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Sondheim: "Something's Coming"

Sondheim has mixed feelings about the work he did for "West Side Story" (famously vanquished by "The Music Man" at the Tony Awards), but he's fond of "Something's Coming":

Could be! 
Who knows? 
There's something due any day; 
I will know right away, 
Soon as it shows. 
It may come cannonballing down through the sky, 
Gleam in its eye, 
Bright as a rose! 

Who knows? 
It's only just out of reach, 
Down the block, on a beach, 
Under a tree. 
I got a feeling there's a miracle due, 
Gonna come true, 
Coming to me! 

Could it be? Yes, it could. 
Something's coming, something good, 
If I can wait! 
Something's coming, I don't know what it is, 
But it is 
Gonna be great! 

With a click, with a shock, 
Phone'll jingle, door'll knock, 
Open the latch! 
Something's coming, don't know when, but it's soon; 
Catch the moon, 
One-handed catch! 

Around the corner, 
Or whistling down the river, 
Come on, deliver 
To me! 
Will it be? Yes, it will. 
Maybe just by holding still, 
It'll be there! 

Come on, something, come on in, don't be shy, 
Meet a guy, 
Pull up a chair! 
The air is humming, 
And something great is coming! 
Who knows? 
It's only just out of reach, 
Down the block, on a beach, 
Maybe tonight . . . 


SS wrote the song late because Tony didn't have enough to do. It's an "I Want" song, like "For Forever" in "Evan Hansen." It happens before Tony meets Maria. Its obvious descendant is "Our Time" from "Merrily We Roll Along"; a middle-aged Sondheim would say, "Gosh, I really have to play-act youth, I have to get into a different mindset to write something as wide-eyed as 'Our Time'." ("Feel the flow; feel what's happening. We're what's happening. Long ago, all we had was that funny feeling, saying someday we'd send 'em reeling. Now it looks like we can. Someday just began.") I imagine the state of being wide-eyed was easier for SS to approximate when he was working on "Something's Coming."

Short, percussive lines telegraph Tony's excitement. "Could be! Who knows? There's something due any day." (You might think of the plucked strings later in the gym dance--the altered theme of "Maria" that happens when boy and girl lay eyes on each other. Short pinpricks of sound.) Then there is the image of destiny as a kind of angel: "cannonballing down through the sky, gleam in its eye, bright as a rose." "Down," "gleam," and "bright" get a hard accent: There's a sense of relentlessness, fate bearing down on you. I imagine one source of inspiration for Sondheim was simply locating all the bits of fun he could have with prepositions: "down the block," "on a beach," "under a tree," "with a click," "around the corner," "down through the sky." (It's useful to say, to a kid, a preposition is something you can insert in "I walk XXXX the street." "I walk on the street, under the street, down the street, around the street, with the street [if it's an anthropomorphized walking street], by the street.")

A famous slice of this song is "Something's coming, don't know when, but it's soon; catch the moon; one-handed catch!" Sondheim is embodying a young straight man here; it's sensible, it's a stroke of genius, that Tony would conceive of his fate in terms of baseball metaphors. It's especially delightful that Tony would pause to note that the catching of the moon isn't simply a two-handed feat; the one-handedness makes the moment extra-special. SS would cringe at "I Feel Pretty": Why would an illiterate adolescent girl observe that she felt "pretty and witty and gay"? But Tony really would think about catching the moon with one hand. An early triumph for SS.

To the extent that there's a plot in the song, here it is. "Something" flirts with Tony until the two entities are together in one room. First, "something" is descending from the sky. Then, Tony is opening the latch for "something"; he is taking an active role in shaping his own fate. Finally, "something" is like a guest at an interview: "Come on, something, come on in, don't be shy. Meet a guy. Pull up a chair!" It's a small, inspired idea: Youth's dreaminess is captured with a kind of "job interview" metaphor. The song ends smartly: Lost in reverie, Tony repeats earlier lines, i.e. "It's only just out of reach, down the block, on a beach, maybe tonight..." (That word--"tonight"--prefigures a big climax of the show. "Tonight, tonight, there's only you tonight. Tonight there will be no morning star.") We leave Tony on the cusp, "waiting for life to begin." The final ellipsis is a neat package; it's a stand-in for Tony's uncertainty and excitement. SS built his entire career--in part--on the respect that this song won from nearly everyone who heard it.

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