According to Robert Holliday, Kilmer's friend and editor, "Trees" speaks "with authentic song to the simplest of hearts" and that "(t)he exquisite title poem now so universally known, made his reputation more than all the rest he had written put together.
The result is a beautifully-authentic song that puts you right there with them, feeling everything they must have been feeling at the time.
Ádám Pálóczi Horváth left a collection of 450 poems, a treasure-house of authentic folk songs.
Still, there are authentic country songs ("So Long Ago"), rootsy rock numbers ("The Gypsy Girl"), and a strong duet with Martina McBride ("All Messed Up").
Where Mr. LaChiusa audaciously tried to recreate and reinvent authentic period songs of the 1920's with a contemporary bite, Mr. Lippa opts more ingratiatingly for of-the-moment power ballads and trendy pop groves, everything from R-and-B to Latin to swing.
Aldridge was adamant that they write an authentic country song, not just a novelty song about Finebaum's radio show.
One song he was certain about, however, was "Blues in the Night" — which he deemed "one of the high points of knowing in my life" and also his only authentic blues song.
But while poking fun, the production also uses authentic Chinese song and dance to tell the opera's story of Lady Du Li Niang, who falls in love with a scholar she sees in a dream.
He thought that Angelou brought out the best in the calypso standards "Peas and Rice" and "Run Joe", but that she reached her peak with "Scandal in the Family", all of which he found as authentic as the songs she wrote.
