Remembering Sheldon Harnick, "Fiddler on the Roof" Lyricist

Sheldon Harnick, who wrote the lyrics for Fiddler on the Roof, Fiorello, and She Loves Me, died last week in New York at the age of 99.

As Robert Berkvist wrote in The New York Times,

“Fiddler on the Roof” was more than a hit show; it was a phenomenon. It won nine Tony Awards, including one for its score. It was made into a hit movie in 1971, has been performed all over the world, and has had five Broadway revivals, most recently in 2015. (A Yiddish-language production was an Off Broadway hit in 2019 and played a return engagement in late 2022.)

In addition to “Matchmaker, Matchmaker,” the score included a number of songs that would soon be regarded as classics, including “Tradition,” “Sunrise, Sunset” and Tevye’s humorously wistful lament “If I Were a Rich Man” (“There would be one long staircase just going up/ And one even longer coming down/ And one more leading nowhere, just for show”).

As a tribute to Sheldon Harnick, we're sharing a video of an on-stage discussion with Jeffrey Lyons during the Florida Holocaust Museum's 2013 To Life event, when Harnick explained how the song If I Were A Rich Man evolved from a Hasidic nigun during the development of Fiddler on the Roof.

Enjoy!

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