By: Letrice Titelli
Composer-lyricist Jerry Herman has died at the age of 88.
Herman is best known for works like ‘Hello, Dolly!’ as well as a host of other Broadway favorites. His melodies also graced such plays as “Mame” Dear World, Mack & Mabel, The Grand Tour, Milk & Honey and “La Cage aux Folles.”
“Mr. Herman wrote music that left the nation singing — rich melodies with powerful lyrics that stopped shows, dazzled critics, kept audiences returning for more and paved Broadway with gold for producers and performers,” was how the New York Times summed up his career. “To millions, he was the postwar theater’s clearest successor to Irving Berlin, a throwback to an era of songwriters who touched the heart with sophisticated simplicity, bringing audiences to their feet at the curtain calls and sending them home humming the unforgettable tune: “Hell-oh, Doll-ee!”
Herman was born July 10, 1931, in New York City. “He was raised in Jersey City, where his parents, who worked summers as musicians in hotels and camps in the Catskills, encouraged him to pursue music,” according to playbill.com. “He learned to play piano at an early age. Young Jerry spent all his young summers at Stissing Lake Camp in the Berkshires, where he eventually directed the camp’s theatrical productions and began writing music. His musical hero was another straight-shooting crowd-pleaser, Irving Berlin, whose Annie Get Your Gun he had seen when he was 11.”
At age 17, Herman was introduced to Frank Loesser who, after hearing material he had written, urged him to continue composing, according to broadwayworld.com. “He left the Parsons School of Design to attend the University of Miami. While an undergraduate student at the University of Miami Herman produced, wrote and directed a college musical called Sketchbook. It was scheduled to run for three performances, but the show created an instant patron demand and ran for an additional 17 performances.”
In 1960, the theater publication continued, Herman “made his Broadway debut with the revue From A to Z, which featured contributions from newcomers Woody Allen and Fred Ebb as well. That same year producer Gerard Oestreicher approached him after seeing a performance of “Parade”, and asked if he would be interested in composing the score for a show about the founding of the state of Israel. The result was his first full-fledged Broadway musical, Milk and Honey in 1961. The show, about American tourists in Israel, starred Robert Weede, Mimi Benzil and Molly Picon.”
