Losing My Mind

Written by Stephen Sondheim.

Released on the 1972 album I Capricorn. The album has been re-released digitally remastered on CD recently and additionally this song is available on the CD collection Original Gold.

This song is taken from the Sondheim musical "Follies". The broadway premiere had been on April 4, 1971, and it had 522 performances.

The story plays on the stage of the Weismann Theatre, New York City. The owner Dimitri Weismann has gathered together the surviving performers of his lavish pre-war Weismann Follies for a first and last reunion. An invitation "to glamorize the old days, stumble through a song or two, and lie about ourselves" before the theater is demolished to make way for a new parking lot.

The follies girl Sally Durant-Plummer tries to rekindle her old flame with Benjamin Stone (who married her best friend from the old days, Phyllis Rogers-Stone), chaos ensues until Sally with Buddy Plummer (her husband), Ben, and Phyllis break down and acknowledge their follies in a dream-Follies sequence, "Loveland."

The entire show is interspersed with ex-showgirls reprising their old big numbers, and the atmosphere is heightened by the presence of the ghosts of everyone's former selves, who sometimes sing along, sometimes reenact important events, and sometimes even interact with the present. Follies contains two scores - the Follies pastiche numbers and the book numbers. The convergence of the two scores results in the "Loveland" sequence, where the characters use traditional songs to comment on their current concerns. The final piece (in the original script) is "Live Laugh, Love" where Ben attempts to present the suave, man-about-town character, but is unable to continue the charade and breaks down as the chorus continues, highlighting the dichotomy between forms.

In the musical "Losing My Mind" has been sung by Sally. Another song from this musical that Shirley Bassey has performed is "I'm Still Here", but it has never been recorded.
In 1987, Follies was reworked for the West End stage. This new production featured a completely new book and five new songs, replacing others which were cut.

To read more about Stephen Sondheim, look at Send In The Clowns.
 

Lyrics:

The sun comes up

I think about you

The coffee cup

I think about you

I want you so

It's like I'm losing my mind

The morning ends

I think about you

I talk to friends

I think about you

And do they know?

It's like I'm losing my mind

All afternoon, doing every little chore The thought of you stays bright Sometimes I stand in the middle of the floor

Not going left, not going right

I dim the lights

And think about you

Spend sleepless nights

To think about you

You said you loved me

Or were you just being kind?
Or am I losing my mind?

I want you so

It's like I'm losing my mind

All afternoon, doing every little chore The thought of you stays bright Sometimes I stand in the middle of the floor

Not going left, not going right

I dim the lights and think about you Spend sleepless nights to think about you You said you loved me

Or were you just being kind?
Or am I losing my mind?

(transcribed by Roman <scribbler@gmx.net>)