Stephen Sondheim's 80th birthday, which took place in March, has been celebrated with considerable fanfare throughout the year, including gala performances in concert halls around the world and the naming of a Broadway theater in his honor. Yesterday, The Kennedy Center announced that it would be marking the occasion with the creation of a new award recognizing teachers, The Kennedy Center/Stephen Sondheim Inspirational Teacher Awards, to be presented annually on the occasion of the composer's birthday.

Each year, The Kennedy Center/Stephen Sondheim Inspirational Teacher Awards will solicit nominations from the general public and notable public figures, providing the opportunity to submit stories about teachers and professors who made a significant difference in their lives.

On March 22, Sondheim's birthday, a select number of these teachers will each receive The Kennedy Center/Stephen Sondheim Inspirational Teacher Award of $10,000 in appreciation for their contributions to the field of teaching. Awardees will also be showcased, along with the people they inspired, on The Kennedy Center/Stephen Sondheim Inspirational Teacher Awards web site. The application deadline is Wednesday, December 15, 2010.

The Kennedy Center/Stephen Sondheim Inspirational Teacher Awards were created in honor of Stephen Sondheim's 80th birthday and were initiated and funded through the generous support of Freddie and Myrna Gershon.

For more information and to enter your teacher, visit kennedy-center.org.

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The Daily Telegraph in London features an extensive profile of the composer and finds that "Sondheim, who revolutionised the musical with hits such as Sweeney Todd and A Little Night Music, has lost none of his edge."

The Telegraph's Mick Brown visited Sondheim in his New York apartment and says: "He has lived in New York all his life, and his work, while seldom explicitly about the city, seems very much to reflect its sensibility—sharp, sophisticated, knowing."

Brown goes on to say that Sondheim "is, by universal acknowledgment, the man who revolutionised American musical theatre, and the last survivor of a form that is all but extinct, swept away in the deluge of 'jukebox musicals’, overblown crowd-pleasers and 'theme-park’ spectacles that now dominate the Broadway stage."

There is much, much more in the complete article at telegraph.co.uk.

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The Public Theater in New York City has just announced that Sondheim will join playwright Tony Kushner on stage at the Public November 29 to close out the Public Forum series. The conversation will be hosted by NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman. For more information, visit publictheater.org. For information on additional public events featuring Stephen Sondheim, visit nonesuch.com/on-tour.