Video: What is PigPen Theatre Co.? Meet the Creators of WATER FOR ELEPHANTS

I mean, really, when we started the first workshop, I think everybody, you know, because you have the whole book to jump into

we all just sort of dove in to the parts of the, either the world or the textures or the sounds that we were most interested in

Like, somebody wrote, like, sort of a soft shoe song, and somebody wrote more of like a folk, dustbowl acoustic ballad

And we really started with just, like, what are the textures of this world? And we sort of came up with, like, there's, like, the Dust Bowl sound

There's sort of, like, the jazz sound of the 30s. There's obviously, like, a circus sort of big top sound, but it's during the Depression

so it's not big and shiny like other circus shows or other circus musicals

And then there's also a human story to tell between, you know, it's sort of a love triangle

and so there's sort of an emotional intimacy that is told mostly through like contemporary folk

which is our sort of calling card, I guess. And we wanted to sort of mel the whole show

sort of between those sounds, right? Yeah. Yeah. What was your initial music inspiration

for if there was an artist, if there was a song, if there was a time period

What was it that originally had your mind jump into the show

Well we all got to do well most of us I just going to say we all got to do a production of the grapes of wrath while we were in school together in Pittsburgh And that was a show that was built around music which was mostly you know the music of the time

So there was a lot of Woody Guthrie songs and, you know, the kind of music that you would hear

if you were traveling across the country during the Depression. So that was our first kind of in, I think

and that's the kind of music that we're more familiar with and more comfortable with. But the cool thing about this show is that it is a massive

tapestry of American music. So we get to cover all kinds of stuff

And because it's a memory play that's set, you know, closer to the present

we also get to write music that's more in our like contemporary folk style

When we were in college, there was an album that we all listened to quite a bit. And we all thought that there was something really special going on there

And that album was called Hitties Town by Aeneas Mitchell. And I remember thinking the way that Anas Mitchell

particularly on the first album, pre-Broadway. The way that she was world-building on that album

was so fast, obviously the Broadway version is phenomenal as well. But I just remember being a college sophomore

listening to Hades Town being like, I wanna make music like this. And it's been really lovely because we've met Anais

we've become friends. To see what she got to do with Hades Town was such an inspiration while we were also kind of building this world and some of our other world sonically So we always wanted to approach our music from a storytelling perspective

So Hitties Town and Young Man in America, which is another one of her albums, has been like very special to me

Yeah, I mean, I think over the, I remember over the pandemic sitting down and watching Ken Burns country music

And so the first sort of like four episodes of that are like just like early folk music

music in America and like what that, how that has like turned into what country music is today

And he talks so much about people like the Carter family and sort of these collectors of songs and this sort of American, very American version of like what it is to pass down musical tradition and oral tradition and stuff

So maybe that's part part of my inspiration. Yeah. I, you know, I think for me, I was so inspired

by everything that these guys have mentioned. The contemporary artists and the artists

that have been making music that made music a long time before us

Getting to connect those threads together into the melting pot of America the American sound and this circus of that time It was so special So there seven of you in this band and as you kind of pointed out each of you took and started from a different place What was it like to then bring it all together and kind of make this collaborative concise

story through music? I mean, I think it's, I don't want to use the word easy because it's not

easy to collaborate, but I think we've strengthened our ability to collaborate from working

with each other for so long. And there is this moment of like

you have a safety net underneath you. Matt said this recently where, you know

somebody could take a song as far as they can go, but then eventually they might run out of steam

And it's so wonderful. Then you have six other partners, writing partners then to come and be like

hey, actually, I'm going to pick up that and continue and carry that ball for you

And it's been really wonderful to be able to rely and extrapolate upon each other's ideas

because, you know, strength and numbers. And if seven heads can take this idea and chew it up

and then, you know, digest it, it probably actually will have been filtered more

than you would if only one person had that idea and then has to sit alone in a room and bang their head around

and figure that idea out. So we're really lucky in that way. And it's difficult, right, to work together

But that filtering system has been really beneficial, I think, in our process