Tim Rice: a hard graft to success

When one thinks of Tim Rice, one doesn’t exactly picture a man who has had a tremendous struggle to make it to the top.

When one thinks of Tim Rice, one doesn’t exactly picture a man who has had a tremendous struggle to make it to the top. He met Andrew Lloyd Webber in 1965, wrote several world-conquering hit musicals with him, and later moved on to Disney where he got a slice of the action on Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King, among others. Unlike his former colleague, who has so often appeared driven and troubled, Rice has always given every impression of enjoying life greatly.

But it wasn’t always plain sailing as a fascinating CD makes clear. That’s My Story: Words and Music by Tim Rice and Friends chronicles his early years as a young lyricist and record producer before the hits happened, when almost everything he had a hand in turned out to be a flop.