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"One of the hardest things about writing lyrics is to make the lyrics sit on the music in such a way that you're not aware there was a writer there."

Stephen Sondheim, American Composer

Music, Writer, Writing

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"One of the hardest things about writing lyrics is to make the lyrics sit on the music in such a way that you're not aware there was a writer there."

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Explore more quotes by Stephen Sondheim

"Every writer I've ever spoken to feels fraudulent in some way or other."

"The worst thing you can do is censor yourself as the pencil hits the paper. You must not edit until you get it all on paper. If you can put everything down, stream-of-consciousness, you'll do yourself a service."

"Everyone I used to play with has either given up or is dead."

"Nowadays, there are sometimes more producers than there are people in the cast, because it takes that much money to put a show on."

"I don't listen to recordings of my songs. I don't avoid it, I just don't go out of my way to do it."

"You can't have personal investors anymore because it's too expensive, so you have to have corporate investment or a lot of rich people."

"In the Rodgers and Hammerstein generation, popular hits came out of shows and movies."

"If you're dealing with a musical in which you're trying to tell a story, it's got to sound like speech. At the same time it's got to be a song."

"So many good songs get written fast, because you know exactly what has to work."

"All the best performers bring to their role something more, something different than what the author put on paper. That's what makes theatre live. That's why it persists."

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