Fiddler on the Roof

Bronx-born librettist Joseph Stein entertained millions through his work for the Broadway stage. He began his career as a psychiatric social worker in 1939. After a chance encounter with actor Zero Mostel, who needed material for a radio show, Stein began writing, joining Sid Caesar’s Your Show of Shows and then moving on to Broadway with his first book, written with Will Glickman, for the 1955 musical Plain and Fancy. Teaming up with composer Jerry Bock and lyricist Sheldon Harnick, Stein wrote the book for Fiddler on the Roof, which went on for three thousand performances on Broadway and has been staged internationally many times. Stein also wrote the libretto for the musical Zorba (1968), based on Nikos Kazantzakis’s 1952 novel Zorba the Greek.

Chicago-born Sheldon Harnick began writing music and comedy in high school, interrupting his budding career with a stint in the army and then obtaining a bachelor’s degree in music from Northwestern University. He moved to New York City in the early 1950s and began writing for Broadway. When he met composer Jerry Bock, Harnick’s career took off as the pair created the Pulitzer Prize–winning musical drama Fiorello! (1959) and later Fiddler on the Roof (1964), which garnered them both Tony Awards. He and Bock split up after the production of The Rothschilds (1970), but Harnick continued to be active into his eighties.

Born in New Haven, Connecticut, and raised in New York City, composer Jerry Bock is best-known for creating the Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof together with Sheldon Harnick. Bock began his Broadway career alongside Lawrence Holofcener composing songs for Catch a Star and Mr. Wonderful, a vehicle for Sammy Davis Jr. With Harnick, Bock won the Tony Award for Best Musical as well as the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Fiorello! (1959), based on the life of controversial New York mayor Fiorello LaGuardia. The Jerry Bock Award for Excellence in Musical Theater is given annually to the lyricist and composer of a project developed in the BMI Foundation’s Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop.