Music straightjackets a poem and prevents it from breathing on its own, whereas it liberates a lyric. Poetry doesn’t need music; lyrics do.
I do not dwell on dreams I know how soon a dream becomes an expectation How can I have expectations? Look at me, No, Captain, Look at me, Look at me!
In the Rodgers and Hammerstein generation, popular hits came out of shows and movies.
Everyone I used to play with has either given up or is dead.
It’s not so hard to be married, I’ve done it three or four times.
The dumbing down of the country reflects itself on Broadway. The shows get dumber, and the public gets used to them.
I get some flak for and some resistance from colleagues for because I’m interested in storytelling. I mean what I like about songwriting is songs used to tell a story.
I don’t write songs apart from theatrical pieces. I’m not interested in writing songs qua songs.
Musicals are so expensive to put on the stage that you have to have the backing of a corporate, you have to have Universal Studios or Disney or somebody to put in the money.
I like songs that are part of a dramatic texture, and therefore I like the scenes to be active. I wanna follow the story and that means you lean on the actors.
If I got involved with the chat rooms and Facebook and everything – I would probably never leave. That’s why I don’t do it. I literally don’t do it. At all.
I love computers. I love writing on them. I love gadgetry. The thing is: I am a slow reader. So, if I am going to get my work done, I read, like, a newspaper and that’s it. If I got into websites and the internet, I wouldn’t get any work done.
A folktale without a moral is merely a whimsy.
It takes almost as much imagination to justify what you write as it does to write it.
Stop worrying where you’re going. Move on. If you can know where you’re going, you’ve gone. Just keep moving on.
You taught me about concentration. At first I thought that meant just being still, but I was to understand it meant much more. You meant to tell me to be where I was, not some place in the past or future. I worried too much about tomorrow.
Somebody, crowd me with love. Somebody, force me to care. Somebody, make me come through, I’ll always be there, as frightened as you, to help us survive being alive!
Music is a foreign language which everyone knows but only musicians can speak.
I know what my decision is... Which is not to decide.
Musicals continue to be the only art form, popular or otherwise, that is publically criticized by illiterates.
Take me to a world where I can be alive.