As I've said and probably often said, before I was a classical music fan(atic), I was a musical show fanatic. I did come to one from the other, since Wright and Forrest's
Kismet used tunes by the Russian nationalist composer Alexander Borodin (1833-1887). (For instance,
Baubles, Bangles and Beads is from the second of his string quartets, and
Stranger in Paradise is to the main theme of his tonepoem
From the Steppes of Central Asia. Themes from the two symphonies he finished, and an opera - Kniaz Igor - that he didn't, for example, also found their way into their devising :) - which I only actually saw on stage after I knew Borodin's music pretty well, but which I knew from an original cast recording for a long while before that!)
Stephen Sondheim seems to have been in some way behind most, though not all, of the musicals I like now. (He was a Hindemith pupil, Cole Porter was a Nadia Boulanger pupil along with many other composers in France... make no simple and easy distinctions... and I gather that Sondheim's thesis work was a piano sonata that if playable is a quite remarkable thing; there was a presentation about it at a conference a friend attended awhile back.) My favorite musical then and now is
A Little Night Music (1973; title an homage to Mozart, plot taken from
this 1955 Swedish movie...) - a man in a childless second marriage visits his mistress and receives an invitation for a "weekend in the country".
"A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" isn't half bad either :^) (Intermission!!!!) (saw it twice, once with Nathan Lane on Broadway in 1996. Yes!)...
Pacific Overtures - less inspired music and book though still some of the lyrics and ideas I found very memorable (esp. Chrysanthemum Tea...)
Eric
