Sondheim was NOT a genius. Here's why.
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- Опубликовано: 3 фев 2022
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LINKS
GET GEEKY ABOUT SONDHEIM
If you’re curious, start with this doco!
Six by Sondheim (2013) • Video
Putting It Together with Kyle Marshall
Landing page: puttingittogether.transistor.fm/
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/1dYqasi...
His two books, Look, I Made a Hat: www.waterstones.com/book/look... and Finishing the Hat: www.waterstones.com/book/fini...
How Sondheim Writes A Musical: • How Sondheim Writes A ...
Glynis Johns Send in the Clowns: • Glynis Johns Send in t...
Sondheim’s appearances on Desert Island Discs:
open.spotify.com/episode/7C35...
open.spotify.com/episode/24sC...
OTHER THINGS I MENTION
A history of magic from the British Library! It’s a book but also here’s some free info: www.bl.uk/a-history-of-magic
Your elusive creative genius | Elizabeth Gilbert: • Your elusive creative ...
Create Dangerously: A Lecture by Albert Camus: static1.squarespace.com/stati...
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Sondheim himself was always very vocal about his collaborators and big on giving credit where it was due. He would say that he felt he wasn't so much a writer as an actor. He took the characters and situations his collaborators created and put himself in there to tell those parts of the story through song. But I think those of us who consider him a genius feel so because of what his contributions were, not because of an assumption that he somehow created masterpieces in a void. His problem solving and puzzle making within his scores took a special kind of mind. The way he distilled information from various sources and collaborators into the songs we love, how he chose to reference familiar tropes or pieces of music to get a specific effect (Assassins is full of musical homages), all of that had to be filtered through his particular sieve and would have come out differently had a different writer been working on those projects. I think rather than looking at how much of the whole he didn't do, we can look at what his contributions were and that's where we find his genius.
Definitely agree with this take.
Amén 🙏🏻
I feel like this is exactly what the video talks about, but in an explorative way.
Much more inclined to agree with this reading. Kinda embarrassed by how seething this video left me. :'D
Shakespeare!! He stole all his plays (ok most of his plays), but his version of the story is the one that endures because his lens was beautiful.
That's a lovely way of putting it
Not to mention Shakespeare’s antisemitism
@@whimsyrosie dude he lived in the 1600s. I’m not saying that excuses it but come on.
@@colonyofrats4193 Doesn't mean it shouldn't be talked about. In fact, it means we should be scrutinizing all the supposed "artistic geniuses," criticize their art, their perspectives, and stop relying on the "Christian, white male" for all of the ways we analyze and create modern art. Their perspective tends to be problematic, filled with antisemitism, sexism, homophobia, and racism, and it also tends to be very one-sided. You can see this through all platforms: music, poetry, paintings, sculpture, books, plays, etc. We glorify the Christian white male perspective without scrutinizing yet ignore all the other perspectives of the time.
@@whimsyrosie I mean, yeah, sure his work is flawed, it was written in the 1600's, but as a Jew I've honestly always found his portrayal of Shylock in The Merchant of Venice as pretty sympathetic, like the 'do we not bleed' speech is very humanising and I enjoyed playing that role in school. His portrayal of Othello, a black man definitely has its issues, but again, it's actually pretty progressive for the time, and he is shown at the beginning of the play as being noble and honest, and his love for Desdemona as genuine and good. He's anything but sexist or homophobic. He is very gay in fact, and his plays reflect that. Works like The Taming of the Shrew vindicate women's rights, and he has plenty of strong female characters throughout his plays. His work can and should be criticised but certainly not written off.
Leena: "Maybe we don't need to look for blank pieces of paper, maybe we need to look at previous narratives that need fixing-"
My nerdy self who's been endlessly ridiculed by "real writers" for writing fanfiction: "Y'don't say?"
In fact, a lot of this argument can be transferred onto Shakespeare; like most of his stories were written from already established sources, and a lot of his work was written in collaboration with his company of actors (especially his lead actor Richard Burbage), and as a result of the need to create entertainment, not great art. Shakespeare had a theatre to run, so he needed plays to show, so he wrote plays. That they are some of the greatest works ever written isn't because of some divine genius, but because of collaboration and effort.
I honestly don't think think many great collaborative professional artists would welcome to be called a genious. It's a rather hollow concept of being "touched by the gods" that kinda takes away from their biggest achievement: having developped their professional skills and advanced their career through years and years of hard and diverse work... Especially, from what I have seen of the man, I can't imagine Sondheim would have appreciated such accolades... He'd have smiled...
I went to a performing arts high school, and one of my teachers was known for telling his students time and time again, "Good artists steal." I didn't really learn what that meant until I became a playwright in grad school, but it's totally true-- originality isn't really a thing anymore and that's okay! Everything comes from something and that's beautiful. Nothing is created in a vacuum and very few things are created completely independently. Even as a playwright, I have dramaturgs and producers and actors who all influence me and my work constantly. Art is an amazing collaborative effort and that's what I love about it
i’m also a playwright in college and we were taught the same thing! they tell us stop worrying about being original and Just Write.
I feel this as a writer in general! Also, whenever I see those videos about musicians that are like "OMG IT SOUNDS LIKE THIS SONG" Like yeah, maybe its because they were inspired that song and then made it their own?
My teacher in Primary school made us little "Magpie books" to write down ideas we saw and wanted to use in creative writing! I guess the idea was that magpies like to steal shiny silver things.
It’s a paraphrase of Stravinsky.
I'm a musician, and a music teacher, and as I was watching this video, basically every point that you used to illustrate how Sondheim was "not a genius" I'm sitting here going "Um... that's literally how music WORKS". Referencing the Dies Irae, collaborating with other people, even just HAPPENING to be in the right place at the right time, this is how careers are made, I mean, just about every opera ever written had a librettist (what we would call a lyricist in musical theatre) and we rarely even know their NAMES unless we deliberately seek out that knowledge, that does not mean the composers were not geniuses!
You mentioning how editors are often left out of the praise of novels made me think about how often we put film directors on a pedestal when in reality they are part of a MASSIVE team of creative experts. With out the lighting specialists, film editors, sound design, continuity/script supervisors the list goes on and on, films we love would not be nearly as enthralling or immersive.
And lots of people not knowing that the director of photography is often the one deciding the shots, the stunt coordinator will be choreographing stunts to the narrative then showing them to the director, sometimes the first time a director sees the stunts is when they start shooting, and the DP will have set up the shots, possibly with the CGI department!
Someone I admire is Ethel Smyth, a British composer and writer who is severely underrepresented in history. She was the first female composer to have her opera performed at the MET, was at the forefront of the suffragette movement, and defied exactions of women of her time. Also see: Nadia Boulanger, who actually taught Leonard Bernstein, composer of West Side Story!! :) Always love you videos, thanks Leena!!
Off to look up Nadia Boulanger, I love Bernstein so much! Thanks for commenting this!
It's so dumb for people to believe creativity can exist in a vacuum - as people, we are made up of all the things we've experienced through our entire lives. There's no way to separate who we "are" at heart, from all the things and people that have influenced us.
When I read the title I thought we're cancelling Sondheim now!!! So glad it's not the case, I would be VERY SAD
Thank you for this comment. As someone who is still waiting for the premiere, the title made me VERY nervous.
@@spiriterised2886 Haha it's gonna be fine, I promise!
Do you think the way we think of genius as being a lone, incredibly talented person is linked to the cult of individuality and the politics and societal BS that links to it? It's helpful to that societal set up to push the idea of individual genius, if we were all aware of the collaborative process of "genius" maybe as a society we'd maybe all value community and collective action more, and that wouldn't bode well for those in power...
!!! Yes!
!!!
On West Side Story: The score is just incredible Bernstein's melodies, character's leitmotifs and arrangements of the orchestral parts and just stunning. There is just so much that is amazing about the music and she didn't give any evidence to support her rash claim
I like how you broke your points down without demolishing Sondheim. And it also makes me wonder how many people never got to shine or experience an opportunity to be really creative, because they did not get piano lessons, they did not get to live next to someone they admired and were not encouraged to do something with their talent.
YUP. I think a lot about that too X
This reminds me of the phase 'There is nothing new under the sun.' I love it when something I love introduces me to something from history! I agree everything connects to something in history whether that is deliberate/obvious or not!
I looked it up, turns out it's a Bible verse! Who knew! I didn't!
Not a fan of musicals but I AM a fan of Sondheim's mischievous grin!
Which he would use sometimes in his interesting and patient coaching sessions.
It’s important to remember that even the most talented of people are only people. This might help put a stop to cancel culture, where one wrong action or quote shatters our idea of a perfect public figure, so we must cancel them altogether.
Mark Rothko is one of my favorite painters and as a painter myself, I felt really connected to his famous work that everyone raved about even seeing it on a computer screen, and I had the priviledge to see his work in person. While I absolutely loved the paintings that I connected to in the beggining , the show I saw also had his earlier works there in the first room were basically him trying to be other painters he admired. You could clearly see him do Kadinski or Picasso and it made me feel really uncomfortable because I could see a young artist really struggling to find himself in his work. As you moved one you could see elements builing up to his iconic paintings and how it all evolved and for me it also was a rare instance where the curatorial text was really great, providing a way for me to put into words why I had felt so connected with his work in the first place. I also had a similar experience while looking at the almost 800 works of Vincent van Gogh. My conclusion was that genius isn't really a thing, it's a label that other people put on creators and I don't know why this is the story that gets told, about it coming out of nothing or being magical or divine, when the experience of creating itself is riddled with self doubt and practice and study and just.. like a banality of daily life. Like cleaning brushes is basically like doing the dishes, it's tedious and boring and you have to do it. The idea of artmaking being something of the divine sounds great sure, but I find it way more inspiring to view them as regular people, who worked on improving their craft constantly and who, on some level were lucky enough to find an audience. When I was younger, I was defining success in those fields by that, the number of views or money or institutions of power acknowleging your work, but now I just define a success artist as someone who can find the time to make art, no matter how much time or recognition they get. It may be a selfish way to view things, but the only person I feel like I need to please now is myself,which is hard enough with being your worst critic anyways. Who am I to decide from art? It's their own thing and I'm just vibing doing mine.
I loved this video! I, however, still think Sondheim is a genius. I don't think circumstance, the fact that collaboration played a big part in his work or the fact that he had imperfect productions takes away from that. Maybe my own definition of genius is too generous, but I think his lyricism alone is worthy of the term. I've also heard stories of how he supported other writers and frequently responded to letters. (see Tick Tick Boom) His generosity of spirit and enthusiasm for storytelling and language forever changed the musical industry!
Ok. I'll stop gushing. I'm off to listen to more Sondheim.
Agreed. By the same logic Shakespeare wasn’t a genius because he recycled earlier plays and stories and collaborated with his actors to generate the texts.
May i recommend channel Sideways for more indepth look in Sweeny Todd and musicals in general?
I used to work at the Kurt Vonnegut Museum in Indianapolis, and I definitely got a lot of visitors who came in and called Vonnegut a genius, and here are two things I have to say about that!
1) Vonnegut was a great writer, YES, but he got as far as he did with the help of his editor friend Knox Burger, who mentored him, and his first wife, Jane, who did a lot of typesetting and probably editing for him!
2) Vonnegut struggled in his writing A LOT! He took a few years to get a short story published, just like everyone else, and many of his early short stories were not that good and we know that because they were published posthumously. He wrote novels before Slaughterhouse-Five, but none of them were commercial successes until then. He got good at his craft because he practiced, not because he was this unearthly genius who naturally had the ability to be an internationally bestselling author the whole time. Sure, he was talented, but talent doesn't mean anything if you don't work.
Ah that's so interesting! Love seeing examples of the same thing in other people's lives, feels like it points to something bigger
Having ADHD I very rarely *just* watch a video, it's usually accompanied by me doing chores or doing something else, but by the end of this video i found myself just intently listening and watching
Olé!
ADHD ftw! I got distracted by the Angela Lansbury clip 5 minutes in and paused to go look up her filmography and message a bunch of people about how she was in a stage production of Sweeny Todd 42 years ago. 😂👍
Has me thinking about how Sondheim was inspirational to Jonathan Larson who also took inspiration also from La Vie Boheme to make Rent that’s success lead to Tick Tick Boom being adapted … everything has so many layers
And then seeing Tick Tick Boom is what motivated Lin Manuel Miranda to pursue musical theatre composition, thus creating In the Heights and Hamilton, Moana and Encanto, etc.
m'am this title had me SHOCKED hahah overall appreciate the analysis of creativity and the whole thing of 'i see something THROUGH what you've made' is so spot on. and i think it's more of a compliment than genius tbh. also sidenote i need to know if you've watched the most recent adptation of Tick Tick Boom on Netflix and your take on it!
i love Sondheim, as a i recently also got deeply into musicals (my current non stop listen is Hadestown). Sweeney Todd is also one of my faves and the way he put Dies Irae and transformed it into every song is fantastic, i recommend the video 'How the Music Spoils Sweeney Todd (and why that's a good thing!)' by Sideways! it really shows the way that he transformed that theme even though it is used in media all the freaking time.
i think hayao miyazaki is my definition of what i mostly call genius, just a fantastic story teller.
Hayao Miyazaki is no different from Sondheim, as his work with Studio Ghibli is HIGLY collaborative, not purely plucked out of the magic void of Hayao's mind magically original without input from other people. I'm with you that the work is amazing, just, if you accept Lena's take on Sondheim not being genius for those reasons, then neither is Miyazaki, or DaVinci, or literally any artist.
Hahaha. The title gave me so much anxiety.
Makes me think of Lin Manuel Miranda. He undeniably has gifts, maybe he is a genius? But part of his success has just been writing about what he knows, what interests him, remixing things, taking from other artists he admires, etc. I feel like a key to his success is that he's not afraid to use what he likes, he doesn't seem to be pressuring himself to think of some whole new thing. Almost like his works are beautiful collages of all the bits of things he's found beautiful and compelling in the world.
Leonard Bernstein wrote WSS and was one of the most significant musicians of the 20th century!! I recommend the West Side Story Symphonic Dances to be able to hear the music itself, which is stunning and invigorating and innovative - Cool Fugue is regularly used as a professional orchestral auditioning excerpt. (I also recommend seeing Gustavo Dudamel conduct Mambo with the Simon Bolivar Symphony Orchestra in 2012.)
* the score of WSS (obvs)
Simon Bolivar orchestra!
@@orlasmyth3409 i knowww it’s such a joy to play :’))
Its AAAAALLLLLL about COLLABORATION! Everything ever created has come from humans collaborating. Sharing ideas, learning from each other, seeing problems to solve, getting inspired - I work in theatre and film and nothing I do I credit as "me" - its chance, its graft, its random beautiful meetings and conversations - it always develops in collaboration and even in my own private poetry writing, shown to no one, I can always see traces of the world around me play on the paper infront of me ! Great video and a clear way to entangle this idea of how creativity and art actually works!
What I love about your videos, Leena, is that even if I have no idea about the thing you're making a video about, I never feel left out of the conversation and I always learn something, and you often convince me to look into the thing you feel passionate about and I discover new and old favourites that way. Thank you!
I feel the same way! 💛
You'd learn far more actual facts about Sondheim by looking literally anywhere else on the internet. This video is devoid of anything other than one person's ignorant opinion.
Would love to see a video of your review of Tick,Tick…Boom! It’s Sondheims last appearance in a film and talks about life of Johnathan Larson who was a the writer of Rent and died the day of the opening night. It is SO interesting and talks about failure and finding you passion and this idea keeping trying at a craft despite set backs. It also has some great songs. It also features loads of Easter eggs for musical theatre lovers.
Love your lipstick! What color/brand is it?
Also regarding Company, it has a lot of queer readings! Mainly how the main character could be read as aromantic, or just not really into the whole heteronormative depiction of marriage. I think Sondheim denied that being the idea (and that it was mostly the struggles of a friend as you said), but it's still a very good way to interpret the musical!
If the emotion climax of a show is about opening yourself up to romantic relationships, can the main character really be considered aromantic?
@@MadameCorgi Yes? Aromantic doesn't mean someone who isn't capable of romantic love, just that you don't experience romantic attraction (or experience it but very little or in certain conditions). Aromantic people can still be in relationships!
Love love love this video. I always try to read the entirety of theatre programs or the acknowledgment sections in books. I also like to wait until the veryyyyy end of movie credits 😂 I know just reading people’s names doesn’t do much for THEM and that it’s really for me, but it continually shows me that it took dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of people to make the art I appreciate. The way we stream music now (a whole other conversation lol) doesn’t really allow me to appreciate a record’s collaborators in the same way, but I need to remind myself that it really was a group effort, and indeed that art almost always is. Even your videos are enhanced by the books you read and the support from The Gumption Club (and you always mention this) ♥️♥️♥️
Love it. Would love to see more like this, maybe about famous books. 🥰
Brilliant video! I read/watched something about creativity and it blew my mind. It mentioned things like it's not about starting with all the choice and a blank slate, and how creating some parameters are useful. If I find it, I'll link it.
+
Currently reading "Everything Was Possible" by Ted Chapin which is about the creation of "Follies" and you might like it (talks about the creative and collaborative process of creating a musical)!
I love how you stitch together thoughts and concepts. Thank you for all your hard work and wonderful antics and shenanigans!
I loved this! I think it’s good to be reminded that EVERYONE is only human. Individuals not having all of their shit together in all aspects of life just as you and me. People can do good things, people can be good at their job (which is often the case with “geniuses” it’s simply someone with luck and being fairly good at their job and with a title giving them credit for the whole teams effort), they can be passionate etc. BUT(!) they are also flawed, unknowing of things known by others, just wing some stuff etc. There seem to be an illusion that “geniuses” are some all knowing, goal minded, clear pathed people and NONE IS LIKE THAT 😆
Sondheim NEVER took credit for other people's work. Without his direct admissions about this Leena would not even know about it for this absurd video.
I didnt get into David Bowie until he died but now he’s one of my favorites
I absolutely adore Elizabeth Gilbert's discussion of creativity. It's definitely a particular vibe and not for everyone, but her book Big Magic is hands down my favorite book about writing and creative work generally
Loved this; my thoughts are sufficiently provoked.
Reminded me a lot of Liz Gilbert’s booked, Big Magic - what she said about Olé that you mention, but also that creativity is about endeavouring to just MAKE, no matter how good/bad, and that the more you make, the more statistically likely it is to make something “good” (but then again, what even is “good”/“genius”, it’s so subjective… also as you mention, becoming successful in the mainstream definitely depends a lot on circumstances and positionality!)
As someone who had never really heard of sondheim, I found this video really insightful and interesting- thank you so much xx
Once you have learned about the dies irae you can hear it popping up every where in cinema, in the shining for example. There's a channel here on RUclips devoted to compiling every film snippet when the infamous 3 notes are used, you'd be surprised by how many there are! Sometimes you don't even register it but it subconsciously gives you that chilling sensation of foreboding.
I enjoyed this video so SO much! One of my favourites you've made :)
So this may be my favorite video of yours Leena! I'm also a huge Sondheim fan and was devastated when he passed away in November. Thank you for sharing the Desert Island Discs episode, I thoroughly enjoyed it on my work day and will probably rewatch Sunday in the Park with George for the eleventeenth million time haha. I'll have to check out the podcast too! But other artists I greatly admire include Mandy Patinkin, John Darnielle, and Elton John!
Check out the Paris production here on RUclips. It's different but still beautiful. How is this your favorite video of hers?
this video blew my mind a little bit... feeling extra creative now, thanks leena!
Had a moment recently where I realized maybe Harry styles isn’t so stylish he just wears Gucci.
I really needed that. Thank you Leena!
So I knew about sondheims colabs and inspirations and it all seemed so obvious to me until you pointed out how much editors influence the work of authors and that BLEW MY TINY MIND. So you're totally right, as soon as I'm not familiar with the inside baseball it's so easy to assume it's a one person project created by a genius
(Also one of my fav singers gave us this way to remember how to pronounce bernstein (rhymes with DIVINE, DARLING))
This is exactly what all of us should know that all the successes in science and technology not only in trivia are not the works of one genius but they are accumulation of the efforts of many people known and unknown. Thank you leena.
This was so thought provoking. Great work Leena!
I was avoiding watching this one because the title wound me up too much! But I think it's really interesting, particularly as someone who works in theatre (lol) where I've had a lot of conversations with different creatives about how new plays/musicals happen, and who gets the credit for what ends up happening. Also reminded me of the group biography of the later romantic poets, "Young Romantics" by Daisy Hay, which really challenges the idea of the Romantic lone genius
Ooo sounds interesting, I'll look it up
Oooooh that is a dangerous title 😂😂😂
You did it again Leena, you took a topic I didn't care about and made me cry halfway through because you turned it so profoundly touching. I love the concept that true creativity, creation, genius even cannot stand by itself and is only made possible by all the cultural and social context, inspirations, people that came before that made a similar thing, and people that exist together at the same time and /make/ each other work. Be it through collaboration, bouncing off ideas and inspiring each other, wanting to make a friend or colleague smile, or plain trying to solve a problem you are getting paid to solve.
Few things are as inspiring to me as all these stories of "geniuses" who actually didn't do it all by themselves in a vacuum up in their ivory tower. There is something so humanising and incredible about being part of a community of creatives that collectively come up with concepts, ideas, works - and learning the people that came before me, that I admire or am inspired by, were just like that as well.
Yes! Problem solving is a huge part of writing, be it music or a story, especially if you're working with a pre-existing story or universe like Sweeny Todd, Beauty and the Beast, or writing fan fiction.
I really enjoy your videos, but this was an especially good topic at the right time for me personally. A discussion of creativity and it's workings is very welcome.
Awwww your two favorite Sondheim shows are also my two favorites! I just saw the Company revival in NYC, and although that show is made up of these universal ideas about/thoughts on marriage that have been out there for much longer than the show itself, the way he assembles his music & lyrics to encapsulate them is just *chef's kiss*
One of the things I really adore about him is his (relative) lack of hubris & the way he supported and encouraged other creators. Heck, he sent an opening night letter to my high school production of Into the Woods.
(My boyfriend's favorite thing about him is that he loved the South Park musical)
You are unbelievably poetic in the way you speak and the ideas and realizations you have. I love to hear you speak. Thank you
Thank you Leena, You reminded me of a Sondheim enthusiast I lived with 20 years back. I saw a production or two over the years too, though not much recently. RIP Steven Sondheim.
I really like Westside story too, Assassins was a personal fave, Unworthy of your love! I was a sad little sap obviously 🥲
This video was so reassuring, specifically your point about not having to focus solely on your own experience to create art. I’ve heard a lot of advice from artists or critics who say ‘paint what you know’ which is definitely valid, but often it’s topics that I don’t know that spark my interest
Great video Leena! I think this serves as a great insight for anyone who tries making things, thank you :D
No it doesn't. She's denigrated a great man's work with no insight or research at all. This woman is merely a narcissist and attention seeker.
@@peteb1206 ah ok Pete thanks for letting me know
Leena, thanks a lot for the video! All of those ideas resonate with me. I write songs when I have time for it and all of them are just the product of the tunes or lines that my brain has accumulated throughout the years of listening to all sorts of music imaginable! When I tell people around that a song came to me in my dream - it does happen from time to time - they start thinking of some divine intervention. Even my husband thinks I sort of connected to some divine channels😂 I’m an atheist and truly convinced it’s just some of the songs I’ve heard combined together.
P.s. I’m such a fan of your video essays, thanks a million for sharing your thoughts and research with us🤍
I am nervous for your comments section
Would LOVE a vid on your thoughts on west side story!!! I really enjoyed the remake so would love to hear your thoughts on it!
Loved this! Thank you for this, so interesting x
Was going ballistic when I started your video, but you are incredible and thanks for all the insight and thought provoking points.
Have you read Art Worlds by Howard Becker?
I love this take. Will be carrying it with me when consuming & creating media from now on 🌟
Thank you Leena and thank you gumption club. This was a great, thoughtful video
Thank you for sharing these ideas! Your video is very enlightening, especially for me as a writer, actor, musical theatre nerd, and someone who tends to put way too many people (including Sondheim) on a pedestal.
I'm agnostic as well, but I believe there is something magical about creative work being several people's combined interpretations of hundreds of thousands of creative work and history and concepts that have influenced their lives. I like to think that magic exists -- not necessarily in the sense of spellbooks and dragons (although I'm not opposed to the possibility), more in the sense of magic as the connective tissue of the world, some combination of fate and happenstance and empathy and interrelatedness and human knowledge that ties everyone and everything together in ways we may never completely understand.
May Sondheim rest in peace. I hope he recognized on some level how deeply his work impacted so many people. Or not his work, I guess, more like each amalgamation of pre-existing ideas that was created through his contribution of skills and perspectives as a composer, lyricist, creator, and human.
I particularly loved these things you said, so I'm just going to leave them here for when I come back to this video over and over and over again:
"Isolation isn't really how most great work has been made"
"I think when we tap into our own creativity and sit down with the blank page and we're like: what should we create? maybe we don't need to look for blank pieces of paper to pull from but actually just look at problems to solve -- look at narratives that existed before and how to fix them or to make them better."
"When you encounter what you perceive as one person's genius, you're actually probably encountering hundreds, if not thousands of people's geniuses or cleverness transposed and retold over millennia."
"The collective genius of humans, the received work that everyone has been doing over generations...this idea that it's like 'I see something through you, in you, I got a glimpse of something cool through you, thank you' rather than like "oh my god, you are god, you're a genius, I will worship you, you're my idol now'"
"On the one hand, genius is expected to be splendid and solitary. On the other, it is called upon to resemble all. Alas, reality is more complex. Balzac suggesting in a sentence the genius resembles everyone and no one resembles him. The artist chooses his object as much as he is chosen by it. Art, in a sense, is a revolt against everything fleeting and unfinished in the world."
"...this idea that good work comes from weird and murky and complicated places"
"It seems to me the only way to make anything pretty good is to at least start and hopefully all the weird and wonderful stuff happens to you along the way"
Another day, another great upload from you 😊
The composer-lyricist - Sondheim's modus operandi - is something of a rarity in musical theatre. The music and the words usually come from two different people. Sondheim scored major early successes with West Side Story - his debut show on Broadway - and Gypsy. Bernstein and Steyne were huge figures in their day. Calling Sondheim's contribution 'incidental' on these shows is like saying Hammerstein was incidental to Rogers' The Sound of Music, or Oklahoma! He was not: no words = no characters = no plot = no theatre, musical or otherwise. It's a partnership, and has to be that way. Sondheim didn't much care for his own efforts on WSS - Bernstein tastes leant towards purple poesy, and Sondheim thought some of the words he wrote unforgivably arch and disconnected from character. Maria's 'I feel pretty' seemed to irritate him particularly. Even so, WSS was a landmark show, for Bernstein's music, inspired by jazz rhythms and Latin dance music, and choreography, which changed Broadway forever. You don't have to like it, but it was incredibly influential. Gypsy is an outright masterpiece of music and lyrics, and Sondheim was very proud of it. But eventually, after a couple of false starts, he he hit his stride doing double duty and the result was the unique, unmistakable sound and feel that that makes Sondheim show sound like Sondheim. Complete unity of musical and lyrical expression, they just flow from the same place, with no cracks or seams, and worked and finished like no other. And his words are amazing! Intellect, invention, characterisation, emotion and narrative economy. In every song! That is so difficult to pull off, and no-one else does what Sondheim does, in the way that he does it. His unique creative personality filled every song that he wrote, and his shows were sui generis. That seems like a gold standard for 'genius' to me.
So I'm not very far into your video, but I must admit to being a little bemused by some of your statements. I'll add to this if I need to, but one other thing I have to mention is 'Sondeim'? There's definitely an 'h' in there, and it is voiced. Sond-Heim. Call me picky, call me a pedant, but if you're gonna make a video about the man, you should say his name as he himself would have liked to hear it. Respect for your subject, and all that. I'm sure you do, but you give away credibility with such an obvious and odd mistake.
You're right about her mispronunciation of "Sondheim"--along with "tabula rasa" and other things--(I think she's a complete idiot to tell you the truth) but you've also misspelled Jule Styne. It was Sheldon Harnick who told Steve that "I Feel Pretty" was too sophisticated for Maria. Steve rewrote it to simplify it, but his collaborators all insisted he go back to the original version.
Leena this video is mind blowing!
Watched this at a really serendipitous moment -- was exactly what I needed to hear! Thanks Leena :)
Regina Spektor - ‘Bon Idée’ & ‘Us’. This comment makes me look like a crazy fan , even thought I don’t listen to her much these days. I remember these songs I’m particular made me start thinking about this subject
Amazing video!!!
Loved the curtain opening
This is how all art has always worked.
"Let's end on a quote by Camus, shall we" - had me howling.
I agree with all of this. I struggle working with other people, but I also know that all my best work has been a result of collaboration and inspiration rather than going solo. Well said Leena. I dig your lighting and setup in this vid too 😊
Im spanish and i got so confused when i heard the translation of “ole” as”god in you” (???) in what world?
I love what you have achieved with this video. You summed up Sondheim's career and pulled back the curtain to reveal the truth behind what too many people have lauded as Sondheim's 'genius'- with what less than two months research? People have been singing, literally singing his praises for over 50 years and you showed him for what he truly was a talented, creative, successful lyricist who had a couple of really great breaks, opportunities and connections. Still love his work and appreciate what you discovered. Good work!
Thank you, I needed this video
i saw another comment mention this too but highly recommend the channel called sideways for musical analysis! he goes really in depth on musical theory but in such an engaging way and i have learned a lot from his videos. he covers a lot of sondheim.
I always said that originality lies in limitation, originality in synthesis. What I mean is we utilize creativity in order to bypass some sort of limitation, either placed by ourselves or externally, and originality only exists when different ideas, motifs, cultures, concepts, and stories that already exist are synthesized into something new.
I really love Amanda Palmer - and she is pretty open about the various inspirations she has had for her music (and that of The Dresden Dolls), but it's interesting when you delve into any of the things/people/art that you love and you can see droplets of other people's work. We are all just a ocean of influences and are shaped by the different cultures we consume as people and as artists.
How this was so powerful and insightful and timely for this creator. Thank you. p.s. Your videos make the internet a better place to be.
Whoa. West Side Story "isn't the best musically" is a HOT HOT take.
I know, I should probably wear some protective goggles for when the West Side stans come after me.
@@leenanorms
the score and orchestral parts are just incredible. amazing motifs and arrangements. its just incredible musically. BernSTEIN is omds amazing
Your videos always educate me and also make me feel a bit better about the world; best combination
I'm a year or two older than you and I remember vividly when Frank Sinatra died, but then I was a big Frank Sinatra fan (I was a weird kid) and also I was in Benidorm at the time. I remember that we went to the one shop that sold English language newspapers and it was on all of the front pages :[
True story; I watched Die Hard with my BFF over xmas and learned that Alan Rickman had died.
I'm that person when it comes to celeb deaths - I don't know they've died til years later! My BFF now shouts "dead" when dead actors are in the thing we're watching!
I may start doing this because I am exactly the same. Especially with actors.
at 10, I cried when i found out that it wasn't Zac Efron who sang the tracks in HSM 1...
Love the video! Very interesting idea of genuis. I was listening to something on radio 4 this week about how Art (specifically painting/sculpture) isn’t made by one person. Spoke to Anthony Gormley and he always credits the people in the foundry who physically make his pieces
(Small moan, sorry! And I don’t know how much control you have over the ads, but getting one as the gregorian chant starts at 06:39 was a bit annoying )
Great video 😁! I only heard about Stephen from tic tic boom.
Talking of cool things hidden in music:
Peter Maxwell Davies' 'Eight Songs for a Mad King' expresses George III's descent into 'madness'. And the score for one of the movements is shaped like a birdcage, with the vocal parts running down and the flute part running across.
Also, my music teacher at school told me that in Handel's Messiah, there is a song called 'Behold the lamb of God', and that Handel made the initial musical line mimic when you sign the cross (whether Handel actually intended that, I don't know but it does look like that).
inspired to go create now 🙈
This video was super thought provoking! I think this idea of “reusing” ideas is quite common in modern musical theatre. Although Wicked is one of the most popular musicals in modern history, the characters and world were already there for Schwartz to dig into. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with this notion (in fact I love spin off stories) but it does demonstrate how influence exists in creativity.
Now that I’m thinking more deeply about it-personal genius is really your unique style-your essence-and the magic is when that personal take and the existing material collide…
Thanks for making me think…on a Saturday…over coffee….
Btw-I love that you nabbed footage of the original Sweeney Todd-I live in NY and remember that commercial well….
Hi Leena! I know its irrelevant to the video but don't have any other way of asking, may you do a video on the best sustainable fashion brands? such as Lucy & Yak (love!) but I can't seem to find those in-between brands that offer colour and reasonable price...as though I thoroughly adore L&Y I do sometimes like more fitted pieces for sophisticated meals/days/travel. This being so I can either purchase or search for them second hand as I can't always get away with relaxed fitting clothes such as L&Y but still want the sustainability and transparency. Trying to broaden and educate myself more and more but getting a little lost in the seemingly limitless amount of websites on google and not knowing where to start. Many thanks, love your videos!
Thought and Know the Origin are great places to start! 🧡
Putting It Together is a cracking podcast as was this video!
I hugely recommend “the best (worst) thing that ever could have happened” on Netflix!! It’s a documentary about the production of Sondheim’s/Lapine’s “Merrily we Roll Along”, and it’s very interesting in terms of the ups and downs of his career but also everything that goes into making a musical.
But yes I agree with what your saying here- to me, I think because I came through his work listening to his music almost out of the context of his shows, and coming to the shows later (Bernadette peters has an album of sondheim numbers that I listened to incessantly and completely without context of who was supposed to be singing or what the larger story is supposed to be), I still think that his words, his melodies, the way he told the characters emotions through song ;even if he didn’t invent the character), is the closest thing I can imagine to the concept of genius. But I think a lot about Liz Gilbert’s “big magic” and how she thinks that when we create great works of art it’s not entirely us, but inspiration moving through us. She spoke about it very spiritually, almost like God making art, but I also think we can be channeling what is in the collective mind, drawing from art history, the collective unconscious, etc etc. She writes that in Ancient Rome the word genius ironically was a spirit that lived the the studio of a writer or artist- ie. “she has a genius”, meaning someone who was making great work clearly had a genius around helping them. I think people who make Great things are not making something entirely from themselves, but they are incredible, unusually skilled at courting the genius, at allowing humanity to work through them. Sondheim may not be a genius but in the Roman sense he sort of HAD a genius, and to me that’s just as incredible
often when there isn't a problem (limitation, constraint, restriction, rule...) artists will willingly make up their own to encourage the most creative solutions - this is a very common practice especially when dealing with improvisation. Limitation and collaboration are powerful creative tools (: and creativity is a type of knowledge (often embodied knowledge) that would be beneficial to any human. Thanks for passing it on!