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" After the Rodgers and Hammerstein revolution, songs became part of the story, as opposed to just entertainments in between comedy scenes. "

Stephen Sondheim

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" I'm interested in the theater because I'm interested in communication with audiences. Otherwise I would be in concert music. "

Stephen Sondheim

" Making lyrics feel natural, sit on music in such a way that you don't feel the effort of the author, so that they shine and bubble and rise and fall, is very, very hard to do. Whereas you can sit at the piano and just play and feel you're making art. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I chose and my world was shaken. So what? The choice may have been mistaken; the choosing was not. You have to move on. "

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" If people have split views about your work, I think it's flattering. I'd rather have them feel something about it than dismiss it. "

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" When I was growing up, there was no such thing as Off-Broadway. You either got your show on or you didn't. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I fell into lyric writing because of music. I backed into it. "

Stephen Sondheim

" Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos. "

Stephen Sondheim

" Lyrics have to be underwritten. That's why poets generally make poor lyric writers because the language is too rich. You get drowned in it. "

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" The dumbing down of the country reflects itself on Broadway. The shows get dumber, and the public gets used to them. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I think 'lunch' is one of the funniest words in the world. "

Stephen Sondheim

" Oscar Hammerstein was a surrogate father during all those many days, and weeks and months when I didn't see my own father. "

Stephen Sondheim

" Every single song I've ever written is sung by a character created by somebody else. Some might have a jaundiced view of love, some don't. But none of these songs is me singing - not a single one. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I was essentially trained by Oscar Hammerstein to think of songs as one-act plays, to move a song from point A to point B dramatically. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I was raised to be charming, not sincere. "

Stephen Sondheim

" One difference between poetry and lyrics is that lyrics sort of fade into the background. They fade on the page and live on the stage when set to music. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I love the theater as much as music, and the whole idea of getting across to an audience and making them laugh, making them cry - just making them feel - is paramount to me. "

Stephen Sondheim

" My parents weren't around much, but I assumed everybody's family was the same. I didn't know people had mummies and daddies who would give them milk and cookies after school. I just thought everybody lived on Central Park West and they had a nanny to take care of them. "

Stephen Sondheim

" Every time one can write a self-deluded song, you are way ahead of the game, way ahead. Self-delusion is the basis of nearly all the great scenes in all the great plays, from 'Oedipus' to 'Hamlet.' "

Stephen Sondheim

" Everybody faces a blank piece of paper, no matter what they've written or painted or composed before. I can't imagine approaching every single new project with-without doubt. "

Stephen Sondheim

" If you're dealing with a musical in which you're trying to tell a story, it's got to sound like speech. At the same time it's got to be a song. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I'm a great audience. I cry very easily. I suspend disbelief in two seconds. "

Stephen Sondheim

" If you force yourself to write away from the piano, you come up with more inventive things. If you're too good a piano player, as some composers are, the music may become flavorless and glib. And if you're not a very good pianist, you're limited to the same patterns. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I would have been a geologist. "

Stephen Sondheim

" One of the hardest things about writing lyrics is to make the lyrics sit on the music in such a way that you're not aware there was a writer there. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I really don't want to write a score until the whole show is cast and staged. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I prefer neurotic people. I like to hear rumblings beneath the surface. "

Stephen Sondheim

" When I'm writing a song, I try to be the character. "

Stephen Sondheim

" I don't find my life that interesting. The shows, maybe. But not me. "

Stephen Sondheim

" A close-up on screen can say all a song can. "

Stephen Sondheim

" The movie adaptations of stage musicals that I've seen, without exception, in my opinion don't work. A lot of people would disagree with me. "

Stephen Sondheim