Rags

• Original Broadway Production (1986)
  New York, NY
• Chicago Revival (1987)
  Chicago, IL
• Off-Broadway Revival (1991)
  New York, NY
• London Revival (1996)
  London, England
• Paper Mill Playhouse Production (1999)
  Millburn, NJ
• London Revival (2001)
  London, England
• New York Concert (2006)
  New York, NY
• Lyric Stage Production (2011)
  Irving, TX
• Off-Off Broadway Revival (2013)
  New York, NY
• Goodspeed Production (2017)
  East Haddam, CT

Click on the title for info on the song.

Original score

• I Remember
• Greenhorns
• Brand New World
• Children of the Wind
• Penny a Tune
• Easy for You
• Hard to Be a Prince
  • aka Hamlet [no note]
• Blame It on the Summer Night
  • aka Summer Night [no note]
• For My Mary
• Rags
• What's Wrong With That?
  • aka What's Wrong With That [no note]
• On the Fourth Day of July
• In America
• Yankee Boy
• Uptown
• Wanting
• Three Sunny Rooms
• The Sound of Love
• Democratic Club Dance
• Prayer
  • aka Kaddish [no note]
• Bread and Freedom
• Dancing With the Fools
• Lullaby

Cut prior to opening

• Nothing Will Hurt Us Again
• Cherry Street Café
  • aka The Cherry Street Cafe [no note]
• Russia, Russia
• The Sweatshop Rag
• Cheer Up, Hamlet
• Up Until Today
• This Golden Land
• Now That Papa's Back
• With Me
• It's Gonna Belong to Me
• Safe Again
• I Must Find a Way to You

Added to 1991 revival

• If We Never Meet Again

Added to 1999 Paper Mill Production

• The Music We Know
• The Brand New World Rag

• Composer Demo (Schwartz) [audio]
• Composer Demo (Strouse) [audio]
• Backers' Audition [audio]

In 1910, a young Jewish widow and her son arrive in New York, seeking a better life. She finds work in the garment industry and builds friendships with fellow immigrants, each facing their own struggles and dreams. As they contend with harsh labor conditions, discrimination, and the lure of assimilation, their resilience is tested. Through love, loss, and the fight for dignity, they discover strength in community and the enduring hope of building a new future.

Begun as Joseph Stein was repeatedly requested to work on a followup to Fiddler on the Roof (1964), Stein wanted to do a show about the immigrant experience. Rather than use the characters he had already dramatized in Fiddler, he began work on an original story.

• Rags: Children of the Wind (1991 American Jewish Theatre title)