Stephen Sondheim is a master of wordsmithing, and that made him a great candidate to write crossword puzzles [Blog post with links]. But not just any sort of crossword puzzles. [How To Do A Real Crossword Puzzle, NY Mag. Archive link] His cryptic cros…
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street
Steven Sondheim had dominated the 1970s on Broadway. As the decade closed out, he turned to a modern adaptation of a Victorian melodrama for source material. With Hugh Wheeler, adapting Christopher Bond, 1979’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet S…
Sunday In The Park With George
Stephen Sondheim was ready to quit Broadway. The failure of Merrily We Roll Along, his first real flop in nearly 20 years, left him cold toward creating more art. Until James Lapine showed him one particular painting, which became a topic of conversati…
How the Rise of the ‘Softboy’ Fueled the Culture Wars
In a pop world ruled by Harry Styles, some hard rockers are going Trumpy. Politico spends a medium-length read examining the evolution of the image of men in the music world and what it might imply for politics. It’s an interesting prism through which …
After 40 Years, Abba Takes a Chance With Its Legacy
How one of the biggest pop groups in the world secretly reunited to make a new album and a high-tech stage show featuring digital avatars of themselves — from 1979. Elisabeth Vincentelli writing in the NYT. [Archive link] We just discussed this album […
B.C. woman awakes to a hole in her roof and a space rock on her pillow
Victoria News reports “On Oct. 4, many were treated to the sight of a fireball lighting up the night sky, with images of a meteor sailing above Lake Louise striking awe. Longtime Golden resident Ruth Hamilton, however, was fast asleep. Or at least she …
Here’s what Bay Area doctors say about how COVID affects the brain
“While driving recently, Cliff Morrison suddenly found himself lost in a forest. He pulled over, looked around and realized he was actually on a tree-lined street half a mile from his home in the Oakland hills, heading to the post office. Morrison, 70,…
The Frogs
Stephen Sondheim was riding high on a wave of his own creation. After the artistic success of Company, Follies, and A Little Night Music, he chose as a follow-up to reunite with Burt Shevelove, with whom he had visited Ancient Rome, this time Ancient …
Laurie Anderson Has a Message for Us Humans
Laurie Anderson Has a Message for Us Humans: For half a century, she has taken the things we know best— our bodies, our rituals, our nation — and shown us how strange they really are. Sam Anderson writes a NYT longread profile of the venerated multi-fa…
Marry Me A Little
Stephen Sondheim writes more songs than he uses, many cut from shows during development. An aspiring Sweeney Todd chorus member (Craig Lucas, who later wrote Prelude To A Kiss amongst other things) approached him about developing a show from this disca…