"I'm not the kind to be vindictive,
holding some childish grudge.
How could I be? I'm in the spotlight - half of the world, my judge.
All I demand is those I work for, those I give all my skills, all my time and pain,
those that I entertain,
give me the same compassion in return.
But the fools never learn.
Not a composer, but his work falls into this category of the rest of a
Theater creator, and plus, he deserves his own page. A lyricist/writer/broadcaster, closely associated with, and all too often overshadowed by, with
Andrew Lloyd Webber (so much so, that his ex(ish) wife wrote a letter of complaint to the The Daily Telegraph to clarify that the whole concept of
Evita was his idea and that
Lloyd Webber is given all the credit) but also a critically acclaimed writer of musicals in his own right. He's also a big cricket fan.
He has written the lyrics and book for these musicals. In chronological order:
He also did the lyrics for the new songs in the stage version of
Beauty and the Beast, as well as all the lyrics for
Aida and
The Lion King both on screen and stage. Since they recruited a new lyricist to beef up
The Little Mermaid for Broadway, it looks unlikely that he will do any more work with them. That said, a lot of critics specifically targeted the new songs as being sub-par, so
Disney may ask him back for their next venture.
A winner of three Oscars, all for Best Original Song, but shares them with Alan Menken, Elton John and Lloyd Webber respectively. Only the first one,
"A Whole New World" falls squarely into
Award Bait territory. "Can You Feel The Love Tonight" relies more on the cool chords, orchestrations and lyrics than any
Ham and "You Must Love Me" has a depresssing subject matter and a
performer who doesn't have the voice for an
Award Bait Song anyway.
Apart from writing one new song for the recent
Joseph revival, he hasn't got any huge projects underway at the moment. With
Aida set to be released as a film in 2010, we may see some fresh material from him then.
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