How come Columbia's cast albums were always so superior up through the 70s — Page 2

Mark just so you know i'm not lieing here's my Candide CD taken with my webcam https://www.sendspace.com/file/juuycr

It was in your lismania that you mentioned they used the mono Music Man--no big deal at all.

All of the other major labels had recording equipment as sophisticated as Columbia Records did but it was the application of that technology that significantly differed. For instance, all of the albums produced by Goddard Lieberson sounded great because he put together a hand picked ensemble of engineers, technicians and general personnel who always worked with him and produced consistently excellent recordings. Beyond this Lieberson consulted with many of the great musical theater composers on how they would prefer to have their works recorded and most if not all gave him the impression that an original cast (or film sound track) album of a musical play’s song score should be first and foremost an aural document of the music, not a mere souvenir of the play for which the music was written. That is why Lieberson produced his recordings with instrumental lead-ins and little or no dialogue and sometimes the music was edited to allow the song to speak for itself rather than within the context of the play. The score came first in his mind and he wanted to preserve as much of the show’s actual score as was possible on a single LP (and in one magnificent instance, when he realised that Frank Loesser’s “The Most Happy Fella” was more an opera than Broadway musical and could not be condensed without undermining the musical presentation, he recorded the entire play as a landmark 3 LP set). That is one of the reasons why (besides Merman and the freshness of hearing the genuine original cast that introduced the songs) the original 1959 Cast Album from “Gypsy” is superior to the recent Patty Lupone revival album, which features additional dance music and deleted songs not on the 1959 original. The Lupone “Gypsy” was produced as a souvenir of that production, not as an aural document of Jule Styne & Stephen Sondheim’s “Gypsy” and this is obvious when you listen to it, even though it can be enjoyed as such, especially if you have not heard the Merman recording of the score. The same is true of the recent revival of “South Pacific”. In these cases more is not always better, especially if that is all the recording has to offer. Lieberson’s recording of the 1962 Jule Styne, Comden & Green “Subways are for Sleeping”, although from a show that was not a major hit, was one of his personal favourite scores and you can tell by listening to his cast album from this show. It is one of the most brilliantly engineered, audiophile quality recordings ever produced and its realistic sound still challenges the best music playback systems of today and puts most of today’s digital recordings to shame. “Subways are for Sleeping” not only became a cult favourite for the musical genre but is one of the few musical cast albums also coveted by audiophiles.

RCA produced hotter sounding albums because their cast albums were produced and recorded by the label's pop music division. Lieberson insisted that the cast albums be produced by the Columbia Masterworks Classical division and these albums were recorded as classical works. RCA did not do this until the late 1970’s when Thomas Z. Shepherd, Lieberson’s protégée, joined that label.

It is an even odder fact that the other producers & engineers at Columbia Masterworks made some of the most mediocre sounding stereo classical recordings of the 1950’s & 60’s while RCA, under the brilliant producer John Pfeiffer, produced the legendary RCA “Living Stereo” classical recordings which still sound better than the majority of classical recordings made today. This is an example of how much of an impact great producers like Lieberson & Pfeiffer can have on a label’s recorded legacy.

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Updated On: 11/25/08 at 01:21 AM

“Speaking of Gypsy, the most recent remaster had Shepherd using many different takes--he justifies why in the liner notes--do you have any objection to this?”

No I have no problem with it; Shepherd did a wonderful remastering of this classic recording and his reasons for using different takes makes sense and more importantly seems to have little impact on the final result. Merman was a consistent performer and Lieberson often recorded additional takes for safety. By the time of the CD era in the mid 1980’s it was discovered that the CBS back catalogue was not preserved as well as other labels and I have heard instances where on some of Leonard Bernstein’s recordings, portions of the SQ quadraphonic or secondary masters were used to produce the digital remaster because the original tapes were partially damaged beyond repair.

By the way, speaking of quadraphonic, Company was the first cast album recorded specifically for CBS’ SQ quadraphonic 4 channel process. The lead vocals were for the most part recorded isolated from the orchestra on separate tracks and the demands placed on the cast and crew can be seen on the excellent documentary of the Company recording sessions which is now on DVD. Lieberson did not care for the SQ process but Thomas Shepherd made good use of it on several recordings like Bernstein’s Mass. The good news about Company being recorded this way is that when Larry Kert, the greatest Bobby of them all, took over the role from Dean Jones very soon after the cast album was recorded, the multi track recording made it possible for Kert to be brought into the studio later and record his vocals of Bobby’s songs to the identical orchestral tracks used for Jones. Thomas Shepherd knew that Kert was the definitive Bobby at the time and wanted to preserve his performance in the role so when the entire Broadway cast including Kert was ready to take the show to London after the Broadway run ended, Shepherd convinced CBS to record Kert’s vocals this way and money was allotted to re-record the one song that could not be done with existing tracks, “Barcelona” and the resulting remixed Larry Kert album was released only in the UK, labeled as the “London Cast Recording”, which it was since virtually the entire cast in the London production was in the Broadway one. Kert’s electrifying still unsurpassed performance of “Being Alive” can be heard as a bonus track on the Sony CD of the “Company” cast album. Kert’s presence on this hybrid London/Broadway cast album of Company instead of the inferior Dean Jones completely transforms the Original Broadway Cast recording of “Company” and pushes it far above any later recordings of the score. It is, in my opinion, the definitive recording of “Company” featuring the definitive Bobby and it should be released as a separate CD by Sony.

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The Larry Kert Cd was issued by Sony U.K. and was also released in Canada but was never released in the U.S. (none of the Sony West End series were) but stores like Footlight carried it as an import.

That explains why it is so rare in the U.S.

Thanks Monestere for your fascinating background. I remember later presings of the stereo COMAPNY used the Quad Lp masters and I liked how the stereo spread was separated into 4 distinct channels. THere was also a quad NIGHT MUSIC but it wasn't as effective.

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I get that. And Shepherd is pretty notorious for his ego isn't he? Didn't even Sondheim, who at first had a great relationship with him, end up cross with him? or something?

Still... Regardless I find that remaster of Gypsy pretty great.

I've watched clips of the documentary about the recording of Company and I'm guessing that Thomas Shepherd's behavior is just the tip of the iceberg?

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bk, while remastering is not always to the benfit of the recording, that early 80s Columbia pressing of Gypsy sounds *unbearably poor*--the vinyl I bougth used sounds FAR more dunamic. That's one reason I never -lay it (and I actually prefer some of Shepherd's choices thoough I agree that that wasn't his place to do).

Matt, yeah and in 1970 Shepherd was pretty new to producing records without Lieberson--so he was trying to prove himself but didn't have the ego he apparantly started to have at RCA. Still, he gave us some super cast albums.

Well, I'm glad that a couple of you like that Mr. Shepherd changed one of the greatest albums in cast album history. Maybe one fine day Mr. Shepherd will go in and change one of your beloved cast albums - you know, a new vocal line there, some extraneous cast squeals here, changing the intention of the original creator's of the album. Peachy.

As to Subways - since I reissued it and had complete control over the remastering, I could have changed a few things too - I had all the original material and all the elements. But - know what? I'm not God, and I didn't do it. What I DID do was listen to the brilliant vinyl and try to match that as closely as possible, while extending the dynamic range a little in the mastering phase - the result is brilliant Lieberson sound with no mucking around from the likes of me.

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"There is no problem so big that it cannot be run away from." ~ Charles M. Schulz

Updated On: 11/27/08 at 08:33 AM

I'd love to hear Subways.....from a show and interest in the recording point of view, after following this fascinating thread.
Is it available?
Amazon doesn't appear to have it.

Thanks for the compliment. Subways was one of the first cast albums I bought when I joined the Columbia House Record Club and got my free stereophonic record player for doing so. I loved it then, I love it now, and it was something I was determined to put out - plus we got all the demo stuff on the CD, too, which is fun.

For anyone who wants a copy, I have some, so drop me a line at kritzerland at aol dot com.

"They put out a fancy-looking reissue on cd of South Pacific a few yrs ago with extra tracks. I had this and an older cd of it with a laughing Ezio + Mary on the cover, out from the liberry at the same time. The new one sounded so much worse and tinny!"

The difference is that the first CD is taken from 78s, whereas the new CD is from a recently-discovered magnetic tapes that were recorded simultaneously with the 78s.

I think the tape sounds much better.

SOUTH PACIFIC - Funny we were just discussing this on the cast album group. This album was recorded both on didc and tape in 1949. The disc masters were sued for the 78 and LP release. The tape was untouched until 1988 when it was released on CD (using the later LP artwork with a photo of Martin and Pinza..the same cover that had been used on the LP from about 1957 onward.) The track of "Carefully Taught" was either an alternate or had been edited to remove the 2nd last line. (The phrase "You've got to be carefully taught" is sung twice, the first time ending on a high note, the second time ending low. The edit jumped from just before the high note to the final "taught.")

Here's where I get confused.

In 1993 Sony Broadway reissued SOUTH PACIFIC using the original LP artwork (the green "Anchor" cover) and then Columbia Braodway Masterworks remastered and re-released it in 1998 again with the green cover. Supposedly the latest reissue is taken from the discs because producer Didier C. Deutsch felt he could get better sound from the discs. (To my ears the sound is a bit brittle, unlike later Columbia albums which have a rich warm sound.) I'll keep you posted as to what we find out.

WONDERFUL TOWN - Eric, I always thought Lieberson produced this album but under the track list it says "Produced for records by Irving Townsend." Townsend was at Columbia until the 1970s when he moved to Columbia Special Products and oversaw their reissues of many show (and personality) albums. (I remember talking to him in 1980 and he was saying then they were going to reissue MR PRESIDENT to tie in with Regan's inauguration. I don't think he is with us now.) as for the orchestrations, they are probably the originals, perhaps augmented for the recording. Decca's OCR is in mono and has that flat brittle sound the label was famous for, but mostly the orchestrations sound the same except where numbers were revamped for the album as in "Christopher Street." Decca was still recording albums for the 78-rpm market in 1953, so WT was kept to 7 ten-inch records: hence no Overture was recorded for the album.

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