The West End is now lagging behind America when it comes to making new musicals because it lacks the venues and tradition of "trying out work and getting it wrong", Lord Lloyd Webber has suggested, as he celebrates a new Broadway record.

Lord Lloyd Webber, who this week became the first composer to have four shows on Broadway since Rodgers and Hammerstein 60 years ago, said the UK could learn from the success of the US, where new works are quietly developed and perfected in small but public theatres.

Saying the success of his School of Rock was down to an extended public rehearsal period off-Broadway before it was officially unleashed on audiences, the theatre impresario argued that process of development is “in the DNA” of American theatre but not the UK.

Lord Lloyd Webber is currently celebrating four shows on Broadway at one time: the first time any composer has achieved such success since Rodgers and Hammerstein in 1953.