The relationship between theatre players' prior musical knowledge and their singings in musicals

Togetherness of music and theatre withstand on thousands years before. From era of first humans' reactions against natural events with songs and dance, imitations of animals and sounds with varied movements and rituals, to 20th century which is known as musical era and today, these two show arts have been together."Musical" type which spread all over the world after golden age of Broadway in USA, also earned an important place in Turkish Theatre. Turkish operettas and musicals staged after translated to Turkish are continue to attract much attention of the masses. In last years, number of musicals staged in government theatres have been increasing and this situation requires theatre players to use their pre-learned musical knowledge effectively.In this research, it's aimed to determine relationship between theatre players' musical knowledge from their license study and their abilities to sing songs. Within this frame, course programs of major institutions which train theatre players have examined and views of permanent players who acted in plays staged on Ankara Government Theatre in season of 2012-2013.Survey model is used in this study. A survey with 21 closed ended,1 open ended, 22 total quesitons used for data collection. Frequency and percentage distributions used for data analysis. Universe of this study consists of Ankara Government Theatre players, while sapmle consists of players staged on 2012-2013 season.As result, it's determined that players have difficulties about auditory, melodic, rhythmic and sound technique, players can't use their musical knowledge effectively , music courses are inadequate in terms of numbers, fields and weekly hours in course programs of institutions training theatre players. In conclusion, results of these findings were explained and recommendations towards more effective music education in theatres were given. Keywords: Theatre, Musical, Music education, Theatre player.