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Valentine's Day is here and love is all around us. At this most romantic time of the year, we can't help but wonder... what is the greatest Broadway love song ever? BroadwayWorld continues our great tradition of finding that consensus- and this year we have more answers than ever! We've gathered responses from over 1500 performers, composers, industry professionals, and entertainment personalities from all over the world.
This year's list is presented by The Notebook, now in previews on Broadway. Based on the best selling novel that inspired the iconic film, this new musical follows Allie and Noah, both from different worlds, as they share a lifetime of love despite the forces that threaten to pull them apart, in a deeply moving portrait of the enduring power of love.
Performer
Rocktopia
My favorite love song from Broadway was from Rock of Ages: "High Enough" by Night Ranger. Just something about the song made me feel like, "okay it's a love song without all the normal dialogue." I was more like a conversation instead of a "I love you because of this." And it was also a great band.
Creative
Memphis
“Love Will Stand When All Else Falls" from my musical MEMPHIS is still the best lyric that says it all when it comes to LOVE!!!!
Performer
Little Shop of Horrors
My favorite Broadway love song is "Forever Yours" from Once on This Island. It is stunning and has an unexpected ending like love often can
Director
Sunday In The Park With George
"Too Many Mornings" from Follies. Few of us could claim to have spent thousands of mornings yearning to wake up to the one they love. But all of us could claim to have, at some time in our lives, spent too many. A heartbreakingly beautiful love song.
Performer
Tuck Everlasting
My favorite Broadway love song is "Forever Yours," from Once On This Island. It's such a wonderful expression of the power and timelessness of true love. Not to mention the fact that the story of star crossed lovers never gets old!
Performer
King Kong
I would have to say that my favorite Broadway love song would have to be When Words Fail from Shrek. It’s not your typical love song, but it is beautiful nonetheless. It gives you a the sense of some cute school yard crush. He is trying so hard not to be awkward and really express himself but can’t find the words. But he knows that no matter what he says (or doesn’t say) she will understand his true intentions. If that isn’t love, I don’t know what is.
Performer
Tina | King Kong | Something Rotten! | Kinky Boots
My favorite is "The Human Heart" from Once on This Island. I'm pretty sure that whenever I get married, someone will fabulously sing that song to me. I love that song!
Performer
My Fair Lady | Catch Me If You Can | Big Fish | Wicked | Dirty Rotten Scoundrels | The Last Five Years
In Big Fish, Kate Baldwin had a song called "I Don't Need a Roof." It makes me emotional just thinking about it. For anyone who hasn't listened to that soundtrack recently, listen to Kate sing the lyric to that Andrew Lippa song, and I'll tell you- if that doesn't make you feel something, you don't have a heart!
Director
Tony Nominee | The Color Purple
I guess "If I Loved You" from CAROUSEL would be it for me. Its indirect and hypothetical way of voicing love is so temperamentally right for me. The underlying fear and vulnerability that often accompanies love is beautifully acknowledged by not saying "I love you" but rather "if I loved you." In fact that "if" allows for full expression and articulation of love in all its manifestation. It alerts the object of the "if love" to what signs and behavior to look for as a signfier of that love. To me it is a perfect love song.
Performer
Shucked | The Wedding Singer | Chitty Chitty Bang Bang | The Rocky Horror Show | The Lion King
Without a doubt, "The Origin of Love" from Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Stephen Trask’s searing masterpiece lets us know how it all began and places our collective truths right at our feet. ‘I could swear by your expression, that the pain down in your soul, was the same as the one down in mine…’. That sums it all up. Plato couldn’t have said it better.
Performer
Forbidden Broadway | Burn the Floor | The Rocky Horror Show
My favorite love songs are "My Time Of Day" and "All The Things You Are.”
Performer
Memphis
"Once Upon a Time" because it's a really sweet song - even though it ends sad.
Performer
Rocktopia
My favorite love song is Gerswhin's "The Man I Love." I learned it when I was about 20 years old, and I was asked to sing it for the late, great Beverly Sills at a dinner party, and I was very nervous. I was told it was her favorite song, and now it's become one my very favorite songs as well.
Director
Other World | Hatefuck | The Big and the Small
"Light My Candle" from Rent. It was one of the first Broadway musicals I ever saw, and it made a huge impression on me. Michael Grief is a mentor of mine. And in my adolescence I performed that song a few times and that is a fond and cringey memory!
Performer
Puffs
"Tonight" from West Side Story is an absolute classic. "Being Alive" from Company perfectly encapsulates the complexities of love. "When You're Home" from In The Heights is my favorite to dance to. When the orchestration comes in on "One Second and a Million Miles" from The Bridges of Madison County, my heart swells. However, everyone knows the greatest Broadway love story of all time is the one between Sweeney Todd and his razors. Sing "My Friends" to your crush on Valentine's Day and watch them swoon!
Performer
Be More Chill | Groundhog Day | Spring Awakening
"Come Out of the Dumpster" from The Wedding Singer. It just nails it.
Performer
Laugh Whore | Assassins | The Violet Hour | The Tempest | Love! Valour! Compassion! | Sex and the City | Comedian
"Sue Me" from GUYS AND DOLLS.
Industry
President | John Capo Public Relations
"The Best Thing That Has Ever Happened" from Road Show.
Industry
The Heart of Rock and Roll | Spamalot | Falsettos
“Suddenly Seymour" from Little Shop of Horrors. It’s such a great song, and what’s not to love about an underdog love story. For me, it’s a song about being seen for who you really are, about seeing what’s been there the whole time, and as they say over and over again, understanding.
Performer
Funny Girl | Rent: Live
“I’ll Cover You” from RENT. A few years ago, I was fortunate enough to be in RENT: LIVE, and every single time I heard “I’ll Cover You” my eyes would just fill with tears. The song is such a perfect declaration of deep, selfless love — “Live in my house, I’ll be your shelter/Just pay me back with 1,000 kisses/ Be my lover and I’ll cover you“ — just so beautiful. And it is, hands down, one of the most romantic songs I have ever heard.
Performer
Falsettos | Bright Star | Cinderella
"Children Will Listen" an unconventional choice, from Into the Woods. *sings* "Careful the things you say, children will listen" Tears every time.
Performer
The Lion King
I sang “Something Good” from The Sound of Music to my wife on our wedding day. I’m still wondering what good I did in my past to deserve her.
Performer
Be More Chill | Dirty Dancing
"Without You" from Rent. It's just beautiful, yearning feeling of loving someone so much, it feels like the world stops without them.
Performer
HAIR
There are so many! Today, I would have to say "One Hand, One Heart" from WEST SIDE STORY and "Our Love Is Here To Stay" by George and Ira Gershwin. Both are brilliantly written and both make my heart melt.
Performer
SPIDER-MAN: TURN OFF THE DARK
"What Do Get When You Fall In Love" from PROMISES PROMISES
Performer
SPIDER-MAN: TURN OFF THE DARK
I don't know too many broadway songs..."All the Things You Are" has always been a favorite....but I'd love to say this year, "If the World Should End" in SPIDER-MAN: TURN OFF THE DARK
Performer
Hand to God
It's old school, but "Something Good," from The Sound of Music slays me. Seeing Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer together as a pre teen woke something up in me. Just like Maria, I couldn't resist the captain. It sounds so pure and chaste, but there's an underlying sensuality in that song that still makes me weak in the knees. But then again, nothing captures that free falling feeling of love like, "Changing My Major," in Fun Home. Oh, Joan. May we all have a Joan at least once......
Performer
Come From Away
My favorite Broadway love song is "Till There Was You" from The Music Man. Not only is the music of the song just plain beautiful, but the way it perfectly expresses the changes love has made in Harold and Marian's life is magical. Well played, Mr. Willson.
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