"Theater buffs will be delighted to find that this scholarly, definitive work is also a hugely entertaining read."
Publisher's Weekly "Large in spirit as well as scope, and as precise, humble, and wise as that Sondheim lyric with which it begins."
Lloyd Rose - The Washington Post "This book is a home run: it is by far the ... Read morebest book ever written about Broadway, a magisterial critical history which will be required reading for virtually anyone interested in musical theater."
Kim Kowalke, The Eastman School of Music "A substantial work of American music history. Scrupulous but not fussy, learned but not pedantic, Stempel is a fine storyteller who delights in clarity and knows a good joke when he sees one. The precision of his thinking and writing gives the book an aura of authority keenly attuned to the tradition he critiques and celebrates."
Richard Crawford, University of Michigan, emeritus, and author of America’s Musical Life: A History "Stempel has hit the trifecta: for academics, it’s a definitive work of scholarship; for students, it’s the perfect textbook; for ordinary lovers of musical theater, it’s a treat to savor at the end of a long day."
Rose Rosengard Subotnik, Brown University Show Less