Karl Miller wrote: >From my perspective music theater is written to be popular, whereas the >primary goal of art music is to please the composer. Not an original >thought on my part, something William Schuman said. I'm not so sure that many composers did not write hoping that their music would be published and performed to the masses (or some masses anyway). Also much popular music (composers of rock) often say that write for themselves. This gets into to issue of whether life imitates art or art imitates life. >And what about all of those fine composers who are still writing opera? Maybe I should have said "musicals are a modern form of opera", not the modern form. Thanks for the correction. Bill Pirkle