sessions at any time, please email info@thesongbook.org. If you are unfamiliar with the Zoom platform, a Zoom webinar tutorial is available here.
If you have trouble accessing the videos housed on this website below, all presentations are also available for viewing via YouTube by clicking here.
Support the Great American Songbook Foundation
We are happy to offer this conference free of charge. To allow the Songbook Foundation to continue its preservation efforts and the ability to offer low or no cost programming, please consider making a gift today by clicking here or by texting “SONGBOOK” to 91999.
On-Demand Offerings
Below you will find recorded presentations, live replays and handouts available for you to view on-demand in addition to the ten live academic panels with special discussions between leading actors, the launch of six new books on musicals and a special conversation between senior musical theater archivists at the New York Public Library and the Library of Congress. Please also explore our digital program book to access presenter abstracts and biographies.
- Archival Perspectives Follow-up Resources: Mark Horowitz has provided two documents available below to address attendees' questions about new acquisitions at the Library of Congress:
- Theorizing the Golden Age Musical: Genre, Structure, Syntax by conference honoree, Kim Kowalke is available below.
Live Session: Replays
Please see a few of the live sessions and keynote addresses available for replay below. The Industry panels on gender and Black representation and experience are also listed as you scroll down through this page.
Panel 1: Themes of the Golden Age
This panel will be chaired by Jeffrey Magee. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
Panel 2: Form & Aesthetics in the Golden Age
This panel will be chaired by Tim Carter. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
Industry Panel: Gender and the Golden Age
This panel will be chaired by Tony-nominated actress Melissa Errico.
This discussion will take place during the live sessions on Wednesday, May 12 and will feature the Broadway actresses below. The starting point for this panel is chair Melissa Errico's article in the New York Times from 2018. Read it here.
Wednesday's session available for viewing below.
Panel 3: Representing Identity in the Golden Age
This panel will be chaired by David Savran. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
Panel 4: Archival Approaches
This panel will be chaired by Steve Swayne. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
Panel 5: The Business of Broadway
This panel will be chaired by Susan Weiss. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
Panel 7: Unsettling the parameters of the Golden Age
This panel will be chaired by Maya Cantu. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
Panel 8: Staging Race in Golden Age Musicals
This panel will be chaired by David Savran. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
Industry Panel: Black Experience and Representation on Broadway and in the West End
This panel will be chaired by Naomi André (Professor in the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies, Women’s and Gender Studies, and the Residential College at the University of Michigan).
This discussion will take place during the live sessions on Friday, May 14 and will feature the Broadway and West End actors below. Read their bios.
Panel 10: Disparate Strands
This panel will be chaired by Walter Frisch. Pre-Recorded presentations available below.
In the Archives: Live Clips
Due to some audio/visual delay, we have uploaded the In the Archives segments for more successful streaming below.
Learn more about the Songbook Foundation
Since we will not be gathering in-person at the Great American Songbook Foundation in Carmel, IN, we invite you to visit the Songbook Archives virtually by viewing a recent episode of the popular video series In the Archives with Michael Feinstein, as well as a conversation between Dominic McHugh and Archivist Lisa Lobdell ahead of Meredith Willson's induction into the Songbook Hall of Fame. We also invite you to explore the Foundation's online exhibits exploring topics ranging from Of Thee I Sing: Politics on Stage to A Change is Gonna Come: 1960s Broadway Musicals available here.
*The list above reflects registration as of May 3, 2021
Special thanks to Dominic McHugh and the Great American Songbook Foundation staff for their hard work in making this digital conference possible. To allow the Songbook Foundation to continue its preservation efforts and the ability to offer low or no cost programming, please consider making a gift today by clicking here or by texting “SONGBOOK” to 91999.
