I really enjoyed the show when I saw it, particularly the act 1 finale...however, comparing what I saw in March to the official recording, they seem to have upped the tempo of some of the songs, perhaps so everything would fit on the one CD. They also kept dialogue from the beginning or even middle of songs to a bare minimum, taking away from the impact of the songs, in my opinion. Overall, I am not very happy with how the recording turned out. (Edited, just to mention that the vocals are excellent, a great job by Jenn, Cheyenne, Sharon, and the rest of the cast. The changes are of course not their fault. I still think they're great..)
It's just like what happened to the Hairspray OBCR, they edited and condensed or completely cut certain parts of numbers and/or necessary dialogue, making it a waste of a recording. The very inferior recordings just don't live up to the live performances. Once you are used to hearing the show in its original live form, the changes & cuts on the recording leave a sour taste.
I don't know exactly why they did this for ASU, as the entire CD clocks in at 57:56, well shy of the maximum 80 minutes that fit on a standard CD. If there is space, why not included as much of the score as possible?
Updated On: 5/25/05 at 04:04 PM
