I agree that it is a very well-produced recording. But honestly I feel it's a hot mess of a score. I have not seen the show yet, and was really excited to get the cast recording and see the show this month, but after listening to the score I honestly have very little desire to see it.
The opening number is great (even if in a show about sexism and the problem women deal with in the corporate world, the first line is sung by a man), but the little sections given to Doralee and her husband and to Judy are very generic. Megan Hilty is doing an impression of Dolly Parton, in my opinion, or at least that's how it comes off on recording. Alison Janney does a good job with what she is given, but "One of the Boys" almost crosses the fine line between homage/rip-off, there are a number of songs I feel it almost copies. "Shine Like the Sun" has a lot of corny, sappiness to it. Stephanie J. Block only really shines in "Get Out and Stay Out" which I think is one of the few successful songs in the show.
I wanted to like the album so much, but I really didn't. Just my opinion. I do agree that as an album, it works quite well but I don't think it deserves a Grammy over the perfection that NEXT TO NORMAL and HAIR are.
"Some people can thrive and bloom living life in a living room, that's perfect for some people of one hundred and five. But I at least gotta try, when I think of all the sights that I gotta see, all the places I gotta play, all the things that I gotta be at"