Stephen Schwartz was born in New York City on March 6, 1948. He studied piano and composition at The Juilliard School while in high school and graduated from Carnegie Mellon University in 1968 with a B.F.A. in Drama. After returning to New York, he worked as an A&R producer for RCA Records, but soon transitioned to the Broadway theatre. His first major credit was the title song for the play Butterflies Are Free, which was later used in the film adaptation.

In 1971, he wrote the music and new lyrics for Godspell, earning two Grammy Awards, among other honors. He then collaborated with Leonard Bernstein on the English texts for Mass, which opened The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. The following year, he wrote the music and lyrics for Pippin, followed two years later by The Magic Show. At one point, all three productions—Godspell, Pippin, and The Magic Show—were running on Broadway simultaneously.

He next wrote the music and lyrics for The Baker’s Wife, followed by a musical adaptation of Studs Terkel’s Working, to which he contributed four songs and which he also adapted and directed, earning a Drama Desk Award for Best Director. He also co-directed the television version, presented as part of PBS’s American Playhouse series.

Additional theatre credits include lyrics for Rags (music by Charles Strouse), and music and lyrics for Children of Eden. He has also written two musicals produced overseas: Mit Eventyr (My Fairy Tale) in Denmark and Schikaneder in Austria. His work for young audiences includes Captain Louie and My Son, Pinocchio. Revue productions of his work include Snapshots and Magic to Do, created for Princess Cruise Lines.

For film, he collaborated with composer Alan Menken on the songs for Disney’s Pocahontas (for which he received two Academy Awards and a Grammy), The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Enchanted. He also wrote songs for DreamWorks’ first animated feature, The Prince of Egypt, winning another Academy Award for “When You Believe.” Both The Hunchback of Notre Dame and The Prince of Egypt have since been adapted for the stage.

His stage musical Wicked opened in 2003 and continues to run on Broadway and around the world. He received a Grammy Award for the cast recording, and by 2008, Wicked had reached its 1,900th Broadway performance, making him the only songwriter in Broadway history to have three shows exceed that milestone.

His first opera, Seance on a Wet Afternoon, premiered at Opera Santa Barbara in 2009 and was later produced by New York City Opera. His frequently performed choral works include “Testimony,” based on the It Gets Better Project; “Keramos”; and portions of the Tyler Clementi Suite. He has also released two singer-songwriter albums, Reluctant Pilgrim and Uncharted Territory.

Schwartz has received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and has been inducted into both the Theatre Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame. In 2015, he was honored with the Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award for his humanitarian and mentorship contributions to the theatre. A book about his career, Defying Gravity, has been published by Applause Books.

Through the ASCAP Foundation, he has served for over twenty years as the artistic director of musical theatre workshops in New York and Los Angeles. He has also led workshops for aspiring writers and performers around the world, including in Australia, Germany, Latvia, and Kenya. He is a past president and current council member of the Dramatists Guild.