First Prerecorded Vocals- Page 3

[My Oh My]

Posted: 10/12/08 at 9:29pm

In A Chorus Line, the 2nd verse of "The Music and the Mirror" was often prerecorded during the original Broadway and national tour runs.

[BNN]

Posted: 10/12/08 at 10:20pm

Was the dictaphone part of Hey There from the original Pajama Game prerecorded? Or was it an actual dictaphone that hopefully worked for every performance?

[Mattbrain]

Posted: 10/12/08 at 10:32pm

I would think it was prerecorded. I don't think the sound of a dictaphone would carry in a theatre.

[misto625]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 12:27am

For "Bye, Bye, Birdie," I believe the reason was because most of the actors were contorted into awkward positions that they couldn't sing naturally in. Plus since they were in squares on top of one another, it is very possible that they were not all in close proximity in microphones.

[Paul W. Thompson]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 1:24am

Good point! I had totally forgotten about "Hey There." It must have been a reel-to-reel tape, right? I wonder what the backup plan was?

And I'm loving the "Company" elevator conversation. But you would think that if it was prerecorded, they would have used that for the OBCR, instead of that comment in the Pennebaker documentary about "Get Stritch out of there" because she was so flat. LOL

So, do we have Hal Prince productions, strenuous Champion, Fosse and Bennett choreography, upstage staging and old people to blame for the origins of this phenomenon? Those seem to be the trends here, I think............

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 12:55pm

I'm gonna one more time to post this. It's odd that two attempts to post about this (and a post on a different subject from SweeneyPhanatic as well) are not showing up, though they do show up if you hit reply.

My memory is that it was only Robert who was on the elevator during the opening number of Company. In fact, I think he was the only person who ever rode on the elevator. It wasn't big enough for 13 people to ride on it.

During the opening number (during that second sustained "love"), he traveled from the stage floor level to the upper area, while the rest of the cast came down the staircases to the stage floor. And the rest of the number was sung with Robert on the upper center platform and the rest of the cast on the deck.

[morosco]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 1:05pm

I always assumed that this was the elevator moment in Company. Wrong?

[LadyRosecoe]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 1:07pm

It would be more helpful if somebody who had seen the original can clarify this elevator business. I recall John Cunningham mentioning that he had to be careful to note that the elevator was in position so I got a sense that the cast was on it, but that could have been in reference to that being in place for the scenes.

And yeah, the "we love" bit definitely isn't pre-recorded. It wouldn't make sense either, why would they need to record them singing something like that? There aren't any ridiculous notes to be sung and they don't have to hold a note out for 30 seconds on their own.

[Princeton78]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 1:10pm

The "we love" bit is most definately pre-recorded. There is no doubt in my mind. Trust me.

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 1:47pm

I'm pretty sure they're not on the elevator in that photo. That's one of the platforms.

I saw the original production twice, and I've watched the national tour video at TOFT (though, of course, the tour didn't have the elevator).

I'm not sure what Cunningham meant, but I think he might have meant that they had to make sure that the elevator had stopped moving and that Robert was off it before they could move from the "love" to "you," though I'd think that would also come on a cue from the conductor.

Alternatively, he might have been referring, as you suggest, to the scenes. My memory is that Robert traveled by the elevator to the platform area for both scenes with Peter and Susan.

Having said all that, Frank Rich's Aronson book refers to "elevators," plural. Both times I saw the show, I was seated far over house left, so that I couldn't see the extreme stage right portion of the set. So now I'm wondering if perhaps there was a second elevator over there that I couldn't see.

Though other books that discuss the set only mention one elevator.

But the Rich book does seem to confirm my memory that during the long "love" note, most of the cast moved from the platforms to the main stage, with Sondheim saying that "I had to gear the amount of bars, the amount of music, the longest journey anyone would have to make—from the highest level to the lower level and the center of the stage. I built the climax of the long-held note of 'Company'—the word 'love'—to suit that, so that Bennett would be able to get people from all over the stage and coagulate them in a mass downstage center."

But you can't trust everything you read. For instance, in Everything Was Possible, Chapin discusses the staging of the time-step section of "Side by Side by Side," saying that the couples alternated from extreme stage right to extreme stage left. I'm certain that he's wrong about this (even though Bob Avian remembered it the same way), that the couples went from stage left to stage right, and that this was consecutively, not alternating sides. And when I watched the national tour video at TOFT, that's the way it is in the video.)

(What Chapin describes really doesn't make much staging sense if you think about how it would have to work with the placement of the couples and Robert. It would mean that Robert was between the first and second stage left couples. You'd want Robert as close to center as possible, either between the second and third couples or the third and fourth couples, the latter of which is what I remember. After all, there were five couples and Robert. Robert has the fourth out of six breaks, with three couples on his left having preceded him and two on his right still to come. If this is making any sense to anybody.)

But people's memories, including mine, are certainly fallible.

Updated On: 10/13/08 at 01:47 PM

[Hest882]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 2:12pm

This is such an enlightening thread. Thanks all, so far, for your comments.

[Paul W. Thompson]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 2:44pm

I had no idea what I was starting!

I do have a question, though. Since both "Cats" and "Company" had off-stage singers, why prerecord anything? Perhaps nothing in "Cats" was prerecorded, but couldn't the "love" note be handled by a combination of the Vocal Minority and stagger breathing?

[Princeton78]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 3:14pm

I always assumed that the "Cats Chorus" sang along backstage in order to fill out the sound when the dancers got winded.
In "Company," weren't the offstage singers called "The Vocal Minority?"

[LadyRosecoe]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 6:19pm

Yes, the Vocal Minority were the sweeteners stationed in the pit who helped strengthen the sound.

[monestere]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 7:56pm

I attended a performance of the 1972 London production of Company which featured almost the entire Broadway Cast including Elaine Stritch and the most fantastic Bobby of them all, Larry Kert, along with the brilliant addition of Julia McKenzie as the definitive April. It was one of the most incredible evenings of live theater that I have ever experienced. I was also the sound technician on one of the first regional productions of the show in the 1970’s and we followed the stage directions and the composer’s intentions exactly as was done in the initial Broadway and London staging. The only thing that was allowed to be pre-recorded was the lover’s comments in the Tick Tock dance sequence, which we did record in advance on tape to play back during this sequence since the majority of the cast was changing for the disco and final scenes. In the actual score that we used the orchestration in the opening number called for the word “love” in the final repeat of “We love you” to be held for about 20 seconds or longer if needed to get the actors in proper position on the stage in relation to Bobby. This was accomplished by having the singers begin together and use a technique of staggered breathing one by one while the other singers continued to hold the vocal line and this made it sound seamless throughout since only one singer at a time was taking a short breath and picking up the note again before another took a breath. This technique is used a lot in classical choral singing but very seldom in Musical Theater, yet another example of the brilliance and innovation of Stephen Sondheim and his orchestrator Jonathan Tunick. The London production used essentially the same set design as the Broadway original and the singers held the word “love’ about the same as we did in our production, about 20 seconds and no pre-recording was used to accomplish this. This does not mean that pre-recording was not used in other productions of “Company” but it was not called for or needed in the script or music direction of the original, especially if there were additional off stage singers used to sweeten andor strengthen the choral line.

[JohnBoy2]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 9:46pm

I can't imagine what possible difference makes. Broadway is so amplified today that everything sound pre-recorded, anyway.

[Princeton78]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 9:57pm

I'm telling y'all.
The note was pre-recorded in the original Broadway production.

[BNN]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 9:58pm

I apologize if this has been said, but you can hear the "love loop" come in as clear as day on the Company OBC recording, it sounds like a completely different group of people are being brought in, which may be the case for the recording session but I noticed it the first time I listened to my album.

Also, if we are going for first prerecorded vocals, is Pajama Game the earliest mentioned so far?

[ljay889]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 10:03pm

^ I don't believe that. Because you can hear Elaine Stritch start singing a flat note, then drop out. I doubt an official loop would have that flat note.

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 10:43pm

A couple of small details.

1. The entire track on the COMPANY cast album is done live in studio with cast and orchestra. (See the documentary on the recording session.) IF it was pre-recorded in the theatre that would be a different track because of union regulations. (I can see why it would have been with everyone getting on the elevator and riding down to the stage it might not be possible to hear otherwise.)

2. It's not in the COMPANY: ORIGINAL CAST ALBUM video where Shepherd talks about getting rid of Stritch, it's in the documentary on the FOLLIES concert where they are rehearsing the end of "Live, Laugh, Love" with that section where the entire cast appear singing different bits of their songs. Shepherd is in the truck and hears Stritch holler out "Pow" and mutters "Gotta get rid of Stritch."

3. Of course PAJAMA GAME would have hat to use tape for the playback in “Hey There.” Eliza’s recording in the final scene of MFL is also on tape. (Anyone ever notice that the dialogue on the “recording” does not exactly match what is said in Act One Scene III?)

It was not unheard of to use tape then (Magnetic tape had been around since 1947.) In fact the script for HAPPY HUNTING has several segments where Liz's (Ethel Merman's) thoughts are heard on tape. Spoken word, or course. Ethel never had to lip-synch!

[COOOOLkid]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 11:07pm

This was accomplished by having the singers begin together and use a technique of staggered breathing one by one while the other singers continued to hold the vocal line and this made it sound seamless throughout since only one singer at a time was taking a short breath and picking up the note again before another took a breath. This technique is used a lot in classical choral singing but very seldom in Musical Theater, yet another example of the brilliance and innovation of Stephen Sondheim and his orchestrator Jonathan Tunick.

I wouldn't necessarily call it brilliant or innovation.

Anyway, I think that long note (actually exactly 30 seconds) was recorded. If anybody has the opening night soundboard, you can hear the differences in the overall sounding of the first "looove" and second "looooooooove"

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 11:10pm

"I apologize if this has been said, but you can hear the 'love loop' come in as clear as day on the Company OBC recording, it sounds like a completely different group of people are being brought in, which may be the case for the recording session but I noticed it the first time I listened to my album."

Well, a completely different group of people does come in: the Vocal Minority (the four female pit singers).
Updated On: 10/13/08 at 11:10 PM

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 11:13pm

(Anyone ever notice that the dialogue on the “recording” does not exactly match what is said in Act One Scene III?)

In the movie you'll notice Rex Harrison turning the phonograph on and off at various points to allow for the final dialogue that ends up being heard. I don't don't know if they did it that way on stage, but they should have.

[LadyRosecoe]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 11:15pm

When you have about 17 people holding out the note and it is layered like that, there will probably be at least one point where a number of people drop out for a breath before getting back to it and coming in sounding like a fresh or new sounding group.

[nobodyhome]

Posted: 10/13/08 at 11:44pm

"(I can see why it would have been with everyone getting on the elevator and riding down to the stage it might not be possible to hear otherwise.)"

I'm not sure what you're saying.

Anyway, as I posted, my memory is that Robert was the only person ever on the elevator. Of course, it was a long time ago and I could be wrong.

But during the "love" note it seems pretty certain (supported by the quotation I posted from Sondheim) that Robert was on the elevator while the rest of the cast was moving from the platforms to the stage floor by other means.

Of course, Sondheim's memory isn't always correct either. So maybe we're both wrong.