The Memory Show tells a simple story: a daughter (Leslie Kritzer) moves back home to take care of her mother (Catherine Cox) who has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. The two women have clashed throughout their entire lives, and illness doesn’t seem to put them less at odds with each other. The daughter resents the mother for having pushed her father way, the mother resents the daughter for not having even tried to come close to her. Even though both characters remain nameless, this doesn’t mean they aren’t fully realized people, and during the show’s month-long run in the spring 0f 2013, it was a pleasure to see what Cox and Kritzer brought to the stage.

With music by Zach Redler and book & lyrics by Sara Cooper, The Memory Show proved to be, pardon the pun, quite unforgettable, but it would take the original cast recording almost two years to make its way to stores. We had the opportunity to talk to Cooper and Redler about the origins of the show and the long road to a commercial release.

The show’s origins

Redler: We met at a musical theatre writing program in graduate school, and The Memory Show was in fact our graduation thesis. It evolved and eventually became a 90 minute presentation, we had a reading at the Barrington Stage Company and it got great reviews.

Dealing with Alzheimer’s

Cooper: We had two ideas, this one and the other was a gigantic idea about a cult which would have been hard to execute. But when we were working on this my grandmother had just passed away, so it seemed like a good story to tell.

Creating the characters and the show’s big twist

Cooper: The character are completely fictional, but I remember writing the lyrics and when we showed them in class, everyone was very moved. We saw the characters slowly coming out of the lyrics. We were so lucky when Leslie and Catherine signed on to do the show.

Redler: The way we wrote the show was more or less that at least for the first few months, we were bringing in three scenes and songs to class each week and we worked on the premise of what if someone found themselves in this scenario, in order to make them real.

Writing “Who is the President of the United States?”

Cooper: That is the first question neurologists ask!

Redler: And in fact it’s the only song in the show that hasn't changed a lyric or a note, everything else had gone through a billion changes, but this number remained the same.

Writing the characters through musical notes

Redler: we always write lyrics first, Sara emails me the lyrics, in terms of the score structure, the mother’s music is more pointillistic, the accompaniment is note to note, as opposed to blocks of harmony, her vocal lines are definitely kind of more over the place, a little conversational, not what you would deem a normal melody for a pop song, the daughter’s music is lighter, her songs are based on four different chords.

Producing the cast recording

Redler: Neither Sara and I had experience producing anything, Sara set up an Indiegogo, campaign which didn’t reach the main goal, but got us enough money to get started. The toughest thing eventually, was finding the time to get it done, everybody involved with the recording was extremely generous with their time, Yellow Sound, Catherine and Leslie. We finished raising all the money in April or May of 2014, recorded until September. It’s been a long process, a true passion project.

Writing musicals about screwed up families (Loving Leo, Putting Off Goodbye)

Cooper: (Laughs) Personally I’m very fascinated by families, being an adult in the world and how the American family has changed.

Redler: I love what that allows the score to do, one act shows, are like great plays, when the character needs to sing they sing. As a composer it allows me to craft a more unified score, looking at the characters very deeply, it just resonates very much with the way that I write. I’m lucky that Sara feels the same way. We were lucky to find each other.

The Memory Show: Original Off-Broadway Cast Recording is now available in online stores and on iTunes. The CD will be available in stores on March 24.