Sondheim Says!

[LostLeander]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 2:51am

I was watching my VHS of the Into the Woods live recording, and it has the interview with Lapine and Sondheim at the end, that I do not believe is on the DVD.

He makes some very interesting statements about musical theatre writing.

"I'm a firm believer that content dictates form and style."
"I think just doing rap music because it's popular at the moment, or any kind of pop music, and just laying it on any story is... (he was cut off).
Using context clues, he's obviously saying that it's not... necessarily good theatre writing.

Writers who use their source stories, settings, time periods, etc, to inform I think are able to create what I would call better theatrical scores.

From Dreamgirls, to Sweeney, to Phantom (though I do find the score boring), Piazza, to Full Monty, to Millie, to Rent and so forth.

I've never been too terribly fond of scores that just write whatever kind of music with no attention to time period, setting, etc. Like Lippa's Wild Party. Though the music is catchy as hell, it just doesn't satisfy me as a theatrical score, and it plays more like a pop CD. The Color Purple, and Wildhorn's score have the same effect on me.

Discuss!

[C is for Company]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 3:04am

I do find shows like LaChiusa's Wild Party and Dreamgirls to have more refined scores, yet perhaps that just says something about the composer. I guess it can't just be luck that many period musicals that adhere fairly well to the musicality of the time are successful and indeed brilliant. However, how exactly they all seem to manage pulling off such accomplishments, I can't really say. I guess it is more satisfying when you can believe the music to fit in with the time of the story. Think of how foolish it would be to see Les Mis with costumes from West Side Story. The anachronistic details are what counts sometimes and with a serious show like The Wild Party, I think that having a more mature and accurate score to go with the time is all the more satisfying when you look at the piece overall. The music is what transforms the piece and to have it remain faithful to the show is important in retrospect. I don't know, just a thought.
Opening this thread I thought there would be some fun kind of game to play . That is alright by me though, a discussion like this is worth more than yet another game here.

Just an edit; When I mean successful, I do not mean it in terms of monetary success or even that of finding an audience. I mean it to be of the integrity of the show overall.

Updated On: 7/19/06 at 03:04 AM

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 3:53am

A very long conversation could be had on this subject (and I've had some fairly long conversations on it), but it's worthwhile to remember something Lehman Engel wrote (which I will paraphrase and expand on a bit): When Wagner wrote Tristan und Isolde, he didn't try to write 12th-century Cornish music. He wrote in the style of the day, late-19th-century German romanticism, the style that he himself helped transform.

For that matter, despite a vaguely turn-of-the-century (19th into 20th) feel, there is nothing especially Swedish about Sondheim's music in A LIttle Night Music. And except for some of the diegetic music, overall there is little about the music for Sweeney Todd that evokes English music of the late 18th or early 19th century.

Still, opera allows the composer to create an all-encompassing sound world, which the composer doesn't do in traditional musicals with lots of dialogue.

I could go on and on about all this, but that's enough for now. It's a complicated subject.about which a lot could be said. But it's late.

[EponineAmneris]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 8:42am

Aside from the PHANTOM song itself, the music in POTO is the closest thing you can get to actual music of that time, opera and orcehstral ect... RENTs music fits it's time period as well... MISS SAIGONs score fits it's time era well IMO.

But yes- now that you mention it, many musicals scores are 'pop.' Although LES MIZ is my favorite of all time and far above and beyond any other show, the score is pop. Not the style of music from the time period

Kind of like the movie A KNIGHT'S TALE. GREAT story, fun movie, good music- but uh- David Bowie and Queen came along much later

Updated On: 7/19/06 at 08:42 AM

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 11:17am

I don't think there's anything wrong with music not fitting the style of the time period it's set in. Beside the issue of that simply being impossible in some cases (good luck telling the story of Jesus with music from 4 BC), our modern ears simply won't accomodate that in many cases. Les Mis would not be the hit it is if the music fit that time period. Rather than setting dictating the music, I think the STORY should dictate it. The composer has the freedom to use whatever type of music that particular story lends itself too in his eyes.

The perfect examples of that are The Wild Partys. LaChiusa heard in the poem the styles of the setting - and though it works theatrically, it's much harder on modern ears than Lippa's where the music comes out of the characters and story. I'm not saying one is right (I think I'm one of the few people who actually like both about equally) - they're two very different interpretations of a piece, and two different ways of approaching it. While LaChiusa's stays mostly true to the period, Lippa's stays true to the characters and the moment. I think, like I said, in a theatrical sense LaChiusa's might be better, but in terms of broader appeal, I think more people would tend towards Lippa's.

[TxTwoStep]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 11:23am

do you think that they cut Sondheim's sentence off because of what the Witch does early in Act One?!?!?!

[LostLeander]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 1:05pm

Sondheim addresses the witches' "rap". He said he used it to give her an edge, and he says it's not really so much of a rap, but a vaudevillian patter.

I'm not saying that this should be the format for ALL shows, but for I'd say most shows, I think it is key in making good theatrical scores.

Sondheim, and I think, especially LaChiusa are INCREDIBLE at using content to dictate form and style. And from what we've heard from Guettel, (Piazza and Floyd Collins).

JCS definately has an opinion and it is a definitve Rock Musical, and it has a point of view, and there is a valid reason for using Rock. It's called Jesus Christ Superstar, something that I think AIDA fails to do.

[Someday]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 3:59pm

I wonder what Sondheim would say about Spring Awakening....

[BSoBW2]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 4:09pm

Not to get into THIS debate again, but I feel as if LaChiusa's TWP is as much character driven as it is a time-piece. If you listen you will hear certain themes under each character. These themes are very much of the vaudevill style, but only work with each particular character.

I think I've listened to the CD too much, though.

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 4:13pm

bso -- I know this has been gone over to death - and yeah, I know it's there in LaChiusa's, but like you said, it takes a lot more work with his. Not saying that's a bad thing, but it's pretty inarguable that Lippa's is more immediately accessible.

[TxTwoStep]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 4:40pm

it is true that the Witch's example is all in vocal style. The accompaniment is pretty sparse, so vocal choice will give you "sprechestimme" or "rap" sound, depending. When Phylicia did it, it was rap. There have been other Sondheim quotes calling it "rap" however....

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 5:36pm

Oh, I don't think that most of the music in POTO is the closest thing you can get to the music of that time. "Prima Donna" is pretty good along those lines, but (for one example) "Think of Me" (though a pretty song) doesn't sound anything like an aria from a Meyerbeer-like opera.

[SorryGrateful]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 5:45pm

In regard to the "Witch's Rap," I truly never thought of it as a rap. It never occurred to me to consider it so until I heard people talking about it as that on here. I thought it was just a way to relay a lot of information to the Baker and the Baker's Wife in an overwhelming (to the characters) and funny way. If the Witch inserted several "yo's" and a "bitch" or two in there, I would definitely consider it rap.

[TxTwoStep]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 5:49pm

rap can be about rhythm as much as vocabulary.

[SorryGrateful]

Posted: 7/19/06 at 5:50pm

Hmmmm, I see your point. Is there a dictionary definition of rap or rap music?