Disaster A New Musical Cast recording question and Cast Recording 101 Education

It costs about $100,000 to make a cast recording. Some shows build them into the production budget, but frankly most shows are still raising money for the actual production during previews. So the reason why most shows don't record earlier than they do probably has to do partly with finances, and partly because they want to cast recording to reflect the final product, not the show as it's changing during previews. Having the cast recording be a fairly accurate as a representation of the final show actually becomes an important issue for future licensing.

I'm not sure Disaster will get a recording. The show is struggling at the box office, and I imagine the royalty agreement would be highly complicated and expensive. And then too the show only features 45-90 second snippets of most of the songs. It wouldn't make for very satisfying listening on disc.

Updated On: 2/29/16 at 05:38 PM

It costs closer to $400,000/$500,000 to record and produce a Broadway cast album.

These days even shows that do not do well on Broadway still record the score as it is a valuable tool for marketing future productions.

The American Psycho recording you mention is from the London production which has already closed. There will be a Broadway recording as well down the road according to Duncan Sheik.

Why On Your Feet hasn't announced a recording is one of the mysteries of the season.

This short link will answer a lot of your questions

Here's another brief link

Updated On: 2/29/16 at 05:46 PM

if op wants to become familiar with the songs, all he needs to do is search google (or some music-listening service) and hear the original recordings.

A few months ago I searched on YouTube, trying to find a cover to "Live for Loving You"- and I was surprised that I couldn't find any. Not one. At the time, I chuckled and said 'well I guess Gloria Estefan doesn't want anyone else recording her music...' I was being facetious, but given the lack of cast recording for her show, maybe there is something to that. Either that or, again, some issue with royalties.

Since this is a thread about cast recordings, I've also thought about seeing Les Miserable before it leaves Broadway in September, so I want to get the cast recording now to start listening to it, but I'm confused here because there are several choices to pick from. Ideally, I would like to hear the one from who's singing on Broadway now, but am not sure that's available. But what I see is available, confuses me. There is the original London cast recording with 31 songs available. The original Broadway version has 33 songs. The 2010 Album has 40 songs and even the film soundtrack HD 43 (items as they have labeled it). So my questions are: why do the different versions have a different amount of songs? Why doesn't each version have the same amount of songs? And which one is most closely aligned with what I can see on Broadway today?

Braniff Forever said: "Since this is a thread about cast recordings, I've also thought about seeing Les Miserable before it leaves Broadway in September, so I want to get the cast recording now to start listening to it, but I'm confused here because there are several choices to pick from. Ideally, I would like to hear the one from who's singing on Broadway now, but am not sure that's available. But what I see is available, confuses me. There is the original London cast recording with 31 songs available. The original Broadway version has 33 songs. The 2010 Album has 40 songs and even the film soundtrack HD 43 (items as they have labeled it). So my questions are: why do the different versions have a different amount of songs? Why doesn't each version have the same amount of songs? And which one is most closely aligned with what I can see on Broadway today? "

The most basic answer is that the entire show just doesn't fit on two discs. Since it's a sung through show every second of the show is fair game for a cast album but most of the time they don't want to add an extra disc for the maybe 20 additional minutes. So they pick and choose whats important for them. In the case of the OBC and OLC it was even more restrictive because they were filling 2 50 minute LPs rather than 2 80 Minute CDs.

The 2010 version is probably closest to what you'd see onstage, as the show has been continually tweaked over the years. The 1988 Symphonic recording is the most complete of the prominent version at that time. And the London album is my personal favorite with IMO the best performances.

Thank you for the Les Mis answer! Did you see it ? The current one on Broadway? I've seen the movie twice but never a stage version

So you don't think Disaster will be a long running musical even with Seth Rudetsky?

The Amazing Grace cast album is actually pretty good in spite of the missing songs.

The 2010 UK album also has John Owen-Jones as Valjean in addition to being closest to the current orchestrations, so I agree and recommend that if you're looking for the recording closest to how it stands on Broadway.

Okay, looks like they haven't recorded it yet, but they will be! It's official!

I know they're expensive to produce, but PLEASE LORD let there somehow be a recording of the new Robber Bridegroom. Putting it in writing here counts for something...right?