Jake Heggie’s Musical Style

Jake Heggie’s unique compositional voice is influenced by several contrasting musical styles. Heggie infuses his work with nonclassical musical genres like gospel and jazz, creating a modern melting pot of operatic style unique to him. This musical mixing is evident in Dead Man Walking, which combines prerecorded music, references to Elvis Presley, Christian hymns, and conventional operatic writing to great dramatic effect.

In this activity, students will explore Heggie’s compositional voice by comparing excerpts from some of his most important musical influences with selections from Dead Man Walking. After actively listening to Heggie’s compositional mentors and influences, they will use their newly discovered knowledge to fill in a chart tracking how specific elements of style appear in the score for Dead Man Walking.

STEP 1. REVIEW

Before we examine his musical style, we need to learn a bit about Heggie’s life, education, and career. Distribute copies of the “The Creation of Dead Man Walking” timeline included in this guide. Students can read the timeline independently or in small groups.

To conclude the examination of Heggie’s life and work, share the quotation below from an interview published in the San Francisco Bay Times:

I think I’ve been influenced in one way or another by everything I’ve ever heard! That definitely started when I was growing up with movies, musicals, jazz, pop and rock. My dad was a fan of classic big band music and singers like Frank Sinatra, Jo Stafford, Peggy Lee, and Ella Fitzgerald. Specific composers who’ve influenced me include Sondheim, Bernstein, Gershwin, Rodgers, Britten, Poulenc, Debussy, Ravel, Mozart, Chopin, Puccini, Verdi, Janáček, Tchaikovsky, etc. It’s a long list! Certainly, I’ve been very influenced by great pop singers like Barbra Streisand, k.d. lang, Carly Simon, Joni Mitchell, and yes, even Lady Gaga. But also great opera stars throughout history. I didn’t find opera until I was in my late 20s, but once bitten I was forever hooked.

STEP 2. WARM UP

Now that students have learned a bit about Heggie’s life and work, it’s time to jump in and prepare to analyze some music. First, we will do a brief word-cloud warm up. Select a free word-cloud generator from the list below:

freewordcloudgenerator.com
wordclouds.com
monkeylearn.com/word-cloud

Students may access the generator on their personal devices. Use the topics below as inspiration for your word clouds, and encourage students to use only one-word responses to the prompts.

• How are you feeling today?
• What did you eat for breakfast?
• What is your favorite TV show?
• What kind of pet do you have?
• Who is your favorite singer?
• What is your favorite movie?

STEP 3. DESCRIBE

Now that students are warmed up and have their brains turned on, they are ready to jump into the main lesson. But before they begin listening, they must first assemble a word bank of descriptive language to use in their analysis. These very basic descriptive words will provide students with vocabulary that they can use to reach more specific characterizations of each track.

Follow these steps to create your class’s word bank:

• Divide students into groups of four or five.
• Assign each group one of the following words: happy, sad, angry, tired, fast, and slow.
• Once all groups have been assigned a term, they will have ten minutes to come up with 10–15 synonyms for their word. Groups must decoratively write their synonyms on a large piece of paper, sticky note, or posterboard that they will present to the class. They should use colored markers or pencils to decorate the word bank.
• Have each group read and display their decorated word banks so everyone in the class can see it.

STEP 4. LISTEN

Now students will listen to several of the musicians who influenced Heggie’s compositional style, using the included handout to track specific qualities of each composition.

• Introduce the activity by beginning the “Elements of Style” chart as a class before students complete the handout on their own. Listen to any one of the tracks listed below, focusing on the second column (“Significance”) of the chart, where students should jot down ideas about the importance of different instruments, lyrics, and melodic lines in the selection. There are no right or wrong answers here! Students should note whatever they hear for each item listed in the first column. (If one element isn’t present in the track, they can leave it blank.)
• As a class, discuss the observations in column two: Was there anything that someone heard that others did not? Are there any disagreements? Why?
• Have students move on to the third column (“Descriptive Language”). Referring to the word banks that the class has already created, play the selection again as students fill in the third column with descriptive words for the items listed in the first column.
• Discuss these entries as a class. Are there any words that need to be added to the word banks created at the beginning of this exercise? As students share, they should feel free to add new descriptions to the third column based on the conversation.
• Divided into pairs, students will then select a piece from the list of musicians that influenced Heggie’s compositional voice. Students should work with their partners to complete the chart again, this time for the selection of their choice. Make sure students listen to the selection at least twice and try to have at least one group for each of the selections. Audio tracks can be found on YouTube, Spotify, or any other streaming platform.
  • Frank Sinatra, “My Way”
  • Steven Sondheim, “Children will listen,” from Into the Woods
  • George Gershwin, “A Woman is a sometimes thing,” from Porgy and Bess
  • Leonard Bernstein, “A boy like that,” from West Side Story
  • Richard Rodgers, “This nearly was mine,” from South Pacific
  • Ella Fitzgerald, “Dream a little dream”
  • Carly Simon, “That’s the Way I’ve Always Heard It Should Be”
  • Benjamin Britten, “The Sally Gardens”
  • Barbra Streisand, “Woman in Love”
  • Lady Gaga, “Poker Face”

Share out!

STEP 5. COMPARE

Now that students are acquainted with the work of some of Heggie’s influences, we will return to the “Elements of Style” chart once again to analyze a few musical moments from Dead Man Walking. Students can work individually or remain in pairs, completing each column of the handout for each selection from the opera.

Track 1 ACT II, SCENE 3: “Well? Well?”

Track 2 ACT I, SCENE 2: “How fast was I going, officer?”

Track 3 ACT I, SCENE 8: “You don’t know what it’s like to bear a child”

Once students have listened to each excerpt from Dead Man Walking and filled out their charts, have them compare their observations about these selections to their earlier notes on Heggie’s musical influences.

Finally, convene a group discussion about students’ findings. Ask:

• What connections can you make between the first selections and the Dead Man Walking clips?
• Which specific elements of style does Heggie use in his writing that speak to you?
• Which elements of style that you heard in the earlier selections does Heggie not use in his score for Dead Man Walking?
• Which composer/performer/musical style do you believe most strongly influenced Heggie? Why?