Highbrow/lowdown
Subtitle: theater, jazz, and the making of the new middle class
By: David Savran.
Publisher: The University of Michigan Press
Published: 2009
Place of publication: Ann Arbor
Language: eng
Number of pages: 326
ISBN-13: 9780472116928
Subjects: Music -- Social aspects -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Jazz -- History and criticism; Theater -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Middle class -- United States -- History -- 20th century
Description: Overview: Highbrow/Lowdown explores the twentieth century's first culture war and the forces that permanently transformed American theater into the art form we know today. The arrival of jazz in the 1920s sparked a cultural revolution that was impossible to contain. The music affected every stratum of U.S. society and culture, confusing and challenging long-entrenched hierarchies based on class, race, and ethnicity. But jazz was much more than the music---it was also a powerful cultural force that brought African American, Jewish, and working-class culture into the white Protestant mainstream. When the influence of jazz spread to legitimate theater, playwrights, producers, and critics rushed to distinguish the newly emerging literary theater from its illegitimate cousins. The efforts to defeat the democratizing influences of jazz and to canonize playwrights like Eugene O'Neill triumphed, giving birth to American theater as we know it today.
Notes: Portions of the text were previously published.

Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: America's music; title: The struggle for legitimacy; title: Fascinating rhythm; title: Pandering to the "intelligent minority"; title: Human cogs and levers; title: Jazz cosmopolitanism; title: The canonization of Eugene O'Neill.