Cast Recording of Whoop Up- Page 2

[WithoutATrace]

Posted: 5/1/06 at 2:04pm

I now have my cast recording of Whoop Up and I am really like "When the Tall Man Talks" and "Love Eyes." "Nobody Throw Those Bull" is so awful it is hilarious!! I'm glad I now have Whoop Up in my collection of broadway cast recordings.

[sondheimboy2]

Posted: 5/1/06 at 5:26pm

Someone really should start a threat about the great Susan Johnson. It's a pity that only "Most Happy Fella", "Oh, Captain", and the studio recording of "Brigadoon" are around to carry her memory on CD. (There was supposed to be a CD of tv performances that she did in the '50's and '60's, but I was never able to find a copy of it.)

I'll watch "Sister Act" just to see her in the chorus. She only gets one solo shot in the film in the song "My Guy", one line (I believe it's "To be exact"), but there is a showmanship and panache to her delivery that you have to wonder if today's Broadway performers will ever have...

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 5/1/06 at 5:33pm

Glad you got it. How did you fins it and what was the final price?

I'm guesing now that you got yours we don't need to petition Decca to re-release it?

[NCGuy]

Posted: 5/1/06 at 8:57pm

There was supposed to be a CD of tv performances that she did in the '50's and '60's, but I was never able to find a copy of it.



Sondheimboy, is this the CD you’re thinking of? If so, it’s available from Amazon and Footlight.com.

Ms. Johnson also performs “Who’s That Woman” on the ’97 Sondheim: A Celebration CD.


Susan Johnson - Legendary Performers CD at Amazon Updated On: 5/1/06 at 08:57 PM

[notabb]

Posted: 5/6/06 at 12:42pm

If you're still looking for it there's a copy of Whoop -Up for sale on Ebay now.I'm not surprised that it's already up to $40.I think some of it is alot of fun especially Quarrel-tet and Love Eyes

[Unknown User]

Posted: 5/6/06 at 2:55pm

When I worked at Tower in Chicago shortly after it opened in the early 90's we had about a dozen copies of Whoop-up on CD cut out. We'd sell it to all the show queens and can remember so many of them coming back to thank us. Sadly, I never grabbed one myself. I used to play it in stores all the time. Susan Johnson could use a biography with a CD. If you can't track down any of her flops, get the original cast of "Most Happy Fella" and hear her on that. What a voice!

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 5/7/06 at 4:27am

I bet you wish you had tucked away a couple of copies of teh WHOOP UP delete Cds for later re-sale. (How much were you selling it for? When it was released it was had a list price of $9.98 - and STILL it didn't sell. Now that it's o/p people pay 10 tims that amount.)

Susan Johnson. What a voice. What a natural for the stage. Sadly she became disenchanted with Broadway (after so many flops and only one outright hit, can you blame her? A girl has to pay rent!) When SHOW MUSIC contacted her she was kinda nasty and didn't seem to want to talk about her career. Now that's she's goe it's a shame that she never really knew how much a small but devoted bunch really enjoyed her work.

But for maybe one more hit after HAPPY FELLA who knows what kind of a career she would have had. Her "Morning Music of Momartre" on OH! CAPTAIN is one of the best tracks on that OCR. She's a joy on Columbia's studio cast of BRIGADOON. And her contributions to WHOOP-UP make it a cherished collector's item.

Those of you who have not yet heard WHOOP UP apply to fanatics for copies.

[WithoutATrace]

Posted: 5/7/06 at 11:19am

A nice guy from ATC sold me his copy for $30...excellent price! I was very lucky.

[Jon]

Posted: 5/7/06 at 2:42pm

Back in the "old days" before CD's, the original cast recoding on vinyl was one of the "Holy Grails" of cast albums. Then, it was re-issued in the late 70's.

[Smaxie]

Posted: 5/7/06 at 3:33pm

"Do I dare dream that I may be, the M.R.S. of a V.I.P.?"

"Feels so good, I'll yell it. Yooooo da lay-eee!"


Two of my favorite lyrics from "Never Before".

[Patrick Bateman]

Posted: 6/9/07 at 12:01am

John Yap? JOHN BLOODY JAP? I mean, he's a nice enough fellow, but I spent the better part of a year working on the restoration of the original cast album of "Whoop-Up" - my name is even on the CD label! I produced every aspect of the reissue and wrote the notes, found the original source tapes in PolyGram's vaults, (they were filed under "L" - for Stanley Lebowsky, the conductor, and hadn't been touched since 1959!), discovered the existance of the cover versions, did the digital remastering in the studio, etc.

I was on-staff at PolyGram from 1982-1994 and did quite a few "notorious" reissues. John Yap (who had absolutely nothing to do with the "Whoop-Up" reissue) has his own company, TER (That's Entertainment Records), based in London. He made his own original cast recordings (i.e. "The Rink," "Baby") and licensed them to PolyGram for US distribution for a limited term in the 1980s.

I think we did an initial pressing of 10,000 units of the "Whoop-Up" CD (it was also released at that time on LP and cassette but without the bonus tracks). It sold miserably and was cut from the catalogue about five minutes after its release.

I did NOT get to meet Susan Johnson, but we had a few phone calls, and I got a bunch of autographed photos of her including one onto which she wrote, "I look like a drag queen."

Updated On: 6/9/07 at 12:01 AM

[frontrowcentre2]

Posted: 6/9/07 at 2:55am

10,000 units seems more than enough to satisfy the small handful of show fans who would want WHOOP UP on Cd. I just wonder where they all went. Were many of the returned copies destroyed?

Does this mean Decca does not have the rights to re-release it?

Thank you for doing it and doing such an excellent job on it.

[madlibrarian]

Posted: 6/9/07 at 12:33pm

Thank you, Patrick Bateman. I am a happy owner of a Whoop-Up CD and love its jazzy score, klutzy lyrics, and generous bonus tracks.