I Feel Pretty: Using Discretization to unpack gender disparity in musical theatre composition

Bias is transferred via codes embedded in musical gestures, conditioning their message (McClary, 1991). Gender disparity is reinforced in modern music theatre character types and their compositional portrayals. Stereotypical character types exist in music theatre –heroic male protagonist, female love interest, male side-kick and female whore – (Wolf 2002 & Barnes, 2015), yet their musical depictions have not been well addressed in the literature. This presentation will introduce new considerations of gendered musical depictions, through an analysis of ‘West Side Story’.

Gender disparity can be found in the representation of the female characters in Leonard Bernstein’s musical ‘West Side Story’. As a postmodern composer Bernstein was open about his social activism, yet did not consider his compositional portrayal of female characters as part of that activism. Using discretization as an analysis tool, this presentation explores the melodic contours of male and female songs in ‘West Side Story’ to show differences in complexity between male and female characterisation. The analysis explores the intervallic relationship between the vocal line and melodic colour in relation to the accompaniment harmony, taking into consideration the use of consonance and dissonance. ‘West Side Story’ is commonly known for the distinct use of the tritone motif and its inherent dissonance. It is evident when reviewing the findings of this study that there is a distinct disparity between male-led and female-led music. The male-led numbers consistently adhere to a dissonant aesthetic with the tritone motif implemented in all of the extracted songs. By contrast, the female songs remain consonant with simple intervallic movement. By examining the results of this study through the lens of Equality Feminism, this study finds that Bernstein has simplified the characterisations of the female leads. This presentation further proposes that without cognisant consideration of the compositional portrayal of women, musical theatre will continue to reinforce gender stereotypes, as evident through this study of Bernstein’s ‘West Side Story’.