Proof of Concept: The Song From ‘In the Heights’ That May Have Started ‘Hamilton’
Like many Hamilton fans, I didn’t know much/anything about its creator Lin-Manuel Miranda before becoming utterly obsessed with his historical rap musical, which may be the most distinct and captivating work of genius I’ve experienced in my lifetime. After listening to the show’s Grammy-winning soundtrack countless times and finally getting to see Hamilton live in Los Angeles late last year, I belatedly decided to check out Miranda’s earlier work, which has become effortless thanks to music streaming services like Apple Music and Spotify. So, one day, for my daily dog walk, I decided to listen to the soundtrack for In the Heights, Miranda’s Tony Award-winning 2005 musical about the residents of Washington Heights, the predominantly Latino neighborhood in New York City where Miranda grew up.
The first song on In the Heights has Miranda’s immediately recognizable voice and rapping as he introduces himself, the neighborhood, and the other characters, as well as the vibrant mix of Latin, pop, and R&B music styles that made the show such a sensation. However, I soon realized that Miranda’s character Usnavi was the only one who really rapped, and while I appreciated the welcome diversity of the characters, the mix of English and Spanish, and the novelty of a Broadway musical full of Latin and modern music, In the Heights struck me as the kind of fairly standard, earnest, belt-it-out Broadway musical that had largely failed to pique my interest in the years before Hamilton. After a few songs, I wasn’t sure if I would get all the way through the album.
But then, on track 7, came “96,000”, a song where several of the characters describe what they would do with a $96,000 lottery prize that an unknown member of the neighborhood has won. And in “96,000”, I could see where Hamilton — which, for many of us, seemed to burst from nowhere to conquer the world — got its start. I listened to the song on repeat for the rest of my walk. Listen to “96,000” below, with lyrics if you want to read along.
In “96,000”, rap is the primary genre, giving the song the propulsive energy, urgency, and information density found in so many of the songs in Hamilton. The lyrics focus on what characters would do with the opportunities $96,000 would bring, reminiscent of a song like Hamilton’s “My Shot” where Alexander Hamilton, Marquis de Lafayette, John Laurens, and Hercules Mulligan rap about what they would do if given the chance to fight the British for independence. Benny, the taxi dispatcher who sings about going to business school and making a fortune, is performed by Christopher Jackson, Miranda’s longtime friend and collaborator who would later originate the role of George Washington in Hamilton.
In the verse from Usnavi’s cousin Sonny (Robin de Jesús), the accompanying music is straight-up hip-hop with no Latin, pop, or R&B elements — unusual for In the Heights but common in Hamilton. Sonny’s blistering verse — where he addresses gentrification, racism, lack of education funding in the inner city, and the need for a robust protest movement — echoes the kinds of political and social issues that Miranda has used his post-Hamilton stardom to magnify. In Vanessa’s verse about using the $96,000 to leave the barrio and sever ties with everyone there, Karen Olivo’s soaring vocals — a mix of conviction, vulnerability, and painful honesty — are reminiscent of a song like Hamilton’s “Burn”, where Philippa Soo as Eliza Schuyler lays bare her embarrassment and disbelief over Hamilton’s public and detailed admission of infidelity, while still honoring her deserved anger over what he’s done. And when, at the end of “96,000”, all of the performers perform their verses in unison, the song builds to the kind of giant, show-stopping crescendo Miranda has proven a savant at creating, as in a song like Hamilton’s “Yorktown”.
From what I’ve found on the internet, most seem to agree that “96,000” is the standout song from In the Heights, the favorite of amateur productions, a flashmob for Miranda at Universal Studios, and even a home singalong from Ariana Grande.
When the Broadway cast was invited to perform live at the 2008 Tony Awards and George Lopez’s Lopez Tonight, “96,000” was the song they performed. With the song’s heavier emphasis on rap, it seems like proof of concept that a hip-hop-based musical could work and be a real success. But if you watch the performances from the Tonys and Lopez Tonight, or hear the radio edit of “96,000”, you may notice something interesting.
To cut down the song’s 5:35-minute runtime, Miranda chose to take out two verses — Sonny’s rap and Usnavi’s second, longer section about using the $96,000 to solve his financial problems, woo a woman he has a crush on, and return to the Dominican Republic. By taking out these two verses, “96,000” has a lot less rap in it and more closely resembles a standard musical number.
So why omit these verses that help make “96,000” so distinct? Perhaps they simply added up to the right amount of time that needed to be cut from the song. Maybe Miranda wanted other performers to have their moments instead of taking more verses for himself. Maybe he wanted the shorter version of the song to have a more even split between the male and female parts.
But I wonder if, perhaps, Miranda wanted to make the shorter version of “96,000” more palatable and understandable to an audience that might be confused or turned off by the idea of a rap musical. Yes, other musicals from the past have debatably had rap-type songs, but they are hardly what anyone who grew up with hip-hop would actually call rap. And, more importantly, theater audiences tend to be older, more affluent, and overwhelmingly white — practically a recipe for someone who not only doesn’t listen to rap, but may be overtly hostile towards it.
By removing two of the rap verses from the versions of “96,000” that would reach larger audiences — including the most aggressive, political, angry, and purest hip hop verse of the entire show — I think Miranda was playing it safe, signaling to traditional musical theater fans that while In the Heights might be different, it would still be recognizable and nothing an older white person need be afraid of. And it wasn’t a dishonest move — while In the Heights went on to be a big, Tony-winning international hit that is considered to be a rap musical, it is still way more sung than rapped. Latin music is its most distinguishing feature, and with a story that’s within the mainstream of Broadway conventions, most likely did not scare away traditional theatergoers.
Miranda’s decision to turn the focus away from rap in shorter versions of “96,000” might have been a wise one. While In the Heights deserves credit for opening the door for rap musicals, Hamilton is really the only true success story for this emerging genre. Holler If Ya Hear Me, the well-intentioned rap jukebox musical which used the songs (but not the life story) of Tupac Shakur, opened on Broadway in 2014 but closed after just six weeks of poor reviews and terrible ticket sales. There are surely many reasons why Holler If Ya Hear Me failed, but the whiteness, age, and stodginess of Broadway and traditional theatergoers must have been an important factor.
Whatever Miranda’s reasoning was, it’s obviously just a footnote to what would follow. Perhaps it was reading Ron Chernow’s 800-page biography of Alexander Hamilton and finding a character who “embodies hip-hop” that allowed Miranda to entertain the notion of a full-scale rap musical, or maybe it was the continuing positive reception In the Heights received as it toured the country and eventually the world. Whatever it was, by the time Holler If Ya Hear Me was closing, Miranda was putting the finishing touches on Hamilton in preparation for its 2015 Off-Broadway debut. A rap musical was still a big risk, but with the success of In the Heights, “96,000”, and the years he spent workshopping Hamilton songs as the Hamilton Mixtape, Miranda must have had a hunch that he was onto something.
Maybe the line from “96,000” to Hamilton is an obvious one for lovers of musical theater, but I doubt anyone — even Miranda — could have predicted that it would lead to a show that would turn the world of musical theater upside down.
