| Name |
Adam Guettel |
| Height |
|
| Naionality |
American |
| Date of Birth |
16-December-1964 |
| Place of Birth |
New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Famous for |
Singing |
Adam Guettel is an American composer-lyricist of musical theater and opera . He is best known for the musical The Light in the Piazza, for which he won two Tony Awards, for Best Score and Best Orchestrations, and two Drama Desk Awards, for Best Music and Best Orchestrations. His early works include 1996's Floyd Collins, Love's Fire, and Saturn Returns (which was recorded as Myths and Hymns).
Guettel's music was almost immediately characterized by its complexity and chromaticism. His major influences include Igor Stravinsky, Maurice Ravel, Claude Debussy, Benjamin Britten, and Stevie Wonder. Stephen Sondheim has referred to Guettel's work as "dazzling." Guettel's songs have been recorded by such artists as Audra McDonald and Brian d'Arcy James. He also contributed original scores to several documentary films, including Arguing the World and Jack: The Last Kennedy Film. In 1999, he performed a concert evening of his own work at New York's Town Hall. In 2004, Guettel contributed vocals to Jessica Molaskey's P.S. Classics album Make Believe, dueting with Molaskey on the song "Glad To Be Unhappy." After six years working on the project, Guettel's musical The Light in the Piazza opened on Broadway in 2005. The show, which starred Victoria Clark and Kelli O'Hara, met with mixed critical notices, but on June 5, 2005, Adam Guettel won the Tony Award for Best Original Score and the Tony Award for Best Orchestrations. He spent much of the period from 2005 to 2007 working on a musical adaptation of The Princess Bride with original screenwriter William Goldman. As of January 2007, Guettel had written the music for ten songs for the project. An orchestral suite from the score was performed at the Hollywood Bowl in November 2006, and Lincoln Center conducted a workshop of Bride in January 2007. The project was abandoned when Goldman reportedly demanded 75 percent of the author's share, even though Guettel was writing both the music and the lyrics.
In summer 2007, Guettel composed incidental music for a production of Anton Chekhov's play Uncle Vanya at the Intiman Playhouse in Seattle, Washington. In July 2009, the Signature Theatre of Arlington, Virginia commissioned Guettel to write a new musical for their 2011-2012 season, under the auspices of their American Musical Voices Project. Currently in the works, this will be a musical adaptation of the Danny Boyle film "Millions". Other current projects include an opera based on the short stories of Washington Irving and a musical of The Invisible Man, which is rumoured to be directed by Daniel Kramer. He is also making a musical out of the 1962 film Days of Wine and Roses. Another major aspect of Guettel's career is his work as a teacher.
Since 1995, he has taught masterclasses and seminars in musical theatre performance and songwriting, considering this to be an important complement to his work as a composer. He has led such classes at New York University, Pace University, Harvard University, Yale University, Princeton University, Emerson College, Elon University, Southern Methodist University, Syracuse University, and many others.
