From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Lehman Engel
Lehman Engel
Lehman Engel also composed the music for the 1939
Broadway revival of Hamlet, starring Maurice Evans, as
well as for the original 1948 stage production of Maxwell
Anderson’s Anne of the Thousand Days, starring Rex Harri-
son and Joyce Redman. In 1965 he served as the musical
director for the Broadway production of La Grosse Valise
(composer Gerard Calvi, lyrics by Harold Rome)
The BMI Lehman Engel Musical
Theater Workshop
Engel founded the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater
Workshop, a workshop in New York for musical theatre
composers, lyricists and librettists. Engel also founded
and personally supervised the Lehman Engel Musical
Theater Workshop, originally based at the Performing
Arts Center of Los Angeles County Music Center in Los
Angeles.
Lehman Engel worked as musical director for the St.
Louis Municipal Opera for a number of years before mov-
ing to New York to conduct on Broadway. He won 6 Tony
Awards, and was nominated for 4 more. The category for
Lehman Engel
which he won and was nominated no longer exists.
Lehman Engel (born September 14, 1910, Jackson,
Mississippi; died August 29, 1982, New York City) was an Recordings
American composer and conductor of Broadway musi- Engel also conducted the first 3-LP version of Gershwin’s
cals, television and film. opera Porgy and Bess, a 1951 Columbia Masterworks
Records album which was highly acclaimed, but did not,
Work in theatre, television and as advertised, really feature the complete opera. The
mono recording, starring Lawrence Winters and Camilla
films Williams, was eventually released on CD. It was the
Engel worked in a variety of positions on television spe- longest Porgy and Bess album made up to that time (129
cials. He was composer and conductor of the music for minutes), and would remain so for many years, until it
the famed 1954 television production of Shakespeare’s was superseded in the 1970s by two complete recordings
Macbeth, starring Maurice Evans and Judith Anderson, of the opera which both won Grammys.
but did not work on the 1960 remake starring the same Between the late 1940s and early 1950s, under the su-
two actors. He was conductor of the first (and so far, the pervision of Columbia Records executive Goddard Lieber-
only) television version of Leonard Bernstein’s Wonderful son, Engel conducted what were then the most complete
Town (1958) (TV), as well as, in the preceding years, of recordings of several classic Broadway musicals of the
the Hallmark Hall of Fame productions of Shakespeare’s past, many of which were appearing as albums for the
Twelfth Night in 1957, The Taming of the Shrew in 1956, and first time - among them Girl Crazy (with Mary Martin
The Tempest, in 1960, all with Maurice Evans.[1] He also performing both Ginger Rogers and Ethel Merman’s old
conducted the music for the Broadway musical version of stage roles), Oh, Kay! (with Barbara Ruick as Kay and Jack
Lil’ Abner, but not for the 1959 film version of the show. Cassidy as Jimmy de Winter), Babes in Arms (again featur-
The music in the film was conducted by Joseph J. Lilley.[2] ing Cassidy and Mary Martin) and Pal Joey (with Harold
He also musically directed and vocally arranged the 1959 Lang in the title role and Vivienne Segal repeating her
musical Take Me Along. original 1940 stage role as Vera Simpson). All of these
were studio recordings, not original cast albums. The Pal
1
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Lehman Engel
Joey recording was so successful that it actually led to a
major, long-running revival of the show in 1952, with the
Sexuality
same two stars who had appeared on the album. Lehman Engel made no secret of his homosexuality, but
He also conducted what was then the most complete in his autobiography This Bright Day (1974) he made no
recording of The Student Prince (with Robert Rounseville overt reference to it.[4]
as the Prince and Dorothy Kirsten as the barmaid Kathie)
in 1952, as well as what was then the most complete
recording of Oklahoma! that same year. The Oklahoma! al-
References
bum used Robert Russell Bennett’s original orchestra- [1] Lehman Engel at the Internet Movie Database
tions and starred Nelson Eddy as the cowboy Curly.[3] [2] [1]
For RCA Victor, Engel conducted studio recordings of [3] http://www.castalbumdb.com/
Carousel in 1955 (with Robert Merrill as Billy Bigelow, Pa- rec.cfm?RNumber=1303
trice Munsel as Julie Jordan, and Florence Henderson as [4] The gay & lesbian theatrical legacy, Billy J. Harbin,
Carrie); and Show Boat in 1956 (with a very politically in- Robert A. Schanke
correct Merrill singing the roles of both Ravenal and the
black stevedore Joe, Ms. Munsel as Magnolia, and Rise
Stevens as Julie La Verne). These versions were also more
External Links
complete than previous recordings of these shows. • Lehman Engel Papers at Yale University Music
All of these recordings (except for Engel’s Show Boat) Library
were eventually issued on CD and were milestones in Persondata
their time for their completeness. Name Engel, Lehman
Alternative names
As author Short description
Engel also wrote several books on musical theatre. One Date of birth September 14, 1910
of them, The American Musical Theatre: A Consideration, was Place of birth
perhaps the very first book to discuss in detail the writ-
ing of a Broadway musical, the elements that went into Date of death August 29, 1982
it, and the art of adapting "straight" plays into musicals. Place of death
Engel was close friends with Pablo Picasso. He also
mentored Stephen Flaherty, Andrew MacBean, and Ed-
ward Kleban.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lehman_Engel&oldid=457789839"
Categories:
• 1910 births
• 1982 deaths
• American composers
• American conductors (music)
• People from Jackson, Mississippi
• Musicians from Mississippi
• LGBT composers
• LGBT musicians from the United States
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