Generally, the best recording is the original cast, because that's the way the piece grew: integrally, with them.
By the time I was 22, I was a professional. A young and flawed professional, but not an amateur.
I don't listen to recordings of my songs. I don't avoid it, I just don't go out of my way to do it.
I certainly wanted my name in lights. I wanted my name on a marquee. I wanted recognition on Broadway.
When the audience comes in, it changes the temperature of what you've written.
So many good songs get written fast, because you know exactly what has to work.
I really don't want to write a score until the whole show is cast and staged.
You can't have personal investors anymore because it's too expensive, so you have to have corporate investment or a lot of rich people.
Every writer I've ever spoken to feels fraudulent in some way or other.
When I was growing up, there was no such thing as Off-Broadway. You either got your show on or you didn't.
I don't find my life that interesting. The shows, maybe. But not me.
I firmly believe lyrics have to breathe and give the audience's ear a chance to understand what's going on. Particularly in the theater, where you have costume, story, acting, orchestra.
Gotta watch out for directors.
In the Rodgers and Hammerstein generation, popular hits came out of shows and movies.
My personal life and my artistic life do not interfere with each other.
The fact is popular art dates. It grows quaint. How many people feel strongly about Gilbert and Sullivan today compared to those who felt strongly in 1890?
On stage, generally speaking, the story is stopped or held back by songs, because that's the convention. Audiences enjoy the song and the singer, that's the point.
Every single song I've ever written is sung by a character created by somebody else. Some might have a jaundiced view of love, some don't. But none of these songs is me singing - not a single one.
My parents weren't around much, but I assumed everybody's family was the same. I didn't know people had mummies and daddies who would give them milk and cookies after school. I just thought everybody lived on Central Park West and they had a nanny to take care of them.
I'm always conscious of what I'm writing, conscious of what the actor may ask me. I have a defense for nearly every line in the song.
