Ladies and Gentlemen, Stephen Sondheim

The boy and I were listening to Tom Waits’s rendition of “Somewhere” the other day — over and over and over again, my bad. Still. A personal favorite, has been for years. There’s a reason Stephen Colbert gushed over the Broadway great earlier this week — because there are few better. Above is a photo the Dallas Independent School District posted today of Sondheim’s visit to the Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts on Wednesday, a make-up following his September cancellation due to illness. (He was in town this week speaking at the Nasher.) There’s another photo on the other side, taken inside the school — those kids look beside themselves; so too the songwriter. Must have been extraordinary. When I was at T.J., the best guest we got was then-Governor Mark White.