Artist Recital Series
An Evening with Stephen Sondheim and Frank Rich
In Conversation
Monday, September 8, 2008, 7:30 p.m.
Tickets: Free, tickets required. (Public tickets SOLD OUT.)
Location: Finney Chapel (directions); Overflow seating will be available at Warner Concert Hall (directions)
7:30 p.m.: Eight student vocalists and one pianist from the Conservatory and College will take the stage to present A Little Sondheim Music, a program featuring some of Sondheim's best-loved songs from A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Into the Woods, Company, Sunday in the Park with George, and Merrily We Roll Along, directed by Associate Professor of Theater Chris Flaharty.
8 p.m.: Two of New York’s most important cultural luminaries come together for an evening of conversation.
Stephen Sondheim has written music and lyrics for many of Broadway’s best-loved musicals, including A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Sunday in the Park with George, Into the Woods, and Sweeney Todd, and au- thored lyrics for such classics as West Side Story and Gypsy. Among his many distinctions are seven Tony Awards, the Pulitzer Prize in drama, and an Academy Award for best song. This career of achievement has placed him among America’s most prized composers and dramatists and has earned him the National Medal of Arts and the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award from the Kennedy Center.
Frank Rich has written about politics and culture throughout his career and is currently an op-ed columnist for the New York Times. He got his start at the Times, however, as chief drama critic, and he has covered film and television for TIME magazine. His published books traverse his broad range of interests, from theater criticism to memoir to politics. His most recent book, The Greatest Story Ever Sold: The Decline and Fall of Truth From 9/11 to Katrina, focuses on the lead-up to the Iraq war and the people behind it. Among his many honors is the George Polk Award for commentary in 2005.
“[Sondheim] is now the greatest and perhaps best-known artist in the American musical theater.”
“[Rich] sees politics as theater. His vision and his voice are the result of the skills honed as a theater critic who expanded his reach to broader cultural criticism and then narrowed it again to political criticism.”
Photos: Jerry Jackson, Brigitte Lacombe
Free tickets will be available beginning at noon on September 4 at Central Ticket Service. Oberlin College students, faculty, and staff must show their OCID and pick up their tickets in person (two-ticket limit). A limited number of tickets are available to the general public (Update: These are sold out.) and may be requested in advance by sending a self-addressed stamped envelope, along with request, to Central Ticket Service, 67 North Main Street, Oberlin, Ohio 44074, by September 1.