#1
Posted: 10/16/05 at 10:18am
I dropped the cd of this Strouse-Adams score into my player this morning. I bought the OBC LP in the Spring/Summer of 1964 at the same time I bought my first copy of HELLO, DOLLY! Both so different. GOLDEN BOY has always been a big favorite of mine since that time.
From the opening musical rythmic sounds of boxers training {"Workout") this score hits you with with a one-two punch that says, "class." The score is intelligent, sophisticated, and contemporary in its Broadway-meets-jazz-and-the-blues sound. The cast is superb, starting with the energetic and multi-talented Sammy Davis. He and Paula Wayne, she of the husky, late-night-bar voice, blend their voices beautifully, and are convincing, and in the moment, at every note. Billy Daniels adds authenticity to the nightclub sound of the score with his dreamy crooning.
Sammy's cuts on the cd a not quite the same as on the original monoaural LP pressing. [My orignial LP came with a souvenir booklet, which Capital Records tried for a while as a marketing tactic, which I still have by the way.] I recall reading somewhere a number of years ago that Sammy re-recorded his cuts later in the run of the show.
I never saw GOLDEN BOY as it played in my pre-NY days, so I can't personally comment how this troubled show worked on the stage, or didn't. However, from the score which I've listened to hundreds of times over the decades, and compared to the hundreds of shows I've seen on Broadway in those intervening years, the GOLDEN BOY score contintues to be a contender for one of the best original cast recordings in the last 40 years.
If you know it, you know what I'm talking about. If you don't know it, get in the ring and be prepared to quickly find yourself on the mat, knocked down by the talent and class of all involved.
From the opening musical rythmic sounds of boxers training {"Workout") this score hits you with with a one-two punch that says, "class." The score is intelligent, sophisticated, and contemporary in its Broadway-meets-jazz-and-the-blues sound. The cast is superb, starting with the energetic and multi-talented Sammy Davis. He and Paula Wayne, she of the husky, late-night-bar voice, blend their voices beautifully, and are convincing, and in the moment, at every note. Billy Daniels adds authenticity to the nightclub sound of the score with his dreamy crooning.
Sammy's cuts on the cd a not quite the same as on the original monoaural LP pressing. [My orignial LP came with a souvenir booklet, which Capital Records tried for a while as a marketing tactic, which I still have by the way.] I recall reading somewhere a number of years ago that Sammy re-recorded his cuts later in the run of the show.
I never saw GOLDEN BOY as it played in my pre-NY days, so I can't personally comment how this troubled show worked on the stage, or didn't. However, from the score which I've listened to hundreds of times over the decades, and compared to the hundreds of shows I've seen on Broadway in those intervening years, the GOLDEN BOY score contintues to be a contender for one of the best original cast recordings in the last 40 years.
If you know it, you know what I'm talking about. If you don't know it, get in the ring and be prepared to quickly find yourself on the mat, knocked down by the talent and class of all involved.
