Tom Jones, Lyricist and Librettist of Long-Running ‘The Fantasticks,’ Dies at 95

Tom Jones, who wrote the book and lyrics for the longest-running musical

“The Fantasticks,” died Friday at his home in Sharon, Conn. He was 95.

Jones was born in Littlefield, Texas, on Feb. 17, 1928.

He attended the University of Texas at Austin, where he first met his longtime collaborator Schmidt.

Jones’s son Michael told The New York Times the cause was cancer.

Jones and the late composer Harvey Schmidt created the musical allegory “The Fantasticks,”

which opened in 1960 in Greenwich Village and ran off-Broadway for a staggering 42 years.

The musical is known for its opening song, “Try to Remember,”

as well as “Soon It’s Gonna Rain,” made popular apart from the show by Barbra Streisand.

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