Complete Lyrics Hammerstein Ii(ISBN=9780375413582)

Here the editorial torch for the Complete Lyrics series passes from Robert Kimball, helmsman for the Lorenz Hart, Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, and Frank Loesser volumes, to Asch. The lavish format remains the same. The lyrics appear chronologically (save for undated lyrics in an appendix) and among plenty of photos. Hammerstein’s time line begins in 1916 with a song for a Columbia University student show and concludes with The Sound of Music in 1959. Hammerstein began writing the book musical, in which the songs suit moods appropriate to the tenors of the scenes in a narrative drama, in 1920, which is surprisingly early. Classic shows before he teamed with Richard Rodgers in the most successful partnership in musical-theater history include Rose-Marie, The Desert Song, and Show Boat, the landmark first “serious” musical. In 1943 came two experiments that further altered the course of the musical’s history: Oklahoma! and Carmen Jones. In all, there are 850 sets of lyrics in this book, which like its series mates, belongs in every collection concerned with musical theater. --Ray Olson

From every “beautiful mornin’” to “some enchanted evening,” the songs of Oscar Hammerstein II are part of our daily lives, his words part of our national fabric.

Born into a theatrical dynasty headed by his grandfather and namesake, Oscar Hammerstein II breathed new life into the moribund art form of operetta by writing lyrics and libretti for such classics as Rose-Marie (music by Rudolf Friml), The Desert Song (Sigmund Romberg), The New Moon (Romberg) and Song of the Flame (George Gershwin). Hammerstein and Jerome Kern wrote eight musicals together, including Sweet Adeline, Music in the Air, and their masterpiece, Show Boat. The vibrant Carmen Jones was Hammerstein’s all-black adaptation of the tragic opera by Georges Bizet.

In 1943, Hammerstein, pioneer in the field of operetta, joined forces with Richard Rodgers, who had for the previous twenty-five years taken great strides in the field of musical comedy with his longtime writing partner, Lorenz Hart. The first Rodgers and Hammerstein work, Oklahoma!, merged the two styles into a completely new genre—the musical play—and simultaneously launched the most successful partnership in American musical theater. Over the next seventeen years, Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote eight more Broadway musicals: Carousel, Allegro, South Pacific, The King and I, Me and Juliet, Pipe Dream, Flower Drum Song, and The Sound of Music. They also wrote a movie musical (State Fair) and one for television (Cinderella). Collectively their works have earned dozens of awards, including Pulitzers, Tonys, Oscars, Grammys, and Emmys.

Throughout his career, Hammerstein created works of lyrical beauty and universal feeling, and he continually strove—sometimes against fashion—to seek out the good and beautiful in the world. “I know the world is filled with troubles and many injustices,” he once said. “But reality is as beautiful as it is ugly . . . I just couldn’t write anything without hope in it.”

All of his lyrics are here—850, more than a quarter published for the first time—in this sixth book in the indispensable Complete Lyrics series that has also brought us the lyrics of Cole Porter, Lorenz Hart, Ira Gershwin, Irving Berlin, and Frank Loesser. From the young scribe’s earliest attempts to the old master’s final lyric—“Edelweiss”—we can see, read, and, yes, sing the words of a theatrical and lyrical genius.

Amy Asch, an archivist and researcher, worked on The Complete Lyrics of Irving Berlin and an expanded edition of The Complete Lyrics of Lorenz Hart. She contributed to the PBS documentary Broadway: The American Musical and prepared the catalog of works for the estate of the composer Jonathan Larson (Rent). Currently an editor of the Playbill Broadway Yearbook, she lives in New York City.