So much to comment on!
George wrote, yesterday
Sometimes I wonder if people write songs for shows write songs, not just to try and be pop-u-lar (a Wicked reference), but with the idea that it might be a good audition song and it can become much more popular with theater performers, who in turn will record the songs, sing the songs in cabaret performances, etc.
There's a song in the musical I'm writing now, A Song That Shows Range, that is being done in auditions. Which makes sense, since it's an audition in the show. But I'm not sure the audition in the show really needs to be seen, so it may get cut.
Musical theatre writers (if they're good) write for the character, situation and plot and don't think about how the songs might be used outside of the show. The show's the thing.
Last night's cabaret went extremely well. I always love it when an audience that's hearing musical comedy material for the first time does what the authors hoped and laughs uproariously. After School Special, Pretty Young Men, Bluer Than You, Miss Byrd, The Boy From..., The Girl in 14G and Glitter and Be Gay all delivered the yoks. It was a grueling day, as I was given no opportunity to leave the piano bench from 11:20 to 6 p.m., but then got an hour-long dinner break before playing the show.
Which brings us to the
media check. Hardest to play of all was the particuarly ridiculous arrangement of Shall We Dance from
Crazy For You. I don't know who did the dance arrangement but this person and choreographer Susan Stroman saw some need to jazz up George Gershwin. So this thing keeps changing tempos without mercy. I had two fine violinists playing behind me who brilliantly went with the flow. If you can call it a flow.
So one of the CDs is the
Crazy For You cast album, and it's wholly unlistenable. It's not just the voices, it's the misconception of almost every number. George and Ira wrote the title tune as K-ra-zy For You. The entire point of the song is that love has made the character lose their grip on language, and so a simple word like crazy is stretched into three syllables. Except it's never done that way in this musical called Crazy For You, so the whole bridge about "love may not inspire my lingo" makes no earthly sense.
On the brighter side of the CD player is the delightful Prime Time Musicals - one of BK's favorites that he's done, and I can see why. Some very good songs there, wonderfully rendered, and an entire genre (the musical written for television) finally gets notice. I'm very glad to have this.