Holy moley on rye - I just read a thing in Backstage about making cast albums. They talked to Tommy Krasker, Billy Rosenfield, Phil Ramone, Flaherty and Ahrens and Jay David Saks. Fine. But I had to laugh because at several points in the article people are saying almost exact quotes of things I've said in interviews over the years, things that have NEVER been said by anyone else who's done this but me. I know when I say these things you all think, oh come on, but I kid you not. One of them says, "Don't ever watch the singer, it will fool you every time." I have never heard a Broadway record producer say this - I said it back in 1993 when I began and I've been saying it ever since and I've said it to some of these very people. That, and quite a few other things, like separation between band and orchestra, and doing pickups because you have good separation - sorry boys, but no one was really doing that before Vinnie and I came along, which is why you get mistakes on older cast albums. People were shocked when we'd put the leads in a booth or do enough separation that we could do a few fixes if we got a great take from the band and the singer missed a note or two. It gave the singer comfort and because of that comfort we didn't really have to do it all that much. They talk about (and almost quote verbatim lines I've said) about making the Broadway people comfortable in front of a microphone, how it's like a closeup in a movie (I mean, come ON, I've been saying this since the beginning). Well, I'm glad I was there in spirit anyway.
It reminds me of the time I was in Joe Allen and Mike Berniker was sitting next to me. He was about to produce the revival album of The Most Happy Fella. We chatted and he told me he was petrified of the two-piano thing and that he was concerned about how to do the recording. He asked if I had ideas. I told him that I'd done one of those and been disappointed with the result, because to me the only way to make it work is to make the two pianos a character, as important as the actors (which I did when I did Ruthless and I Do! I Do!. Apparently, the next day Mr. Berniker walked into the studio and said, "I want the two-pianos to be a character, as important as the actors."