Actualizing the (Im)Possible in Community Musical Theater

Community musical theater actively engages individuals in music-making and dramatic performances across the United States. Musical experiences in the realm of community musical theater afford individuals opportunities for meaningful musical and social interactions. This intensive study of music as a social activity chronicles the experiences of a community group in the southeastern United States as they present a production of Maury Yeston's blockbuster musical Titanic. Participants' approaches to music-making on the community level, their reasons for involvement, and their view of the relationship between community and professional musical theater are discussed. This examination of community musical theater, which examines its ability to shape and influence the most fundamental aspects of its participants' lives, reveals the power of this compelling variety of musical and dramatic performance and its vital function in the larger community. My research focuses on influences that define or confine musical experience and interactions that come to shape these musical activities. Community musical theater is explored as an important activity that affords individuals opportunities to fulfill a need to be musical through self-exploration and collaboration in a social environment. Community musical theater participants are positioned at the crossroads of what Thomas Turino refers to as "the Possible" and "the Actual." The relationship between the Possible and the Actual is explored as it unfolds in three contexts: between community musical theater and Broadway, within the musical Titanic itself, and for the individual participant in community musical theater. This thesis reveals the power of actualizing possibilities in community musical theater and how the music at the heart of this experience is so meaningful to its participants.