John Kander and Fred Ebb

In musicals like Cabaret, Chicago, and Kiss of the Spider Woman, John Kander and Fred Ebb have fashioned fantastic realms of song featuring unusual stories and settings. Their 40-year collaboration reveals a distinctive working style. It is never "which comes first, music or lyrics?" These artists come to the moment simultaneously. Both Kander and Ebb say they are attracted to material that is life-affirming. Characters are survivors. And their popularity may, in part, stem from the hope their songs convey to the audiences who enjoy them.

John Kander was born March 18, 1927, in Kansas City, Missouri. He graduated from Oberlin College and later earned a master's degree from Columbia University, where he studied composition. Early in his career he played in the Broadway orchestra for West Side Story, which led eventually to jobs creating the dance arrangements for Gypsy in 1959 and Irma la Douce in 1960. In 1962 Kander wrote A Family Affair with James and William Goldman. The musical had only a short Broadway run but connected Kander with its director, Harold Prince.

Fred Ebb was born April 8, 1936, in Manhattan. He graduated from New York University in 1955 and received a master's degree in English literature from Columbia University in 1957. With an early collaborator, Paul Klein, he wrote From A to Z, which opened 1960 at the Plymouth Theater. Kander and Ebb were brought together in 1962 by their music publisher, Tommy Valando. Early in their collaboration they had successes with pop songs like "Sara Lee" and "My Coloring Book," which became a hit for Barbra Streisand and other artists.

The team wrote a musical, Golden Gate, that was never produced but which they later used to audition for legendary director George Abbott's 1965 musical Flora, the Red Menace. While writing the songs for Flora, they were introduced to 19-year-old Liza Minnelli, who was eager to play the lead role. Kander and Ebb convinced Abbott to cast Minnelli, and the production marked her first appearance on Broadway. It also began a long association between the performer and the songwriters, who have created some of her most affecting material. Flora was a noteworthy debut for Kander and Ebb and produced an appreciated score that includes an ode to youthful ambition, "All I Need (Is One Good Break)" and the delicate "A Quiet Thing."

With Cabaret, the team's second production, Kander and Ebb entered a new dimension of accomplishment. Not only are their songs striking and original but the 1966 show earned Kander and Ebb the Tony Award for Best Score and shook the traditional Broadway musical by the proscenium with its concept and stylized production. The score includes songs performed as part of the stage show in the Kit Kat Klub, a Weimar Berlin cabaret, and others that help convey the narrative of several characters buffeted by the changing mood as the Nazi party rises to power. "Wilkommen," "Cabaret," and "Don't Tell Mama," among other songs from the score, are now standards, and the production has had an enormous influence on musicals written afterward. A 1998 Broadway revival was also a major success and demonstrated the work's timelessness.

Kander and Ebb followed Cabaret in 1968 with The Happy Time, a gentle tale of a French Canadian photographer who disappoints his young nephew when he reveals that he has misled his family about his achievements. The show was directed by Gower Champion and starred Robert Goulet and David Wayne. Despite its promising source material and a talented group of collaborators, critics felt the production lacked the appropriate tone for its sentimental story.

For Zorba, Kander and Ebb joined again with director Harold Prince, for an adaptation of Nikos Kazantzakis's rich novel Zorba the Greek. The stylized 1968 production, with a bold performance by Herschel Bernardi in the lead, ran for 305 performances. The songs included the powerful but somber opening number, "Life Is," the humorous "No Boom Boom," and the tender "Happy Birthday to Me."

For 1971's 70, Girls, 70 the team tackled a tale of a group of elderly New Yorkers who embark on a life of crime. The show included the life-affirming song "Yes" and "Coffee in a Cardboard Cup," in which the older characters reflect on how so-called progress affects quality of life.

Next came Chicago, the 1975 musical directed by Bob Fosse that starred Chita Rivera and Gwen Verdon. The vividly staged show, based on Maurine Dallas Watkins' 1926 play about "merry murderesses" Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly, included a rich assortment of stylized songs that recalled jazz and popular music of the 1920s. The opening anthem "All That Jazz," the vaudeville-tinged "Mr. Cellophane," and "We Both Reached for the Gun" are all examples of the clever and inspired songs that comprise the score. Although it opened to mixed reviews, Chicago's original production ran on Broadway for 923 performances. A 1996 concert rendition by City Center's Encores! series led to a successful Broadway revival that is still running today. And the 2002 movie, starring Richard Gere, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Renee Zellweger won the Academy Award for Best Picture, cementing Chicago's hold in the pop arena outside of Broadway and igniting a revived interest in movie musicals.

Following Chicago was 1977's The Act, a vehicle for Liza Minnelli. The show was originally directed by Martin Scorsese, who proved less accomplished as a stage than movie director and was replaced by Gower Champion. The musical generated accolades for Minnelli and ran for 233 performances.

Their next show, Woman of the Year, based on the 1941 Spencer Tracy/Katharine Hepburn movie, was written for Lauren Bacall and opened on Broadway in 1981. The musical included a plaintive love song, "Sometimes a Day Goes By," and a hilarious duet, "The Grass is Always Greener," and the score won Kander and Ebb a Tony Award for Best Score.

Kander and Ebb have expressed particular affection for The Rink, which opened in 1984. It featured a book by Terrence McNally and starred Chita Rivera and Liza Minnelli in an examination of a mother and daughter struggling with their relationship. Its notable songs include "Don't, ‘Ah, Ma' Me" and "Chief Cook and Bottle Washer."

Kiss of the Spider Woman, an adaptation of the novel by Manuel Puig, reunited Kander and Ebb with director Harold Prince. The story of a macho political prisoner and a gay window dresser obsessed with movies seemed to defy musicalization, but the show went on to win seven Tony Awards including Best Score for Kander and Ebb. The musical played in Toronto and London in 1992, opening in New York in 1993 where it played for 906 performances.

After a successful 1987 Off-Broadway revival of Flora, the Red Menace directed by Scott Ellis, choreographed by Susan Stroman, and with a new book by David Thompson, Kander and Ebb agreed to participate with the same team in a retrospective of the songwriters' work. And the World Goes ‘Round features a diverse selection of 22 Kander and Ebb songs. It opened in 1991 and ran for 408 performances. Kander and Ebb teamed up again with Ellis, Thompson, and Stroman in 1997 for Steel Pier, a fanciful tale about a 1933 dance marathon with a ghost as its romantic lead.

Aside from their stage works, Kander and Ebb have written songs for such films as Funny Lady and of course, New York, New York, for which they created the classic title song. They have also written for numerous TV specials, including "Liza With a Z", "Gypsy in My Soul", "Baryshnikov on Broadway" and "Early Frost."

Recently Kander and Ebb contributed to a new musical, Curtains, and have worked on regional tryouts of Over & Over (an adaptation of Thornton Wilder's The Skin of Our Teeth) and The Visit (Terrence McNally's adaptation of the play by Friedrich Dürrenmatt). The Visit was produced during the fall of 2001 at Chicago's Goodman Theatre.

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Contact: Nancy Donner, Herb Scher, or Lindy Regan at 212.704.8600.

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