Remembering Broadway Lyricist Sheldon Harnick

Fresh Air

NPR

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4.4 • 34.4K Ratings

🗓️ 30 June 2023

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Harnick, along with composer Jerry Bock, wrote the enduring music for Fiddler on the Roof, as well as Fiorello and She Loves Me. He died June 23 at the age of 99. Originally broadcast in 1988, 2004 and 2014.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Fresh Air. I'm Dave Davies.
0:02.8	One of Broadway's great lyricists,
0:04.8	Sheldon Harnick died last week at the age of 99.
0:08.6	In 1964, he and his writing partner, composer Jerry Bach,
0:12.6	brought to life a small Jewish village in Zara's, Russia.
0:17.8	A fiddler on the roof. Sounds crazy, no?
0:22.7	But now a little village of Anatefka you might say.
0:26.8	Every one of us is a fiddler on the roof,
0:30.0	trying to scratch out a pleasant simple tune
0:33.1	without breaking his neck. It isn't easy.
0:37.3	You may ask, why do we stay up there for so dangerous?
0:41.6	That's zero, Mastell, in the original Broadway cast recording with fiddler on the roof.
0:46.4	It ran for 3,242 performances, which at the time was a Broadway record.
0:52.1	Tradition.
1:11.9	Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bach also wrote the Broadway musicals, Theorello,
1:16.0	a music about political corruption.
1:18.2	She loves me, a love story between two pen-pal set in Budapest
1:22.7	and tenderloin, set in the red light district of 1860's Manhattan.
1:27.6	Stephen Sondheim said Harnick was one of his favorite lyricists for his quote,
1:31.8	grace, charm, and perfection of setting.
1:34.6	Unquote.
1:36.1	Sheldon Harnick has been a frequent guest on fresh air.
	...

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