You’ve got to learn how not to be/Where you are/The more you face reality, the more you scar/So close your eyes and you’ll become a movie star/Why must you stay where you are? As Aurora, the dark vision of fantasy and title character of Terrence McNally, John Kander, and Fred Ebb’s 1992 musical Kiss of the Spider Woman, Chita Rivera cast a powerful spell. Since her Broadway debut as an ensemble dancer in the 1950 production of Guys and Dolls – billed as Conchita del Rivero, shortened from her birth name of Dolores Conchita…
Put on a Happy Face: Jasmine Reissues, Expands Dick Van Dyke’s “Songs I Like”
In an extraordinary showbiz career spanning almost 75 years, perennial song-and-dance man Dick Van Dyke has only recorded three solo albums (in addition to his appearances on best-selling cast albums and soundtracks, that is!). While two of those – 2017’s Step Back in Time and 2009’s Put on a Happy Face, the latter with his a cappella group The Vantastix – are from recent years, he did record one LP while starring on the 15-time Emmy Award-winning sitcom The Dick Van Dyke Show. 1963’s Songs I Like, recorded with The Ray Charles…
Gee, But It’s Good to Be Here: Stage Door Releases “Lost Broadway 1956-57”
For the second volume in its Lost Broadway series of 2-CD sets, the U.K.’s Stage Door Records label has turned its attention to the years 1956 and 1957. Musical hits during the 1956-1957 and 1957-1958 seasons included Bells Are Ringing, Li’l Abner, West Side Story, and The Music Man, but Stage Door’s attention doesn’t lie with those smashes but rather with the largely-forgotten, but certainly worthy, shows that haven’t received nearly as much love over the years. Like the first volume (which looked back to 1961), this edition features original cast performances…
Release Round-Up: Week of June 22
Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! The Cure, Mixed Up: Deluxe Edition (Universal (U.K.)/Elektra/Rhino (U.S.)) 1CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 3CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Mixed Up 2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Torn Down 2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Postponed from last week: The Cure revisits its 1990 remix album as a 3-CD deluxe edition. The first disc of the new set contains the original Mixed Up album, as newly remastered by Smith. The second disc, Remixes…
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And All That Jazz: The “Now!” Series Goes to Broadway
The long-running Now That’s What I Call Music! series is adding another volume in about two weeks and this one is a little different from its normal fare. Now That’s What I Call Broadway! is an 18-track compilation rounding up tracks musical theater tracks from the last 40 years and is due to hit stores on April 29. While the Now! series is primarily focused on contemporary pop music from the Top 40 charts, it has had several detours into slightly other genres, like volumes focused on Disney songs and Halloween songs. This will mark the first…
Analog Spark Breathes New Life Into Three Classic Broadway Cast Recordings
Curtain up! Analog Spark, the audiophile imprint of Razor and Tie, has brought back the luster of yesteryear with a trio of reissues from the days when people dressed up to go to the theatre. The label has given the Original Broadway Cast Recordings of My Fair Lady, West Side Story and Fiddler on the Roof the deluxe treatment on 180-gram vinyl, and indeed, one would be hard-pressed to think of three titles more worthy of the presentation. Fair Lady, Fiddler and West Side all reveal profound, universal truths about love, tolerance,…
Wouldn’t It Be Loverly: Analog Spark Reissues “My Fair Lady,” “West Side Story,” “Fiddler” On Vinyl
Following its vinyl and SACD presentations of the original soundtrack of 1965’s The Sound of Music and its 40th anniversary vinyl pressing of 1975’s original Broadway cast recording of A Chorus Line, Razor and Tie’s audiophile division Analog Spark has turned its attention to three more classic cast albums. My Fair Lady (1956), West Side Story (1958) and Fiddler on the Roof (1964) are all now available from Analog Spark in newly-remastered, 180-gram deluxe audiophile vinyl editions. These are the first titles released in association with Masterworks Broadway; the Sony imprint last…
