Appreciation …

… Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021) - WSJ. (Hat tip, Dave Lull..)

Mr. Sondheim’s shows were deeply rooted in the traditional craftsmanship of his trade, but their songs and subject matter were radically different from anything that had hitherto been heard on a Broadway stage. The pastel harmonies and complex wordplay of his score for “Company” (“It’s sharing little winks together, / Drinks together, / Kinks together, / That makes marriage a joy”) were as unusual as its ironic, ambivalent tone. Throughout his career, his best songs would more often than not be written from the point of view of an inhibited man unable to open himself up to the prospect of romantic love. Ambivalence, he said, was his “favorite thing to write about, because it’s the way I feel, and I think the way most people feel.”