Jerrold Lewis "Jerry" Bock was an American musical
theater composer. He received the Tony Award for Best Musical and the Pulitzer
Prize for Drama with Sheldon Harnick for their 1959 musical Fiorello! and the
Tony Award for Best Composer and Lyricist for the 1964 musical Fiddler on the Roof
with Sheldon Harnick.
Born in New Haven, Connecticut and raised in Flushing,
Queens, New York, Bock studied the piano as a child. He attended the University
of Wisconsin–Madison, where he wrote the musical Big As Life, which toured the
state and enjoyed a run in Chicago. After graduation, he spent three summers at
the Tamiment Playhouse in the Poconos and wrote for early television revues with
lyricist Larry Holofcener.
Bock made his Broadway debut in 1955 when he and Lawrence
Holofcener contributed songs to Catch a Star. The following year the duo
collaborated on the musical Mr. Wonderful, designed for Sammy Davis, Jr., after
which they worked on Ziegfeld Follies of 1956, which closed out-of-town.
Shortly after, Bock met lyricist Sheldon Harnick, with whom
he forged a successful partnership. Although their first joint venture, The
Body Beautiful, failed to charm the critics, its score caught the attention of
director George Abbott and producer Hal Prince. They hired the team to compose
a musical biography of former New York City mayor Fiorello La Guardia.
Fiorello! (1959) went on to win them both the Tony Award for Best Musical and
the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Bock's additional collaborations with Harnick include
Tenderloin (1960), Man in the Moon (1963), She Loves Me (1963), Fiddler on the
Roof (1964), The Apple Tree (1966), and The Rothschilds (1970), as well as
contributions to Never Too Late (1962), Baker Street (1965), Her First Roman
(1968), and The Madwoman of Central Park West (1979). Fiddler on the Roof
included the hit song "If I Were a Rich Man".
Established in 1997, the Jerry Bock Award for Excellence in
Musical Theater is an annual grant presented to the composer and lyricist of a
project developed in the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop.
Bock spoke at the funeral of 98-year-old Fiddler playwright
Joseph Stein just 10 days before his own death, from heart failure at the age
of 81, four weeks before his 82nd birthday.
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