Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
-
Upload
samueljohnsonho -
Category
Documents
-
view
219 -
download
0
Transcript of Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
-
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
1/9
Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd': The Case for the DefenceAuthor(s): Carey BlytonSource: Tempo, New Series, No. 149 (Jun., 1984), pp. 19-26Published by: Cambridge University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/945080.
Accessed: 22/05/2014 13:50
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at.http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
.
Cambridge University Pressis collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Tempo.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cuphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/945080?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/945080?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cup -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
2/9
SONDHEIM'S
'SWEENEY
TODD'
The
Case
for the
Defence
CareyBlyton
As
BOTH LYRICIST
AND
COMPOSER,
Stephen
Sondheim
has
proved
to be the
most
original
and innovative
force on
Broadway
since
the late
I950's,
when
he
first
attracted attention
as
the
lyricist
for some
of
the
songs
in Leonard Bernstein's West
Side
Story
(1957),
including
'Maria' and
'Tonight'.
Few
composers
for the
musical
stage
have
such a record
of success
as
Sondheim.
In addition to these
lyrics
for
Bernstein,
he
also wrote all
the
lyrics
forJule
Styne's Gypsy
(1959);
then,
as
composer
as well as
lyricist,
he wrote a number of musicals over the next two decades:A
Funny
Thing Happened
on the
Way
to the Forum
(1962),
Anyone
Can Whistle
(1964),
Company
(1970),
Follies
(197I),
A Little
Night
Music
(I973),
Pacific
Overtures
(1976),
Sweeney
Todd
(1979),
and
Merrily
We
Roll
Along
(198I).
From
Anyone
Can
Whistle
onwards,
Sondheim
has
pushed
the
frontiers
of the
Broadway
musical
further and further
outwards,
exploring
harmonically
and
structurally
in a series of
highly
original
works,
of which
Sweeney
Todd
is the most
remarkable.
After
its
opening
in New
York,
many
of the audience considered
the
work to
be an
opera,
not a musical.
Sondheim
himself had said beforehand:
'I had
wanted to write a ballad opera, and here it is, with 26 numbers'. Harold Prince, the
producer
with
whom
Sondheim
has worked
fruitfully
for
the
past
14
years,
had
referred
to the work as 'music theatre'.
The
printed programme
called
the
piece
a
'musical
thriller'. After detailed
study,
perhaps
all one can
say
is that
is
is not
a musical
in
the
generally
accepted
meaning
of
the
word,
i.e.
a
Broadway
'show'.
The work
is based on
a
play
by
the British
playwright Christopher
Bond,
adapted
by
Hugh
Wheeler.
Between
them,
they
made
a
powerful
and dramatic
story
out
of what had hitherto
been,
in
numerous
previous
versions,
no more than
a
Grand
Guignol
melodrama
with cardboard characters.
Sweeney
Todd is
given
a
strong
reason for
his
appalling
anti-social activities:
revenge.
Transported
for life
by
a
wily
and devious Judge Turpin, who lusts after Todd's beautiful young wife Lucy, he
manages
to
escape
from down-under and
returns
swearing vengeance
for
all his
wrongs
at the hands of the
judge
and his
obsequious
beadle,
Bamford.
Todd takes
up
residence
once more
in
the
barbershop
above Mrs. Lovett's
pie-shop
in
Fleet
Street.
Mrs.
Lovett,
a widow who
still
remembers the
'beautiful
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
3/9
TEMPO
barber'
with
more
than
a little
affection,
does not
recognize
Todd at
first,
but
when
she
does
so,
she tells
him
that
his
wife,
Lucy,
is
dead,
and that
his
beautiful
young
daughter, Johanna, is now living with Judge Turpin as his ward. The Judge has
developed
an
all-consuming
lust for the
daughter.
Romantic interest
is
provided
by
a
young
sailor,
Anthony,
who
has saved Todd from
drowning
when their
ship
was
wrecked
on its
return to
England
from Australia. Todd's
plan
is
quite
simple:
he
intends
to
kill
theJudge
and
the
Beadle for the
wrongs
they
have
done
to
him
and
his
family.
But because
things
do
not
go
according
to
plan straightaway,
Todd
is
forced
to
practise
on 'less
honourable throats'. . . and his
desire
for
revenge
and
his
madness
grow.
So the
story
is
simple
and
powerful,
with
excellent
dramatic
shape,
and
many
opportunities
for a
composer
to
write
very many
different kinds of music:
Sondheim
rises without fail to each challengeof the libretto, and, as one writer put it: ' "Sweeny
Todd" rushes
hell-bent
through mounting
dissonances
to a
shattering
finish.'1
As
the work
begins,
with
its
harshly
dissonant music
'played'
on
stage
by
a small
pipe
organ
(though actually
in
the
pit by
a
Hammond
organ),
and
as
Sweeney
Todd
makes
an
unnerving
and sudden
appearance
from out of
his
own
open grave,
we
know we are not
in
for some
cosy
family
entertainment
along
the
lines
of
The
King
and
I or The
Sound
of
Music. The chorus
sings
the violent and
harmonically
disorientated
'Ballad of
Sweeney
Todd'
(whose
second half
is
based
on the 'Dies
Irae'),
and then the
events
of Todd's dark
and sinister life are re-enacted
before
our
eyes
(and
ears).
The
work's
uncompromising
drama,
which deals with
the
less attractive
aspects
of the
human psyche-deceit, lust, violence, murder, etc.-places it unequivocally in the
same
area
as
the
Brecht/Weill
collaborations like
Mahagonny
and
The
Seven
Deadly
Sins.
Virtually
all the
apparently conflicting descriptions-ballad opera, opera,
music
theatre-seem
justified:
there
are
very
few lines of the libretto which are
not
sung
or
spoken
over musical
accompaniment.
Those
lines which
are
spoken
without
any
music,
like Mrs.
Lovett's
hoarse,
whispered:
'So it is
you,
Benjamin
Barker ',
when
she
finally recognizes
Todd,
are
electrifyingly
effective-Sondheim
clearly
knows the
dramatic
effectiveness of silence. The
chorus
is used
both
in
the normal 'musical'
manner
(here,
as London
townspeople)
and-a
purely operatic
device-as
a
Greek
chorus,
commenting
on
the action at
intervals
throughout
the work: the
all-important
'Ballad of
Sweeney
Todd'
occurs,
either
in
full or
in
part,
seven
times,
with
differing
words: its
first
appearance
gives
the whole tenor of the
ensuing
work: 'Attend the
tale
of
Sweeney
Todd/His
skin was
pale
and
his
eye
was
odd/He
shaved
the faces
of
gentlemen/Who
never
thereafter were heard
of
again'.
From
a
purely
musical
point
of
view,
the
most
interesting thing
about
Sweeney
Todd
s
that Sondheim reveals in it that
he
is
very
much aware of what has been
going
on
in
'serious' music
since
the turn
of
the
century.
His harmonic
language
is
frequently
highly
dissonant,
and
many
passages
show
clearly
identifiable
models.
The
handling of the choral lines (for three tenors), in the 3rd statement of'The Ballad of
Sweeney
Todd',
is
very
reminiscent
of
the
writing
for male voices
in 'The
Family'
sections of Weill's
The
Seven
Deadly
Sins.
Other
parts
remind
one
of
Britten's
vocal
writing
in
early
works like Let's Make an
Opera.
Orchestral
passages
owe a debt here
and there to
such
diverse
composers
as
Stravinsky
('No
Place like
London',
b.256
et
seq.),
Bliss
('Green
Finch
and
Linnet
Bird'-especially
bb.
50-54),
and
Sousa
(the
piccolo counterpoints
in
'Pirelli's Miracle
Elixir'),
to name
just
a few.
1
TV
Times,
31
July
1980.
20
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
4/9
'SWEENEY TODD'
However,
like all
good composers,
Sondheim
has taken
what
he
requires
for
his
own
expressive
ends
from
the
sound-worlds
of other
composers,
and
adapted
them
in
such
a
way
that
they
end
up
as
sounding highly original:
echt-Sondheim,
in fact.
Any
hint
of
plagiarism
is
finally dispelled
by
Jonathan
Tunick's
always
effective
and
imaginative
orchestrations,
arrived at after
consultation with the
composer.
These use
a
28-piece
orchestra
comprising
I.I.
I.I.
(with
the
usual
doublings)-
I.2.3.o-Perc.-Harp-Organ--4.4.2.2.I,
an
ensemble
giving
an infinite
variety
of
timbres
and
orchestral
'weights'.
The libretto
afforded
Sondheim
a
number of
opportunities
for
pastiche,
which
he
seized
to
great
effect.
(He
had
already
shown
a
real
flair for
pastiche
in
previous
works,
c.f.
the
brilliant G
&
S
'patter song',
sung
by
the British
Admiral,
in
Pacific
Overtures.)
The
'Parlor
Songs',
sung by
Beadle
Bamford,
accompanying
himself
on the
harmonium, are amusing copies of'ye olde Englishe ballad', and the I8th-century
minuet
in 'Poor
Thing'
is
effective,
despite
its
brevity.
The
musical
digs
at Verdi
and
Puccini
in
'Pirelli's
Miracle
Elixir',
a virtuoso
song
for a
very high
Italian
tenor,
are
both clever
and
witty.
These
pastiches give
further evidence
of
Sondheim's
awareness
of
music
outside that
of
the
Broadway
musical
and its traditions.
Perhaps
of the
greatest
interest to musicians
is the actual harmonic
language
that
Sondheim
employs
at certain
times,
often
harshly
dissonant, and,
at
times,
clearly
bitonal.
Ex.
I,
taken
from
'The Ballad
of
Sweeney
Todd'
(first
statement),
shows how
Sondheim
achieves
the musical
equivalent
of Todd's cut-throat
razor about
its
grisly
business
'floating
across
the throats
of
hypocrites':
Ex.
I
Ad
Lh
3
nJr
slJ
ie
d
ntrM
1
And what if none of their
souls
were
saved?
They
went
to their
Mak- r im
-
pec-ca-bly
shavedd
(
*
^-
-
E
qv
I
I
.)
VLS
r
T
r
r~
I
7r
rr rr
r
rrrr-
r
r
-r
fr
%47-
'
._L--
4
Ps
4
'~
Ex.
2,
from
the same
song,
is a
good example
of some of the
choral
writing,
which would
no
doubt
stump many
a chorus
singer
in
a
repertoire
musical,
while
Ex.
3
is
an
example
of
bitonality resulting
in a
texture-and
an
emotional
impact-reminiscent
of
parts
of
Berg's
Wozzeck.
Sondheim's
vocal
writing
is
wonderfully
fluid,
the
underlaying
following
the
stresses
and internal
rhythms
of the words
very
closely.
A
good example
(Ex.
4)
comes from
'No
Place
like
London',
where the metre
changes restlessly:
21
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
5/9
TEMPO
Ex.
2
(J.
=c120)
1
f
'~"
k
130
f,-
1
-1.
1: 4
S.
:
l
|Swee
-
ney
Swee
-
ney
Swee
-
B.
)
F
P
*
f
f
|
f'
|
ff;'
f
_
ff
ft-
f
''
>
>> >>>
>>
>>>i
W.W.,
Tpts.
>-
Ss.
Hn.,Vlns.,Vlas.
Tpts.|
j:t
__
+
Organ
'
s
t
A.
~
#_
I
-
_
ney
iB..y
'r--
T--
-
-
I
\lll#
nlf
^
if
rfi
frrrfrrr
^'
,
J
III
I
I> I>
I>
> >
L> I>
>
I>
I
I
a
M
Bsn. lc.(pizz.)
*,i
._
,
>
-
(
gpff
~r
c.* '`q
IF
4* *
kJ.
)
(Strs.)
>
;
>
Ex.
3
Strs.
Organ
Xylo.
Tpts.
Hn.
Presto
(=
11-2).
Tpts.
^
^^^^^^^^(^^1^_^
Hn.)
'
V
'
I
L-
,
_
W
f
6
L.
t
,
L
,
L_ .
L
_
k
,
L._
.
L
f
Organ
Ped.
Ex. 4
F2151
SWEENEY
TODD
6
Meno
mosso,^
mp
t4^^c?~1
Ii-uT-]
IIjI
.
i
IL?8
-W
;
There was a
bar-ber and his
wife,
And she was
beau-
ti-ful,_
20
'-
ih
b
r
ad
hs
wif,
e wshs
ren
ad
If
fool-ish
bar-ber and his
wife,
She was his
rea-son
and his
life,
22
Tb.?
.(-R)
,
p
,
VcI
rF
af
I
r
V
I
m)fP
6J
-
b
J
6
a)
>
>
-I,
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
6/9
'SWEENEY TODD'
23
B^
1
.
KJ?
g .
I$r
r
F,i?
.
6-
P
1t
And
she
was
beau-ti-ful,_
And she
was vir
-
tu-ous,_
J
2251J
And he
was
na- ive.
Similar
examples
of
constantly shifting
metres occur
it
many songs,
most
notably
in
Mrs. Lovett's 'Worst
Pies in
London',
where the dislocations in the
metre
give
emphasis
to her
attempts
to
swat
and
thump
the
flies
that
plague
her as
she kneads
dough:
4/4 2/4
4/4
3/4 5/4
3/4
4/4
3/4
5/4 3/4
5/4 4/4
etc.
We
are a
long
way away
from the sound
of hills alive with music.
Occasionally,
the American roots of
Sondheim's
music
become
apparent
in
the
syncopations
in
such
songs
as
Anthony's
'Ah,
Miss'
(note
the
rhythm
of
the
Charleston
in
the
accompaniment):
Ex.
5
a
tempo
Look
at me ook at me
miss,
oh
look
at me
please
oh,
Fa vor
me
fa
-
vor me
with
your
pa
tempo
l)^-
t^
C^r- f
f
A f_
glance.
Ah,
miss,
6$
8
J-
r
r
I
As
his own
lyricist,
Sondheim
is
able to
arrive at the
precise
words he
requires
to
marry
to the music he
has in
mind,
and we
are
constantly
reminded
of his
brilliant
way
with words
by
many
felicitous
and
witty
lines.
Perhaps
the
most
outstanding,
among
many
excellent
songs,
is 'A
Little
Priest',
the
marvellously
black
ending
to Act
I,
where
Mrs. Lovett is
tempting
Sweeney
Todd to
sample
different
pies,
each flavoured
by
a different
profession:
TODD
Anything
that's lean.
MRS. LOVETT
Well, then,
if
you're
British and
loyal,
You
might enjoy Royal
Marine.
(TODD
makes
a
face)
Anyway,
it's
clean
Though,
of
course,
it
tastes
of
wherever it's been.
And later:
MRS.
LOVETT
Since
marine doesn't
appeal
to
you,
how
about rear admiral?
TODD
Too
Salty.
I
prefer general.
MRS.
LOVETT
With or without his
privates?
'With'
is
extra.
TODD
chortles)
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
7/9
TEMPO
If
anything
gives
full
weight
to
the
description
of
the work as an
opera,
it is
the
way
in
which the
music is
unified and
given
dramatic
cohesion
from
song
to
song,
and
from act to
act,
by
a host of
technical means:
(I)
canon
(2)
the
derivation
of
accompanimental
figures
in
one
song
from
the
music of
another
(3)
the
interjection
of
previously
heard
music into
the
on-going,
foreground
music
(4)
the use of
orchestral
solos,
derived from
previously
heard
songs,
in
the
accompaniment
of other
songs
(the
possibilities
for
irony
here
are not
missed)
(5)
the use of the 'Dies
Irae'
(within
'The Ballad of
Sweeney
Todd')
in various
guises throughout
the whole work
(6)
the use of
previously
heard music with new
words,
sung
either
by
the
same
character,
or
by
a
different one
(7)
the use
of
pregnant
melodic/harmonic
fragments
or
motifs,
which occur
at
salient
points
in
the drama
(with
all their associations
from
previous
occasions)
(8)
polyphonic
ensembles for
the main
protagonists,
in a
truly
operatic
fashion,
the
voices
singing
simultaneously fragments
of
music
they
had
sung
previously
(9)
the use of the chimes of
Big
Ben
(the
'London
Connection')
throughout
the
work, in various (and sometimes highly dissonant) harmonizations
(Io)
the use of an
ear-piercing
factory
whistle
at
the
point
of most
(but
not
all)
the
murders: this was an
idea of the
producer,
Harold
Prince,
and the use
of this
at the start of the work is
one
of
the
most
genuinely shocking
moments
in
the theatre
All
in
all,
the work is so
tightly
knit and
unified,
both
musically
and
dramatically,
and
examples
of the above
technical means are so
numerous,
that it would be
impossible,
within the
scope
of
a
short
article,
to
list
them all.
However,
a few
examples
may
give
some idea of the hand
of
a
master craftsman of
the
theatre
at work.
When
Anthony
asks
the
Beggar
Woman
who the
young
woman is
that
lives
in
Judge Turpin's house, we hear, as an oboe solo marked triste,a minor variant of
Johanna's
song,
'Green
Finch and Linnet
Bird'.
During
Judge
Turpin's
song,
'Mea
Culpa'-a
truly
horrendous
musical
representation
of an
old
man's
lust for a
young
woman-we hear the minuet
again.
This
first
appeared during
Mrs. Lovett's account
of
Judge
Turpin's rape
of
Todd's
young
wife,
Lucy,
at the
masked
ball,
just
after Mrs. Lovett
had
recognized
the
'stranger'
(Todd).
('Of
course
when
she
goes
there,
poor thing, poor
thing/They're
having
this ball all
in
masks').
The minuet is in fact a clue to the
Beggar
Woman's
identity,
being
the tune
of
her
raunchy
song
in
the
opening
scene,
when she
offers
herself for
money
to Todd and
Anthony.
Sweeney
Todd's
'My
Friends',
sung
to his cut-throat razors
nestling
in their
velvet-lined
box,
which Mrs.
Lovett
has
kept
from
the old
days-possibly
the
most
chilling
'love
song'
ever written-is
heard
again during
the
duet
between
Sweeney
Todd and
Judge Turpin, 'Pretty
Women'.
The main motif of
'My
Friends'
is an
inversion of the
figure
that
accompanies
'The Ballad of
Sweeney
Todd',
and
in
this
song,
Todd's
promise
to his
'friends'
('Friends,
you
shall
drip
rubies.
You'll soon
drip
precious
rubies')
seems
near
to fulfilment.
During
this
same
song,
Todd
hums a
variant
of the Beadle's
song,
'Ladies
n
Their
Sensitivities',
which he
picks
up
from the
24
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
8/9
'SWEENEY TODD'
Judge
as
he
prepares
to shave
him,
while
a
derivative
of
this same
song
is heard
in
the
accompaniment
as a
triplet
figure
in
the woodwind.
Johanna's
music from
'He
means
to marry me on Monday' also makes a fleeting appearance.
The now famous
'Epiphany',
sung by
Todd,
contains
many
references
to
previously
heard material: Mrs. Lovett's
'Wait',
Todd's own 'There's a hole
in
the
world like a
great
black
pit',
and
the 'Dies
Irae',
among
others.
This
song
also
has
the
Ivesian effect of a full orchestral
tutti
suddenly
stopping
to leave
a
'foreign'
harmony,
pianissimo,
held on
by
the
high
strings
(cf
Ives's
Decoration
Day).
The
following
two
melodic/harmonic
motifs are also
important,
and
occur at
various
times
throughout
the
work
(Exx.
6
and
7):
Ex.6
Ex.
7
(Sweeney
Todd's 'madness
motif,
heard whenever he
is
either
brooding
or
murderously
inclined.
It is also
the
melodic and harmonic basis of
such
passages
as
the
conspiracy
during
'God,
That's
Good ')
Act
II is shorter than
Act
I
(8
numbers
compared
to
I8):
it is
also denser and
more
musically
unified
than
Act
I,
with
many
fragments
from
previously
heard music
making fleeting appearances, frequently
in
contrapuntal
combinations with
themselves,
or with
new material.
Perhaps
the
most
interesting-and
the most
'contemporary'-is
the 'Final
Scene',
where Mrs. Lovett
sings,
with
new
words,
music
from
her Act
I
song,
'Poor
Thing', against Sweeney
Todd's
slow-moving
lament,
sung
after he realizes
that the
'Beggar Woman'
he
has
just
killed
is in
fact
Lucy,
his
wife,
whom he
thought
had died
long ago.
(The
lament
is
in
fact
derived
from the
'Epiphany';
its
original genesis
going
right
back to the
Beggar
Woman's
motif when
she
asks
tor
'Alms ' at the
beginning
of the
work.)
(Ex. 8)-there
are shades
here,
perhaps,
of
Britten's
Church
Parables,
with
the
pitting together
of
different
tempi.
Ex.8
A
(Largo
(J=
40))
MRS. LOVETT
(No,
no,
not)
lied
at
all..
No,
I ne-
ver
lied. Said
she
took
the
poi
A~l
v.
i~~~~~i wSWEENEY
ODD
Lu
-
cy...
I(8)J-7
L;J
JT
-a
j
J
i
-son,
she
did,
Ne
-
ver said that she
died.
Poor
thing.
l
:~(,
)-
.o,I've
cme
've come
25
This content downloaded from 203.78.9.149 on Thu, 22 May 2014 13:50:47 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp -
8/11/2019 Sondheim's 'Sweeney Todd' - The Case for the Defence
9/9
26
TEMPO
IP4(R)v
I
she lived but it left
her weak in the head. All
she did
for
months was
just
lie
there
in
bed.
IAAw
.
.1.
-
-.
I
home
a
gain.
2W%
J
-tl-
*18
\r
J
m
J1lhl'Rli .
Shouldve
been in
hos-pi
-
tal,
wound
up
in Bed-lam
in-stead.
Poor
thing.
Bet-ter
you
should
|^,[~bl2.
--
c
O.
n.
-
-#.
Lu
-
cy
Oh,
my
(God )
Sweeney Toddran for only about five months in its London production at the
Theatre
Royal,
Drury
Lane.
A
number of reasons have been
given
for this:
it
was
too
'English'
a
story
for the
English
to
accept
from
Americans;
the
story
was
simply
too
grisly
for
comfort;
there were not
enough
'hummable tunes'
in the
piece.
Perhaps
the
reason
is
simpler
and,
paradoxically,
not obvious: it was heard
by
the
wrong
audience.
The work
is
an
opera,
and,
as
such,
it did
extraordinarily
well
to
run
as
long
as it
did-most
operas
have to
be content
with
just
a
few
performances
in
any
one season
(and
few new ones
get
revived).
Because
it is an
opera,
and
a
very powerful
and 'difficult' one
at
that,
it
needs
to be
presented by
an
opera company
like
the
English
National
Opera
or the
Welsh
National
Opera. Opera
audiences are
clearly
prepared
to
accept
much
'tougher'
stories
for musical
treatments
than
those which
normally
support
musicals: one
only
has
to think of
Salome and
Wozzeck
to
realize
this. A
really good production
of
Sweeney
Todd
by
a
professional opera company
would
give
the
work
the chance
in
England
that
it
clearly
deserves.
Sweeney
Todd is available
as
follows:
2
I2"
LPs
(or
double
cassette)
from That's
Entertainment,
43
The
Market,
Covent
Garden,
London
WC2,
price
?15.99.
Vocal Score from Chappell & Co. Ltd.,
129
Park Street, London WI, price ?45 (Vocal Selection: ?6.95).
Libretto
(cased)
from
Samuel French
Ltd.,
26
Southampton
Street,
London
WC2,
price
?7.50.
Acknowledgements
The
author wishes to thank Mr.
Skip
Humphries,
Head of Music
Services,
London
Weekend
Television
Ltd.,
for the
loan
of
the
piano
conductor
score of
this
work
used in the
preparation
of the edition of LWT's
'South Bank
Show'
devoted
to
Sweeney
Todd-The
Demon Barber
f
Fleet
Street,
transmitted
on
28/7/1980.
All music
quoted
is
?
1979
Revelation Music
Publishing Corp.
and
Rilting
Music Inc. A
Tommy
Valando
Publication.
Reprinted by special permission.
Thi t t d l d d f 203 78 9 149 Th 22 M 2014 13 50 47 PM
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp