Sondheim lives on

 

To the left is an image of Stephen Sondheim receiving an award from former president Obama.

Born March 22, 1930, Stephen Sondheim the legend, came into this world. He studied piano and organ, and at age 15 he wrote a musical at George School in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He also studied music at Williams College, Williamstown, Massachusetts, and wrote college shows there. When he graduated in 1950, he received the Hutchinson Prize for composition, a fellowship. He then studied further in New York City with the composer Milton Babbitt. In the early 1950s, Sondheim wrote scripts in Hollywood for the television series Topper. After returning to New York City, he wrote incidental music for the play The Girls of Summer (1956).

video link of song. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnLKbc2hvxk

He started becoming more well know after writing lyrics for Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story, which opened in 1957. He then wrote the lyrics for Gypsy (1959; music by Jule Styne).

Many of your favorite artists love to sing his songs. In 1993, Mr. Sondheim received the Kennedy Center Honors for lifetime achievement, and in 2015 he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama. In 2008, he was given a Tony Award for lifetime achievement.

Sondheim continued to combine various musical genres with sharp lyrical writing and unexpected subject matter in the 1990s. Sondheim has claimed eight Tony Awards, a record for a composer, as well as eight Grammy Awards. He shared the 1985 Pulitzer Prize for Drama with James Lapine for Sunday in the Park with George and won an Academy Award for the song “Sooner or Later,” one of five tracks written for the 1990 film Dick Tracy, starring Warren Beatty and Madonna.

Stephen in an interview.

https://www.charlotteobserver.com/entertainment/movies-news-reviews/article256145482.html.  

Sondheim was honored as a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in November 2015. In 2017, he became the first composer-lyricist to win the PEN/Allen Foundation Literary Service Award. He was active and productive all his life, but on November 26, 2021, he died suddenly at age 91. His lawyer and friend, Richard Pappas, said that Mr. Sondheim was healthy and did not have any known disease. On the day before his death, Sondheim celebrated Thanksgiving at a dinner with friends. His only reported recent illness was in the winter of 2020, when he tore a ligament in his leg after falling in his Connecticut home.

Two years before he died, Sondheim had fallen and tore a ligament in his leg. This caused him to cancel many of his social events, limit his activity and walk with a cane. American composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim is mainly known for his stage works, which include A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962); Anyone Can Whistle (1964); Company (1970); Follies (1971); and A Little Night Music (1973). According to Celebrity Net Worth, Stephen Sondheim had an estimated net worth of around $20million at the time of his death. Known for his musical talent and lyricism, Sondheim is behind some of the most beloved musicals of all time.

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