#51
Posted: 6/30/17 at 1:01am
Dear Evan Hansen, Falsettos, and Hello Dolly. Oh so good.
Favorite Cast Recording(s) of the 16/17 Season? — Page 3
#52
Posted: 6/30/17 at 2:16am
I thought her "Knight" song in GHD was probably one of the best songs written in awhile. And the same for "Playing Nancy." I just didn't care for any of Karl's songs.
#53
Posted: 6/30/17 at 2:18am
Hello, Dolly!, for sure. It transports me back to one of the most magical evenings I've ever had in a theater. I know many think it's lackluster, but I don't.
Also, I'm rather shocked to see people on this board referring to "soundtracks" in this thread. Every time you call a cast recording a soundtrack, a chorus boy tears his ACL.
#54
Posted: 6/30/17 at 2:44am
Soundtrack
Soundtrack
Soundtrack
Soundtrack
Soundtrack
Soundtrack
Soundtrack
#55
Posted: 6/30/17 at 9:03am
Sundays, I'm not in the least insulted. I appreciate your remarks on the importance of stage craft to telling the story of GHD and I, too, hope I get to see it someday.
In the meantime, I had a great time last night giving BANDSTAND another listen. I was overly influenced, previously, by what I thought was a lackluster performance on the Tonys. The recording is lovely and fun, and has been placed on my regular-play list.
Just one of the reasons I like BWW.com. Thanks to everyone who recommended BANDSTAND!
#56
Posted: 6/30/17 at 9:56am
For me it is Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812. In my eyes (and ears) that show is a work of art that works for me just as much as an album as the experience in the theatre.
I also really enjoy the Come From Away recording. I really didn't think that the album would get much play for me, even after seeing and loving the show, but I go back to it often.
Rounding out my top 3 would be Groundhog Day. I don't listen to it straight through, but there are some really wonderful songs there. The ones I tend to skip are the ones that are mostly music (Philandering/Philosophy/etc), and I find myself listening to the second act more than the first.
#57
Posted: 6/30/17 at 11:11am
Great Comet. It has stolen my heart.
Closely followed by Falsettos. But I must say I have worn out the track, "Requim" from DEH.
#58
Posted: 7/3/17 at 11:48pm
Dear Evan Hansen #1, which is odd because there's so much left out. Bandstand is #2, it's so well done. Come From Away does a great recording as well. Groundhog Day is a show I loved and the recording is alright but not as good. Great Comet's album is dead last IMO. It's all over the place and I just don't think the music works outside of that theater setting.
#59
Posted: 7/4/17 at 12:02am
I am really into the Off Broadway recording of Great Comet!!! SO that doesn' t count for 16-17 but the current broadway production/recording turned me onto the past one which I prefer for both Dave Malloy and Philippa Soo
#60
Posted: 7/4/17 at 8:51am
Mediamaven2 said: "I am really into the Off Broadway recording of Great Comet!!! SO that doesn' t count for 16-17 but the current broadway production/recording turned me onto the past one which I prefer for both Dave Malloy and Philippa Soo
"
I totally agree on Dave Malloy. I'm reading War and Peace now and his voice matches my image of Pierre exactly. Nothing against Groban though, I've only heard the off-Bway recording so far.
I think War Paint is probably my fave album this season. Breathtaking performances beautifully preserved (and it doesn't hurt that the score itself is gorgeous as well).
#61
Posted: 7/5/17 at 2:37pm
It all depends whether you saw the show or not:
But this will come as no surprise:
To relive the show: Come From Away (great story, great score, & great cast--- and it all comes through in the recording) & Groundhog Day Musical (OBCR is brilliant and underrated; and yet another way this show has been poorly marketed.)
If never saw the show: Dear Evan Hansen
#62
Posted: 7/5/17 at 2:42pm
War Paint is by far the easy win for me - the best theatrical score of the season, written for and delivered by two of our best singing actors working today. If only the book had been as good...
#63
Posted: 7/5/17 at 2:44pm
I heard a rumor about there being a sunday in the park cast recording.
#64
Posted: 7/5/17 at 2:51pm
RippedMan said: "Guess I'm in the minority, but I love the Amelie recording. I listen to it at least once a week. So haunting and beautiful. I went into the show thinking eh, this will be boring, but I was really taken with it. Def. not a big Broadway show, but I hope it has a healthy regional life. I think the music is at times really gorgeous."
Another vote for AMELIE from me. Some lovely music in there.
#65
Posted: 7/5/17 at 2:54pm
TheThreadMaster said: "I heard a rumor about there being a sunday in the park cast recording."
Well, they announced they were making one, so...
So far, this season's breakout OBCR is Great Comet for me.
#66
Posted: 7/5/17 at 4:45pm
I've only heard two:
COME FROM AWAY is my fave, it brings back all the emotions and enjoyment I felt when I saw the show
I also like [but have not seen] Dear Evan Hansen
#67
Posted: 7/5/17 at 5:51pm
I have to give A Bronx Tale some love! I've been a lifelong fan of Alan Menken, and this recording definitely doesn't disappoint! It definitely has the feel and soul of the era.
Another vote for Amelie. While the melodies may seem similar here and there, I really like the lyrics.
And, like most people here, DEH, CFA, and Anastasia.
#68
Posted: 7/5/17 at 5:53pm
My favorite cast recordings from the 2016-17 Broadway season are (in order):
Come From Away
Dear Evan Hansen
Falsettos
Great Comet
In Transit
Amelie
Hello, Dolly!
HELLO PEOPLE! :D
#69
Posted: 7/5/17 at 8:25pm
Am really enjoying Bandstand.
#70
Posted: 7/5/17 at 9:10pm
GHD
I listen to Comet a lot, but the off broadway cast as I prefer Dave to Josh. Amelie was also good enough for me to buy...
#71
Posted: 7/5/17 at 9:44pm
You shame me, Gaveston. I rarely think twice about purchasing a cast album of a show I did not care for. You listen to them all, usually multiple times, and no doubt discover songs, performers and composers who would have otherwise just slipped past most.
But I'm very interested in this rule of the perfect rhyme. Is there some school that teaches the necessity of perfect rhyme in musical rhymes? I have an English degree among my other useless credentials and have read many poets. Alexander Pope, active in the early 18th century during the reign of Queen Anne, was a slave to the Heroic Couplet, which required perfect rhymes, but even he at times had to sacrifice the rule to express a sentiment just as he desired.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast;
Man never is, but always to be blessed:
The soul, uneasy and confined from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
The two bold words would not meet the rhyme rule? Well, let's keep trying. Here is Gray's much loved "Elegy," written over a hundred years later than Pope.
Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.
I don't think that "toil" is a very good word to rhyme exactly with "smile," but this stanza has done very well with the public over the years.
A little less than a hundred years later, Keats was writing for the romantics. This opening stanza of "The Eve of St. Agnes" is one of my favorites.
St. Agnes' Eve—Ah, bitter chill it was!
The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold;
The hare limp'd trembling through the frozen grass,
And silent was the flock in woolly fold:
Keats follows a very strict ABAB rhyme scheme in this poem and yet makes no attempt at all to rhyme the 1st and 3rd lines. Why? Line 3 is the most expressive in this long poem and no rhyme could be worth altering a syllable.
I won't take up any more space, but I note that Maya Angelou gave herself great freedom not only in which lines of a stanza to be rhymed, but how many lines would be in the stanza.
Notwithstanding all this above, I wonder to whom does the perfect rhyme requirement apply.
#72
Posted: 7/5/17 at 11:32pm
I can't accept too much applause, OlBlueEyes. One of the reasons I follow OCBRs so closely is that I live in a medium-size market on the West Coast where most of these shows won't play except years from now as community theater. (I'm two hours from Los Angeles, so I do see some things there, including AMELIE.)
As for rhyming, you are correct that near-rhymes have been in use throughout the history of the English language. (Different languages have different customs: Japanese, for example, doesn't use rhyming as a rule, but is very big on alliteration.) For one thing, in poetry that is meant to be read, primarily, paired rhymes like home/come "rhyme" to the eye, if not to the ear. For another, imperfect rhymes feel more "relaxed" and may better fit the contemplative mood of many poems.
In the theater, however, where lyrics must be heard over an orchestra, the rumbling of a turntable, the tapping of the chorus and God only knows what else, perfect rhymes were the norm from the early 20th Century to 1970 or thereabouts. Unconsciously, the theatergoer knows that if she hears "time" at the end of a line, the next line will end with "mime" or "rhyme", not "mind", "thine" or "Hammerstein". This aids her comprehension. Here is one of the great lyrics of all time:
"Here's to the ladies who lunch.
Everybody laugh.
Lounging in their caftans and planning a brunch.
On their own behalf.
Off to the gym,
Then to a fitting,
Claiming they're fat.
And looking grim
'Cause they've been sitting
Choosing a hat.
Does anyone still wear a hat?
I'll drink to that."
I love the above example (from COMPANY, 1970, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim) because it illustrates another rhyming principle: perfect rhymes should highlight (for the ear just as I did above for the eye) the most important words in each line.
What's even more astonishing is that Sondheim repeats the same complex rhyming pattern in TWO MORE choruses! And in doing so allows Joanne to discuss the psychology and philosophy of her social class along with other complex themes. The same content might well be lost in the theater without equivalent perfect rhymes. (People keep quoting wonderful lines from GROUNDHOG DAY in this thread, but I didn't hear a one of them when I first listened to the recording.)
My remarks here apply largely to theater music. Pop music, on the other hand, is designed to be played repeatedly, on the radio and, once-upon-a-time, on the record player; so it has never mattered whether one heard every word on the first hearing. A good hook that allows the listener to remember the song when he gets to the record store is enough. (There are a number of great pop lyricists, of course, and most of us would put Dylan, Springsteen, Henley and Mitchell alongside the best of Broadway wordsmiths.)
And Broadway audiences today are more conditioned by pop than theater music; meanwhile, songs are amplified loudly and clearly. So whether perfect rhyming really matters as much nowadays is a matter for debate. But it's an aspect of craft that we old-timers appreciate.
#73
Posted: 7/5/17 at 11:38pm
Groundhog Day is on 24/7. I also am obsessed with Dear Evan Hansen and Falsettos
Use my code "YZTFG" for $20 OFF tickets on TodayTix!
#74
Posted: 7/6/17 at 1:04am
I want to say thanks for Gaveston and Blue Eyes for the discussion. I have nothing intelligent to add, but it's a pleasure to read.
#75
Posted: 7/6/17 at 2:16am
10086Sundays said: "I want to say thanks for Gaveston and Blue Eyes for the discussion. I have nothing intelligent to add, but it's a pleasure to read.
"Thank you, but you are giving me too much credit. It is Gaveston who has the knowledge.
She has hit on my biggest regret of the musical theater. The amplification and the inevitable distortion. I was at The King & I for the third time and I was down close to the stage. Kelli O'Hara was finishing "Hello, Young Lovers," and her voice ascends as she holds out the last two notes. They were distorted. Not badly, but enough so that I noticed it. After all the education and training that went into that voice, why should we not hear it naturally.
I know there's nothing to be done about this. Most performers don't have highly trained voices and don't always perform at a theater the size of the Vivian Beaumont.
But even in a cabaret setting of 54 Below. I was talking to one of the employees there and this subject came up. Betty Buckley is appearing at the end of August with Michael Feinstein. Does Betty Buckley need a mike to be heard in that room? No. Will she be using a mike? Probably. Why? He was going to bring that up with a couple of people there.
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