I can't stop thinking about "Merrily We Roll Along." People say it's Sondheim's "most tuneful" score. That it has Sondheim's best overture. People say Sondheim was tired of the "HE CAN'T WRITE A MEMORABLE MELODY" allegation. So, right before "Merrily," he gave us "A Weekend in the Country," from "A Little Night Music." That melody was so damned hummable, it wedged itself permanently in many, many brains. In "Merrily," famously, Sondheim puts one of his critics centerstage: "How 'bout a tune you can hum? How 'bout a tune you go BUM BUM BUM DEE DOO?"
For his opening number, Sondheim thinks hard about the weird, slightly archaic jauntiness in the sentence: "Merrily we roll along." (Sondheim borrowed his title from an old play.) The childlike quality of the sentence--along with the idea of life as traveling, "rolling"--gives Sondheim all he needs for his first three minutes.
Yesterday is done.
See the pretty countryside.
Merrily we roll along, roll along,
Bursting with dreams.
You feel as if you're reading a child's primer, with the odd use of the imperative: "See the pretty countryside." The childlike language seems deliberate: We get "pretty countryside," along with "some roads are rough and really bumpy," "why make it tough by getting grumpy," "traveling's the fun."
There's a tension in the song--between optimism and despair. There's this bouncy quality, but then Sondheim qualifies the cheeriness with darker thoughts: "time goes by and hopes run dry," "bend your dreams with the road," "once it was all so clear," "how did you get so far off the track?"You get the sense that two different voices in Frank's head are arguing: Frank feels both the optimism and the darkness. He wants to believe that "traveling's the fun," but at the same time he suspects that he may be on the wrong road; he may have strayed far, far from the place where he wishes to be.
Frank may will himself to "never look back," but notice that the sentence gets interrupted. "Never look--" ....and then the command stops. It stops because another voice has asserted itself: "How did you get to be here?" The new voice is--of course--"looking back."
You see the same kind of interruption at the end of the song. We're "rolling along, rolling along, rolling along, rolling a----" And we never hear that final "long." It's replaced by a party. Once again, we're "thrown from the track." We're not really rolling along. We're stuck in some sewage.
The opening reminds me a bit of Rose's breakdown in "Gypsy," where Rose is asserting herself: "Mama's getting hot, Mama doesn't care, Mama's moving on...." and then suddenly Rose is interrupting herself. "Mama?" There's self-doubt underneath the (apparent) breeziness.
Franklin S. is a ball of anxiety, in "Merrily," despite his superficial success, and the first number lays out for us some of the crackling, roiling tumult in Frank's head. A Greek chorus at war with itself. A fractured psyche. "Small" details--an interrupted thought, a weirdly sing-song turn of phrase--help to unsettle us, to keep us on edge. We feel for Frank--despite his awfulness--because, really, aren't we all at war with ourselves?
For his opening number, Sondheim thinks hard about the weird, slightly archaic jauntiness in the sentence: "Merrily we roll along." (Sondheim borrowed his title from an old play.) The childlike quality of the sentence--along with the idea of life as traveling, "rolling"--gives Sondheim all he needs for his first three minutes.
Yesterday is done.
See the pretty countryside.
Merrily we roll along, roll along,
Bursting with dreams.
You feel as if you're reading a child's primer, with the odd use of the imperative: "See the pretty countryside." The childlike language seems deliberate: We get "pretty countryside," along with "some roads are rough and really bumpy," "why make it tough by getting grumpy," "traveling's the fun."
There's a tension in the song--between optimism and despair. There's this bouncy quality, but then Sondheim qualifies the cheeriness with darker thoughts: "time goes by and hopes run dry," "bend your dreams with the road," "once it was all so clear," "how did you get so far off the track?"You get the sense that two different voices in Frank's head are arguing: Frank feels both the optimism and the darkness. He wants to believe that "traveling's the fun," but at the same time he suspects that he may be on the wrong road; he may have strayed far, far from the place where he wishes to be.
Frank may will himself to "never look back," but notice that the sentence gets interrupted. "Never look--" ....and then the command stops. It stops because another voice has asserted itself: "How did you get to be here?" The new voice is--of course--"looking back."
You see the same kind of interruption at the end of the song. We're "rolling along, rolling along, rolling along, rolling a----" And we never hear that final "long." It's replaced by a party. Once again, we're "thrown from the track." We're not really rolling along. We're stuck in some sewage.
The opening reminds me a bit of Rose's breakdown in "Gypsy," where Rose is asserting herself: "Mama's getting hot, Mama doesn't care, Mama's moving on...." and then suddenly Rose is interrupting herself. "Mama?" There's self-doubt underneath the (apparent) breeziness.
Franklin S. is a ball of anxiety, in "Merrily," despite his superficial success, and the first number lays out for us some of the crackling, roiling tumult in Frank's head. A Greek chorus at war with itself. A fractured psyche. "Small" details--an interrupted thought, a weirdly sing-song turn of phrase--help to unsettle us, to keep us on edge. We feel for Frank--despite his awfulness--because, really, aren't we all at war with ourselves?
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