Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#1Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 3:58pm
I'm not saying these shows are bad, but just that they would have been great or at least a lot better with different composers.
My list:
Sunday in the Park With George - Richard Rodgers
Marie Christine - Kurt Weill
Giant - Jerome Kern
The Secret Garden - Victor Herbert
Side Show - John Kander
The Producers - Jerry Herman
Wicked - Arthur Schwartz
The Mystery of Edwin Drood - Arthur Sullivan
Mr Roxy
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/17/03
#2Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:09pm
Interesting
Agree with some & disagree with others.
henrikegerman
Broadway Legend Joined: 4/29/05
#2Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:10pm
Song of Norway - Fela
Fela - Grieg
A Gentlemen's Guide to Love and Murder - Salieri
Updated On: 12/19/14 at 04:10 PM
ohjustjake
Leading Actor Joined: 4/18/06
#3Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:11pmI'm really intrigued about the Side Show and John Kander idea.
ggersten
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/06
#4Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:33pm
Rodgers and Hammerstein on Assassins.
What If? (5)
dramamama611
Broadway Legend Joined: 12/4/07
#5Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:34pmANY show would have been different: there is absolutely no way to determine better. The road not taken and all.
ggersten
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/06
#6Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:34pm
Sondheim on Bye Bye Birdie
Sondheim's Birdie
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#7Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:36pmdramamama, yes I know that there would be no way to tell. I should probably rephrase my question as which composer had a style of music that would fit better with a musical.
ggersten
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/06
#8Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:37pm
Loesser on Sweeney Todd
Herman on Sweeney Todd
Sweeney Todd
ggersten
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/06
#9Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:38pm
Irving Berlin on West Side Story
West Side Story Berlin Style
ggersten
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/11/06
#10Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:39pm
Bock & Hartnick on A Chorus Line
A Chorus Line
#11Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 4:46pm
The Addams Family should have been a Shaiman and Wittman show.
I disagree strongly about Victor Herbert doing Secret Garden- I'm not a huge fan of the novel, but I think Lucy Simon and Marsha Norman were brilliant when they turned Act 1 into a gothic horror melodrama. The only trouble is that they went completely soft and in a different direction for Act 2, glossing over all the dark elements AND the vaguely murderous subplot.
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#12Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/19/14 at 5:01pm
Forgot the main reason why I created the thread:
Sunset Boulevard - Richard Rodgers
degrassifan
Broadway Legend Joined: 1/23/08
#13Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 12:23amRodgers and Hammerstein tried to tackle Pygmalion and turn it into a musical, but they couldn't. I think it would've been interesting to see what they would've come up with had they succeeded in their endeavor.
#14Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 12:27am
Some of these baffle me. I'm not sure if they would have been "better."
Just different.
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#15Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 12:42amCare to be less vague?
#16Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 12:54am
Forgot the main reason why I created the thread:
I just want to forget the thread.
#toomuchtimeonyourhandsfindanotherhobby
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#17Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 1:11amThen don't reply and bump it...
#18Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 5:45pm
Hell would freeze over before Rodgers would attempt SUNDAY. Rodgers' entire approach was to load Act II with reprises so the audience would walk out humming the tune. How would he manage that with SUNDAY, where Act II takes place in a different century with different characters? (This isn't the only reason, but it's an important one.)
Nor would Rodgers have touched ASSASSINS. Let's recall that this is the composer who nixed the original (and brilliant) lyric to "We're Gonna Be Alright".
SUNSET BOULEVARD might well have worked with a Rodgers score, though we'll never know because he didn't write that sort of thru-sung poperetta.
***
As for the other suggestions and with all due respect, Fantod, the honest answer is that NONE of the shows could have been written with your alternate composers, because the alternates would have made them entirely different shows.
1000songs
Chorus Member Joined: 12/13/14
#19Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 5:54pmI actually think Bullets would be great if it actually had one.
baal
Swing Joined: 12/7/14
#20Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 5:58pm
Although Sunset Boulevard is my favorite score from Lloyd Webber, I would love to see what Erich Korngold would have done with the material.
Updated On: 12/20/14 at 05:58 PM
philly03
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/20/07
#21Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/20/14 at 6:06pm
I think some of these shows, such as Side Show, are "popular" because of Henry Krieger's score.. not necessarily because of the subject matter.
There have been numerous different attempts at Jekyll & Hyde musicals for example, but the reason why Frank Wildhorn's is so popular is because.. well, because of the bombast, pop-y score that he created.
#22Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/21/14 at 1:00am
The beauty of Sondheim's score to Sunday is that, like Georges, he is using pointillism to create art: the art of minimalist music is showcased by Sunday because of the complex and beautiful lyrics. You can HEAR Georges paint in "Color and Light". The songs are all related: In particular, "Move On" is an extension and development of "We Do not Belong Together", which is an extension and development of the lyrical section of "Color and Light", which can be found in the interlude of "Sunday In the Park With George". Rodgers never really developed off his other songs, they may be written in the same style, but they are much different. The best he does is reprise, which, as Gaveston pointed out, is wildly inappropriate in this show. What makes "Move On" cathartic and serve as a closure to the love story of George and Dot is that Sondheim manages to connect George to 19th France through music, which makes the reappearance of Dot not only more believable, but ultimately more moving.
As for Hammerstein, his lyrics are often wonderful, but he writes very poetically. The verse of Hammerstein would both undercut and diminish the power of Sunday. In particular, "Children and Art", one of the most moving songs ever written, would never register in waxy poetic verse, nor would "Lesson #8" (nor would the songs that, figuratively, Rodgers and Hammerstein would have written, I expect). Besides the point, Rodgers would have never agreed to write Sunday. After the failure of Allegro, he never experimented wildly again.
And why do we need a Rodgers and Hammerstein version of Sunday In the Park With George? With the tones of surrealism and artistic crisis, the show that LaPine wrote is already in Sondheim's voice and tone. As is Marie Christine with LaChiusa. Why ask for new versions of already existing shows. Especially when Sondheim and LaChiusa already did it better.
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#23Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/21/14 at 1:31amWell I was just creating discussion, and I never said my opinions were correct, I just think that if these composers tackled these stories, the results would be, in my opinion, either a better fit or a better show. I wasn't saying that the shows would be at all similar, just the same basis of a story (novel, movie or original idea) and a different composer with an entirely different take on it. The playwright would be different to. I'm not suggesting the exact same show with different music, I'm saying the same story adapted differently.
Fantod
Broadway Legend Joined: 10/3/14
#24Shows that would have been great with a different composer
Posted: 12/21/14 at 1:39amSpecifically for Sunday, I think that a more lyrical and gentle approach to the story of an artist could be more poignant and less mathematical. Hammerstein would obviously write the book and lyrics so you wouldn't have Lapine's book with Rodgers' music, it would be totally different. I just think that the story could benefit from the R&H style of adaptation. Do you have an opinion on stories that could have been adapted better with different composers, Sally?
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