Harmonizing Hip-Hop and History: Implications of Music Congruence on Broadway’s Hamilton

Open Access
- Author:
- Fisher, Madelyn
- Area of Honors:
- Marketing
- Degree:
- Bachelor of Science
- Document Type:
- Thesis
- Thesis Supervisors:
- Brett Christenson, Thesis Supervisor
Jennifer Chang Coupland, Thesis Honors Advisor - Keywords:
- Marketing
Music
Broadway
Incongruence
Sensory
Elaboration - Abstract:
- Through its hip-hop soundtrack, Hamilton: An American Musical, gave rap fanatics and theatergoers alike an exciting and fresh perspective on a 200-year-old story. This thesis aims to address how Hamilton’s deviance from the conventions of a Broadway musical’s sound contributed to a cultural, musical, and storytelling revolution. Straddling both musical genres of Broadway and hip-hop, Hamilton’s perceived musical novelty heightened interest to engage with both musical theatre and American history (Romano et al., 2018). In alignment with relevant literature on moderate incongruence, the theoretical framework of Mandler’s Schema Congruity Theory, and the Elaboration Likelihood Model, this thesis attempts to explore the role of incongruent music as a driver of unprecedented willingness to not only listen to a historical drama’s music, but to learn about the history itself. The researcher hypothesizes that when compared to congruence, moderate incongruence will produce a greater intent to engage with the content of a song. The findings of this thesis demonstrate that music’s fit with paired content was proven to be a statistically significant contributor to changing the perception of congruence. Following two studies, it is proven that when (in)congruence is identified, there is a greater intent to continue listening to and learning about the content within a song. The outcomes from this case study on Hamilton and its paired music choice are valuable to marketers seeking to rebrand mature products with assistance from interesting music. Ultimately, this thesis aims to authenticate the role that music plays in eliciting surprise and delight from widespread commercial audiences.