The Greatest MT Song Ever Written

Even though it is a full ensemble number, I would say “Make Our Garden Grow” from Candide. Probably one of the greatest pieces of music ever written, period.

Nah, not Something Baaaaad. Surely Sleeping On Our Own from Martin Guerre?

Very interesting question. Impossible to answer! And very hard to answer objectively without just turning to one's personal favourite melodies. I guess to have such an accolade, you'd need a stunning melody that also has huge dramatic purpose at a key moment in a well written plot.

As If We Never Said Goodbye.
Memory.
Don't Cry For Me Argentina.

I'd say One Day More but it's been popularised and performed out of context in low rent TV shows etc so much, I think people can forget how sensational it is.
BUT - in the 80s at The Palace Theatre - that's got to be up there.

It's quite hard to pinpoint what is a greatest Musical theatre song because there's so many across different eras to choose from.

One Day More for me, it's rousing, feels like a proper epic, and encompasses most of the cast

Climb Ev’ry Mountain is the greatest MT song ever written.

If I Loved You from Carousel for me

I can make a strong case for Tonight from WSS. As a quintet, it creates narrative and character brilliantly and really does contribute to the drama of the moment.

Musically it is a masterpiece of construction. Complex but always comprehensible.

It shows Bernstein as a composer who truly worked as well in the classical and Broadway traditions.

Without this, we would not have had One Day More.

I love it too, but Sondheim definitely wouldn't agree with you haha. He hates those lyrics (though maybe what he considers his most embarrassing only appear in the duet? I'd have to go away and have another listen to see).

If Some Enchanted Evening is the example, I'd go with If I Loved You, from Carousel. The bench scene is sublime. I do admire the way Some Enchanted Evening is used in South Pacific, so it's a close thing.

But I think the second act Johanna, in Sweeney Todd, is probably the greatest piece of extended writing in musical theatre.

A Weekend in the Country, as a piece of ensemble writing is the greatest. (I also love Make Our Garden Grow - constrained, as it is, theatrically).

"Greatest" maybe not, but "Reviewing the Situation" from Oliver is absolute musical theatre genius. As are the rest of the songs in it.

Sondheim has always been a strange beast. Sn amazing body of work and a living legend who connects us directly to Hammerstein and the legends of the past.

But he is someone who has been admired more than adored and has certainly struggled to find real popular acclaim.

MT would be much poorer without him and he is to be cherished.

But he has always made some idiosyncratic choices that have not always paid off. And his WSS lyrics only fail for me when they (understandably) avoid swear words that would be part of gang talk.