Getting ready for Wall to Wall Broadway, we’re asking people to name The Musical that Changed Your Life. Isaiah asked me, and my answer was immediate: West Side Story. I was about ten or eleven years old, slogging through the usual beginner/intermediate piano repertoire with my wonderful teacher, Hadassah Sahr. I was not a particularly inspired piano student, to say the least. Until one day, she presented me with the piano score for West Side Story. I fell in love with it and would play practically nothing else for the next year. The rest of my family probably once loved this music, too, but after 12 months of unrelenting “Tonight,” “Maria,” “Somewhere,” “Something’s Coming,” etc., I think they haven’t been ready to hear it again until the current revival—and I won’t say how many years that’s been.
Sometime near the end of my playing-it-to-death period, my parents’ old friend Schuyler Chapin came over for drinks one night. And who did he have in tow? Leonard Bernstein! As I might have said then: OH. MY. GOD. And…they asked me to play a couple of numbers for him. Well, you can imagine the terror, and the thrill.
So how did this change my life? In my idolatry, I soon moved on to other Bernstein music, and then to other music that Bernstein played and conducted, and on and on. I studied conducting in college, but didn’t have much—or enough—actual musical talent. So I decided to follow in the footsteps of my other role model, Schuyler Chapin. Full circle. Luckily, the arts management career choice has turned out pretty well.
So how about you? What musical changed your life? We’re anxious to hear all your stories!
Tags: broadway, wall to wall
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In high school, my mentor was my Theatre/English/Philosophy teacher, who also directed all of our school plays. She had also directed school musicals many years before, but gave up when she decided that the shows were terrible because it was too difficult to find students who could sing AND act. She taught all of us a general loathing for musicals, deeming most of them “dippy” and far inferior to straight plays.
Because I took every word she said as gospel, I too had a general distaste for musicals. But then, a few years later, someone told me about Rent. I listened to the music and studied the libretto, and for the first time a musical was actually speaking to me. It wasn’t “dippy,” but a real story right off the streets that was burning with passion, fear, grief, and love. I had finally found “my musical,” one that spoke to me in words and music meant for my generation.
Over the years, I’ve seen Rent over 40 times in seven different cities, I attended both the 5 year and 10 year original cast reunion concerts, watched taping of the film version (right in the neighborhood where I lived – that’s my bodega in the background of “I’ll Cover You”), and had the privilege of producing a special sneak-peek screening of the movie followed by a cast Q&A at Symphony Space. Rent became a HUGE part of my life, and undoubtedly changed it in many ways.
As for my Theatre teacher, when I told her that the first time seeing the show was “the greatest experience of my life,” she rolled her eyes and mumbled, “You need to get some more experiences.” Oh well. You can’t win ‘em all.
The Musical That Changed My Life? Hello Dolly! with Pearl Bailey, right here in New York. I still don’t know how my parents managed family vacations for us every summer on teachers’ salaries, traveling by car or motorhome from Michigan to some exciting destination. One summer we came to New York City and saw two Broadway shows: Hello Dolly! and The Great White Hope. (I don’t think my parents realized how much bad language was in the latter!)
Hello Dolly! was important for many reasons that I’ve only recently begun to examine. It was a non-traditionally cast show that was wildly successful (Carol Channing’s recent revelations about her African-American heritage notwithstanding, because that was not generally known at the time, and the rest of her cast was pretty, um, standard for the era.) This production showcased the talents of many black performers in a show that was not focused on race and did not require them to enact a narrow stereotype.
At a relatively early age, I saw that on a Broadway stage, people who were African-American (and whose heritage was discernible even under strong stage lighting and makeup) were playing characters who could have been anybody. Middle class characters. Goofy characters. A mature woman who wants financial and emotional security. A business owner! People who fell in love, made mistakes, enjoyed life, and were not somebody’s social problem. These images were strong signals to a young black girl growing up in the 60s, even as some people, including many blacks, were insisting that the only true blackness existed in a context of poverty, hatred and urban sensibility.
Looking back, I also have to comment on the Jerry Herman score and his sometimes criticized sunny style—which seems to be having a comeback via the movie Wall-E’s use of songs from Hello Dolly! Nowadays it is considered oh-so-hip to be arch and negative in musicals (and, sadly, in life). Several modern musicals take traditional subjects and get laughs from spoofing them or from being camp. The Hello Dolly! score was optimistic and old-fashioned, and was about hope, like so many of the best musicals of the “golden age” were. That’s why we keep reviving them. Irony and sarcasm don’t age well. I have to say that the older I get, the more I appreciate the need for light in the midst of the often disturbing issues we face each day.
This particular show also taught me about the adage, “the show must go on.” During the Hello Dolly! number, about two-thirds in, all of a sudden, Pearl Bailey literally stopped the show. She stopped singing and revealed that her mike had fallen down her dress. Hello live theatre! She went to the wings as her dressers changed her, and kept up a hilariously entertaining monologue for the audience. At one point she dangled a bare arm playfully from the side of the stage. Then she went back up the stairs and started the whole number over, from the top! I’m not sure the dancers were pleased, but the audience was thrilled.
One of the dancers in that show was Morgan Freeman. Many years after that performance, way before my current job in development here at Symphony Space, I became an actor, and one of the people I worked with was Morgan Freeman, who was honored by Symphony Space at last year’s gala. It is truly a small world.
At age twelve I’d been begging my parents to take me on a trip to New York City for years. I was the stereotypical southern girl who yearned for the big city because all the movies had convinced me that something incredible was bound to happen around every corner: I could stumble upon fame, I could eat lunch next to a movie star, I could purchase the outfit that would change my life in Macy’s. Finally, for my twelfth birthday, my parents relented, and we flew up to New York to stay with my exotic great-aunt, a lifelong New Yorker. Knowing my love for musicals, she’d purchased tickets to Les Miserables.
In the lobby before the show I felt like a real grownup. Here I was in a Broadway Theater with a big, tall, cold Coke in my hand getting ready to see a musical about a revolution! With cursing in it! And drama! And death! But as the story unfolded, it become more than that. I’d seen a few musicals in my hometown, but I’d seen nothing like this. We sat first row balcony and I don’t think I blinked the entire time. I’d never heard music so beautiful. I thought I could reach out and touch the characters.
A lifelong alto singer, I’d been frustrated that the heroines in musicals I’d seen before were all sopranos! I could never belt their songs around the house! But Eponine was better than all of those sopranos combined. A strong individual who was constantly scorned by love – this was a character I could relate to. And my twelve year old self thought she had the best song in the show all to herself – “On My Own”
At the end of the show, I did what I had never done before during a live performance: I cried. Although I have seen many musicals since then, and my tastes have changed, Les Mis taught me what live theatre could be at its very best. Les Mis was a new part of my life: a life where I experienced a city that would later become my home, a life where I realized that there was a place in the world for altos, and a life where I knew that theater in any form would provide me with immeasurable joy for the rest of my life.
Musicals were the only records in our home as a child. At seven years old and having never left the Berkshires, my parents packed the car with seven children and brought us to the Broadway musical “The Whiz”. The impact it had on all of us was tremendous. The music, theatre, dances and technical design was beyond our dreams. The Whiz opened our eyes to the diversity of our nation beyond New England. Reenactments of the production was done back at home.
To this day when we gather, we share stories about this childhood event and sing songs from musicals, as we do dishes after a fine holiday dinner. The kitchen musical revue also includes Oliver, My Fair Lady, Sweet Charity, West Side Story, Jersey Boys and definitely RENT.
Phantom of the Opera! My dad is a huge Andrew Lloyd Webber fan, so of course, growing up, I was always surrounded by his music. I absorbed the sounds and lyrics of all the songs on my dad’s favorite compilation album (which he always played on the car stereo), which had everything from “Memory” (Cats) to “Any Dream Will Do” (Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat), and even “By Jeeves” (Jeeves). But my favorite always was “All I Ask of You,” from Phantom of the Opera.
Being so young, though, I had no idea what I was listening to! I didn’t know they were from musicals, or what they were singing about, and I certainly couldn’t understand their contexts, but I loved them all the same. For years I knew these songs but not the great plays and stories that they were a part of. Then my dad took me to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway – and I don’t think it was more than a few years ago.
When I heard and saw “All I Ask of You,” finally, on the stage, the way it was meant to be heard, I was brought to tears! In that moment I understood my dad’s love for the music, and why he played it incessantly. I felt so much for the song, and it was as though all the years of listening culminated just then; everything I had loved about it when I was younger made so much more sense! Musicals can enrich any life, but for me, it was like I had never known music before I knew Phantom of the Opera.
Wow! Though I had seen countless TV versions of The Wizard of Oz and once saw an amazing double bill in the 70′s of that and Singin’ in the Rain at the Avon Cinema in Providnece…(still there!), for me it has to be A Chorus Line…(original version, thank-you-very-much!) As a wannabe actor at Rhode Island College, freshman year, it was a thrill to take the first of many field trips with the theatre dept to NYC – and my first B’way show. The trip was filled with so many things…bonding with my classmates, some of them still dear friends…NYC pizza by the slice…Times Square…a matinee of Equus…but most of all this groundbreaking musical. As a gay man not-yet out, it was so affirming to see a living, breathing actor talking about being gay…not to mention how “T&A can change your life…!” The humor, the realness, the bitter-sweet, the feeling that some of this could be my future and the stunning dancing and music all made a huge impression. Back home as a techie, we played the cast-album loudly over the stage sound system constantly…building and striking sets, hanging lights.
I recently came across the souvenir t-shirt I had purchased. Though it doesn’t fit anymore and the silk-screened image is faded, I just didn’t have the heart to throw it away.
Very young, I saw the original Music Man on Broadway. At the time I had a strong lisp, of which I was very aware. Winthrop, the little lisping boy, is the hero, and so I felt heroic by association. Still do.
I am 9 Going on 56
(or maybe the other way around)
I was taken to exactly 1 live performance when I was a kid – the Sound of Music at the Camden County Music Fair. Did it change my life? Well, no but it changed my record collection, the ecology of our household and continues to jangle around somewhere deep in my psyche.
Any kid would be thrilled to be taken to a show with real live people singing their hearts out – at night – in a big tent – during the summer. But whether I recollect it so vividly because the performance was transformative or because it was such an unusual break from the routine, I really don’t know. I do know that I didn’t identify with the vonTrapps – a wealthy family whose father is cavorting with a sexy baroness in a clingy gown was beyond my imagination, BUT I emphatically wanted to join the family sing-alongs – which I did endlessly until my brother made good on his threat and broke the record over my head – after just one too many blastings of My Favorite Things – it just wasn’t one of his. (Didn’t stop me – I went on to obsessively play Mary Poppins)
Around this time, I developed a recurring fantasy of being a shepherdess in the Bavarian hills (with their wonderful association of Bavarian cream pies) – a daydream I retreated into whenever things got tough on the home front – it was serene, beautiful, elevated above the everyday. And I was the center of it; in fact, I was the only human being in it – imagine St. Francis of Assisi crossed with Heidi but with a wicked set of pipes and the inner glow of sanctifying grace. The shepherdess fantasy evaporated long ago, but I confess that to this day I imagine removing the distributor from the car of a person who annoys me. Now where did that come from?
None of this is important though. What is important is – CAN YOU DANCE TO IT?
In answer to that question, and as evidence of the enduring power of the Fraulein, I offer you
Op zoek naar Maria
http://www.kqed.org/arts/multimedia/article.jsp?essid=24495
This is easy. It’s definitely Gypsy. It was in January 2004. My friend was visiting from Texas (where I had moved from not too recently) and we wanted to see a show. I knew I wanted to see everything on Broadway, but I hadn’t gotten to that point. We chose Gypsy because I knew the movie, it sounded like fun and we both knew who Bernadette Peters was. The minute Bernadette marched down the aisle, calling out, “Sing out Louise!”, I was hooked. I saw that Gypsy another two times and started on a path to enjoying and studying about as many shows as possible. Being a fan of Broadway has given me joy beyond entertainment – it has nutured dear friendships and provided escape and even peace. Thank you Broadway.
Jesus Christ Superstar!
As a parochial school kid growing up in suburban Pennsylvania in the late 70s/early 80s, much ado was always made about suitable afternoon and week-end pursuits…what to do after school, if not in Girl Scouts or an official CYO activity? Often times I would find myself at my friend Alise’s house where we would color paper dolls (anything to escape our ridiculous uniforms) while listening to music. For some reason, the original cast recording of this Andrew Lloyd Weber classic was considered approved material by her parents—after sleepovers, it would even do in lieu of Sunday mass!
By the time I was in 3rd grade I pretty much knew all the words, though of course I couldn’t make heads or tails of the eschatological/christological concepts behind it all. “What’s the Buzz?” was pretty popular with the Notre Dame elementary school crowd, as well as the uplifting “Superstar.”
By the time I made it into public high school, I had almost left this behind me…but much to my delight/chagrin, our theatre advisor decided we’d do Jesus Christ Superstar for our spring show. Happy to be behind the scenes, I headed up the art department with good friends Heide and Jessie and even stole items from my parents’ house to use as props in the show. My best friend Tara was first viola in the student orchestra, and I was also dating the idiot who was playing Pontius Pilate.
Later in life I chose religion as my college major, focusing on 2nd temple Judaism and early Xianity…love that Jesus movement! In retrospect I would suspect that this popular soundtrack had something to do with it…and the fact that I LOVE Ian Gillan-era Deep Purple now (Jesus could be seen as a rock star/charismatic figure- like the Krishna/Mick Jagger connection- so it was good he was played by a rock star).
In the early 90s I joked about reviving this musical: Perry Farrell from Jane’s Addiction as Jesus or Judas; the Beastie Boys as Caiaphas, Annas, and the other priests; Kate Bush as Mary Magdalene—or how about Sinead O’Connor (now that scholars have demystified the Magadelene’s status)?
Who could do justice to this 70s acid-rocky gem in the 21st century?
The Fantasticks. I was fortunate to have played the Boy in this musical many, many times both in school and professionally. Seeing the show every year on the original Sullivan Street stage was practically a religious experience for me. No longer the Boy and more El Gallo now, I still find things in the musical that touches me deeply. It is simply my “soul mate” musical.
When thinking of the musical that changed my life, it is impossible for me to narrow it down to just one. As a child, my family was constantly moving. By the time I graduated from high school, I had gone to more than ten different schools in six different states. In elementary school, my grandmother introduced me to the world of musical theatre–PHANTOM, LES MIS, PIPPIN, THE SOUND OF MUSIC, OLIVER, PARADE, CAROUSEL, ANNIE, the list goes on and on. The cast recordings were constantly looped on my tape player. I have so many memories of singing along while packing up my toys and books for moving the umpteenth time, knowing that thanks to my Grandmother and then the support of my parents, while my friends from the old school would drift away, I would always have these characters and songs. As I continue on in my professional career, working on several musicals a year, I always pause at a revival of one of those shows when the orchestra starts the first chord of the overture and am taken back to coasting down the highway with my grandmother, blaring those soundtracks, and knowing things were going to be alright.