Sondheim in Our Time and His offers a wide-ranging historical investigation of the landmark works and extraordinary career of Stephen Sondheim, a career which has spanned much of the history of American musical theater. Each author uncovers those aspects of biography, collaborative process, and contemporary context that impacted the creation and reception of Sondheim's musicals. In addition, several authors explore in detail how Sondheim's shows have been dramatically revised and adapted over time.
Multiple chapters invite the reader to rethink Sondheim's works from a distinctly contemporary critical perspective and to consider how these musicals are being reenvisioned today. Through chapters focused on individual musicals, and others that explore a specific topic as manifested throughout his entire career, plus an afterword by Kristen Anderson-Lopez; by digging deep into the archives and focusing intently on his scores; from interviews with performers, directors, and bookwriters, and close study of live and recorded productions--volume editor W. Anthony Sheppard brings together Sondheim's past with the present, thriving existence of his musicals.
"Introduction: Our Sondheim W. ANTHONY SHEPPARD Part I. Early Stages 1. Williams College Before, During, and After Sondheim STEVE SWAYNE 2. Fragments of Fairyland: Sondheim's Abandoned Adaptation of Mary Poppins DOMINIC McHUGH 3. ""...nearly everything I wrote"": Sondheim and the Actors Studio JEFFREY MAGEE 4. Breakout from the Asylum of Conformity: Sondheim, Laurents, and the Dramaturgy of Anyone Can Whistle JAMES O'LEARY Part II. Staging Identities 5. Sondheim's Whiteness TODD DECKER 6. Politics, Representation, and Collaboration in Pacific Overtures (1976) ASHLEY M. PRIBYL 7. Sexual Identity in Company, 1969-2019 ANDREW BUCHMAN 8. Students Performing Gender with Sondheim's Musicals in the Age of #MeToo STACY WOLF Part III. Versions, Genres, and Collaborations 9. Sweeney's Identity Crisis and the Dynamic Potential of Generic Hybridity KIM H. KOWALKE 10. ""A sad and listless affair"": The Unsung Film Adaptation of Sondheim's A Little Night Music GEOFFREY BLOCK Part IV. Reconceived Structures and Techniques 11. Time and Time Again: Temporal Structures in Sondheim's Musicals JIM LOVENSHEIMER 12. Sunday in the Park with Sondheim, Lapine, Seurat, and Babbitt LARA E. HOUSEZ 13. Sondheim and the 11 O'clock Principle ELIZABETH A. WELLS 14. Finishing the Line: Wit, Rhythm, and Rhyme in Sondheim W. ANTHONY SHEPPARD Afterword: Moving on with Sondheim KRISTEN ANDERSON-LOPEZ"
"W. Anthony Sheppard is Marylin and Arthur Levitt Professor of Music at Williams College. His first book, Revealing Masks: Exotic Influences and Ritualized Performance in Modernist Music Theater received the Kurt Weill Prize, his article on Madama Butterfly and film earned the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award, an article on World War II film music was honored with the Alfred Einstein Award by the American Musicological Society, and ""Puccini and the Music Boxes"" received the AMS H. Colin Slim Award. His most recent book, Extreme Exoticism: Japan in the American Musical Imagination, received the AMS Music in American Culture Award and the Society for American Music Lowens Award. Sheppard's research has been supported by the NEH, the American Philosophical Society, the ACLS, and the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. He has served as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of the American Musicological Society and is now Series Editor of AMS Studies in Music."
Reviews for Sondheim in Our Time and His
To say I have put Sondheim on a pedestal would be an understatement. He is the genius of all geniuses. The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost of my chosen religion: musical theater. As has been explored in multiple chapters in this book, Sondheim's monolithic greatnessDLto my mind and in the Broadway community at largeDLis connected to his ability to capture the nuanced paradoxes of the human heart and mind. * from the Afterword by Kristen Anderson-Lopez, Oscar and Grammy award-winning songwriter * All hail to a comprehensive collection representing the latest work and thoughts by most of the big Sondheim players in the musicological field! The quality of the contributions is high, and several essays may become classics. * Stephen Banfield, emeritus professor, University of Bristol * Given the range of topics and the subject expertise from contributors well established in the field, there will be something in this collection for experienced academicians as well as the new practitioners. * John Snelson, Music & Letters *
