Culture January 1, 1

Early in their fascinating, sometimes maddening cornucopia of erudition, The New Music Theater, Eric Salzman and Thomas Desi define their subject: “Music theater can be considered the confluence or adding up of language-like expressions: verbal or spoken language (the story; the libretto), physical movement or body language (gesture, dance), images or visual language (décor or design), and sound or musical language (pitch and rhythm; vocal and instrumental).” The book’s subtitle, Seeing the Voice, Hearing the Body, aptly conveys the nature of this porous and flexible art form, in which disciplines mate in diverse and often obstreperous ways. The subject is