Why The Last Five Years Inspires Me

We're all trying to be moved, right? We're searching for something wonderful and inspiring to make us look deep inside ourselves and find something that, in turn, will make our lives a little bit more meaningful. Or we're trying to be more cultured, investigating new experiences and ideas hoping to find something we've been missing that will make our lives a little bit more bearable. Or we're snobby musicians looking for something that will actually wow us, and we'll have to spend months poring over to make our lives a little bit more exciting. Or maybe that last one is a little more rare; I don't know.

I've been there. All of those things. I'm looking for something more from my music. And if you've been victim to one of those aformentioned moods, The Last Five Years is something I would recommend for you. Why, you ask?

The Last Five Years is the story of a couple, Jamie and Cathy, who meet, fall in love, get married, and fall apart within (you guessed it) five years. Don't worry- I'm not giving away any plot points. The opening song tells you that. Not in a Greek chorus kind of way, but tastefully. I'll explain that later. This story is the rise and fall of a relationship. It takes you through all the phases- the excitement and early infatuation, the blossoming of love, taking those serious steps, marriage, the disillusionment, the strained trying-to-make-it-work phase, anger, and the end. As you see each phase of the relationship from both characters separately, you become deeply invested in the relationship yourself.

Jamie is a young writer met with wild success at his early age. Cathy is an actor struggling to make it. This, as you can imagine, comes between them. Cathy is needy and clingy and intimidated by Jamie's success. Jamie is basking in his success and develops a bit of a wandering eye and is increasingly frustrated by Cathy's demands of him. It's realistic- brutally realistic. Yet it is told poetically and beautifully, allowing us to fall in love with them and understand all their feelings and complications as if they were your own.

It's painful and sad. It's hilarious and sweet. It's honest. And it's beautiful.

Jason Robert Brown, if you're not familiar with his work, is a musical genius. He's a musician for musicians. His scores are complex and very piano-heavy, often incorporating odd time signatures and rhythms. He also likes to use uncommon harmonies that end up working marvelously. And, as I can attest as a singer/musician, opening up one of his songbooks is frightening and amazing all at once. It's very exciting, and that's what gives his work such power even after repeated listenings.

His lyrics are always very witty without being ridiculous. An example, from the song "A Miracle Would Happen" -

"Everyone tells you that the minute you get married

Every other woman in the world

Suddenly finds you attractive

Well, that's not true

It only affects the kind of women

You always wanted to sleep with

But they wouldn't give you the time of day before..."

He rips your heart out with the simplistically poetic lyrics of "Still Hurting," and follows it up with the unusually funny "Shiksa Goddess." His perky quirky love letter "Summer in Ohio" makes you smile and want to belt along with Cathy, while his quiet musings of "Nobody Needs to Know" makes you want to cry and wail with Jamie. His simple and honest confessions of love in "The Next Ten Minutes" move me every time, and being one of the two times the couple sings in harmony, it's a real unique moment on the soundtrack. The finale, the poignant "Goodbye Until Tomorrow/I Could Never Rescue You" captures the message and themes of the play brilliantly, once again bringing the pair together, singing counter-melodies. Conceptually and musically, The Last Five Years is a flawless piece.

The recording of Jason Robert Brown's masterpiece (in my opinion it's his best work) is an amazing soundtrack to own. JRB's work is further embellished by the casting of Norbert Leo Butz as Jamie and Sherie Rene Scott as Cathy. Both excellent and unique singers and actors in their own right, they complement each other beautifully (perhaps this is why they've been in three productions together). Sherie's clear and powerful style brings out Cathy's hopeful adoration of Jamie and the brokenness left in his wake. Norbert's style is very expressive, very musical, and very endearing; he brings the necessary charisma to the role, even when you're only listening to him.

There is an additional level of genius to the musical- Jamie and Cathy are both telling the story from two different perspectives. Jamie tells the story from after their first date to their separation. Cathy tells the story backward, from the separation to saying goodbye after their first date. Cathy, the first voice you hear, says that Jamie is gone. When we first hear Jamie, he's completely smitten with Cathy. At the end, an enthusiastic Cathy is saying goodbye to Jamie, and a defeated Jamie is saying goodbye to Cathy.

The effect is brilliant. You feel Cathy's sadness, and then you are immediately flung into Jamie's excitement. Or you finally get to see a happy Cathy, but it's juxtaposed with a frustrated, straying Jamie. The result? You feel each person's emotion at each phase of the relationship. You are reminded in the sadness that there was once something good, and in the joy, that it's all bittersweet at best.

The Last Five Years is thought-provoking, shamelessly emotional, refreshingly funny and clever, and musical enough to make any singer or pianist giddy. It brings a level of reality to the stage that simply wasn't seen in traditional musical theatre, and is still very rare. And it brings something to my personal collection that I'd been looking for for a very long time- something more.