“Sadie’s Seder” by Mark Bornfield
- H B
- Apr 11
- 1 min read
MTM2025 is fortunate to be able to draw upon a rich reservoir of wonderful musicians and composers who offer a variety of musical styles, backgrounds and cultures! Composer Mark Bornfield who writes music and lyrics for theater and film, offers a peek into his writing process and how he created this sweet, humorous and catchy song for the musical, "Confessions of a Retired Witch!" (Formerly “MisSpelled!” in it's earlier stages.) Many thanks to Mark Bornfield and D’Jamin Bartlett (singing,) for offering us this unique and creative insight into how one particular song is created. Beginning with just an idea, the composer shares the steps taken through to the final lyrical and musical creation!
“The first consideration for this particular song was in setting the style which would include tempo and rhythm. For this case I chose a Hora dance. Once that was done, I had to figure out how to tell my story. In this case I set up the story of Passover. My lyrics came first. I used four bar sections which modulated between two keys (I-IV) intro. Then accelerating to the actual dinner with 5 verses. I just came up with actual facts about the dinner including what was served and human response. The stop time was a contrast to the repeating verses as the story unfolded. The last verse just reinforced the happy get together." ~ Mark Bornfield