Musical or opera with little or no spoken dialogue
A sung-through or through-sung work is a piece of musical performance art such as musical theatre, musical film, or opera in which the entire libretto consists of songs, with little to no non-musical speech. Monologues, dialogues, asides, and any other literary device used to tell the story are set to music. There is frequently instrumental accompaniment, and sometimes choreography.
A scene that may include a speech, a conversation, and some musings may include a combination of recitative, aria, and arioso. Early versions of this include the Italian genre of opera buffa, a light-hearted form of opera that gained prominence in the 1750s.[1][2]
A through-sung opera or other form of narrative work with continuous music may also be described as through-composed.
Originally starting off as a concept album, the musical has a reputation for being re-written during every new production that is staged around the world. Some productions are completely sung-through, some have scattered lines, and some (notably the original Broadway production) are staged as book musicals.[20]
^Richard Taruskin, (2009 ). Music in the Nineteenth Century: The Oxford History of Western Music. Oxford University Press
^Lotte Eilskov Jensen, Joseph Theodoor Leerssen, Marita Mathijsen (eds). 2010. Free Access to the Past: Romanticism, Cultural Heritage and the Nation. Brill. p. 236.
^Hummler, Richard (13 October 1982). "Cats". Variety. Archived from the original on 2 April 2019. Retrieved 2 April 2019.
