Kiedy muzyka jest działaniem. Kontaminacje gatunkowe nowego dramatu

Abstract

Musicality is a strong, often inseparable feature of recent Polish dramas and texts for theater. Its characteristic manifestations include choral parts (singing or recitative), songs (usually quotations of well-known works and remixes), or operations on language which bring out its sound qualities. Ewa Wąchocka analyses two most important musical phenomena in contemporary drama, crucial from the genological perspective: the assimilation of songs and com-positional-structural references. The use of ready-made verbal and musical ele-ments clearly indicates the transformation of the dramatic text itself and, at the same time, the change of its status and meaning in the theatrical performance. The inlays usually go beyond the traditional role of musical scenery, consti-tute more than just a commentary or an aesthetic sign, and not infrequently function in a manner similar to musical theater genres (such as musical, song--play, concert). Expanding the text with songs or chants, motivated primarily thematically and ideologically – like in the case in dramaturgy presenting new historical narratives – simultaneously affects genre contaminations. It testifies to the infiltration of popular genres into theater, while works built on the model of musical forms, which are rarer, harken back to the tradition of high genres (requiem, oratorio). Both forms of music in the transpositions of contemporary playwrights take on a performative character, becoming events that combine music and text in action.