Ghostlight Releases WOMEN ON THE VERGE Album Today

Ghostlight Records has confirmed the April 19th (digital) and May 10th (physical) release of the Original Broadway Cast Recording of Lincoln Center Theater's production of WOMEN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN, featuring book by Jeffrey Lane, and music and lyrics by David Yazbek.

The OCR includes a 40-page full-color booklet featuring an essay by Pedro Almodovar, liner notes by the renowned Frank Rich, and even a recipe for gazpacho by NY Times writer Mark Bittman. Rich comments: "Listen to Yazbek's haunting score, and you'll start to understand why the show has legs. Its blend of Latin and pop owes more to the Almodovar/Madrid spirit - and to the romantic soundtracks of vintage Hollywood - than it does to other Broadway musicals. The music and lyrics alike delve to the core of Almodóvar's signature characters."

The CD features de'Adre Aziza, Laura Benanti, Danny Burstein, Justin Guarini, Nikka Graff Lanzarone, Patti LuPone, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Mary Beth Peil and Sherie Rene Scott, and was produced by Dean Sharenow and David Yazbek, with Kurt Deutsch serving as Executive Producer. The album was recorded on January 19th at MSR Studios in New York. Hear samples, pre-order the CD and learn more here: http://sh-k-boom.com/womenontheverge.shtml

Based on Pedro Almodóvar's internationally acclaimed 1988 film, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is set in late 20th-century Madrid and tells the story of the intertwining lives of a group of women (Sherie Rene Scott, de'Adre Aziza, Laura Benanti, Nikka Graff Lanzarone, Patti LuPone) whose relationships with men lead to a tumultuous 48 hours of love, confusion and passion. Featuring book by Jeffrey Lane, music and lyrics by David Yazbek and direction by Bartlett Sher, the production ended its limited engagement run on Sunday, January 2 at the Belasco Theatre.

OCR Track Listing:
Overture
Madrid is my Mama
Lie To Me
Lovesick
Time Stood Still
My Crazy Heart
Model Behavior
Island
The Microphone
On The Verge
Entr'acte
Mother's Day
Yesterday, Tomorrow and Today
Tangled
Invisible
Island (Reprise)
Shoes From Heaven
BONUS: My Crazy Heart (Original Show Opening)

More about the film and the Lincoln Center Theater production:
When Pedro Almodóvar arrived in town in 1988 to show his new film at the New York Film Festival he became an instant sensation. Channeling the burst of energy and freedom in post-Franco Spain, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown was one of the most unusual and exhilarating new films in years. It was nominated for the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, and quickly became not just a classic, but a favorite.

WOMEN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN is a new musical based on the film. Lincoln Center Theater's Resident Director, Bartlett Sher, still happily reeling from his achievement on South Pacific, leads the extraordinary collaborators Jeffrey Lane (book) and David Yazbek (music and lyrics). Lane and Yazbek, the team behind Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, have taken Almodóvar's tale and infused it with their own wry, comic style and an irresistible Spanish beat.

Both touching and hilarious, it's a story about women and the men who pursue them... finding them, losing them, needing them, and rejecting them. At the center is Pepa (Sherie Rene Scott) whose friends and lovers are blazing a trail through 1980s Madrid. And why do they all keep showing up at her high-rise apartment? Gazpacho anyone?

Along with Pepa, there's her missing (possibly philandering) lover, Ivan (Brian Stokes Mitchell); his ex-wife of questionable sanity, Lucia (Patti LuPone); their son Carlos (Justin Guarini); Pepa's friend, Candela (Laura Benanti), and her terrorist boyfriend; a power-suited lawyer (de'Adre Aziza) plus a taxi driver (Danny Burstein) who dispenses tissues, mints and advice in equal proportion. Mayhem and comic madness abound, balanced by the empathy and heart that are trademarks of Almodóvar's work. And of Bartlett Sher's too.

Sh-K-Boom with its imprint Ghostlight Records has become the leading independent force in Original Broadway Cast Recordings - building a library of over 100 records the last 10 years, featuring the most successful Broadway musicals and solo albums by Broadway's biggest stars. Founded by Kurt Deutsch and wife Sherie Rene Scott, the label was created by and for the Broadway community and has garnered acclaim not only for their high-quality recordings, but for their innovative marketing techniques and efforts to reach the next generation of Broadway music fans via iTunes, music videos and more. The label (and President Kurt Deutsch) earned their first ever GRAMMY AWARD for the Tony Award-winning musical In the Heights. In recent Broadway seasons, Ghostlight has also preserved the scores of some of Broadway's biggest musicals, including Next to Normal, Hair, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, Legally Blonde, Everyday Rapture, Passing Strange, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and The Drowsy Chaperone. Just released on the label are the OCR of Sister Act, as well as solo albums from Tony winners Sutton Foster, Alice Ripley, Christine Ebersole and Ben Vereen. Coverage of their albums has ranged from Rolling Stone to USA TODAY to The New York Times, from Blender Magazine to Playbill to Billboard, from AP Radio to Entertainment Weekly, from New York Magazine to Variety to NY-1 TV, from Time Out NY to Paper Magazine to The Advocate to The NY Daily News and much more. President Kurt Deutsch was interviewed by PLAYBILL, regarding the label's embrace of 'Broadway's Digital Age': http://www.playbill.com/features/article/118331.html. The company is recognized for reinventing the musical theatre recording landscape, and creating a new type of ‘United Artists' environment for Broadway producers and artists to participate in the funding and co-ownership of their albums.

Visit http://sh-k-boom.com/womenontheverge.shtml

 

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