Memory

“Memory” is a show tune composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, with lyrics by Trevor Nunn based on poems by T. S. Eliot. It was written for the 1981 musical Cats, where it is sung primarily by the character Grizabella as a melancholic remembrance of her glamorous past and as a plea for acceptance. “Memory” is the climax of the musical and by far its best-known song, having achieved mainstream success outside of the musical. According to musicologist Jessica Sternfeld, writing in 2006, it is “by some estimations the most successful song ever from a musical.” Elaine Paige originated the role of Grizabella in the West End production of Cats and was thus the first to perform the song publicly on stage. “Memory” was named the Best Song Musically and Lyrically at the 1982 Ivor Novello Awards. In 2020, Jessie Thompson of the Evening Standard wrote, “Paige’s version set the standard and enabled Memory to become one of the most recognisable musical theatre songs of all time.” In Cats, “Memory” is sung primarily by Grizabella, a one-time “glamour cat” who has fallen on hard times and is now only a shell of her former self For most of the musical, Grizabella is ostracized by her fellow Jellicle cats.[5] She sings a prelude version of “Memory” at the end of the first act, recalling the time before she became an outcast. Melodic fragments of “Memory” are then sung twice in a higher D major key by Jemima (also known as Sillabub), a young cat who is sympathetic to Grizabella’s plight. The first instance occurs at the beginning of the second act after “The Moments of Happiness”, and the second instance occurs near the end of the second act right before Grizabella’s final appearance. As Grizabella returns near the end of the musical, she sings the full version of the song as she pleads for acceptance, with Jemima joining in briefly to urge her on.
Conception and composition Andrew Lloyd Webber originally composed the tune for a proposed Giacomo Puccini project that he later abandoned. Although the tune was intentionally written in the style of Puccini, Lloyd Webber was concerned that he had unknowingly lifted it from one of Puccini’s works. He asked his father, a noted expert on Puccini, for his opinion on whether it sounded like one of the composer’s works; according to Lloyd Webber, his father responded: “It sounds like a million dollars!” Prior to its inclusion in Cats, the composition had also been earmarked for his early draft of Sunset Boulevard. The widow of Larry Clinton claimed that “Memory” was based on Clinton’s “Bolero in Blue”, which in turn was based on Maurice Ravel’s Boléro. Musicologist John Snelson dismissed this claim, however, noting the difference in the phrasing between Boléro and “Memory”: the former is long and continuous, while the latter is centered on a repeated tone and a “turnlike figure” to emphasize said tone. Snelson further argues that the chord progression (I-vi-IV-iii) and time signature
8) in “Memory” are more akin to popular music of the time, suggesting a completely different origin than Boléro. Cats is based on a 1939 book of poems by T. S. Eliot, Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, and the lyrics for “Memory” were adapted from Eliot’s poems “Rhapsody on a Windy Night” and “Preludes” by the musical’s director Trevor Nunn. Lloyd Webber’s former writing partners Don Black and Tim Rice had also each submitted a lyric to the show’s producers for consideration, although Nunn’s version was favoured. Elaine Paige was given a different lyric to sing to the tune of “Memory” every night during previews for Cats