Your favorite composer?- Page 3

[Lizzya9]

Posted: 12/30/06 at 7:38pm

Alan Menken

[madlibrarian]

Posted: 12/30/06 at 8:48pm

Interesting lists, folks. Surprised to see so few mentions of Bock. Folks, this is The Man Who Gave You Fiddler, Fiorello!, She Loves Me, Tenderloin, and current offering The Apple Tree. And I am gobsmacked by the omission, so far, of Harold Arlen--Jamaica, Bloomer Girl, House Of Flowers, plus that old movie about the girl from Kansas. Burton Lane (Finian's Rainbow, On A Clear Day) too. Caviar, folks.

[rosekwbp]

Posted: 12/30/06 at 8:57pm

Stephen Sondheim

[Dirty Rotten Scoundrel]

Posted: 12/30/06 at 11:12pm

Jason Robert Brown.

[Fenchurch]

Posted: 12/30/06 at 11:20pm

I have to agree that Bock is underrated. He wrote a lot of incredible music (She Loves Me is my favorite)

But also Coleman writes great melodies and of course Sondheim writes good lyrics that fit his music well, but I don't think he's an incredibly artistic composer.

For sheer artistry of music writing, I would have to go with Adam Guettel of those who are living, to find music that good and that well written one would have to turn to the classical canon to find a good comparison.

all time seems a bit of a weird question to ask, times and the art form have changed so much, what would Burton Lane be writing now? Richard Rodgers? etc? If they have decided to move with the trends, they might have come up with something incredible, not that they didn't come up with incredible things on their own, in their time.

[Raviolisun]

Posted: 12/30/06 at 11:23pm

Andrew Lippa and of course:

Stephen Sondheim.

Posted: 12/31/06 at 1:50am

I'm surprised at the people who still insist Sondheim is more of a lyricist than composer--ya his words ar ebrilliant but Passion and even many of his older shows I think prove to me why my love for him is music first--lyrics second

Menken is an interesting choice -- I remember one critic onc said how if he lived back in the oldschool days of Broadway he woulda been huge.

Like I said how I prefer Kander and Ebb when working with a strong directro's vision (my four fave shows of them are with Prince or Fosse). There are other scores I love but am still not sold on everything the composer did--I love Gypsy and Funny girl but not all Styne--Sweet Charity is maybe my fave score of the 60s but I'm not a massive Coleman fan. I love both versions of Steven Schwartz's Baker's Wife and his Pippin is underated but i'm kinda meh about other scores of his