Other Shows & Songs

More Shows and Songs from Howard's Career

Babe (unfinished)

Lyrics by : Howard Ashman
Music by : Alan Menken

After Rosewater closed, Howard sat down with Alan Menken to work on a musical that would star Fred Coffin. Alan talked about the show, among other things in an interview for this site a few years back.

Both Howard and Alan had adored working with Fred, whom Howard had cast as Eliot Rosewater and thought he would be a perfect Babe Ruth.

Fred was a big, avuncular man with a baby face who could look and act the part of homegrown American hero.

Thus Babe - the story of Babe Ruth. Work on Babe stalled, though, and Howard and Alan went on to work on another show - based on a cult movie about a talking plant.

“Mr. Coffin is a big, lumbering bear of a man who completely captures the character’s attitude of enlightened ingenuousness. ”

— Mel Gussow, on Fred Coffin as Eliot Rosewater

Songs from Babe:

"Voices"
"Growing Boy"
"Statistics"
"Hero"
"For the Good of the Game"

Diamonds

1984, Circle in the Square

Diamonds was a baseball themed review, conceived and directed by Harold Prince. Howard contributed two songs, both written in collaboration with composer Jonathan Sheffer.

"Song of a Hunter College Graduate"
"Straw Boater Rag (Hundreds of Hats)"

Dreamstuff

1976, WPA Theater

Although Howard had written the book and lyrics for The Snow Queen as part of his Masters thesis at Indiana University, up until Dreamstuff, his focus had been on plays, not musicals. On Dreamstuff, a musical take on Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Howard wrote the book, but the lyrics were written by Dennis Green, with music by Marsha Malamut.

Most importantly to Howard and his career, it was on Dreamstuff that he realized his interest in writing lyrics as well as the book for musicals.

More songs by Howard

"Sheridan Square" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken)
"Aria For a Cow" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken)
"Daughter of God" - recorded by Alix Korey (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken)
"Brown" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken)
"The Count's Lament" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken)

Fletch

"Fletch, Don’t Drop The Ball" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken)

Fatty At The Opera (unfinished)

"A Day In The Life Of A Fat Kid In Philly" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Jonathan Sheffer)

LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS (CUT SONGS)

"We’ll Have Tomorrow" (Cut)

"A Little Dental Music" (Cut)

“The Worse He Treats Me” (Cut)

"Bad" (For film. Cut)

"Bad Like Me" (For film. Cut)

"ThunderCrash" (For film. Cut)

"Your Day Begins Tonight" (For film. Cut)

Oliver and Company (animated Disney film)

"Once Upon A Time In New York City" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Barry Mann)
"El Gato/Something About Them (Tito’s Song)" (Lyrics by Howard Ashman, Music by Alan Menken)