Broadway composer Charles Strouse in New York Metropolis in 2011. Strouse died Thursday, Could 15, 2025, at 96.
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Andy Kropa/Getty Photos
Broadway composer Charles Strouse in New York Metropolis in 2011. Strouse died Thursday, Could 15, 2025, at 96.
Andy Kropa/Getty Photos
Tony Award-winning Broadway composer Charles Strouse has died. The creator of the hit musicals Bye Bye Birdie, Applause and Annie died at his dwelling in New York Metropolis on Thursday, in response to a press launch shared with NPR by The Press Room. Strouse was 96.
His 4 kids, Benjamin, Nicholas, Victoria, and William, shared the information of his passing. He was predeceased by his spouse, choreographer Barbara Siman, in 2023 after six a long time of marriage.
Strouse was a musical chameleon, mentioned theater historian Laurence Maslon. “Strouse was a terrific craftsperson. He adopted and tailored his vocabulary to regardless of the wants of the actual style had been.”
He may write songs within the type of early rock and roll, like “One Final Kiss” from Bye Bye Birdie, or Despair-Period New York, like “You are By no means Absolutely Dressed With out A Smile” in Annie, or ultra-groovy Nineteen Seventies New York, as in “However Alive” from Applause.
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Strouse was classically skilled on the Eastman Faculty of Music in Rochester, New York, and labored with American composer Aaron Copland. He was making a residing enjoying rehearsal piano for Broadway reveals till a stage supervisor who wished to be a producer approached him, as he instructed NPR in 2008.
“And he mentioned to me, ‘I hear you write music,'” Strouse recounted. “And I mentioned, ‘Sure, I do.’ He mentioned, ‘I’ve an concept for a present about youngsters, would you have an interest?’ I mentioned, ‘Would I!'”
The present was Bye Bye Birdie. It opened in 1960 and, regardless that the New York Instances panned it (calling it “neither fish nor fowl nor good musical comedy”), the present grew to become an unlimited hit, profitable the Tony for Finest Musical. And since then, it has been one of the vital carried out reveals in neighborhood theaters and excessive colleges.
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“It is a fantastic feeling. And I’m modest, although not humbled in any approach,” Strouse instructed NPR. “However I am a really fortunate man.”
Although he suffered a string of flops afterwards, Strouse had one other Tony Award-winning smash in 1970 with Applause, a musical model of All About Eve.
Strouse heard much more applause, and in 1977, he received a Tony Award for finest rating, with Annie, based mostly on the caricature “Little Orphan Annie.” He mentioned the best-known tune from that rating, “Tomorrow,” was written in rehearsal, simply to cowl a set change.
“She discovered the canine and he or she needed to, in 12 seconds, to illustrate, get again to the orphanage,” he defined. “So, we wanted a tune there.”
Andrea McArdle was 12 years previous when she starred in Annie. “My favourite factor was to hearken to him play his songs,” McArdle mentioned. “Not each composer is as charming as Charles Strouse is when he performs his music.”
Strouse saved working into his 80s on new initiatives, at a time when most creators would have been blissful resting on their laurels.
“I like composing, I find it irresistible,” Strouse mentioned. “, and if I am not composing, if I haven’t got a brand new undertaking or one thing, I am fairly at a lack of what to do.”
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