Borders.com in Original Cast Music

"Rent [Original Broadway Cast]" (08/27/1996) Pop Vocal Original Cast, Dreamworks SKGMusic and lyrics written by Jonathan Larson. Principal cast: Adam Pascal (Roger Davis); Anthony Rapp (Mark Cohen); Jesse L. Martin (Tom Collins); Taye Diggs (Benjamin Coffin III); Fredi Walker (Joanne Jefferson); Wilson Jermaine Heredia (Angel Schunard); Daphne Rubin-Vega (Mimi Marquez); Idina Menzel (Maureen Johnson); Kristen Lee Kelly, Byron Utley, Gwen Stewart, Timothy Britten Parker, Gilles Chiasson, Rodney Hicks, Aiko Nakasone. Additional personnel: Stevie Wonder. Recorded at Sorcerer Sound and Right Track Recording, New York, New York. Includes a 36-page booklet with a plot synopsis and complete lyrics. RENT was nominated for a 1997 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album. Composer: Jonathan Larson. Lyricist: Billy Aronson. Personnel: Daphne Rubin-Vega, Rodney Hicks, Jesse L. Martin, Gwen Stewart, Idina Menzel, Aiko Nakasone, Taye Diggs, Byron Utley, Wilson Jermaine Heredia, Gilles Chiasson, Adam Pascal, Anthony Rapp (vocals); Anthony Jackson (guitar, contra guitar); Daniel A. Weiss (guitar, synthesizer); Kenny Brescia (guitar); Ira Siegel (electric guitar); Dominic Derasse (trumpet, piccolo trumpet); Tim Weil (piano, synthesizer); Steve Skinner (keyboards, synthesizer, drum programming); Jeffrey Potter (drums, percussion); Kurt Fischer (sound effects). Audio Mixer: Michael O'Reilly. Recording information: Right Track Recording, NY; Sorcerer Sound, NY. Directors: Michael Grief; Michael Greif; Robin Sloane; Tim Weil. Photographers: Joan Marcus; Richie Lee; Amy Guip. Unknown Contributor Roles: George Marino; Anthony Jackson; Stevie Wonder; Tim Weil. Arrangers: Arif Mardin; Steve Skinner; Tim Weil. This 43-track set includes in its entirety the unlikely opera about AIDS, drugs, squatters, down-and-out artists and (of course) love that won the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for drama and went on to knock Broadway off its feet at a time when the Broadway musical was widely assumed to be dead. Like the climactic love song that seems to magically rescue one of the main characters from near-death, RENT itself may well be responsible for bringing Broadway back to life. RENT was written and composed by Jonathan Larson, who died suddenly hours after the final dress rehearsal. Larson's music is almost seamless in the way it quilts together show-tune tradition with current pop styles, reflecting the story's blend of a classical plot (it's loosely based on Puccini's opera "La Boheme") with a thoroughly modern setting. A tango, in which a man and woman compare notes on a lover they have shared, fits comfortably between an electronic dance tune with rapped vocals ("Today 4 U," sung by the play's drag-queen hero) and a rocking entreaty to come "Out Tonight." The latter is sung by Daphne Rubin-Vega, whose coquettish pop voice and sensual presence help her stand out from a great ensemble cast. The play's unexpectedly optimistic message is spelled out in a breathtaking pop song called "Seasons Of Love," which leads off the second act. As a bonus, Stevie Wonder joins the cast for a reprise that puts a soaring coda of hope on this dark opera.

"Ain't Misbehavin' [Original Broadway Cast]" (07/07/1987) Pop Vocal Original Cast, RCA Victor Records (USA)The Broadway musical based on the music of Fats Waller. Cast includes: Andre De Shields, Nell Carter. Ain't Misbehavin' originated as a simple song by Thomas "Fats" Waller that he sold for $500 and that was then performed by Louis Armstrong. In 1978, it became the title track of a cabaret show featuring the music of Waller. It was such a considerable success that it became a Broadway show, and was resurrected in 1988 for a brief stint. Ain't Misbehavin' won numerous Tonys, not the least of which was the award for Best Musical. The original Broadway cast recording features the Tony Award-winning performance of Nell Carter and captures the cabaret feel of the show that made it so charming and refreshing. An excellent recording of the show. ~ Sarah Erlewine

"Little Women [Original Broadway Cast]" (05/03/2005) Pop Vocal Original Cast, GhostlightComposer: Jason Howland. Lyricist: Mindi Dickstein. Original Cast Recording/Sutton Foster: Sutton Foster; Danny Gurwin, Janet Carroll, Maureen McGovern, Amy McAlexander, Megan McGinnis, Jenny Powers, John Hickok. Personnel: Karl Kawahara, Sylvia Davanzo, Eric Degioia, Mary Whitaker, Martin Agee, Sean Carney (violin); David Blinn, Liuh-Wen Ting (viola); Lawrence Feldman (flute, alto flute, piccolo, clarinet, bass clarinet); Lynne Cohen (oboe, English horn); Tony Kadleck (trumpet, cornet, flugelhorn); Russ Rizner-French (French horn); Mark Lusk (tenor trombone, bass trombone, euphonium); Rob Meffe (piano); Jim Saporito (percussion); Peter Hylenski (sound effects). Audio Mixer: Joel Moss . Liner Note Author: Allan Knee. Recording information: Avatar Studios, New York, NY (02/03/2005/02/28/2005); The Hit Factory, New York, NY (02/03/2005/02/28/2005). Photographers: Paul Kolnik; Joan Marcus. Louisa May Alcott's perennially popular 1869 novel Little Women, recounting the domestic adventures of the four March sisters (particularly the literarily minded middle sister, Jo) in the Civil War era in Concord, MA, has proven perennially popular as a subject of adaptation into other media, especially since the book fell out of copyright. There was the classic 1933 film starring Katharine Hepburn; a 1949 movie with June Allyson; a 1958 TV musical with songs by Richard Adler; a 1978 TV movie; and a well-received 1994 screen version featuring Winona Ryder. And, starting on January 23, 2005, there was a Broadway musical (no relation to the Adler work), with songs by composer Jason Howland and lyricist Mindi Dickstein, starring Sutton Foster (fresh from her Tony-winning performance in Thoroughly Modern Millie) as Jo, with cabaret singer Maureen McGovern as Marmee, the mother of the brood. The show made a modest appearance on Broadway, which had in recent years seen a plethora of musical adaptations of public-domain novels. Neither particularly liked nor disliked by critics, it nevertheless settled in for an extended run, and while the cast album, recorded the month after the opening, seems to have had a little trouble finding a home, such that it did not appear in record stores until May 2005 through the auspices of theater specialist Ghostlight Records, the show was still running at that point. (After the Tony Award nominations virtually ignored it, only giving a nod to Foster, it closed on May 22 after 137 performances.) On disc, the reasons for both the theater community's indifference and the public's acceptance are suggested. Certainly, this is not a remarkable score; serviceable would be a better word to describe it. The lyrics have none of the wit that critics revel in when it comes from the pen of Stephen Sondheim, and the music is neither traditional Broadway show music nor entirely in the camp of the sub-operatic style of Andrew Lloyd Webber, though it suggests both at times. But then, Little Women is not the sort of material that would be likely to attract either Sondheim or Lloyd Webber. As the show goes on, it becomes apparent that Dickstein is aiming at a simple, plainspoken language that matches the tone of the book, while Howland, though capable of dramatic passages (particularly employed comically in "An Operatic Tragedy," as Jo recounts one of her overwritten early stories to a friend at the outset), also wants to match his music to the understated particulars of the story. The score is conventional and workmanlike: it gives co-star McGovern two showcases ("Here Alone" and "Days of Plenty") and provides Foster with a typical Broadway "I am" song ("Astonishing"). Indeed, it provides her with much more; this is nothing less than a star vehicle, and Foster, who may be to Broadway what Sandra Bullock was to Hollywood in the early 2000s, a rough-and-ready heroine who can handle a kiss or a pratfall with equal aplomb, is up to that challenge. Slow to get going, Little Women makes its points about family commitment and social responsibility movingly by its end, and it's no surprise that audiences respond to that kind of sincerity

"I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change" (11/19/1996) Pop Vocal Original Cast, VarŠse Sarabande (USA)The original cast recording of I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change features the musical revue's witty songs detailing the travails of dating and romance in the age of safe sex. ~ Jason Ankeny