For those who may not know him, I promise you that you’ve at least heard his work as the lyricist for West Side Story.
His incredibly sophisticated and clever lyrics are enviable. He manages to fit strange rhymes, alliteration, and wordplay into songs so that it feels natural.
His harmony (and melody) sound so natural and obvious until you pause and look at it for a minute and wonder how he got something so odd and strange to sound like music, and to make the unexpected sound expected (if that makes any sense).
I’ve seen a lot of Sondheim shows, but am just now delving into a production of Into The Woods. A song like On The Steps Of The Palace uses song form and harmonic structure to communicate the meaning and emotion of the song just as much as it uses the lyrics. It seems like an obvious thing to do, but no one does it like Sondheim. Even a simple I-IV progression sounds fresh when he writes it.
If this is turning into a great SF and F writer thread I’d list John Crowley and China Mieville. Gene Wolfe is great. I met him once at a con and he’s a nice guy to boot. I’d recommend Jack Vance and Jorge Luis Borges if you’re interested in his inspirations.
One of the things that I’ve always admired about Garriott is that he’s not afraid to really put it on the line, even if it means doing a total face-plant (kind of how Tabula Rasa is doing right now).