![]() ![]() Sondheim’s death the day after Thanksgiving, at the age of 91, marks the passing of the American musical theater’s most incisive lyricist and grandest theatrical composer not just of his generation, but of the second half of the 20th century and part of the 21st. I met my first real friend at college when, down the dorm hall, I heard Gordon (now a crack illustrator and comics artist) singing along to an LP of “Anyone Can Whistle,” going to town on “Everybody Says Don’t.” I thought no one else even knew that song. Crazy as it sounds, a lot of people’s kids have done Sondheim by now, and not just “Into the Woods.” It was basically the “Bugsy Malone” version of “Follies.” My son was in a high school production of “Sweeney Todd” a few years ago. My friend Stephen, now a director and academic, and I listened to that album a lot.įirst sensation of feeling terrifyingly outmatched by a high school theater production: “Follies” at Racine’s St. First time I ever really listened to an emotionally complicated song lyric: “Sorry/Grateful,” from “Company,” an alarmingly accurate crystallization of so many relationships. First time I fell in love with an original Broadway cast album: age 14, maybe 15, ”A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,” checked out from the Racine Public Library, downtown branch in Wisconsin. Stephen Sondheim fans all have their own benchmarks of discovery. ![]()
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