• A Critical Companion to the American Stage Musical
• The Oxford Companion to the American Musical: Theatre, Film, and Television.
• A Chronology of American Musical Theater
• Film it with Music: an Encyclopedic Guide to the American Movie Musical.
• Broadway Musicals, Show by Show
• Show Tunes: the Songs, Shows, and Careers of Broadway's Major Composers.
• Broadway Musicals: a Hundred Year History.
• The Routledge Companion to African American Theatre and Performance
• The Routledge Companion to the Contemporary Musical
• The world of musicals: an encyclopedia of stage, screen, and song
• Oxford Music Online

 

• The Oxford Companion to American Theatre
• North American Theatre Online
• Library of Congress Performing Arts Encyclopedia
• The Encyclopedia of Vaudeville
• Vaudeville, old & new: an encyclopedia of variety performers in America

Streaming Videos

• American Music
• BroadwayHD
• Database of Recorded American Music [DRAM]
• Jazz Music Library
• Popular Music Library
• Films from Kanopy
• Opera in video
• PBS Video Collection

• **see also, Finding Videos

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Digital Images

• ARTStor (2.5+ million high-quality images in dozens of disciplines, all rights-cleared for education and research.)
• Library of Congress
• New York Public Library
• Digital Public Library of America

I. (JumboSearch for) Books 

Keywords/Phrases to try out:

• Musical Theater

  Musicals -- United States:

  • -- 21st Century -- History And Criticism.
  • -- Analysis, Appreciation.
  • -- Bibliography.
  • -- Dictionaries.
  • -- Exhibitions.
  • -- Foreign Influences.
  • -- History And Criticism.
  • -- Stories, Plots, Etc.

  Musical Theater -- United States

  • -- Dictionaries
  • -- History.
  • -- History -- 18th Century.
  • -- History -- 19th Century.
  • -- History And Criticism.
  • -- Pictorial Works.
  • "musical theater" and reviews

  Musical Films -- United States -- History And Criticism.

  • Porter, Cole (on a dominant figure)
  • Vaudeville
  • Music-halls (Variety-theaters, cabarets, etc.)
  • "victor herbert" and libretto
  • Librettists
  • Revues

 

A few sample titles at Tisch Library:

• Adapting The Wizard of Oz: musical versions from Baum to MGM and beyond

  Race and performance after repetition

  Broadway musicals, show by show

  Reframing the musical: race, culture and identity

  Oklahoma!: the complete book and lyrics of the Broadway musical

  Passing strange: the complete book and lyrics of the Broadway musical

  A beautiful pageant: African American theatre, drama, and performance in the Harlem Renaissance, 1910-1927

  The Great White Way: Race and the Broadway Musical

  Making Americans: Jews and the Broadway Musical

  The American Musical and the Formation of National Identity

  The American musical and the performance of personal identity

  The Theatre Will Rock

 

Note: Worldwide Libraries (also known as WorldCat is still a better place to get a fuller picture of  books on a topic)

II. Scholarly and Trade Journal Articles

A. Performing Arts and Music Databases

• Performing Arts Periodicals Database
• RILM Abstracts of Music Literature with Full Text
  (for reception:
      -- "dramatic criticism" in Scholarly journals
      -- "theatre reviews" in popular press and trade publications.)
• JSTOR (all subjects)
• Project Muse (all subjects)

 

Diversity of Scholarship and Sources

• In the study of popular musical theater, you can choose to focus on your topic from a variety of perspectives, and you will need to consult diverse publications in theater scholarship, musical scholarship (and, perhaps, sociological and economic scholarship) as well as the popular press.

   

  For example, from the perspective of performance studies, you may engage in describing how a musical uses some dramatic conventions to offer social commentaries. You will be offering your own analysis of their effectiveness or ineffectiveness in conveying the message to the audience.

  Search Tips

  1. Start with "names" of the composers, lyricists, librettists, directors, designers, choreographers, performers and producers, and, titles of the shows.

  2. Examine search results to learn what and how critics and scholars have written about your potential topics.

  3. Think of "evidence". For example, when research on the question, "Why do musicals continue to be popular?", you may consider using analysis of evidence such as "box office", "attendance", duration of productions to prove its popularity.

B. Related Subject-Databases

• In EBSCOhost databases, you can select to search across the following databases, among others:
• Academic Search Premier
• America: History & Life
• Communication & Mass Media Complete
• Film & Television Literature Index
• LGBTQ+ Source
• Music Index Online
• MLA International Bibliography (includes theatre studies)

III. Newspaper Articles

For reviews of recent productions:

• Access World News (rich U.S. regional newspapers)
• Factiva (more international coverage)
• More

Our most frequently requested newspapers:

• New York Times. Please note that you can create your own personal account on the New York Times’ website using your Tufts email address.
• Boston Globe
• The Washington Post: Direct Publisher Access (Current | digital reproduction)
• The Washington Post on Factiva (Current | plain text)

For historical reviews:

• American Periodicals (1740 - 1940)
• Boston Globe (1872-1985)
• Los Angeles Times (1881-1992)
• New York Times Online Archive (1851 - 2013)
• Washington Post (1877-1999)
• more