Favorite Cast Recording(s) of the 16/17 Season?

[GavestonPS]

10086Sundays said: "For those who don't like the imperfect rhymes, Groundhog Day specifically, does it ruin any possibility of an emotional connection to the show?  This a genuine question, since, while I don't mind the imperfect rhymes, some of the cruder lyrics, I could do without.  However, that hasn't prevented me from connecting to the show as a whole.  Is it a case of the rhymes just being one of many issues with the show or the rhymes being the sole reason for not enjoying it?

 

"

For me, that was just one factor. (Note: I have not seen the show.)

I noted the first 3 rhymed couplets given to the hero only as an example of what I find to be sloppy craft throughout. The thing is: "erection", "rears", and "cop" are NOT hard words to rhyme. It's not as if Minchin was wrestling with "orange".

As Someone points out above, there are plenty of near-rhymes in this season's shows; I'm resigned to that. (Though I wonder why, in COMET as in DADDY LONG LEGS a few years ago, lyrics sometimes rhyme (imperfectly or perfectly) and sometimes don't. I'm okay either way, but I expect to find a consistent pattern.) In GHD, however, the lyric craft strikes me as severely and unnecessarily lacking AND I find the music dull.

As for ROBBER BRIDEGROOM, it was off-Broadway and the previous season. (But I'm glad I downloaded it, because I would have worn out a CD by now. I saw the original and first tour, and this recording is MUCH better.)

I should add that this thread has convinced me to give GHD and BANDSTAND another try.

[10086Sundays]

Thank you for your responses Someone and Gaveston.  I understand where you're both coming from and, much as I love GHD, I can admit they went for some low hanging fruit when it comes to certain lyrics.  For example, I get wanting Phil to be a jerk and immature, but, in "If I Had My Time Again" they pass up a chance to advance his character in favor of a masturbation joke.  To the show's detriment I think, because otherwise, that song could be used to sell it.

There are moments though, like the "this stunning stasis" lyric from "Hope" that has stayed in the back of my mind since I first saw the show.

Gaveston - I'm glad you're giving GHD another try, though I fear until you see it live, you'll have the same issues as before.  (This isn't anyway meant as an insult to you.)  The cast, particularly Andy, overcome the music and lyrical deficiencies with their performances, as does the incredible staging. I hope you get a chance to see it!

[TheThreadMaster]

Dear Evan Hansen, Falsettos, and Hello Dolly. Oh so good.

[RippedMan]

I thought her "Knight" song in GHD was probably one of the best songs written in awhile. And the same for "Playing Nancy." I just didn't care for any of Karl's songs. 

[BeukyBaby]

Hello, Dolly!, for sure. It transports me back to one of the most magical evenings I've ever had in a theater. I know many think it's lackluster, but I don't.

Also, I'm rather shocked to see people on this board referring to "soundtracks" in this thread. Every time you call a cast recording a soundtrack, a chorus boy tears his ACL.

[GeorgeandDot]

Soundtrack

Soundtrack 

Soundtrack

Soundtrack

Soundtrack

Soundtrack

Soundtrack

[GavestonPS]

Sundays, I'm not in the least insulted. I appreciate your remarks on the importance of stage craft to telling the story of GHD and I, too, hope I get to see it someday.

In the meantime, I had a great time last night giving BANDSTAND another listen. I was overly influenced, previously, by what I thought was a lackluster performance on the Tonys. The recording is lovely and fun, and has been placed on my regular-play list.

Just one of the reasons I like BWW.com. Thanks to everyone who recommended BANDSTAND!

[willep]

For me it is Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812. In my eyes (and ears) that show is a work of art that works for me just as much as an album as the experience in the theatre.

 

I also really enjoy the Come From Away recording. I really didn't think that the album would get much play for me, even after seeing and loving the show, but I go back to it often.

 

Rounding out my top 3 would be Groundhog Day. I don't listen to it straight through, but there are some really wonderful songs there. The ones I tend to skip are the ones that are mostly music (Philandering/Philosophy/etc), and I find myself listening to the second act more than the first.

[asoftplacetoland]

Great Comet. It has stolen my heart. 

Closely followed by Falsettos. But I must say I have worn out the track, "Requim" from DEH. 

[coreman009]

Dear Evan Hansen #1, which is odd because there's so much left out. Bandstand is #2, it's so well done. Come From Away does a great recording as well. Groundhog Day is a show I loved and the recording is alright but not as good. Great Comet's album is dead last IMO. It's all over the place and I just don't think the music works outside of that theater setting. 

[Mediamaven2]

I am really into the Off Broadway recording of Great Comet!!! SO that doesn' t count for 16-17 but the current broadway production/recording turned me onto the past one which I prefer for both Dave Malloy and Philippa Soo

[CorkySt.Clair]

Mediamaven2 said: "I am really into the Off Broadway recording of Great Comet!!! SO that doesn' t count for 16-17 but the current broadway production/recording turned me onto the past one which I prefer for both Dave Malloy and Philippa Soo

 

"

I totally agree on Dave Malloy. I'm reading War and Peace now and his voice matches my image of Pierre exactly. Nothing against Groban though, I've only heard the off-Bway recording so far. 

I think War Paint is probably my fave album this season. Breathtaking performances beautifully preserved (and it doesn't hurt that the score itself is gorgeous as well). 

[BroadwayCritic1]

It all depends whether you saw the show or not:

But this will come as no surprise:

To relive the show:  Come From Away   (great story, great score, & great cast--- and it all comes through in the recording)   &   Groundhog Day Musical (OBCR is brilliant and underrated; and yet another way this show has been poorly marketed.)

If never saw the show: Dear Evan Hansen 

[newintown]

War Paint is by far the easy win for me - the best theatrical score of the season, written for and delivered by two of our best singing actors working today. If only the book had been as good...

[TheThreadMaster]

I heard a rumor about there being a sunday in the park cast recording.

[gallerygirl]

RippedMan said: "Guess I'm in the minority, but I love the Amelie recording. I listen to it at least once a week. So haunting and beautiful. I went into the show thinking eh, this will be boring, but I was really taken with it. Def. not a big Broadway show, but I hope it has a healthy regional life. I think the music is at times really gorgeous."

Another vote for AMELIE from me. Some lovely music in there.

 

[haterobics]

TheThreadMaster said: "I heard a rumor about there being a sunday in the park cast recording."

Well, they announced they were making one, so...

So far, this season's breakout OBCR is Great Comet for me.

[hak5]

I've only heard two:

COME FROM AWAY is my fave, it brings back all the emotions and enjoyment I felt when I saw the show

I also like [but have not seen] Dear Evan Hansen

[Melanie73]

I have to give A Bronx Tale some love!  I've been a lifelong fan of Alan Menken, and this recording definitely doesn't disappoint!  It definitely has the feel and soul of the era.

Another vote for Amelie.  While the melodies may seem similar here and there, I really like the lyrics.

And, like most people here, DEH, CFA, and Anastasia.

[CoolDogeGuy]

My favorite cast recordings from the 2016-17 Broadway season are (in order):

Come From Away

Dear Evan Hansen

Falsettos

Great Comet

In Transit

Amelie

Hello, Dolly!

[Babe_Williams]

Am really enjoying Bandstand. 

[JustAnotherNewYorker]

GHD

 

I listen to Comet a lot, but the off broadway cast as I prefer Dave to Josh. Amelie was also good enough for me to buy...

[OlBlueEyes]

You shame me, Gaveston. I rarely think twice about purchasing a cast album of a show I did not care for. You listen to them all, usually multiple times, and no doubt discover songs, performers and composers who would have otherwise just slipped past most.

But I'm very interested in this rule of the perfect rhyme. Is there some school that teaches the necessity of perfect rhyme in musical rhymes? I have an English degree among my other useless credentials and have read many poets. Alexander Pope, active in the early 18th century during the reign of Queen Anne, was a slave to the Heroic Couplet, which required perfect rhymes, but even he at times had to sacrifice the rule to express a sentiment just as he desired.

Hope springs eternal in the human breast;

Man never is, but always to be blessed:

The soul, uneasy and confined from home,

Rests and expatiates in a life to come.

The two bold words would not meet the rhyme rule? Well, let's keep trying. Here is Gray's much loved "Elegy," written over a hundred years later than Pope.

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil, 

         Their homely joys, and destiny obscure; 

Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile 

         The short and simple annals of the poor.

I don't think that "toil" is a very good word to rhyme exactly with "smile," but this stanza has done very well with the public over the years.

A little less than a hundred years later, Keats was writing for the romantics. This opening stanza of "The Eve of St. Agnes" is one of my favorites.

St. Agnes' Eve—Ah, bitter chill it was! 

       The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold; 

       The hare limp'd trembling through the frozen grass, 

       And silent was the flock in woolly fold: 

Keats follows a very strict  ABAB rhyme scheme in this poem and yet makes no attempt at all to rhyme the 1st and 3rd lines. Why? Line 3 is the most expressive in this long poem and no rhyme could be worth altering a syllable.

I won't take up any more space, but I note that Maya Angelou gave herself great freedom not only in which lines of a stanza to be rhymed, but how many lines would be in the stanza.

Notwithstanding all this above, I wonder to whom does the perfect rhyme requirement apply.

[GavestonPS]

I can't accept too much applause, OlBlueEyes. One of the reasons I follow OCBRs so closely is that I live in a medium-size market on the West Coast where most of these shows won't play except years from now as community theater. (I'm two hours from Los Angeles, so I do see some things there, including AMELIE.)

As for rhyming, you are correct that near-rhymes have been in use throughout the history of the English language. (Different languages have different customs: Japanese, for example, doesn't use rhyming as a rule, but is very big on alliteration.) For one thing, in poetry that is meant to be read, primarily, paired rhymes like home/come "rhyme" to the eye, if not to the ear. For another, imperfect rhymes feel more "relaxed" and may better fit the contemplative mood of many poems.

In the theater, however, where lyrics must be heard over an orchestra, the rumbling of a turntable, the tapping of the chorus and God only knows what else, perfect rhymes were the norm from the early 20th Century to 1970 or thereabouts. Unconsciously, the theatergoer knows that if she hears "time" at the end of a line, the next line will end with "mime" or "rhyme", not "mind", "thine" or "Hammerstein". This aids her comprehension. Here is one of the great lyrics of all time:

"Here's to the ladies who lunch.
Everybody laugh.
Lounging in their caftans and planning a brunch.
On their own behalf.
Off to the gym,
Then to a fitting,
Claiming they're fat.
And looking grim
'Cause they've been sitting
Choosing a hat.
Does anyone still wear a hat?
I'll drink to that."

I love the above example (from COMPANY, 1970, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim) because it illustrates another rhyming principle: perfect rhymes should highlight (for the ear just as I did above for the eye) the most important words in each line.

What's even more astonishing is that Sondheim repeats the same complex rhyming pattern in TWO MORE choruses! And in doing so allows Joanne to discuss the psychology and philosophy of her social class along with other complex themes. The same content might well be lost in the theater without equivalent perfect rhymes. (People keep quoting wonderful lines from GROUNDHOG DAY in this thread, but I didn't hear a one of them when I first listened to the recording.)

My remarks here apply largely to theater music. Pop music, on the other hand, is designed to be played repeatedly, on the radio and, once-upon-a-time, on the record player; so it has never mattered whether one heard every word on the first hearing. A good hook that allows the listener to remember the song when he gets to the record store is enough. (There are a number of great pop lyricists, of course, and most of us would put Dylan, Springsteen, Henley and Mitchell alongside the best of Broadway wordsmiths.)

And Broadway audiences today are more conditioned by pop than theater music; meanwhile, songs are amplified loudly and clearly. So whether perfect rhyming really matters as much nowadays is a matter for debate. But it's an aspect of craft that we old-timers appreciate.

[ZellMorrowsPledge]

Groundhog Day is on 24/7. I also am obsessed with Dear Evan Hansen and Falsettos

[10086Sundays]

I want to say thanks for Gaveston and Blue Eyes for the discussion.  I have nothing intelligent to add, but it's a pleasure to read.