Broadway's Carol Hall Passes Away at Age 82

BroadwayWorld is sad to report that composer/lyricist/actress Carol Hall has passed away at age 82.

Carol Hall's first recorded song was "Jenny Rebecca," intended it only as a gift for a friend who had just had a baby, but it was immediately picked up and performed by cabaret legend Mabel Mercer, and recorded soon after by a young up-and-coming singer.... Barbra Streisand.

Since then, her songs have been performed by such extraordinary singers as Tony Bennett, Harry Belafonte, Barbara Cook, Lena Horne, Chita Rivera, Michael Feinstein, Mark Murphy, Mabel Mercer, Olivia Newton-John, Maureen McGovern, Miriam Makeba, RuPaul, Frederica von Stade, Kermit the Frog and Big Bird.

Her classic musical THE BEST LITTLE WHOREHOUSE IN TEXAS won two Drama Desk Awards for lyrics and music, received a Grammy nomination for its cast album, and entertained Broadway audiences for almost five years. It also became a popular film starring Burt Reynolds and Dolly Parton. Dolly's recording of Carol's song "Hard Candy Christmas" won an ASCAP "Most Performed Country Song" Award, and the film generated an Oscar nomination for Charles Durning, who sang "The Sidestep" as the slippery Governor of Texas. A national tour of WHOREHOUSE, starring the entertainment legend Ann-Margret, enjoyed a run for over a year and a half.

For over ten years, she wrote songs for Sesame Street and was one of the major contributors to Marlo Thomas' ground-breaking FREE TO BE... YOU AND ME (Emmy Award and gold album). She also contributed songs to FREE TO BE... A FAMILY, THANKS & GIVING: ALL YEAR LONG, and wrote the music and lyrics for the musical MAX AND RUBY (TheatreWorks, NYC), which toured the country for four years.

She served as lyricist for the musical based on Truman Capote's well-known classic story A CHRISTMAS MEMORY. This show received rave reviews and broke attendance records at its world premiere in December 2010 (Theatreworks in Palo Alto, California) With a libretto by Duane Poole and music by Broadway veteran composer Larry Grossman, its southern premiere is scheduled at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival, in December, 2011.

Other stage work includes GOOD SPORTS (Goodspeed Theatre), PAPER MOON (Paper Mill Theatre), ARE WE THERE YET? (Williamstown Theatre Festival), TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN (Off-Broadway), and songs for A... MY NAME IS ALICE and A... MY NAME IS STILL ALICE. Her collection of non-musical one-act plays is called THE DAYS ARE AS GRASS and has been done at the Woodstock Fringe Festival, Bay Street Theater, and Actors Studio Playwrights Unit, NYC.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride / WM Photos

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