Content dictates form • Less is more • God is in the details
– Stephen Sondheim
all in the service of
Clarity
without which nothing else matters.
This is the mantra at the beginning of both volumes of Stephen Sondheim’s magical lyric collections, Finishing The Hat and Look, I Made a Hat.
But of course, this mantra can be applied to much more than lyrics. Over the last few days, I’ve been considering each part of the mantra as it applies to teaching.
“All in the service of clarity, without which nothing else matters.” In other words, if your work doesn’t communicate the story you want to tell, then it hasn’t served a purpose. For Sondheim, the songs had to advance the story in the musical he was working on: he has literally said that without a theatrical story, he didn’t know what to write.
For educators, clarity comes down to instilling the ideas you’re teaching successfully in your students. As John Wooden put it, “You haven’t taught until they’ve learned.” Clarity is the goal of all teaching.
Clarity is also specifically the goal of teaching choral music. We seek clarity of intonation, clarity of diction, clarity of musical line, clarity of meaning conveyed to an audience. All the work we do with content, details, and the “less” that is more must be in the service of that clarity.
The beauty of Sondheim’s creative mantra is that it can be applied well beyond his area of expertise. Take a minute and think about how you might apply it to your own art, whatever it may be. Chances are, it works.