Where are all the other songs?

[Pippin]

Posted: 5/7/06 at 1:27pm

So, if Jonathan Larson said he wanted to write a song every day for the rest of his life, (and I'm sure he did) where are they? and why hasn't anyone published them or made a revue a'la "songs for a new world", or something like that. the songs are there, somewhere. just wondering what has happened to all of them.

[iluvtheatertrash]

Posted: 5/7/06 at 1:37pm

I never understood why his other material never came to fruition.

[acrocksyo]

Posted: 5/8/06 at 1:00am

Well they did use "Love Heals" as a bonus track on the RENT Movie Soundtrack. So that's something right?

[RentBoy86]

Posted: 5/8/06 at 1:09am

yeah, but "love heels" sucked. I was not a fan of that song. Just because he wrote a song every day doesn't mean that they were his "best songs." I'd rather remember him as the genius he is rather than a revue of some not so great songs. But, that's not to say they wouldn't be great. But I didn't care for "love heels" - hopefully his other stuff is just as great.

[BWIDB Charlie]

Posted: 5/8/06 at 1:16am

There is a decent amount of Larson material out there. A large chunk of it is from unproduced shows such as SUPERBIA, etc, with a portion being just individual songs (if memory serves me, LOVE HEALS is one of these types of songs. I believe it was written for a young lady (Ali?) who was diagnosed with HIV.) As these shows haven't been produced, the songs aren't in a "finished" form. If you want a good idea, and assuming you're familar with the workshop productions of RENT, think of the earlier incarnations of songs versus their current versions. These songs have changed so significantly, and that's through the work of several workshops and performances. You can imagine what the other pieces sound like. That's not to suggest they're sub-par; just that it takes an author's presence to get the work to that final level.

Perhaps someday, the Larson estate will allow appropriate artists to work on the earlier projects. Stephen Oremus' work on TICK, TICK...BOOM! was brilliant, and yet entirely in Larson's artistic world.

- Charlie
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