Working on a Song
Page 13
Off-Broadway, the song was identical to the studio recording, with the addition of this Hermes narration meant to illustrate the song’s effect on Persephone:
Hermes: Persephone heard the poor boy sing / And it broke her heart in two / So she went to go find that mighty king / To see what she could do
And the boy . . . / The boy kept singing loud and clear / And everybody knows / That walls have ears
Edmonton & London
Like “Wedding Song,” “If It’s True” always landed in concert, but was problematic in the theater. It was a major culprit in what we identified as a long, slow slog through the second act. Act II had more than its share of minor keys, mid-tempos, and monologues, and “If It’s True” was all of those things. Ken described it as “a pity party.” For Edmonton and London, I added sung counterlines for Hermes and the Workers Chorus, to take it out of the realm of monologue and disrupt the static quality of the verses. I also added the forward-leaning I believe outro that went beyond righteous anger and toward a more positively articulated worldview. It was important that Orpheus not only struggle against the way the world is, but also struggle toward the way it could be.
Broadway
In Edmonton and London, the early “lamentation” centered around Orpheus’s betrayal by Eurydice:
Orpheus: If it’s true what they say / If there’s nothing to be done / If it’s true that it’s too late / And the girl I love is gone / And they say I would do well / To go back the way I came / Everybody for himself, they say / I guess you felt the same
For Broadway I rewrote it once more, this time to express a loss of innocence for our New Orpheus: Is this how the world is? The cumulative overhaul of “If It’s True” was significant, and it worked on a few levels. It was no longer a monologue or a “pity party,” and it now told the broader story of the Workers’ awakening and Orpheus’s emergence as an unwitting political leader. But there’s a way in which “If It’s True” never quite delivered the catharsis I was after. What made it elusive, I think, is that the song ends on a question—Is it true what they say? I couldn’t figure out a way to end on a statement, and I wasn’t willing to pair a lyrical question with a musical resolution, so it ends instead on a long, suspended note. We did everything in our power to give it a “button” under the circumstances, but it’s not easy to “button” a suspension. If I had it to do over, I’d search again for a decisive final statement that allows the audience to applaud Orpheus’s political mic-drop. Perhaps I will still rewrite it! I believe if there is still a will, then there is still a way.
HOW LONG?
Persephone
What are you afraid of?
Hades
What?
Persephone
He’s just a boy in love
Hades
Have a drink, why don’t you?
Persephone
No
I’ve had enough
He loves that girl, Hades
Hades
Well, that’s too bad
Persephone
He has the kind of love for her
That you and I once had
Hades
The girl means nothing to me
Persephone
I know
But she means everything to him
Hades
So?
Persephone
Let her go
Hades, my husband, Hades, my light
Hades, my darkness
If you had heard how he sang tonight
You’d pity poor Orpheus
All of his sorrow won’t fit in his chest
It just burns like a fire in the pit of his chest
And his heart is a bird on a spit in his chest
How long, how long, how long?
Hades
How long? Just as long as Hades is king
Nothing comes of wishing on stars
And nothing comes of the songs people sing
However sorry they are
Give them a piece and they’ll take it all
Show them the crack and they’ll tear down the wall
Lend them an ear and the kingdom will fall
The kingdom will fall for a song
Persephone
What does he care for the logic of kings?
The laws of your underworld?
It is only for love that he sings!
He sings for the love of a girl
Hades
You and your pity don’t fit in my bed
You just burn like a fire in the pit of my bed
And I turn like a bird on a spit in my bed
How long, how long, how long?
Persephone
How long? Just as long as I am your wife
It’s true the earth must die
But then the earth comes back to life
And the sun must go on rising
Hades & Persephone
And how does the sun even fit in the sky?
It just burns like a fire in the pit of the sky
And the earth is a bird on a spit in the sky
How long, how long, how long?
Notes on “How Long?”
After I finished college and spent some time driving around trying to start a singer-songwriter career, I had an opportunity to return to Cairo for a few months, where I’d studied abroad. It was a place that inspired me, and I could live very cheaply there and write songs. I shared a flat in the Zamalek neighborhood with a Canadian grad student working on her dissertation. I had a little bedroom with a private balcony I could smoke off of, which was romantic to me at the time (I never was a “real” smoker, and only briefly a “romantic” one). I wrote several songs for my early record The Brightness in that room. One of them was “How Long?” which was for Hadestown, but I included a solo version of it on the album as well. The mysterious “fit/spit/pit” choruses came, fully formed, in a dream.
The body of the song remains nearly untouched after all these years, but the intro scene changed many times as I tried to contextualize what was happening in this dense, poetic argument with a rather ambiguous outcome. In an early workshop, I tried this sung Persephone solo, an appeal to Hermes:
Persephone: Brother Hermes, god of speed / Put your feathers on his feet / Hasten his delivery / Keep him hale and whole / Brother, I’m a jaded woman / But there’s something in his singing / And it feels like spring a-comin’ / To the winter of my soul
Brother Hermes, god of speed / Put your feathers on his feet / Hasten his delivery / Keep him safe and sound / He reminds me of the lover / That I was when I was younger / Back before my heart went under / Undercover / Underground
It expressed the awakening that leads Persephone into confrontation with Hades, but it didn’t bring any clarity to the argument itself. For NYTW and the Citadel, I rewrote it as a recitative scene:
Persephone: How long have we been married?
Hades: Since the world began
Persephone: I don’t mind if you look at other girls now and then
Hades: The girl means nothing to me
Persephone: I know / But she means everything to him
Hades: So?
Persephone: Let her go
Persephone’s final Let her go worked wonders for “How Long?” because it gave Hades a specific demand to push back against. I loved the economy of this early version, as well as the humor and the sense that, for these immortally wedlocked gods, a little infidelity wasn’t a big deal. But it began to seem, especially to Rachel, that the casualness of the scene wasn’t serving Persephone’s arc. We needed her to come at her husband with more heat. For the National,
I rewrote it this way:
Persephone: Well? Are you happy?
Hades: Why?
Persephone: You proved your might
Hades: Is this about the boy?
Persephone: He sang a song tonight / You should have heard him, Hades / So beautiful—so sad / He has the kind of love for her that you and I once had
Hades: The girl means nothing to me
Persephone: I know / But she means everything to him
Hades: So?
Persephone: Let her go
I didn’t love the first few lines, but He has the kind of love for her that you and I once had was revelatory. It summed up so much about the way in which our young couple holds a mirror for our older one. For Broadway, I kept that line, and paired it with an idea we’d been moving toward for a long time: that Persephone herself bears some responsibility for the deterioration of her marriage and the world. Hades’s compulsion is the engine of the problem, but Persephone’s not a blameless victim. She’s in denial, drowning her cares from one scene to the next in her beloved “fruit of the vine.” For some, Hades’s Have a drink, why don’t you? was jarringly realistic, like something out of Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (For reasons connected to Edward Albee that I don’t entirely understand, we all called this the “New Canaan” version of the scene.) But Persephone’s response, No—I’ve had enough, seemed to set up the confrontation with Hades as a moment of newfound sobriety for her. She’s fully awake.
CHANT REPRISE
Hermes
Now everybody knows that walls have ears
Orpheus
Is it true?
Workers
Is it true?
Hermes
And the walls had heard what the boy was sayin’
Orpheus
Is it true?
Workers
Is it true?
Hermes
A million tons of stone and steel
Orpheus
Is it true?
Workers
Is it true?
Hermes
Echoed his refrain . . .
Workers
Oh, keep your head, keep your head low (Kkh!)
Oh, you gotta keep your head low (Kkh!)
If you wanna keep your head (Huh! Kkh!)
Oh, you gotta (keep your head)
Why do we turn away when our brother is bleeding?
Oh, keep your head
Why do we build a wall and then call it freedom?
Oh, keep your head
If we’re free, tell me why
I can’t look in my brother’s eye
Keep your head!
Hades (to Orpheus)
Young man! Got to hand it to ya
Guess you don’t scare easy, do ya?
Are you brave, or stupid, son?
Doesn’t matter which one
Cos it seems your song made quite
A strong impression on my wife
But it takes more than singin’ songs
To keep a woman in your arms
Take it from a man no longer young
If you want to hold a woman, son
Hang a chain around her throat
Made of many-karat gold
Shackle her from wrist to wrist
With sterling silver bracelets
Fill her pockets full of stones
Precious ones, diamonds
Bind her with a golden band
Take it from an old man
Orpheus
If I raised my voice
Workers
If I raised, if I raised, if I raised my—
Keep your head low
Eurydice
If I raised my head
Workers
If I raised, if I raised, if I raised my—
Keep your head low
Eurydice
Could I change my fate?
Workers
Could I change? Could I change? Could I change my—
Keep your head low
Orpheus
If I raised my voice, could I
Workers
Keep your head low
Orpheus & Eurydice
Could I change the way it is?
Workers
Why do we turn away ’stead of standin’ with him?
Oh, keep your head
Why are we digging our own graves for a livin’?
Oh, keep your head
If we’re free, tell me why
We can’t even stand upright
If we’re free, tell me when
We can stand with our fellow man
Keep your head!
Hades
Young man! I was young once too
Sang a song of love like you
Son, I too was left behind
Turned on one too many times
Now I sing a different song
One I can depend upon
A simple tune, a steady beat
The music of machinery
You hear that heavy metal sound?
The symphony of Hadestown
And in this symphony of mine
Are power chords and power lines
Young man! You can strum your lyre
I have strung the world in wire!
Young man! You can sing your ditty
I conduct the electric city!
I’ll tell you what, young man
Since my wife is such a fan
And since I’m gonna count to three
And put you out of your misery
Hades & Company
One!
Hades
Give me one more song
One more song before I send you
Hades & Company
Two!
Hades
To the great beyond
Where nobody can hear you singing
Hades & Company
Three!
Hades
Sing a song for me
Make me laugh, make me weep
Make the king feel young again . . .
Sing! For an old man
Notes on “Chant Reprise”
I began “Chant Reprise” in the early days of working with Rachel. Like “Chant,” it was meant to function as a “set piece” capable of tracking multiple characters and stories at once. On the one hand, it chronicles the rising rebellion of the Workers (and the newfound hope that affords Orpheus and Eurydice). On the other, it’s the public continuation of the private “How Long?” confrontation between Hades and Persephone. Here’s how both aspects of the song evolved:
The Workers
Off-Broadway, the Company-as-Workers-Chorus sang:
Company: Oh, keep your head, keep your head low / Oh, you gotta keep your head low / If you wanna keep your head / Oh, he said he’d shelter us / He said he’d harbor me / He said we’d build them up / And then the walls would set us free / I’m gonna count to three / And then I’ll raise my head, singing / One! Two! Is it true? / Is it true what he said?
The second time around, they sang:
Company: He said he’d shelter us / He said he’d harbor me / He said we’d soldier on / And then the war would bring us peace / We’re gonna count to three . . .
In my imagination Hades was counting down to the moment he’d “put Orpheus out of his misery,” while the Workers were counting down to the moment they’d “raise their heads” to confront the boss. In rea
lity, I’m not sure anyone clocked the significance of the counting, but it was satisfying to hear all those voices shouting One . . . two . . . three! in unison . . . so that stayed.
At the Citadel, where we suddenly had flesh-and-blood Workers, I briefly tried out an alternate intro to the song that came directly from them, rather than by way of Hermes’s metaphorical A million tons of stone and steel narration. It went like this:
Workers: What’s he gon’, what’s he gon’ / What’s he gonna do to the poor boy now? / It ain’t none, it ain’t none / It ain’t none of our business anyhow / What’s he want, what’s he want? / What does he wanna hurt him for? / Here he comes, here he comes / You better keep your head down / Loooow . . .
It moved me, but the phrasing was rhythmically laid-back in a way that didn’t launch the song with enough “oomph.” And the old Hermes narration, together with Orpheus and the Workers singing Is it true? call-and-response style, drew a cognitively important line between “If It’s True” and “Chant Reprise,” so we went back.
Hades & Persephone
As for Hades and Persephone, their verses underwent many metamorphoses over the years. Here’s the old first Hades verse:
Hades (to Orpheus): When I was a young man like you / Son, I held a woman too / Held her in my naked hands / When I was a young man
Now you know how it feels / Women are as slick as eels / Woman! Quicker than the asp / Always slipping from your grasp / Take it from a man no longer young . . .
Right up until Broadway previews, Persephone had a whole response section of her own. At NYTW and the Citadel she sang: