Weighing in on the Original Broadway Cast Recording of 'next to normal'

By: May. 21, 2009
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Hello Everyone.

Well, it's awards season and the name on everybody's lips is not 'Roxie,' but 'Alice.' Alice would be Alice Ripley, who would seem to be a shoe-in for Best Actress in a Musical for next to normal. next to normal has been building a buzz ever since it returned home to New York and took up residence at the Booth Theatre.

We've done many features and have covered next to normal and their activities leading up to awards season and the only things that they haven't been considered for were The Drama Desk Award and The Outer Critics Circle Award which they were considered for last year and, by the way. didn't win anything. My suspicion is that is all about to change.

I usually do CD reviews in 'roundups' but wanted to feature this one in particular because of the care that clearly went into 'putting it together' - no pun intended. Here is my review:

next to normal

Original Broadway Cast Recording

Ghostlight Records

 (5 out of 5)

 

REJOICE! We can stop playing SPRING AWAKENING and start living on NEXT TO NORMAL! This show is a knockout and they are being rewarded right now on Broadway, after having gone away quietly and doing their homework on fixes, after the Second Stage production - which people were fascinated by, but not satisified with. Well, they are now ... and they've released a recording on a fantastic DOUBLE-DISC! Produced by Kurt Deutsch, Joel Moss and the producer of the show, David Stone, this is dizzying to listen to. Loved the show - love the disc. Predicting a TONY for Alice Ripley and a GRAMMY for the Cast Recording. Great booklet, great packaging - BUY IT! It's SO GREAT when people do it right! Thank you.

I strongly recommend that you purchase the physical CD, as the packaging is beautiful, there's a lyric book and it's very generous with photographs of the production as well. There are few albums these days that you really want to add to the shelf and this one of them that will have a 'shelf life', as I refer to, it in the vein of Spring Awakening, RENT, WICKED, Jersey Boys...you get the idea.

With Mother's Day just passed, the Tonys coming - summer on its way, which will include air travel, car travel, train travel and beach time, you're definitely going to want to hook up to this Original Broadway Cast Recording.

 



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