Musical theatre, although containing many of the same ingredients as music hall, is more closely related to opera and it's lighter cousin operetta, as pioneered by Gilbert & Sullivan. But whereas operetta contains a storyline, this aspect is often reduced to a minimum in musical theatre in favour of dance routines, songs, or a combination of the two. Sometimes it is dispensed with altogether.

Edwardian Britain produced few if any songwriters of note for this genre, and by the 1920's, with Broadway entering a long Golden Age, British musicals were homely, charming and nostalgic, the product of writers like Noel Coward, Ivor Novello and Noel Gay.
Noel Coward was not a great songwriter by any stretch of the imagination, but was a fine playwright and a renowned wit. His most well-known songs include Mad Dogs And Englishmen - written in 1930 and first heard on the stage in the 1932 revue WORDS AND MUSIC - Don't Put Your Daughter On The Stage, Mrs. Worthington written in 1933, and the war-time favourite London Pride from 1941.
Ivor Novello produced a huge body of much-loved music between the wars, but is best remembered for the First World War favourite Keep The Home Fires Burning, written in 1915 with Lena Guilbert Ford.
Noel Gay's cockney musical ME AND MY GIRL of 1937, written with lyricists L. Arthur Rose and Douglas Furber, contains two old favourites in The Lambeth Walk and the jaunty The Sun Has Got His Hat On as well as the excellent title number. Gay also wrote George Formby's signature tune Leaning On A Lamppost .
After 1950, talented and original songwriters are even harder to find, notable exceptions being Lionel Bart , whose 1960 success OLIVER contains songs such as As Long As He Needs Me and I'd Do Anything.
Anthony Newley and Leslie Bricusse's early 1960's collaborations for the stage yielded Once In A Lifetime, What Kind Of Fool Am I ? and Who Can I Turn To ? amongst others. But it was the partnership of Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber which, following the success of HAIR in 1968 and Pete Townshend's 1969 rock musical TOMMY, led a 1970's and 1980's revival of the genre with their mega-musicals and pop operas.

In 2000 Stephen Sondheim suggested that musical theatre had ceased to be a creative vehicle for original songwriting, morphing into little more than a tourist attraction. No doubt he was referring mainly to the situation on Broadway, but it also applies to the UK, where the advent of so-called 'jukebox' musicals such as MAMA MIA, WE WILL ROCK YOU and OUR HOUSE, containing minimal plot lines and based around the already popular hits of established acts, has only served to reinforce his suspicion.
The Golden Age of musical theatre is long gone. Will it ever return?Almost certainly not, but, of course, time will tell.

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