Fred Ebb

Fred Ebb, the American lyricist whose partnership with composer John Kander gave Broadway Cabaret, Chicago, and the anthem “New York, New York,” died of a heart attack at a Manhattan hospital on September 11, 2004. He was seventy-six. Born in New York City on April 8, 1928, he worked odd jobs, finished degrees at NYU and Columbia, and found his true instrument in words that sat on Kander's melodies like a well-cut suit. Flora the Red Menace introduced them; Cabaret made them indispensable. Chicago, Woman of the Year, Kiss of the Spider Woman, and a shelf of songs for Liza Minnelli followed. He wrote for stage, film, and television with a urban snap that treated cynicism as entertainment rather than despair. At his death he left unfinished work that collaborators finished — Curtains among them — proof that a lyricist's desk does not empty on schedule. He is remembered at Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn beside companions, under a stone that says together forever. The Fred Ebb Award continues to stake young writers the way a good verse stakes a tune. He died in New York on September 11, 2004. Come to the cabaret remains an invitation; his rhymes still hold the door. Ebb's gift was conversational steel — lyrics that sounded spoken until you noticed every consonant had a job. Kander supplied the harmonic engines; Ebb supplied the city's accent. Cabaret's emcee, Chicago's merry murderesses, and Minnelli's skyline anthem are different costumes on the same refusal to be naïve. Later writers still chase that balance of bitterness and showmanship. Green-Wood's mausoleum is quiet; the pit orchestras are not. This page keeps the lyricist's name where searchers for September 11 anniversaries might not expect to find Broadway, which is exactly why it belongs.