SOUND OFF: MASTERWORKS MASTERPIECE ROUND-UP

Today, we are taking a listen to five of the greatest and most deservedly classic-status cast albums of all time, with all five selections also being Tony-winning Best Musicals recently remastered, repackaged and re-released by Masterworks Broadway in time for Tony Award season which this week is finally coming to a close. In salute of Broadway now - and as it was fifty years ago when the first of these scores premiered - we take stock of what we have got, for better or worse. Surely, the strength of these shows' scores speak and sing out loud for themselves: 42nd Street, 1776, HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING, MAME and CITY OF ANGELS. From Herman to Coleman to Loesser and beyond we go, with a glance to the future and the all-to-recent past...

Re-Signed, Re-Sealed, Re-Delivered - They're Ours

Looking back on the scores we have had on Broadway in the last ten years, it seems as though there is no new generation of composers that are represented at all who are carving out careers that can stand with the greats like Loesser, Herman, Coleman, Sondheim and the old guard of Rodgers & Hammerstein, Porter, Gershwin, Arlen, and the rest. There is talent - as sporadically showcased on Broadway as it may be, and whatever concessions made by any parties to get their show on - but there is so little actual innovation and excitement in the musical theatre big leagues that it is almost futile to even hope for any better, it seems. Ten years ago, a new generation of musical theatre composers were heralded - and represented all on Audra McDonald's genius first solo album WAY BACK TO PARADISE - as ushering in a new age of musical theatre. Right off the bat, Michael John LaChiusa premiered two scores during the 1999-2000 season, both superb and among the very best scores of the twentieth or twenty-first century: MARIE CHRISTINE and THE WILD PARTY. Some of the other three-named composers tried but failed to get the traction necessary to get a show on Broadway and their efforts cannot be underestimated, and Jason Robert Brown actually had a few go rounds but his best score remained off-Broadway with THE LAST FIVE YEARS. Jeanine Tesori, too, showed so much promise with CAROLINE, OR CHANGE, but to say SHREK's score was a disappointment would be being a bit too kind. Adam Guettel scored with critics and audiences (for a time) with LIGHT IN THE PIAZZA - taking the Tony for Best Score, the only composer of his generation to do so, though LaChiusa was doubly nominated in '00 but lost to Elton John & Tim Rice for AIDA, of all things - but considering he has written three shows total - one of them a song cycle, MYTHS & HYMS/SATURN RETURNS - in twenty years time does not bode well for his future output, particularly considering his three-year-long-gestating collaboration with William Goldman on THE PRINCESS BRIDE ended on bad terms so abruptly last year. After all, Broadway is where the big time is. Or at least where it used to be. So, hopefully Duncan Sheik and Tom Kitt and Lin-Manuel Miranda and some of the other new bright talent can get their shows on Broadway and not be relegated to off-Broadway and regional theatres as the brightest talents that began on Broadway and off in the late-twentieth/early-twenty-first century were. It's a sad state of affairs when there are more revivals than original musicals in any given season, and almost as bad when the original musicals do not possess original scores. Was this season the worst ever for new scores? It was close, if not the cigar.

So, let's look back, not forward, if only for today. These are some of the finest scores ever written and the names of the composers of a few of them are among the top-tier of talent who ever composed for the musical theatre. Sony Masterworks Broadway has done an absolutely marvelous, bang-up job with each and every one of these titles and I urge you to pick up these glorious remasters at your earliest possible convenience with full knowledge that you will be enjoying the best of Broadway with the best possible technical fidelity available. Like their work on GYPSY and WEST SIDE STORY and so many other Sondheim titles recently re-released in eco-packaging and with bonus content, so, too, are these albums overflowing with care, precision and clarity. There will always be discrepancies among collectors and slight deficiencies in some songs here and there, but given the age of most of these recordings - all are at least twenty years old, going all the way back fifty years to 1961 with HOW TO SUCCEED, MAME in ‘66, 1776 in ‘69, 42nd Street in ‘80 and CITY OF ANGELS in ‘90 - complaints are few. And the performers, oh, what performers! To just mention a few of these magnificent performers would be almost too unfair, but I'll try: Robert Morse, Rudy Vallee, Angela Lansbury, Bea Arthur, Ken Howard, Betty Buckley, Jerry Orbach, James Naughton and so many, many more. These are performers you never forget, giving their best performances on record. These are scores by composers at the top of their game, two by creators that never had another score on Broadway since. So, whatever flavor you favor, there is a taste to satisfy you here with one of these delectable and divine - and, in stark comparison to the sound of today's over-amplified, anemic orchestras, whether for revival or the scant new score: decadent - treats. I hope you will devour them with as much relish as I did!

Coffee Break-through

HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING - Original Broadway Cast Recording

SCORE: 8/10

Frank Loesser was truly one of the most dazzling wordsmiths and tunesmiths Broadway has ever known, and in no score is that more evident than it is in this one - with the exception of, perhaps, GUYS & DOLLS - and it is no wonder the show took that year's Pulitzer Prize for Drama given its biting satirical take on corporate America at the time. Robert Morse was irreplaceable, irrepressible and irresistible. Rudy Vallee was debonair perfection. Charles Nelson Reilly's forceful and formidable section of "Coffee Break" says - and sings - with zing everything we need to know about him as a performer, here or elsewhere. These were transcendent talents at the top of their field and this was a truly singular show thanks in no small part to the contributions of Frank Loessor, Abe Burrows and Bob Fosse. Sure, some sequences are a bit creaky and antique-y and the pervasive sexism run rampant is not quaint or cute as it sometimes can come across with the right light touch - though the remedies to that issue in the revival were not satisfactory, either - but, the score still stand tall among all. What gems. Some may say THE MOST HAPPY FELLA is Loessor's most accomplished score and GUYS & DOLLS his most entertaining, but I find HOW TO SUCCEED possesses his best all-around sound and style of any score and specificity of his words and music was never quite as sharp in any other score as it was here. This score licks you, bites you, pinches you, punches you, kisses you and caresses you. And aren't we lucky that it does those things so extremely well.

We Need A Little Jerry

MAME - Original Broadway Cast Recording

SCORE: 8.5/10

Just as GUYS & DOLLS is the score with all the hit crossover songs and standards for Loesser, his most entertaining and audience-friendly concoction, it seems clear that MAME more than any other Jerry Herman score - even HELLO, DOLLY! despite the huge success of the title song as sung by Louie Armstrong - should hold that title as far as Herman's oeuvre goes. MACK & MABEL may be his most daring and risky score, and HELLO, DOLLY his most overall cohesive and solid score, but MAME is the knock-out of knock-outs. And if anyone knows a knock-out or a showstopper, it's Jerry Herman. MAME has all the best song styles we have come to expect from him when each form was entirely new and fresh and pristine. To think Herman could even top the catchiness-level-quotient of HELLO,DOLLY with a song in this score - though it does borrow quite liberally from a dance sequence in DOLLY's score, but no matter - is nothing to bluster at, and he does with "We Need A Little Christmas" which has gone on to become, additionally, a Christmas standard as well. Shall that be the song of Herman's that outlives them all if only for that feature of its many marketable and marvelous attributes. Herman always seeks to please, it seems, and with this score he succeeds with each successive song. An infectious and effervescent opening number like "It's Today" begins a score - and a show - that could only reach its culmination in an eleven o' clock number on the order of "If He Walked Into My Life". Everyone delivers on their promise and each and every asset is as delicious as it seems it could be when considering the combination of Jerry Herman, Gene Saks, Angela Lansbury and Bea Arthur. What wonders to behold! Also, this lovingly restored remastering contains new bonus tracks of Jerry Herman performing five demos with apropos enthusiasm and affection for the material he is performing.

Ours, Ours, Ours

1776 - Original Broadway Cast Recording

SCORE: 7.5/10

While 1776 will always be one of those shows that I appreciate more than I adore, it is certainly easy to love the original Broadway cast. From William Daniels to Betty Buckley to Ken Howard and the rest, they are note-perfect and you could not really ask for better players for these iconic roles from American history. Buckley truly is thrilling and brings a gravitas to the role I've never seen another performer come close to accomplishing. True, I do prefer the spectacular and near-identical film version to the stage show itself, and I also slightly prefer some of the performances of the others on the film soundtrack, but it would be splitting hairs to call one that much better than the other. It is a shame Sherman Edwards never wrote another score on the level of this one since 1776 has such folksy charm, but I suppose it was just not meant to be.

Come Along & Listen

42nd STREET - Original Broadway Cast Recording

SCORE: 8/10

Gower Champion's last show and David Merrick's most notable late-era musical, 42nd STREET is a case of everything-old-is-new-again-itis gone viral, but the show wears it well. Sure, we know a few of the songs thanks to the well-worn song catalogue of Harry Warren & Al Dubin, but Michael Stewart and Mark Bramble make it work in new and exciting ways. Just "Lullaby of Broadway" alone, in context, should be enough to teach many lessons to the hatchet jobs of far too many jukebox shows that have come after it. Few, if any, have done the jukebox genre better than Champion and Co. here. Jerry Orbach is legendary for a reason, and this is one of his best cast album performances - particularly considering the questionable quality of the PROMISES, PROMISES OBCR and even the tinny sound and off-day performances on the CHICAGO OBCR. Molly Brown herself, Tammy Grimes, does well additionally, but this is a show about the chorus numbers and as one of the first digital cast recordings this album could not sound better than it does now. Another gem in album producer Thomas Z. Shepard's formidable crown.

What You Don't Know About Coleman

CITY OF ANGELS - Original Broadway Cast Recording

SCORE: 9.5/10

Cy Coleman could have rested on his laurels as one of the best jazz songwriters in the Great American Songbook tradition, but he chose to try his hand at Broadway. And aren't we all the more lucky he did! SWEET CHARITY is one of the most interesting scores of the 60s - with so many standards as to astound - and so many of his other scores are fantastic as well, but perhaps no other score works as well as CITY OF ANGELS. Perhaps it's the perfect cast that makes it work a little better. Perhaps it's the precise direction that makes each and every performance shine a little brighter. Perhaps it's the absolutely thrilling and exceedingly expert orchestrations and instrumentation that makes the score burn a little hotter. Whatever propels this jet engine of an entertainment forward into the strastophere does so with such effortless, enjoyable abandon that the listener cannot help but be caught up and taken along on the ride. To single out a single performer or song or performance would be impossible as they are all absolutely awesome and amazing - two words thrown around far too often these days it seems, but there they are all the same. Zippel's lyrics are awesome, Coleman's music is amazing and combination of those mixed with the myriad magnificence of the rest of this masterpiece is something to leave the listener agog. Larry Gelbart's book is among the very best ever to grace the Broadway stage and even the small snippets here are so biting and blissfully sarcastic as to elicit guffaws. Bottom line: If you are not familiar with this show - get familiar. If you are already a fan, you know what pleasures this true wonder of a show and score by Broadway's best possesses. Beg, borrow, (but don't) steal it - and love it, too... it's probably humanly impossible not to adore it.

Lull & Bye

Is it unfair to hold the scores of today to the high standard of these scores? Perhaps. Is it unfair to hold the scores of today to any standard? It seems. Credit where credit is due: great work is being done, just not a lot of it seems to be ending up on Broadway. Where are the Jerry Hermans with showstopper after showstopper, the Cy Coleman with innovative-yet-mainstream appeal, the Frank Loesser with the reinvention of the way a story can be told in song? Where fore art thou even a Sherman Edwards with one great show and one stupendous score? Wherever they are, I hope they are reading this and I hope they keep trying their damndest. The original title of HELLO, DOLLY! Was DOLLY, A DAMNED EXASPERATING WOMAN. The same seems to be true of Broadway these days in reference to new scores by new composers; exasperating. These scores are liberating and exhilarating if only because they bring us back to a time when Broadway was at its best and the future looked bountiful. Now, in the present, it seems there are nothing but boundaries. Break them. Without new voices Broadway is broken and out-of-service. To the up-and-coming composers and lyricists of the future, I beg of you: Break on through to the other side. Broadway needs you now more than ever.