September 24, 2026: The Harlem Renaissance and Musicals of the 1920s
Class Preparation
Recommended Reading:
- Broadway: The American Musical:
- “It's Getting Dark on Old Broadway”: Sissle and Blake and Shuffle Along—pages 80-84
- "There Never Was and Never Will Be a Show Like This!": Show Boat--pages 106-113
- "The Blackbirds Reviews"--page 73
- "I Can Do Bloody Well Without You": Traditions and Transitions in Revivals--pages 462-468. This section describes several revivals of the 2010-2019 decade, including the one of Shuffle Along in 2016.
- Black Broadway:
- Chapter 3, pages 56-87 (includes information about plays as well as musicals)
- Class 2 Selected Lyrics (There are more lyrics from Shuffle Along, because I found an authoritative source for them. From Show Boat, I only included those songs that are directly connected to the African-American characters in the show.)
- Handout of Key Class 2 slides
Links & Playlists
YouTube Playlists:
- Sissle & Blake Sing Shuffle Along (Includes 1921 recordings by original cast members as well as demonstration recordings by Eubie Blake made in anticipation of a 1950 revival.)
- Show Boat (Excerpts from John McGlinn's 1988 Complete Recording--including the dialogue of the "miscegenation scene" with its underscoring.)
- Show Boat (Paper Mill Playhouse, 1989) This full performance was taped in front of a live audience at the Paper Mill (NJ) Playhouse and aired on PBS on October 27th, 1989, in the Great Performances series. Running time: 2:36:02. "Miscegenation scene" occurs at [40:11].
- Class 2 Video Playlist (includes videos shown in class except for those from Paper Mill's complete performance described above)