Music Analysis: The Music Man

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The Music Man is a musical about con man Harold Hill, who comes to River City, Iowa to act as a boy’s band organizer to sell instruments and uniforms. He’s successful because he promises to train the members of the band - when, in reality, he can’t read a note of music. The librarian, Marian sees right through him as he tries to woo her, but when Marian’s little brother overcomes his shyness because of his band she starts to fall in love. In the end, Harold chooses love over his tricky profession, and stay in River City as an honest man. As a musical, the movie takes great care in using choreography to add to the music. In the song “Marian the Librarian”, various diegetic sounds are used to add to the tune in the song playing. For example, in the beginning of the song, in separate scenes, Marian is stamping books and accidently stamps Harold’s hand, which starts off the song with a very sudden tone, just like the slap of the stamp on the books or Harold’s hand. Another time, they time jabbing notes to Marian’s head …show more content…
Before the Marian the Librarian song, Marian is seen loading up books on a pulley, one which is shown as an Indiana Education Journal. Later on, the book comes up again when Marian remembers that Harold said that he graduated from Gary Conservatory in Indiana in ‘05. Earlier on, when Harold sings “Ya Got Trouble” telling all the parents of River City that their new pool table will lead their children down a path filled with drugs and deceit, Harold ends up standing next to a statue and copies its commanding stance. In this way, we can see Harold is commanding, influencing the River City parents to find an after-school activity for their children so as to keep them out of trouble. At another time, they make a joke out of it - two kids are playing hop-scotch, and when one girl notices that the Wells Fargo wagon is coming, the other girl runs straight through the hop-scotch to see