Having recently been revisiting my interest in Broadway albums, replacing some of my old library copies, getting new stuff, and so forth, it seems that right now is a good time for a “top ten” list of Broadway albums. Utterly useless, and fun. Note: I’m limiting this list to original cast albums only—no revivals, London Cast, or movie versions.
1. My Fair Lady (Original 1956 Broadway Cast, Columbia Masterworks)
I don’t suppose there’s much to argue about this one. The show had opened about 10 days earlier, and all on board were acutely aware that they were in one of the all-time Broadway successes. The performances were fresh, completely polished, exuberant. I don’t suppose Julie Andrews has ever sounded better with her razor-sharp diction and bang-on intonation, high lyric soprano without the slighest wobble or apparent flaw (at least to this ear.) Rex Harrison owned the role of Henry Higgins from the onset, but in this first recording his performance was refreshingly free of the mannerisms which eventually virtually overwhelmed it. (Think about the movie performance, which is really almost a collection of twitchy ticks and tocks.)
In some ways it’s a shame that it isn’t in stereo; Columbia was already experimenting with stereo recording in 1956 and would in fact release “West Side Story” in stereo just a year later. Rival label RCA had been making stereo recordings since late 1953. On the other hand, early Columbia stereo recordings weren’t all that polished as a rule, and this 1956 recording probably stands as the last of the truly great monophonic recordings. I’d certainly rather have this than some violently spread-out affair where everything emerges far left or far right, never in the middle, and never with any space. Columbia’s master engineers knew everything there was to know about monophonic balance, so the sense of spaciousness is excellent. In fact, this recording is a prime of example of just how good monophonic recording can be. So it really isn’t much of an issue, especially not in the recent digital remastering which lets us hear what those master tapes really sounded like without all the LP equalizations. Columbia went to London in 1959 and recorded the cast there in a stereo recording (same leads, but different supporting roles). That is the “gold cover” My Fair Lady, which is interesting to be sure but rather sloppy in comparison to this original. It’s the “white cover” which is the crown jewel.
I should also mention that the concert world owes a special debt of gratitude to this recording, one of the highest selling of all time. The Masterworks division of Columbia, which made this album, was also the ‘classical’ division. It was Columbia’s practice to keep profits within the division, meaning that the enormous sums earned from this single recording went into financing some of Columbia’s “prestige” recording projects of the late 1950s and into the 1960s. In a nutshell, “My Fair Lady” paid for the irreplacable set of composer-conducted recordings, especially the legendary Igor Stravinsky series. It also paid for Aaron Copland’s performances with the London Symphony, and the complete works of Webern conducted by Robert Craft.
2. South Pacific (Original 1949 Broadway Cast, Columbia Masterworks)
Columbia Masterworks will have the lion’s share of the entries in this Top Ten list. The head of the Masterworks division, eventually to run the entire company, was Goddard Lieberson, a cultivated if somewhat megalomaniac man who signed his letters as “God”. Lieberson was devoted to both classical and theater music, and it was under his leadership that Columbia made their now-legendary series of original cast albums. For a long time archrival RCA came in a very distant second to Columbia in the Broadway market.
‘South Pacific’ was among the earlier of Columbia’s ventures into Broadway recordings, and the label’s first Rodgers & Hammerstein project. Decca had pioneered the original cast album with “Oklahoma” back in 1943, and had followed up that success with “Carousel”. RCA recorded Rodgers & Hammerstein’s failed third musical “Allegro”. A comparison with Columbia’s recording technology as of 1949 with, say, Decca’s recording of the original cast of “The King and I” (1951) immediately reveals Columbia’s technical superiority. The sound is rich monophonic, full-frequency, whereas the Decca recording is shrill and tinny. So, although Rodgers and Hammerstein plays were recorded by a number of companies (Decca, RCA, and Columbia) it is the Columbia recordings (South Pacific, Flower Drum Song, and The Sound of Music) which have held up the best sonically.
As a sidenote, it’s interesting that RCA has the dubious honor of having recorded the original cast albums of all three of the R&H failures—Allegro, Me & Juliet, and Pipe Dream—and none of the hit shows.
So much for the history. The recording itself is uniformly splendid, each performance really the defining one for that particular character. Ezio Pinza may have spoken English with a nearly impenetrable accent, but in singing Emile de Becque he is unequalled. Mary Martin’s greatest Broadway role and her most memorable performance is here captured, as is Juanita Hall’s magnificent Bloody Mary. (In the movie version, Hall recreated her performance—but her voice was dubbed, for some unfathomable reason.) There have been a lot of fine Joe Cable performances, but for sheer impassioned power, William Tabbert remains the champ. Add to that a stellar orchestra and one of the more powerful men’s choruses in Broadway history, and you have a total winner.
About the only fly in the ointment is the playing time for the selections. In 1949 records were still being released in 78 rpm format as well as the newer long-playing album, so no selection could be longer than the side of a 78 record—i.e., a little under 4 minutes. Thus there are cuts here and there. Nonetheless, the recording is an imperishable gem, a must for every Broadway collection. Incidentally, it appears to have been one of the very last albums to have been recorded simultaneously on magnetic tape and a 78-rpm disc master. The recent remastering is from the tapes, of course, and sometimes it’s hard to believe you’re hearing a sixty year-old recording, even if it’s monophonic.
3. Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (Original 1979 Broadway Cast, RCA Victor)
Stephen Sondheim may have been relatively unlucky when it comes to movies of his musicals (until Tim Burton finally broke the hex with “Sweeney Todd”), but he has been abundantly blessed when it comes to original cast albums. Even his short-lived flop “Anyone Can Whistle” received a lovingly careful, pristine recording at the hands of the ace producer Goddard Lieberson at Columbia—a recording which kept the show’s cult status alive. As a lyricist his successes of the 1950s are beautfully documented on Columbia’s glorious recordings of “Gypsy” and “West Side Story” (both of which are also on this list.) Capitol Records gave us first-class versions of “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” and “Follies”, and Columbia then chipped in with a near-legendary recording of “Company”. RCA Victor was a bit of a latecomer to the Sondheim stable, but once they arrived, they produced immaculately fine recordings of some of Sondheim’s finest scores—not only Sweeney, but also “Sunday in the Park with George”, “Into the Woods”, and “Assassins” (even going so far as to commission a full orchestration for the latter recording instead of using the original 3-piece combo).
“Sweeney Todd” is probably Sondheim’s masterpiece, and we are fortunate in that Thomas Z. Shepard (RCA’s equivalent to Goddard Lieberson) saw fit to record this landmark production nearly complete, instead of cutting and trimming to fit a single long-playing album. The recording even includes “Joanna”, sung by Judge Turpin, which was cut out of the show early on and has remained cut in most productions.
The performances are stellar: Angela Lansbury has owned the role of Mrs. Lovett from the beginning (despite some very fine competition from Patty LuPone), while Len Cariou stands with George Hearn as among the major interpreters of the title role. Splendid orchestration and performance of same with a slightly enlarged forces, glorious performances from supporting roles, and spacious engineering leave little doubt about this recording’s quality. A recent digital remastering also reveals how masterful the RCA engineers were right there in the last years before digital recording overtook analog. That factory whistle near the beginning will knock you right out of your seat.
4. West Side Story (Original 1957 Broadway Cast, Columbia Masterworks)
Coming the year after “My Fair Lady”, this is Columbia’s first great stereo Broadway recording. True to the show, it has an ‘edgy’ sound about it, a fairly dry acoustic which serves the clarity of the music well.
We have later recordings with Bernstein conducting this score, but none of them come close to the sheer energy and raw spirit of this one. The performers, most of them young and unknown at this point, are fairly bristling with vitality and at times come close to shouting into the microphones. Carol Lawrence’s lovely soprano is perfectly matched by Chita Rivera, who in her first major Broadway role practically melts the wires with her “A Boy Like That.” The pit band, not really an orchestra, snaps, crackles, and pops through Bernstein’s blazing score; just the opening Prologue is reason enough to hear this recording. Instrumental playing this totally into the groove and thoroughly on edge doesn’t come along every day.
In short, the thing’s a roller-coaster ride from beginning to finish, just as fresh and vital today as it was when it was new (and relatively unsuccessful, one might add.) Once again, a recent digital remastering has revealed even more detail and clarity in this landmark recording.
5. Gypsy (Original 1959 Broadway Cast, Columbia Masterworks)
Subtle it ain’t, but it was never meant to be. “Gypsy” is a gloriously bombastic and thrilling musical, one of the classics of the American stage. The lead character of Mama Rose was written for ace Broadway veteran Ethel Merman, and fortunately for us, this recording grabbed her in all her balcony-shaking glory. (She played the role only for about a year, but that was long enough for her to be associated with it forever.)
But the cast album isn’t just about Ethel. The rest of the cast is superlative, meticulously recorded in pristine, no-holds-barred stereo sound. The orchestra remains one of Broadway’s best, blasting out that overture-that-ends-all-overtures. One could wish it were slightly more complete, of course, but what’s here is grand. Some of the earlier CD masterings suffered from shrillness, but recent remasterings have taken advantage of the latest developments in digital technology and give us the recording the way it was meant to be heard: exciting, compelling, loud, in-your-face, irresistable. Curtain up!! Light the lights!!
6. The Fantasticks (Original 1960 Off-Broadway Cast, Originally MGM, now Decca)
Produced and recorded on a shoestring, this theater legend with its umpty-million performances boasts one of the most familiar scores ever written. It’s really kind of hard to believe that it was ever new, but here it is in its original recording, the paint barely dry on the paper moon.
The original cast album dresses up the instrumentation a bit by adding a second piano and a bit of percussion; the recording is so familiar, in fact, that a lot of people are often puzzled when they hear a live performance of the show and find out that it is scored for piano and harp only.
Despite the small scale of the project, this was always one of the better-engineered recordings of its time. The balances between voices and instruments were excellent, and it made spectacular use of stereo effects given the two pianos. (One could gripe a bit that the second piano is sometimes a bit jarring when it enters, due to having been recorded in separate sessions and then grafted into the final mix in a far right channel.)
It’s a lot of fun to hear a young Jerry Orbach, long before “Promises, Promises” or “42nd Street” or “Beauty and the Beast” and especially before “Law & Order”, here in his first recording. Some of the performers went on to other things — the Boy became the lead in “The Boys in the Band” on Broadway, for example. Several of the voices during the “Rape” scene are actually the authors. Perhaps the original Girl, Rita Gardner, is a bit shrill, but she certainly inhabits the songs she sings. Nor has there ever been a more tender performance of “They Were You”.
When the original tapes were originally remastered for CD, very heavy use of Dolby noise suppression resulted in a thick, fuzzy, and very disappointing sound compared to the lush clarity of the original recording. Fortunately, remastering has rectified all of that, and the new Decca CD of this great recording is every bit as satisfying as the original. Thanks, folks.
7. The Most Happy Fella (Original 1956 Broadway Cast, Columbia Masterworks)
Frank Loesser’s wonderful creation is really an American operetta, not a traditional musical. It contains very little spoken dialog, is filled with leitmotivs, arias, and recitatives. It is written for either operatic or vintage Broadway-power type voices. Perhaps parts of it seem a bit racist now (Robert Weede’s over-the-top Italian accent is a bit tough to handle nowadays). One forgets what a big deal it was for a character in a Broadway musical to be pregnant by a man other than her husband.
Nonetheless, it was one of Broadway’s shining moments, no matter how overshadowed it wound up being by “My Fair Lady”, which opened the same year. The performances are unbeatable, from Jo Sullivan’s gorgeous Amy through Weede’s glorious Tony to the suave sexiness of Art Lund as Joe. There were no microphones in the original production, all the more impressive given the gigantic orchestra. Sheesh, could these people sing!
Under Goddard Lieberson’s stewardship, Columbia Masterworks took the high road and recorded the show pretty much entire, skipping only occasional bits of dialog. It required three LPs in its original incarnation (the same length as the average opera recording) and nowadays is on two CDs. It’s a first-source document of this glorious, if somewhat obscure, Broadway show, in a complete format that would really never come again, until the advent of complete videos nowadays.
It’s also a document of a kind of Broadway singing that seems next to extinct now. Susan Johnson is the brassy comic sidekick with that Merman edge to her voice; does anyone really have it any more? And are there any pure Broadway sopranos like Jo Sullivan any more? Barbara Cook in her day was similar. Even Rebecca Luker today, although a very attractive singer, doesn’t have anywhere near the vocal power of Sullivan. Marin Mazzie, perhaps.
And I’ll be damned if there are any male Broadway singers who can match Art Lund when it comes to that rich pure lyric baritone of his. If there are, they aren’t recording.
8. Fiddler on the Roof (Original 1964 Broadway Cast, RCA Victor)
How many productions of “Fiddler” have there been? In some ways it’s the last of the great classic musicals in the grand tradition pioneered and mastered by Rodgers and Hammerstein, here skillfully realized by Bock & Harnick.
Zero Mostel and Maria Karnilova created the two leads, wonderfully. The entire superbly-engineered recording is a jewel. I don’t find a performance in it less than compelling. The tempi are perfect, and it strikes just the right balance between lyricism and energy. Balances are impeccable, the tone warm and enveloping. You really feel like you’ve been on the journey with the characters once you reach the end of the album. In short, it’s a perfect jewel.
RCA treated this long-time big seller rather shabbily on the whole; some of the earlier CD masterings were lousy and the packaging minimal. They finally put out a much better edition of it, complete with some extra tracks, and a very fine remastering, but it took until 2003 for them to do it. At least now we’ve got it the way it should be heard.
9. Camelot (Original 1960 Broadway Cast, Columbia Masterworks)
Probably half of the households in America had a copy of this beautiful album. I had one myself, a wonderful deluxe book-style album that opened up (and had an inner page as well) full of pictures from the production, including one of a scene that had been cut during the tryouts. It was an endlessly fascinating record jacket just on its own, with an elaborately majestic stage setting of the Act I Finale for the back, and a detailed multi-colored cover with all kinds of interesting medieval drawings.
As if that wasn’t enough, the record itself was mesmerizing, one of the most spectacular recordings of its era, in a richly full-bodied stereo sound that could make even a fairly humdrum hifi (like mine) sound pretty darn good. The order of the selections was a bit off from the original show; Lieberson made the decision to place the opening march (Guinevere being brought to Camelot) later in the album in order to break up the series of dreamy slow songs that make up most of Act II.
Later releases did away with the glorious cover and all those great pictures inside, but the sonic quality of the recording never really varied. However, a recent remastering brings out more of the recording than I ever heard before (and I’m playing it on a really fine stereo system). Furthermore, most of those pictures from the original jacket are back, although all of them are in black & white (I clearly remember that the big photo of “The Lusty Month of May” was in full color originally.) The recent remastering also puts the tracks into the performance order, rather than Lieberson’s shuffle.
Richard Burton played Arthur with marvelous dignity, Julie Andrews was absolutely radiant in her Guinevere numbers, and Robert Goulet kicked off his wonderful career with his super-baritone renditions. And then there is the fun of Roddy MacDowell being evil as Mordred; he had a ball with the part and it shows. A great chorus (which included the soon-to-be-leading-man John Collum), great big orchestra with a ton o’ strings. “Camelot” may not be in the top roster of Broadway shows (it’s basically a succession of heavy sets cranking on and off stage), but this recording is prime.
10. The Music Man (Original 1958 Broadway Cast, Capitol)
There are those who say that the movie soundtrack is better. You get Robert Preston in both Broadway and movie recordings, and there’s nobody since who has inhabited Harold Hill like Preston. (He also avoided twitchy mannerisms in his movie portrayal, which is more or less vocally identical to his Broadway performance.) But the original Broadway album gives us Barbara Cook as Marian, and despite how nicely Shirley Jones sang the part in the movie, nobody can equal Barbara Cook when it comes to that beautiful, pure Broadway soprano. Preston alone is worth the price of admission; Cook turns it into a gold-plated bargain.
A lot of the cast is the same as in the movie—Pert Kelton as Mrs. Paroo and the Buffalo Bills are also heard in their barbershop quartet renditions. The orchestra is leaner and meaner than in the movie (naturally). The recent remastering of the original tapes opens the sound up beautifully; at one point it was a relatively constricted-sounded recording, but no more.
There is also a different number near the end of the Act I; on Broadway Barbara Cook sang “My White Knight” but for the movie a lovely (but easier, I think) song was substituted for Shirley Jones, “Being in Love”. (Meredith Willson wrote it, so it’s ‘authentic’, whatever that means.)
The sizzling energy, the sense of head-over-heels joy, marks this album as one of the great ones.