Alan and Marilyn Bergman on Barbra Streisand and her definitive version of Windmills of Your Mind

Streisand's new album, “What Matters Most,” is a tribute to the Alan and Marilyn Bergman and their music. The Bergmans spoke with Reuters about the album and their long relationship with Streisand. Here are some excerpts:

Marilyn

Other people have sung ‘Windmills of Your Mind,' but really, we think hers will be the definitive version It's the nuances and the layers of meaning that perhaps we meant but didn't hear ourselves. They are all highlighted when she works, she really works at it. She strives for excellence. You can read that as being a perfectionist but not in the sense that has become pejorative. She wants to make something the best it can be… She's aware of the permanence when you write something or perform something, and she sees her responsibility as making something as good as it can be.

Alan

What Marilyn said is true. We can't dismiss all those things we talked about that go into the notes and interpretation. They're all richer. That's why the songs have added dimension, more than what we realized, because she makes little vignettes and stories out of every song. That is the actress in her and the dramatist in her.

Gramilano( Editor )

Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano') about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.

His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman's Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia' column for Dancing Times magazine.