"Chess" (1) The Story of Chess

Part one of Chess in Concert, featuring the talents of Josh Groban, Adam Pascal, Idina Menzel, and Kerry Ellis. Recorded live at the Royal Albert Hall. Chess involves a romantic triangle between two players in a World Chess Championship, and the woman who manages one and falls in love with the other.

Reference:  Chess in Concert.

Script

The Arbiter:
Each game of chess
Means there's one less
Variation left to be played. 

Each day got through
Means one or two
Less mistakes remain to be made. 

Soloists 1 & 2:
Not much is known
Of early days of chess
Beyond a fairly vague report-- 

Soloist 3:
That fifteen hundred years ago
Two princes fought,
Tough brothers,
For a Hindu throne. 

Soloist 4:
The mother cried,
For no one really likes
Their offspring fighting
To the death.
She begged to stop
The slaughter
With her every breath. 

Soloist 5:
But sure enough
One brother died. 

Soloists 4 & 6:
Sad beyond belief,
She told her winning son, 

Soloist 6:
"You have caused such grief
I can't forgive
This evil thing you've done." 

Soloist 3 & 7:
He tried to explain
How things had really been. 

Soloist 7:
But he tried in vain,
No words of his
Could mollify the queen. 

Soloist 8:
And so he asked
The wisest men he knew
The way to lessen her distress. 

The Arbiter:
They told him he'd be
Pretty certain to impress
By using model soldiers
On a checkered board
To show it was his brother's fault-- 

All:
They thus invented chess 

Male Soloists:
Chess displayed no inertia,
Soon spread to Persia,
Then west. 

Female Soloists:
Next the Arabs refined it,
Thus redesigned, it
Progressed. 

Soloist 9:
Still further yet,
And when Constantinople
Fell in 1453,
One would have noticed
Every other refugee
Included in his bags a set. 

Soloist 10:
Once in the hands,
And in the minds
Of leading figures
Of the Renaissance-- 

Soloist 2:
The spirit and the speed
Of chess made swift advance
Through all of Europe's vital lands. 

Female Soloists: {Male Soloists:}
Where we must record {Each game of chess,}
The game was further changed-- {Means there's one less}
Right across the board {Variation left to be played.}
The western touch
Upon the pieces ranged. 

Soloists:
King, and queen, and rook,
And bishop, knight, and pawn
All took on the look
We know today--
The modern game was born. 

The Arbiter:
And in the end,
We see a game
That started by mistake
In Hindustan--
And boosted in the main
By what is now Iran--
Become the simplest,
And most complicated
Pleasure yet devised
For just the kind of mind
Who would appriciate this
Well-researched, and fascinating
Yarn. 

[Spoken]
The World Chess Federation, of which I have the honor
of being president, announces that the next world championship
will take place here in Merano, Italy. 

The current world champion Frederick Trumper of the United
States of America will defend his title again Anatoly Sergievsky
of the Soviet Union. 

The first player to achieve six victories will be declared
champion. The first game will begin on March 27, 1979. 

Welcome, world, to Merano!

The Story of Chess