Sondheim In Our Time And His

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Sondheim in Our Time and His

Author : William Anthony Sheppard
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 019760319X
Total Pages : 457 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (976 download)

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Book Synopsis Sondheim in Our Time and His by : William Anthony Sheppard

Download or read book Sondheim in Our Time and His written by William Anthony Sheppard and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2022-02-25 with total page 457 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sondheim in Our Time and His offers a wide-ranging historical investigation of the landmark works and extraordinary career of Stephen Sondheim, a career which has spanned much of the history of American musical theater. Each author uncovers those aspects of biography, collaborative process, and contemporary context that impacted the creation and reception of Sondheim's musicals. In addition, several authors explore in detail how Sondheim's shows have been dramatically revised and adapted over time. Multiple chapters invite the reader to rethink Sondheim's works from a distinctly contemporary critical perspective and to consider how these musicals are being reenvisioned today. Through chapters focused on individual musicals, and others that explore a specific topic as manifested throughout his entire career, plus an afterword by Kristen Anderson-Lopez; by digging deep into the archives and focusing intently on his scores; from interviews with performers, directors, and bookwriters, and close study of live and recorded productions--volume editor W. Anthony Sheppard brings together Sondheim's past with the present, thriving existence of his musicals.

Victorians on Broadway

Author : Sharon Aronofsky Weltman
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780813944326
Total Pages : 328 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (443 download)

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Book Synopsis Victorians on Broadway by : Sharon Aronofsky Weltman

Download or read book Victorians on Broadway written by Sharon Aronofsky Weltman and published by . This book was released on 2020-06-24 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Broadway productions of musicals such as The King and I, Oliver!, Sweeney Todd, and Jekyll and Hyde became huge theatrical hits. Remarkably, all were based on one-hundred-year-old British novels or memoirs. What could possibly explain their enormous success? Victorians on Broadway is a wide-ranging interdisciplinary study of live stage musicals from the mid- to late twentieth century adapted from British literature written between 1837 and 1886. Investigating musical dramatizations of works by Charles Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, Christina Rossetti, Robert Louis Stevenson, and others, Sharon Aronofsky Weltman reveals what these musicals teach us about the Victorian books from which they derive and considers their enduring popularity and impact on our modern culture. Providing a front row seat to the hits (as well as the flops), Weltman situates these adaptations within the history of musical theater: the Golden Age of Broadway, the concept musicals of the 1970s and 1980s, and the era of pop mega-musicals, revealing Broadway's debt to melodrama. With an expertise in Victorian literature, Weltman draws on reviews, critical analyses, and interviews with such luminaries as Stephen Sondheim, Polly Pen, Frank Wildhorn, and Rowan Atkinson to understand this popular trend in American theater. Exploring themes of race, religion, gender, and class, Weltman focuses attention on how these theatrical adaptations fit into aesthetic and intellectual movements while demonstrating the complexity of their enduring legacy.

Stephen Sondheim

Author : Meryle Secrest
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 0307946851
Total Pages : 482 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (79 download)

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Book Synopsis Stephen Sondheim by : Meryle Secrest

Download or read book Stephen Sondheim written by Meryle Secrest and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2011-10-04 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the first full-scale life of the most important composer-lyricist at work in musical theatre today, Meryle Secrest, the biographer of Frank Lloyd Wright and Leonard Bernstein, draws on her extended conversations with Stephen Sondheim as well as on her interviews with his friends, family, collaborators, and lovers to bring us not only the artist--as a master of modernist compositional style--but also the private man. Beginning with his early childhood on New York's prosperous Upper West Side, Secrest describes how Sondheim was taught to play the piano by his father, a successful dress manufacturer and amateur musician. She writes about Sondheim's early ambition to become a concert pianist, about the effect on him of his parents' divorce when he was ten, about his years in military and private schools. She writes about his feelings of loneliness and abandonment, about the refuge he found in the home of Oscar and Dorothy Hammerstein, and his determination to become just like Oscar. Secrest describes the years when Sondheim was struggling to gain a foothold in the theatre, his attempts at scriptwriting (in his early twenties in Rome on the set of Beat the Devil with Bogart and Huston, and later in Hollywood as a co-writer with George Oppenheimer for the TV series Topper), living the Hollywood life. Here is Sondheim's ascent to the peaks of the Broadway musical, from his chance meeting with play- wright Arthur Laurents, which led to his first success-- as co-lyricist with Leonard Bernstein on West Side Story--to his collaboration with Laurents on Gypsy, to his first full Broadway score, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. And Secrest writes about his first big success as composer, lyricist, writer in the 1960s with Company, an innovative and sophisticated musical that examined marriage à la mode. It was the start of an almost-twenty-year collaboration with producer and director Hal Prince that resulted in such shows as Follies, Pacific Overtures, Sweeney Todd, and A Little Night Music. We see Sondheim at work with composers, producers, directors, co-writers, actors, the greats of his time and ours, among them Leonard Bernstein, Ethel Merman, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Jerome Robbins, Zero Mostel, Bernadette Peters, and Lee Remick (with whom it was said he was in love, and she with him), as Secrest vividly re-creates the energy, the passion, the despair, the excitement, the genius, that went into the making of show after Sondheim show. A biography that is sure to become the standard work on Sondheim's life and art.

Sondheim

Author : Stephen M. Silverman
Publisher : Black Dog & Leventhal
ISBN 13 : 0762482362
Total Pages : 524 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (624 download)

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Book Synopsis Sondheim by : Stephen M. Silverman

Download or read book Sondheim written by Stephen M. Silverman and published by Black Dog & Leventhal. This book was released on 2023-09-19 with total page 524 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lively, sophisticated, and filled with first-person tributes and glorious images, Sondheim: His Life, His Shows, His Legacy lifts the curtain on a Broadway legend. "Aside from Sondheim's own exceptional books...this may be the best coffee-table volume devoted to his work."(Shelf Awareness) Brimming with insights from a veritable Who's Who of Broadway Babies and complemented by more than two hundred color and black-and-white images, Sondheim: His Life, His Shows, His Legacy offers a witty, multidimensional look at the musical genius behind Company, Follies, A Little Night Music, Into the Woods, Sunday in the Park with George, Sweeney Todd, and the landmark West Side Story and Gypsy. Exploring the unique bond between Sondheim and his audiences, author Stephen M. Silverman further examines the challenging Sondheim works that continue to develop devoted new followings: Anyone Can Whistle, Pacific Overtures, Merrily We Roll Along, Assassins, and Passion. The result is a lavish, highly engrossing documentation of the dynamic force who reshaped twentieth-century American musical history.

Finishing the Hat

Author : Stephen Sondheim
Publisher : Knopf
ISBN 13 : 0679439072
Total Pages : 482 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (794 download)

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Book Synopsis Finishing the Hat by : Stephen Sondheim

Download or read book Finishing the Hat written by Stephen Sondheim and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2010-10-26 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • Titled after perhaps Stephen Sondheim's most autobiographical song, from Sunday in the Park with George—Finishing the Hat not only collects his lyrics for the first time, it offers readers a rare personal look into his life as well as his remarkable productions. Stephen Sondheim’s career spanned more than half a century; his lyrics are synonymous with musical theater and popular culture. Sondheim—the winner of seven Tonys, an Academy Award, seven Grammys, a Pulitzer Prize and more—treats us to never-before-published songs from each show, songs that were cut or discarded before seeing the light of day, along with the lyrics for all of his musicals from 1954 to 1981, including West Side Story, Company, Follies, A Little Night Music and Sweeney Todd. He discusses his relationship with his mentor, Oscar Hammerstein II, and his collaborations with extraordinary talents such as Leonard Bernstein, Arthur Laurents, Ethel Merman, Richard Rodgers, Angela Lansbury, Harold Prince and a panoply of others. The anecdotes—filled with history, pointed observations and intimate details—transport us back to a time when theater was a major pillar of American culture. Best of all, Sondheim appraises his work and dissects his lyrics, as well as those of others, offering unparalleled insights into songwriting that will be studied by fans and aspiring songwriters for years to come. Accompanying Sondheim’s sparkling writing are behind-the-scenes photographs from each production, along with handwritten music and lyrics from the songwriter’s personal collection. Penetrating and surprising, poignant, funny and sometimes provocative, Finishing the Hat is not only an informative look at the art and craft of lyric writing, it is a history of the theater that belongs on the same literary shelf as Moss Hart’s Act One and Arthur Miller’s Timebends. It is also a book that will leave you humming the final bars of Merrily We Roll Along, while eagerly anticipating the next volume.

Some Day

Author : Robert Eidelberg
Publisher : Xlibris Corporation
ISBN 13 : 1984580965
Total Pages : 247 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (845 download)

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Book Synopsis Some Day by : Robert Eidelberg

Download or read book Some Day written by Robert Eidelberg and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2020-06-29 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: SOME DAY The Literature of Waiting A Creative Writing Course With Time on Its Hands Now wait. Now. Wait. You do it all the time. Time and time again. You’re doing it right now: waiting on our every word. So here goes: before there was this book SOME DAY on writing creatively about a world of waiting, there was special topics Hunter College English course on “The Literature of Waiting” that featured a selection of novels, plays, and short stories by some rather famous world authors. But wait: even before that time-sensitive college course there were, well, the elevators—particularly the ones in the North Building of Hunter College of the City University of New York. Elevators that you always had to wait distressingly long for when they were apparently working and eternally long for when they were “out of service.” There was even that infamous elevator repair sign. Picture it: a photoshopped female student with her right hand flat out in the stop-and-wait position, her compressed lips silently conveying that any wait on your part for an elevator to come would be entirely futile. And did we mention that the repair sign would inevitably remain up even after that elevator had been fixed? Now that made a certain sense since it was only a matter of time before the sign was, like a broken clock, accurate again. Author Robert Eidelberg’s Books With a Built-In Teacher In addition to “Some Day: The Literature of Waiting, all of the following “Books With a Built-In Teacher” by educator and author Robert Eidelberg are available through all online bookstores as well as from the author by contacting him at [email protected] “Who’s There?” in Shakespeare’s HAMLET – That Is the Question! Stanza-Phobia: A Slef-Improvement Approach to Bridging Any Disconnect Between You and Poetry by Understanding Just One Poem (Yes, One!) and Winding Up Not only Learning the Process involved but Coming to Love at Least a Few More Poems (and Maybe Poetry Itself) Good Thinking: A Self-Improvement Approach to Getting Your Mind to Go from “Huh?” to “Hmm” to “Aha!” Playing Detective: A Self-Improvement Approach to Becoming a more Mindful Thinker Reader, and Writer By Solving Mysteries Detectives: Stories for Thinking, Solving, and Writing So You Think You Might Like to Teach: 29 Fictional Teachers (for Real!) Model ow to Become and Remain a Successful Teacher Staying After School: 19 Students (for Real!) Have the Next What-if Word on Remarkable Fictional Teachers and Their Often Challenging Classes. Julio: A Brooklyn Boy Plays Detective to Find His Missing Father (with John Carter)

Assassins

Author : Stephen Sondheim
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781559360395
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (63 download)

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Book Synopsis Assassins by : Stephen Sondheim

Download or read book Assassins written by Stephen Sondheim and published by . This book was released on 1991 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Evokes a fraternity of Presidential assassins across a hundred years of history. Examines success, failure, and the questionable drive for power and celebrity in American society. | Original cast recording; booklet includes lyrics.

Road Show

Author : Stephen Sondheim
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 120 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (318 download)

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Book Synopsis Road Show by : Stephen Sondheim

Download or read book Road Show written by Stephen Sondheim and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stephen Sondheim's first new work in over a decade.

Sondheim on Music

Author : Mark Eden Horowitz
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN 13 : 153812551X
Total Pages : 296 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (381 download)

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Book Synopsis Sondheim on Music by : Mark Eden Horowitz

Download or read book Sondheim on Music written by Mark Eden Horowitz and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2019-03-13 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this collection of interviews conducted by Mark Horowitz of the Library of Congress, musical theatre legend Stephen Sondheim discusses the art of musical composition, lyric writing, the collaborative process of musical theater, and how he thinks about his own work. A postlude features a more recent conversation with Sondheim.

Dance in Musical Theatre

Author : Phoebe Rumsey
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1350235555
Total Pages : 548 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (52 download)

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Book Synopsis Dance in Musical Theatre by : Phoebe Rumsey

Download or read book Dance in Musical Theatre written by Phoebe Rumsey and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2023-12-14 with total page 548 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Oklahoma! and West Side Story, to Spring Awakening and Hamilton, dance remains one of the most important and key factors in musical theatre. Through the integration of song and dance in the 'dream ballets' of choreographers like Agnes De Mille; the triple threat performances of Jerome Robbins' dancers; the signature style creation by choreographers like Bob Fosse with dancers like Gwen Verdon; and the contemporary, identity-driven work of choreographers like Camille A. Brown, the history of the body in movement is one that begs study and appreciation. Dance in Musical Theatre offers guidelines in how to read this movement by analyzing it in terms of composition and movement vocabulary whilst simultaneously situating it both historically and critically. This collection provides the tools, terms, history, and movement theory for reading, interpreting, and centralizing a discussion of dance in musical theatre, importantly, with added emphasis on women and artists of color. Bringing together musical theatre and dance scholars, choreographers and practitioners, this edited collection highlights musical theatre case studies that employ dance in a dramaturgically essential manner, tracking the emergence of the dancer as a key figure in the genre, and connecting the contributions to past and present choreographers. This collection foregrounds the work of the ensemble, incorporating firsthand and autoethnographic accounts that intersect with historical and cultural contexts. Through a selection of essays, this volume conceptualizes the function of dance in musical: how it functions diegetically as a part of the story or non-diegetically as an amplification of emotion, as well as how the dancing body works to reveal character psychology by expressing an unspoken aspect of the libretto, embodying emotions or ideas through metaphor or abstraction. Dance in Musical Theatre makes dance language accessible for instructors, students, and musical theatre enthusiasts, providing the tools to critically engage with the work of important choreographers and dancers from the beginning of the 20th century to today.

Putting It Together

Author : James Lapine
Publisher : Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ISBN 13 : 0374720223
Total Pages : 417 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (747 download)

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Book Synopsis Putting It Together by : James Lapine

Download or read book Putting It Together written by James Lapine and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2021-08-03 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A behind-the-scenes look at the making of the iconic musical Sunday in the Park with George Putting It Together chronicles the two-year odyssey of creating the iconic Broadway musical Sunday in the Park with George. In 1982, James Lapine, at the beginning of his career as a playwright and director, met Stephen Sondheim, nineteen years his senior and already a legendary Broadway composer and lyricist. Shortly thereafter, the two decided to write a musical inspired by Georges Seurat’s nineteenth-century painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Through conversations between Lapine and Sondheim, as well as most of the production team, and with a treasure trove of personal photographs, sketches, script notes, and sheet music, the two Broadway icons lift the curtain on their beloved musical. Putting It Together is a deeply personal remembrance of their collaboration and friend - ship and the highs and lows of that journey, one that resulted in the beloved Pulitzer Prize–winning classic.

Sunday in the Park with George

Author :
Publisher : Hal Leonard Corporation
ISBN 13 : 9781557830685
Total Pages : 228 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (36 download)

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Book Synopsis Sunday in the Park with George by :

Download or read book Sunday in the Park with George written by and published by Hal Leonard Corporation. This book was released on 1991 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: (Applause Libretto Library). This 1995 Pulitzer Prize-winning musical was inspired by the painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat. A complex work revolving around a fictionalized Seurat immersed in single-minded concentration while painting the masterpiece, the production has evolved into a meditation on art, emotional connection, and community. This publication contains the entire script of the musical. " Sunday is itself a modernist creation, perhaps the first truly modernist work of musical theatre that Broadway has produced ... a watershed event that demands nothing less than a retrospective, even revisionist, look at the development of the serious Broadway musical." Frank Rich, The New York Times Magazine

How Sondheim Found His Sound

Author : Steve Swayne
Publisher : University of Michigan Press
ISBN 13 : 0472026356
Total Pages : 336 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (72 download)

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Book Synopsis How Sondheim Found His Sound by : Steve Swayne

Download or read book How Sondheim Found His Sound written by Steve Swayne and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2010-02-09 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “ Steve Swayne’ s How Sondheim Found His Sound is a fascinating treatment and remarkable analysis of America’ s greatest playwright in song. His marvelous text goes a long way toward placing Stephen Sondheim among the towering artists of the late twentieth century!” — Cornel West, Princeton University “ Sondheim’ s career and music have never been so skillfully dissected, examined, and put in context. With its focus on his work as composer, this book is surprising and welcome.” — Theodore S. Chapin, President and Executive Director, The Rodgers and Hammerstein Organization “ . . . an intriguing ‘ biography’ of the songwriter’ s style. . . . Swayne is to be congratulated for taking the study of this unique composer/lyricist into hitherto unnavigated waters.” — Stage Directions “ The research is voluminous, as are the artistry and perceptiveness. Swayne has lived richly within the world of Sondheim’ s music.” — Richard Crawford, author of America’ s Musical Life: A History “ Amid the ever-more-crowded bookshelf of writings on Sondheim, Swayne’ s analysis of Sondheim’ s development as a composer stands up as a unique and worthy study. . . . For the Sondheim aficionados, there are new ideas and new information, and for others, Swayne’ s How Sondheim Found His Sound will provide an intriguing introduction into the mind of arguably the greatest and most influential living Broadway composer.” — talkinbroadway.com “ What a fascinating book, full of insights large and small. An impressive analysis and summary of Sondheim’ s many sources of inspiration. All fans of the composer and lovers of Broadway in general will treasure and frequently refer to Swayne’ s work.” — Tom Riis, Joseph Negler Professor of Musicology and Director of the American Music Research Center, University of Colorado Stephen Sondheim has made it clear that he considers himself a “ playwright in song.” How he arrived at this unique appellation is the subject of How Sondheim Found His Sound— an absorbing study of the multitudinous influences on Sondheim’ s work. Taking Sondheim’ s own comments and music as a starting point, author Steve Swayne offers a biography of the artist’ s style, pulling aside the curtain on Sondheim’ s creative universe to reveal the many influences— from classical music to theater to film— that have established Sondheim as one of the greatest dramatic composers of the twentieth century.

How to Be Richer, Smarter, and Better-Looking Than Your Parents

Author : Zac Bissonnette
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 1101580453
Total Pages : 250 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (15 download)

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Book Synopsis How to Be Richer, Smarter, and Better-Looking Than Your Parents by : Zac Bissonnette

Download or read book How to Be Richer, Smarter, and Better-Looking Than Your Parents written by Zac Bissonnette and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2012-04-24 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Striking out on your own for the first time is exhilarating. But in a culture full of bad advice, predatory banks, and splurge-now-pay-later temptations, it can also be extremely dangerous—leading you to make financial decisions that could hurt you for years to come. Combine this with a slumped economy, mounds of student loans, and dubious examples from reality TV stars to politicians to your own parents, and it’s no wonder so many twenty-somethings are struggling. Twenty-three-year-old Zac Bissonnette—the author of Debt-Free U—knows exactly what you’re going through. He demystifies the many traps young people fall victim to in their post-college years. He offers fresh insights on everything from job hunting to buying a car to saving for retirement that will give you a foundation for a secure, stable, and happy life. In the process, he reveals why FICO scores are overrated, online job applications are a waste of time, car loans are for suckers, and credit card rewards are a scam. With detours to discuss wine connoisseurs, Really Broke Housewives, and Lenny Dykstra, Zac shows you how to make better choices today so you can be richer, smarter (and better-looking!) for years to come.

Sondheim's Broadway Musicals

Author : Stephen Banfield
Publisher : University of Michigan Press
ISBN 13 : 9780472080830
Total Pages : 476 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (88 download)

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Book Synopsis Sondheim's Broadway Musicals by : Stephen Banfield

Download or read book Sondheim's Broadway Musicals written by Stephen Banfield and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 476 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first in-depth look at the work and career of one of the most important figures in the history of musical theater

The Oxford Handbook of Sondheim Studies

Author : Robert Gordon
Publisher : Oxford Handbooks
ISBN 13 : 0195391373
Total Pages : 517 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (953 download)

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Book Synopsis The Oxford Handbook of Sondheim Studies by : Robert Gordon

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Sondheim Studies written by Robert Gordon and published by Oxford Handbooks. This book was released on 2014 with total page 517 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This handbook presents a comprehensive introduction to all aspects of composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim's oeuvre. Chapters come from a remarkably wide range of disciplines as they offer new insights into Sondheim's work not only for the stage, but also for film and television, describing in full how Sondheim has re-shaped American musical theater.

Careful the Spell You Cast

Author : Ben Francis
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1350281824
Total Pages : 185 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (52 download)

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Book Synopsis Careful the Spell You Cast by : Ben Francis

Download or read book Careful the Spell You Cast written by Ben Francis and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2023-02-09 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stephen Sondheim is one of the best-known and most-loved musical theatre composers, but also one of the most misunderstood, often being labelled as 'distant' or 'cynical'. Careful the Spell You Cast instead argues that Sondheim firmly belongs to the Broadway aspirational tradition, in that many of his characters are defined by their dreams: to abandon one's dream (as Ben does in Follies, Frank does in Merrily We Roll Along, and Addison does in Road Show) is to lose one's soul. Rather than take the established view of Sondheim as a cynic, this book contends that throughout Sondheim's work, letting go of one's illusions is a process that his characters need to go through, that they must cast off illusions and false dreams, without becoming cynical and destroying their genuine dreams in the process. In turn this view aligns Sondheim's work as being aspirational and a logical continuation from the work of his mentor, Oscar Hammerstein II. Following the trajectory of Sondheim's career, Careful the Spell You Cast shows how Sondheim has dramatized this process throughout his writing life alongside different collaborators. From his work as a lyricist with the musicals Gypsy and West Side Story through to his later collaborations with Hal Prince (Company, Follies) and James Lapine (Into the Woods, Sunday in the Park with George), this book reframes the established view through lyrical and structural analysis in relation to the characters within each of these celebrated works of musical theatre, arguing that Sondheim is, in the popular sense of the word, a romantic within the tradition of the Broadway musical.