I confess that I am extremely resistant to listening to soundtracks of new musicals.

A hit song or two from a show is fine — it’s what I use to train Broadway singers, but I’m a composer also. I don’t want to be influenced by someone else’s hooks constantly looping in my brain.

Entire soundtracks do that to me.

And I don’t need to write LES MIZ music.

It’s been done.

A lot.

By the same guys, as a matter of fact.

Show after show after show…

So, I rarely listen to Original Broadway Cast Albums unless forced.

And that’s how I got into listening to WICKED.

Two years back, my five year old daughter insisted on listening to it every day on the way home from kindergarten.

She could read a little bit by that time and her vocabulary really increased by reading and singing along with the WICKED soundtrack lyrics. It was fun to hear her sing in the back seat.

Oh sure, we listened to “Popular” three or four times a day. “The Wizard and I,” “Defying Gravity,” “I’m Not That Girl” and that guy with the funny sounding pudding-in-the-throat tenor voice on the first track always got a laugh from her.

“No One Mourns The Wicked!”

**gargle**

So, my resistance became futile and, having been a “Son of Sondheim” these last thirty years, I finally had to come to the conclusion that musical theatre had moved on and, with WICKED, Stephen Schwartz had just changed the game for us all;

HIGH FIBER LYRICS

No “chicks and ducks and geese better scurry”

no repetitive “this is the moment,” “this, too, is the moment,” “and, oh yeah, this is also the moment”

no already drawn “Send In The Clowns” summations.

These are “high fiber lyrics.” They have layer upon layer of character exposition and development.

Each character speaks to, and in many cases, denies/accepts, their own truth. The King in THE KING & I had three hours to debate with himself. The folks in WICKED have about three minutes before making a move.

Inside rhymes are EVERYWHERE. And not the obvious clever composer, “look at my lyric” inside rhymes — these rhymes are rhythmic, conversational and belong because they are right.

Philosophy: Not every character has their own musical theme (in an opera sense) but each character has a definable philosophy through song. Wagner would be proud.

THE HUMAN VOICE:

Elphaba is a rock star. She belts a high F (as do all my student/client belters), but good on ya, Stephen Schwartz for recognizing that the use of one’s true vocal chords can also be “unlimited” for eight shows a week.

THE IMPACT

It’s already happening, but in the next five years, a “critical mass” of interest in musical theatre will occur at the junior high and high school levels due to WICKED.

And where the chicks go — green though they may be — so do the boys.

So, yeah, Stephen Schwartz changed the game with WICKED; artistically (high fiber lyrics), physically (uh, high fiber belting), and, best of all, he guaranteed those of us who love musical theatre a whole new generation.

Oh, lol, and I still haven’t seen the show.