Very early in my "career" as a theatre composer, I wanted a piece that was very unsettling to reflect a character's mental state, so I thought that I would try 12-tone technique for it. Admittedly, it was not true atonal music, but it did have much of the feel. I liked the result and though it was very emotional.

The singer, the orchestra, the conductor and the arranger all simply sat with their mouths hanging open.

Apparently, you can't do that in musical theatre.

I wrote another piece for it.

To heck with art: this is show biz!