The Scarlet Letter: A New Musical

Audio Samples

Click on the song title to download an audio track in mp3 format.

Song Title	Representative Type	Description

“City Upon a Hill - Prologue”	Anthem / “Radio spot”	Introduces briefly the principal musical and textual themes that anchor the show. Establishes an immediate juxtaposition between the soothing, ethereal quality of the colony’s lofty goals and the stark relief of the more realist sounds of “Judgment Day” (Hester’s sentencing).

“City Upon a Hill”	Anthem / “Radio spot”	A fuller exposition of the theme with a take-home beginning and ending. Excerpts from this piece have been considered a prime commercial radio spot.

“Speak For Me”	Solo for the songbooks	Startling solo ballad to demonstrate the full range of both Hester’s emotion and also her technicality. The thoughtful reverie of the beginning of the song contrasts sharply with the powerful and trenchant ending. Possibly the song that every 15-year old wants to go home and sing for her auditions.

“Revelations”	Character montage	Searing climax to Act I, the last time that Dimmesdale, Roger, and Hibbins can truly escape to their individual spaces. Dimmesdale’s agonizing first confession -- a confession that this time he makes only to himself -- provides a significant “star moment” for the role.

“Be True”	Audience pleaser /Parody	Opening of Act II welcomes the audience back in with a break; it is an upbeat, parodic number with plenty of room for humor and farce. The witches’ dance is satire; they join what they reject and reject what they join. An unexpected dose of fun.

“The Election Day Sermon”	Dramatic climax	Confession at last; in this final sweep of emotion each of the characters again tells his story. As the clamor builds to a fervor and frenzy we finally attain the purging, the inexorable revelation, that we have been seeking since Hester accepts her sentence in silence on the first judgment day.