Greatest Hits Three: “Hamilton Medley”

Here at Bristol Show Choir, sometimes a show has so many brilliant tunes that it’s hard to choose what one we’d like to arrange, so out come the medleys! We have two medleys that made our “Greatest Hits” ten, funnily enough both works are by the same composer. You’ll hear about the second of the works in our fifth Greatest Hits blog, but right now it’s time to take our shot and tell you about our medley from Hamilton!

Written by Lin Manuel Miranda, this sung and rapped through musical tells the story of Alexander Hamilton, one of America’s Founding Fathers, inspired by Miranda’s reading Ron Chernow’s 2004 biography. The score has something in it to suit lots of eclectic tastes: there’s hip hop, soul, R & B, pop alongside more traditional musical theatre influences. Hamilton opened on Broadway in August 2016, just a few short months after its sold out Off Broadway premiere. On opening, Hamilton received widespread critical acclaim: at the 70th Tony Awards, it received a record breaking 16 nominations, winning 11! When the show opened on the West End a year later, it went onto receive seven Olivier awards in 2018. Miranda has described the show as about “America then, as told by America now”

Now a confession from your Bristol Show Choir blogger: it took me a long time to get on board with the buzz around this show; I have a great friend who kept persevering: they sat me down with the cast recording and explaining the context of each song, and first trying out the songs that had a more traditional musical theatre sound to ease me in! I’m pleased to report that their work paid off, and I’ve seen the show a few times.

A medley can be a tricky beast at the best of times, and Hamilton has a lot of intricacy going on! The Show Choir arrangement includes: “Alexander Hamilton”, “My Shot” and “History Has Its Eyes On You”, each with its own distinct style and sound, but we aren’t afraid of a challenge… the keys to singing this one well are precision: each section of the choir has its own timings, rhythms,  and even lyrics to master, and always being aware of how your part fits in relation to the choir as a whole. If we lose the precision as can happen because there’s a temptation to speed up, everything can potentially fall a little flat. Listening and reacting to our conductor and each other is vital with any song we learn and sing, but it’s vital here as it keeps us focused and we maintain control, rather than the song running away with us. Diction is also massively important in this number, as it’s an incredibly wordy song… I’ve been learning this the hard way as when we originally learned this number, I had been an alto, but have long switched to singing Tenor; this has taught me one thing: practise, practise, practise! It’s sounding better and better the more we sing, and we can’t wait to perform it once again.

Next time, we’ll be off to the Pridelands… watch this space!