How much of HELLO, DOLLY did Herman write? — Page 4

What did Herman write for BEN FRANKLIN IN PARIS?
HALF THE BATTLE sounds like his style, and different from most of the score.

"What did Herman write for BEN FRANKLIN IN PARIS?"

He wrote "To Be Alone With You" (which I think was singled out by several critics as one of the best songs in the show) and "Too Charming."

I think "To Be Alone With You" is one of Herman's great songs.

"Sondheim has spoken at length (and often negatively) about his own contributions to WSS; I've wondered if one could maybe get a clue about Bernstein's lyric contributions by eliminating the lyrics Sondheim has 'claimed' and seeing what's left."

I think pretty much every song is almost entirely Sondheim's, except for a few words here and there. On page 115 of Secrest's Sondheim bio (a mediocre, very flawed book, but what'cha gonna do?), Sondheim quotes some of Bernstein's original lyric for "I Have a Love": "Once in your life, only once in your life / Comes a flash of fire and light . . . And there stands your love / The harvest of your years." If Sondheim is upset about Maria singing "It's alarming how charming I feel" (which I think he's completely wrong about), what must he feel about the possibility that Maria might have sung "And there stands your love / The harvest of your years"? Why would a teenage girl sing about her love being the harvest of her years? Very strange.

It's funny because Bernstein did write some pretty good lyrics, as folks have mentioned. At least as long as he was writing comedic lyrics, he did pretty well. But in Trouble in Tahiti, the music for Dinah's big aria in the psychiatrist's office is glorious, but the words? Not so much.

Bernstein wrote some pretty damned funny lyrics for "I Am Easily Assimilated" in Candide.

raker said,
"Strouse tells the story in his recent memoir. He and Adams were hired to doctor the show, and they wrote songs that were never used. Strouse said unambiguously that it was Jerry Herman who wrote the music for Hello Dolly and not Strouse and Adams"

And at about 3:15 this morning, I think, I heard him say the same thing to a filmmaker (Amber Edwards) about it, and it was too late for me to get up and find a tape to shove into the whatsis so I don't have the exact language, but after Strouse told the story of JH being ambushed out-of-town by numerous score-doctors etc., Jerry said that Merrick came to him and said, well, it's Up To You.

And he wrote Before The Parade Passes By in five minutes, and the rest is history.

That doesn't mean that Strouse et al. didn't get checks, because (in this particular case) the stipulations of their doctoring-contracts could have been written a hundred ways. So,

When bk wrote earlier (above),
” Frank Loesser wrote not one note of The Music Man - had he, he would receive contractual royalties, and I've seen the contracts and he doesn't. That's how it works...”

Pal Joey responded, but I thought he was reacting only to the absolute-sounding “That’s how it works” when he wrote,
That's not necessarily true. [For example,] I receive a percentage of the royalties for a relatively obscure show I worked on, and my name is not in the "grand rights contract." I thought PJ was just saying that "that's not how it works" in every case. Mom, dad, please don't fight.

I thought that in the documentary, Strouse and Herman spoke very forthrightly, as though this version of events was substantially what had happened. Someone might say that the royalty checks make it really easy to shade the truth, but the whole story sounded pretty cohesive, imho.

Updated On: 1/2/09 at 04:47 PM

I have no knowledge to add to this discussion, but I can add this saying:

Igor Stravinsky (and others) is reputed to say "Lesser artists borrow, great artists steal."

Ok.. Let me preface this with saying that I have no proof to support the opinion I'm about to express. Let me also add that I LOVE Jerry Herman and have nothing but the highest regard for his work.

But...

I have NEVER bought the I wrote PARADE PASSES BY number in a hotel room out-of-town story. He and Channing have that story down so pat that I get suspicious...

Add to that, when I was growing up and listening to the DOLLY cast recording there were a handful of songs that didn't sound very "Herman:" MOTHERHOOD, ELEGANCE... and PARADE PASSES BY.

Again, I have nothing to point to other than my gut feeling..but those three songs always "pricked" my ear in a way that made me think they were written by someone else.

But that is just me.


P.S.

I also had the same reaction to the new songs in the film SOUND OF MUSIC.. it was much later in life that I found out the Hammerstein hadn't written the lyrics.

So I trust my ear.

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From what I understand it wasn't creative team that had a say. The rights were sold and the producers could do with the material as they wished.

I'm pretty sure legendary film director John Huston didn't like the song TOMORROW. So they moved it to the opening credits(he didn't even like it there) and filled the empty spot with DUMB DOG.

If there ever was a director/material mis-match, it was Houston and ANNIE.

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Updated On: 1/3/09 at 12:30 PM

Sure they would... they were getting ....$$$$ WELL PAID $$$$...

And what was there other option?... to let the film producers hire ANOTHER writing team to write any new material?

They may not have liked the changes being made, but they both understand how the movie business works. Better they should cash the checks and try to make the best out of a bad situation.. rather than let some other yahoos totally ruin it.

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well annies score is one that should not be messed with.

Gypsy9, taking a song from one show that didn't do so well and putting in in a later show was a common practice back in the twenties and thirties, before the advent of the cast album. (On a couple of Ben Bagley's Rodgers and Hart Revisited albums he has a few medleys where the same song is sung with the lyrics of one show and then the lyrics for another show.)

But, Jule Styne did it a lot. And, it's not so hard to reason why he took a song from a TV special that only got done once and put it a show that will (hopefully) get done a lot. (He did the same thing with a song from "The Dangerous Christmas of Little Red Riding Hood" and put it into the revamped, touring version of "Sugar.")

But, he took a song from "Fade Out/Fade In" ("Call Me Savage") and used it in "Hallelulah, Baby!" ("Witches' Brew") and the shows both had cast albums and were only a year or so apart!

Though, both of those shows had the same lyricists (Comden and Green) and Bob Merrill did the lyrics for both "Dangerous Christmas of Little Red Riding Hood" and "Sugar". With the song from "Gypsy", it's another matter as "Ruggles" had a different lyricist. I think that Sondheim has commented on how he wouldn't have written "You'll Never Get Away From Me" if he had known that the other song existed.

And Jule Styne did that again, taking a song from "Look to the Lillies" ("I, Yes, Me", lyric by Sammy Cahn) and using it in "The Red Shoes" (I don't know what it was called in that show).

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(And "No One Is Alone" is "Candy Man" from WILLIE WONKA.)

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