Every Twelve Years (Or So...)

I've realized, recently, that I have a very odd relationship with Sweeney Todd. The show seems to re-enter my life in a particularly powerful way every 12 years, although, to be fair, it has never really been that far absent since my first encounter with the recording when I was 14.

In 1988/89, I was a graduate student at the University of Western Ontario, deep in the throes of writing my master's thesis, "The Solo Scene in the Musical Theatre of Stephen Sondheim." (I felt things so deeply then. I remember having a great discussion – in the best, most enjoyable and most challenging, sense of the word – with my thesis advisor over that title, since I really wanted it to read "...in the Music Theatre of...", and that was very important to me at the time.)

Chapter 4 of my thesis is about Sweeney Todd. It was the first chapter that I wrote in full version, and it was the chapter that helped me discover my writing style for the entire work. While researching my thesis, I dove into the conventions of melodrama and positioned Sweeney within those constructs. I also spent a great deal of time discussing pastiche, particularly in relation to Mrs. Lovett's music, since Chapter 2 of my thesis had introduced those concepts in relation to Follies. Rereading the work now, however, the most detailed analysis is of song structure or form. Sondheim had said that he believed the content of a scene dictated the required form of a musical number, and I took that assertion to heart. My thesis contains (among other things) a detailed analysis of the structure of Todd's final solo in Act 1, "Epiphany," and I go to great lengths to show the progress of Todd's thinking from his frenzied opening through the development of a recurring theme – in a number of smaller rondo sections and a possible overarching structure of a loose rondo – which represents his quest for vengeance. I became almost Todd-like in my obsession with the structure of that number.

In 2000/01, I was fortunate enough to be hired by Scarborough Music Theatre to music direct their first production of Sweeney Todd. (I felt things so deeply then. I remember having a great discussion – in the best, most enjoyable and most challenging, sense of the word – with Randy Leslie, who was the extraordinary director of that production, about the lack of music for the curtain call. Spoiler alert: there is still no music for the curtain call.)

Despite having discovered the same thing as a student 12 years earlier, I again became fascinated with song structures. Randy asked me to write a program note as music director to help the audience understand the piece better, and I once again turned to structural matters in the following. "Listen for moments of greater simplicity in the music: compare the traditional style and harmonies of Anthony's love song to the disjointed structure of Todd's 'Epiphany,' in which his evil plans are finalized." I had to live inside the music in a much deeper way this time, however, as I had to teach the score – teaching the notes is hard enough work, teaching people how to find all of the dramatic moments on top of learning the complex melodies and rhythms was incredibly challenging – to a group of people with varied musical background. I learned so much more, finding new dramatic impetuses for action in the music and discovering new things about these complex characters.

It's now 2012/13, and I've returned to Sweeney Todd at SMT. I still feel things so deeply, but it's still a little too fresh to talk about my great "discussions." Already in rehearsal, however, certain moments, certain relationships, and the willingness of the cast to throw themselves into the material has moved me almost to tears.

Unsurprisingly, I have found myself again intrigued by song structures. In my preparation work over the summer, I learned something fascinating about "A Little Priest," which I have taken opportunities to discuss with the choreographer and the two cast members who will work with me, next Sunday, to stage the number. The song structure, which had remained hidden to me for the past 24 years despite writing a thesis about the work and conducting it, revealed something surprising to me about the relationships of those characters and the way in which they are trying to control each other. Other lessons in song structure keep coming back to me. Teaching Judge Turpin's version of "Johanna" – both the music and the blocking – returned me to the structural analysis chart I wrote in my thesis 24 years ago. That may not have been particularly helpful for the actor, but it really helped me prepare for the staging of that number, and it kept grounding me in the honesty, as opposed to the melodrama, of the moment.

It is interesting to be this deep within the piece again after an absence of so many years. I find that I still remember how I taught certain sections of the score in 2000/01 – I remember the tricks that helped that cast learn its complexities. There are, however, vast passages that I don't remember teaching at all. I'm sure that we performed them, and I remember them onstage, but I have no recollection of conducting them. I've also been 21 for 12 years longer than I had in 2000/01. I relate more to the emotions of the older characters, and I feel the depth of emotion in people's desperation to attain something, but my body is going to struggle with the physicality of the conducting, and I'm always slightly more tired and less energetic in rehearsals. That doesn't make me enjoy the process any less – it just makes me worried about what I might be asked to do in the 2024/25 production of Sweeney...