Some Enchanted Evening

This article is about the song. For other uses, see Some Enchanted Evening (disambiguation).
"Some Enchanted Evening"
Song
from the album South Pacific
Published1949
Composer(s)Richard Rodgers
Lyricist(s)Oscar Hammerstein II

"Some Enchanted Evening" is a show tune from the 1949 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific. It has been described as "the single biggest popular hit to come out of any Rodgers and Hammerstein show."[1] Andrew Lloyd Webber describes it as the "greatest song ever written for a musical".[2]

The song is a three-verse solo for the leading male character, Emile, in which he describes first seeing a stranger, knowing that he will see her again, then dreaming of hearing her laughter and finally of feeling her call him. He sings that when you find your "true love", you must "fly to her side, and make her your own, / Or all through your life you may dream all alone." The song has been called "a marvelous distillation of love at first sight [but also] a reflection for mature people who've known it and lived it".[3]

  1. ^ Mast, Gerald. Can't Help Singin': The American Musical on Stage and Screen, Overlook Press (1987), p. 206, excerpted in: Block, Geoffrey. The Richard Rodgers Reader, p. 91, Oxford University Press (2006).
  2. ^ "BBC One - imagine..., Winter 2017/18, Andrew Lloyd Webber: Memories". imagine ... Andrew Lloyd Webber. Retrieved 26 July 2020.
  3. ^ Steyn, Mark. "'Some Enchanted Evening': Steyn's Song of the Week", The Mark Steyn Club, August 18, 2024