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| Orchestra Pit question ?? | |
| Posted by: hobokenken 10:08 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| Does anyone know whether EVERY Broadway theater has an orchestra pit? There are some theaters known for only housing plays (vs musicals), and therefore was wondering whether that issue comes into it. Trying to settle a score (ha-ha) with a friend. | |
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| re: Orchestra Pit question ?? | |
| Posted by: NewtonUK 11:06 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: Orchestra Pit question ?? - hobokenken 10:08 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| All theatres except the Hayes & Circle in the Square have orchestra pits. The Hayes pit was filled with concrete when it became a TV studio. Before WW2 every theatre had to pay a minimum orchestra whether they were used or not. If your minimum was 14 musicians, and you were doing DEATH OF A SALESMAN you still had to pay musicians. | |
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| I think that's not exactly correct | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 08:17 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Orchestra Pit question ?? - NewtonUK 11:06 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| I believe the minimum was four musicians when nonmusicals were being performed. The union did sometimes decide that nonmusicals were musicals if a sufficient amount of music was played, and then the production was required to hire the same number of musicians that were required for musicals. This happened, for example, with Margaret Webster's 1945 production of The Tempest, although Cheryl Crawford tried to fight it. But it didn't happen often. | |
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| A bit more | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 09:00 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: I think that's not exactly correct - AlanScott 08:17 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| I think that in the days when plays sometimes took advantage of the house-minimum requirement, and they were used to play pre-show and intermission music (music that wasn't written for the play), they were sometimes placed in a box rather than the pit. I think often it was a string quartet, although I've read that at the Winter Garden in 1957, the house musicians were two violists and two cellists. So I think that even if wasn't always a string quartet, they were often all string players. I think it was pretty common that the house musicians were not very good. Sometimes they were someone's relative who wasn't good enough to get hired as a regular pit musician. There's a story I've read that when the West Side Story orchestrations were being prepared, Bernstein, perhaps along with Ramin and Kostal, listened to the house musicians and decided that the violists simply could not be used. The cellists were not very good, but they could be used with limitations. The orchestration was prepared to include four cellists, two of whom would play the tougher stuff and the other two — the Winter Garden house musicians — would play very simple stuff (whole notes). |
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| re: Orchestra Pit question ?? | |
| Posted by: ryhog 06:10 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Orchestra Pit question ?? - NewtonUK 11:06 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| not sure what the minimums has to do with this, but Studio 54 has an actual pit? | |
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| re: Orchestra Pit question ?? | |
| Posted by: reed23 06:31 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Orchestra Pit question ?? - ryhog 06:10 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| Studio 54 has had more name changes than any other theatre. It began life as Gallo's Opera House in 1927, and for many years was a legit house – until 1943, when CBS bought it, renamed it Studio 52 (referring to the order of purchase), and transformed it into a TV studio. I'm not sure of the pit was permanently filled in or not, at that time or when it became a nightclub in 1977. | |
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| re: Orchestra Pit question ?? | |
| Posted by: tmdonahue (tmdonahue@yahoo.com) 10:59 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: Orchestra Pit question ?? - hobokenken 10:08 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| This is not a detailed answer to your question, but it's a relevant factoid. The smallest Broadway house, the Helen Hayes, has a pit. As early as 1913 when the venue was called the Little Theatre a musical was performed there, called "Prunella or Love in a Dutch Garden." | |
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| Read NewtonUK only after posting. Now I know the HH has no pit anymore. | |
| Posted by: tmdonahue 01:25 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Orchestra Pit question ?? - tmdonahue 10:59 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| re: Read NewtonUK only after posting. Now I know the HH has no pit anymore. | |
| Posted by: NewtonUK 01:29 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: Read NewtonUK only after posting. Now I know the HH has no pit anymore. - tmdonahue 01:25 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| I think they assumed it would be TV STudio forever - and the concrete was a great surface for the cameras to roll on. | |
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| re: Orchestra Pit question ?? | |
| Posted by: FleetStreetBarber 10:48 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: Orchestra Pit question ?? - hobokenken 10:08 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| I doubt whether EVERY Broadway theatre has a pit. Take, for example, Circle in the Square.... | |
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| re: Orchestra Pit question ?? | |
| Posted by: NewtonUK 05:55 pm EDT 06/24/19 | |
| In reply to: re: Orchestra Pit question ?? - FleetStreetBarber 10:48 am EDT 06/24/19 | |
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| Circle in the Square and the Hayes are the only two - and the Hayes was built with a pit, which was sadly filled with concrete in the 1950's. | |
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