Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II changed the course of the American musical in 1943 when they wrote Oklahoma!. It was centered in a strong story line with all the musical elements organically related to developing the story and/or characters. From that point to Hammerstein’s death in 1960, they wrote eight additional musicals for Broadway: Carousel(1945), Allegro (1947), South Pacific(1949), The King and I (1951), Me and Juliet (1953), Pipe Dream (1955), Flower Drum Song (1958), The Sound of Music(1959); one film: State Fair (1945) and one television show: Cinderella (1957). While the songs were firmly tied to the context of the musical, many of them passed into frequently performed works within the popular music of the American Songbook. There, removed from the original musical context, they took on a life of their own as interpreted by the performer. The original gender of the song might be changed to fit with the gender of the performer. The lyrics might take on different meanings and shadings from the original context. The tempo and beat might be changed. Unlike many performers, Mabel Mercer, the great cabaret singer who died in 1984, said she never changed a single word of the original lyrics, “I sing the song.” She was famous for her unerring feeling for tempo in lyrics and finding new shadings and meanings.
In 1993 Walter Bobbie, actor and director, conceived A Grand Night for Singing to explore the lesser-known songs in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals. In additional to lesser-heard songs, he gave them different contexts from the original one. While in The Sound of Music, the nuns pose a question, “How do you solve a problem like Maria?” about one of the young novices whom they all love but who won’t behave as a novice should; in Grand Night it becomes a lament of a young man about his girlfriend:
Oh, how do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand?
When I’m with her I’m confused,
Out of focus and bemused,
And I never know exactly where I am.
Unpredictable as weather,
She’s flighty as a feather--
She’s a darling!
She’s a demon!
She’s a lamb!
She’ll outpester any pest,
Drive a hornet from his nest,
She could throw a whirling dervish out of whirl.
She is gentle,
She is wild,
She’s a riddle,
She’s a child.
She’s a headache!
She’s an angel--
She’s a girl.
One of the characteristics of Hammerstein’s songs is that by the conclusion of the song the story and/or character will have moved and developed from where they were at the opening. In “The Gentleman Is a Dope,” (Allegro) the lyrics of the refrain start on what might be a humorous tone:
The gentleman is a dope,
A man of many faults,
A clumsy Joe
Who wouldn’t know
A rhumba from a waltz.
Rodgers’s music, however, hints at something else, and by the end of the refrain we have arrived at,
The gentleman is a dope,
He isn’t very smart,
He’s just a lug
You’d like to hug
And hold against your heart.
The gentleman doesn’t know
How happy he could be,
Look at me crying my eyes out
As if he belonged to me--
He’ll never belong to me.
The musical arrangements in Grand Night often turn a song into something quite different from the original context: “Honeybun” (South Pacific) becomes a full out raucous swinging jazz turn with vocal scatting instruments. “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Out Of My Hair” (South Pacific) is a swinging sultry Andrew Sisters-esque takeoff.
You will listen to the songs in a different way, hear the lyrics in a new light, swing and sway to different tempos. It is indeed a grand night of singing.
It’s grand night singing,
The moon is flying high,
And somewhere a bird who is bound he’ll be heard,
Is throwing his heart to the sky.
It’s a grand night for singing,
The stars are bright above.
The earth is aglow, and, to add to the show,
I think I am falling in love,
Falling, falling in love!
See The Contemporary Scene, March 6, 2018, for related material.
A Grand Night for Singing. Music, Richard Rodgers; lyrics, Oscar Hammerstein II; musical arrangements by Fred Wells; orchestrations by Michael Gibson, Jonathan Tunick; conceived by Walter Bobbie.
In 1993 Walter Bobbie, actor and director, conceived A Grand Night for Singing to explore the lesser-known songs in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals. In additional to lesser-heard songs, he gave them different contexts from the original one. While in The Sound of Music, the nuns pose a question, “How do you solve a problem like Maria?” about one of the young novices whom they all love but who won’t behave as a novice should; in Grand Night it becomes a lament of a young man about his girlfriend:
Oh, how do you solve a problem like Maria?
How do you hold a moonbeam in your hand?
When I’m with her I’m confused,
Out of focus and bemused,
And I never know exactly where I am.
Unpredictable as weather,
She’s flighty as a feather--
She’s a darling!
She’s a demon!
She’s a lamb!
She’ll outpester any pest,
Drive a hornet from his nest,
She could throw a whirling dervish out of whirl.
She is gentle,
She is wild,
She’s a riddle,
She’s a child.
She’s a headache!
She’s an angel--
She’s a girl.
One of the characteristics of Hammerstein’s songs is that by the conclusion of the song the story and/or character will have moved and developed from where they were at the opening. In “The Gentleman Is a Dope,” (Allegro) the lyrics of the refrain start on what might be a humorous tone:
The gentleman is a dope,
A man of many faults,
A clumsy Joe
Who wouldn’t know
A rhumba from a waltz.
Rodgers’s music, however, hints at something else, and by the end of the refrain we have arrived at,
The gentleman is a dope,
He isn’t very smart,
He’s just a lug
You’d like to hug
And hold against your heart.
The gentleman doesn’t know
How happy he could be,
Look at me crying my eyes out
As if he belonged to me--
He’ll never belong to me.
The musical arrangements in Grand Night often turn a song into something quite different from the original context: “Honeybun” (South Pacific) becomes a full out raucous swinging jazz turn with vocal scatting instruments. “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Out Of My Hair” (South Pacific) is a swinging sultry Andrew Sisters-esque takeoff.
You will listen to the songs in a different way, hear the lyrics in a new light, swing and sway to different tempos. It is indeed a grand night of singing.
It’s grand night singing,
The moon is flying high,
And somewhere a bird who is bound he’ll be heard,
Is throwing his heart to the sky.
It’s a grand night for singing,
The stars are bright above.
The earth is aglow, and, to add to the show,
I think I am falling in love,
Falling, falling in love!
See The Contemporary Scene, March 6, 2018, for related material.
A Grand Night for Singing. Music, Richard Rodgers; lyrics, Oscar Hammerstein II; musical arrangements by Fred Wells; orchestrations by Michael Gibson, Jonathan Tunick; conceived by Walter Bobbie.
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