b. 1930 American composer and lyricist Sondheim studied with Oscar Hammerstein II (1895–1960) and Babbitt. Early work as a lyricist for Jules Styne’s (1905–89) Gypsy (1959) and Bernstein’s West Side Story (1957) brought his name to public attention, but it was not until Follies (1971) that he achieved recognition as a composer. His work is marked by a biting wit ...
, one of Hammerstein’s many collaborations with Richard Rodgers, moved towards the synergy of score and speech that characterized musicals in the second half of the twentieth century. Stephen Sondheim introduced melodic themes that were fragmented over an entire show, and the baton then passed over the Atlantic to Andrew Lloyd Webber (Sunset Boulevard), whose productions borrowed tricks of ...
unsettling, Sculthorpe’s music regularly displayed his gift for beautiful melody. Recommended Recording: Irkanda IV, Australian SO (cond) Richard Tognetti (Chandos) Introduction | Contemporary | Classical Personalities | Stephen Sondheim | Contemporary | Classical ...
into the story so that they naturally arose out of the dialogue, or ‘book’, of the show. Oklahoma! is usually cited as the most important milestone. However, Sondheim rightly points to the ‘If I Loved You’ section of Carousel (Rodgers & Hammerstein) as more seminal. There is no ‘number’, as such. What you have is a scene in ...
Throughout the twentieth century, opera constantly re-evaluated and redefined itself. Two world wars created a crisis of national identities that was reflected in a series of artistic challenges within the world of music – tradition over pluralism, experimentation over formalization – as composers sought to free themselves from Austro-Germanic influences. Bolder Attitudes Janáček is a case in point. Quitting ...
refused to accept that musicals are inferior to opera. A Quiet Place (1983), unequivocally labelled ‘opera’, imperceptibly fuses classical idioms with popular and jazz styles. The works of New York-born Sondheim, who worked with Bernstein on West Side Story, also lean towards opera, from Sweeney Todd (1979) to Passion (1994). Hugo Weisgall (1912–97) and Dominick Argento (b. 1927), ...
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