Stephen Schwartz
This is the first solo album by Schwartz, composer of the musicals Pippin, Godspell and The Magic Show as well as the lyricist for the animated movies Pocahontas and The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Schwartz's singing is like his music, frail, vague, almost dispirited. There is only one theatrical song on this CD (from Children of Eden), and most of the 11 tracks are rhetoric-heavy, quasi message songs like "Cactus Flowers" ("They say: Don't play a game that you might not win/ Don't waste your time on what might have been/ Forget the lost causes/ Forget the incurable romances"). Sometimes successful composers are also terrific singers. Think of Johnny Mercer, Hoagy Carmichael or Carole King. Some composers are best left unheard. (Midder)
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