Quotes from Stephen Sondheim

Slotted spoons don't hold much soup...

No one has ever loved me As deeply as you. No one has truly shown me What love could be like until now: Not pretty or safe or easy But more than I ever knew. Love within reason - That isn't love. And I've learned that from you..

Music straightjackets a poem and prevents it from breathing on its own, whereas it liberates a lyric. Poetry doesn't need music; lyrics do.

Now, this one might be a little stringy, but then again, it's fiddle player. That isn't fiddle player, it's piccolo player. How can you tell? It's PIPING hot! Then blow on it first!

Two of the hardest words in the language to rhyme are life and love. Of all words!

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

Lyrics have to be underwritten. That's why poets generally make poor lyric writers because the language is too rich. You get drowned in it.

The concerts you enjoy together/ Neighbors you annoy together/ Children you destroy together,/ That keep marriage in tact.

I was never much of a reader. I'm a slow reader, which is unusual, because I'm so into language and I love words so much. But it's hard for me to read.

Let Pirelli's / Miracle Elixir / Activate your roots, sir... Keep it off your boots, sir- / Eats right through. Yes, get Pirelli's! / Use a bottle of it! / Ladies seem to love it... Flies do, too!

Everybody faces a blank piece of paper, no matter what they've written or painted or composed before. I can't imagine approaching every single new project with-without doubt.

When the audience comes in, it changes the temperature of what you've written.

Every single song I've ever written is sung by a character created by somebody else. Some might have a jaundiced view of love, some don't. But none of these songs is me singing - not a single one.

When you know your cast well and their strengths and weaknesses, you can start writing for them, just the way Shakespeare wrote for his actors.

I was essentially trained by Oscar Hammerstein to think of songs as one-act plays, to move a song from point A to point B dramatically.

I was raised to be charming, not sincere.

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.

I played the organ when I went to military school, when I was 10. They had a huge organ, the second-largest pipe organ in New York State. I loved all the buttons and the gadgets. I've always been a gadget man.

White. A blank page or canvas. So many possibilities.

Here's to the ladies who lunch—Everybody laugh—Lounging in their caftans and planning a brunchOn their own behalf.

Every day a little death,In the parlor, in the bed,In the curtains, in the silver,In the buttons, in the bread.Every day a little sting,In the heart and in the head.

Tonight, tonight, won't be just any night.Tonight there will be no morning star.

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.

I'm interested in the theater because I'm interested in communication with audiences. Otherwise I would be in concert music.