Many theatre critics consider composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim the greateest living Broadway composer. There's no denying the groundbreaking musicals he wrote changed the way we create musical theatre today. A short list of his shows include West Side Story, Gypsy, Company, Follies, and Sweeney Todd, among others. He recently released the second volume of his lyrics, called "Look, I Made a Hat." Sondheim discusses the lyrics he wrote for all of his songs, gives opinions about other composers he admires, and tells stories about his experiences writing the shows. He distills his advice about writing lyrics to three simple rules:
Form dictates Content
God is in the Details
Less is More
All of these rules serve to increase the clarity of the piece.
I'll address each of these in a subsequent post. There's one other lesson that practically shouts from the pages of these books, which include not just all of his finished lyrics but also different versions and pictures of his original hand-written note: Stephen Sondheim worked hard! He would write as many different versions as he needed until he got it right. The effortless brilliance of his lyrics was the result of Sondheim's continual effort to improve his work.
Perhaps we can't all be Sondheim, but we can all learn from his effort. How much time are you putting into your content projects? Try for continual improvement.
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