Rodgers & Hammerstein

Biography

The partnership of Rodgers & Hammerstein came about in 1943, with a colaboration on the Broadway musical Oklahoma! This is the story of a frontier town in that territory (not yet a state) at the start of the 1900s, and of two love triangles. The central plotline involves Laurey, and the romantic choice she must make between a farmhand, Jud Fry, and a cowboy, Curly McLain. Some comic relief arrives in the parallel tale of Ado Annie, and her two suitors: Ali Hakim and Will Parker. Oklahoma! earned its exclamation point. It has a wildly successful run, and the partnership – Rodgets as composer, Hammerstein as lyricist, went on to provide the songs (and generally a good deal more than the songs) for an array of non-classic musicals: Carousel (1945); South Pacific (1947); The King and I (1951); Flower Drum Song (1958); and The Sound of Music (1959). Hammerstein died of cancer only nine months after the premiere of The Sound of Music.