Album Review: HANDS ON A HARDBODY

This ain't your typical musical theatre score. Hands on a Hardbody, the short-lived Broadway musical by Phish band member Trey Anastasio and lyricist Amanda Green, has been beautifully immortalized on a terrific recording by Sh-K-Boom Records that will make you wonder why this heartfelt, bare-bones little show didn't last longer on the Great White Way.

Perhaps Broadway isn't as welcoming of something different as it should be. There's no glitz of flash in this show, nor any in the score. The music, a tough-as-nails blues, folk, country, and rock score, sounds more like a playlist for a road trip through the American South than anything you'd ever hear on a Broadway stage... though, I have no doubt that was what Anastasio and Green were going for. It gets the head nodding and the toes tapping, that's for sure.

List: My Top 10 Contemporary Musical Theatre Cast Albums

Ladies and gentlemen, I have a lot of cast albums. Like, a lot. Some of them haven't been listened to more than once or twice, or at all in fact... but they're part of the collection, so I keep them around. However, there are a number of cast recordings I revisit quite frequently. I'll be scanning my iPod, have an "Oh yeah! That one!" moment, and give it another listen. Based on the suggestion of a reader, I took some time to sit down and narrow down/order up a list of my Top 10 favourites. Realize that, as new cast albums emerge and my taste potentially changes (you never know!) this list may change. All I know now is that it hasn't changed for a very long while, and so I feel comfortable presenting you now with my Top 10 Contemporary Musical Theatre Albums. Let's start at 10 and work our way up to 1, shall we?

Album Review: THE LIGHT IN THE PIAZZA

If you've read my review of the original cast recording for Floyd Collins, it'll come as no surprise to you that I'm a huge fan of Adam Guettel. I firmly believe he's one of the greatest post-Sondheim composers. But something else inspired me to write a review of The Light in the Piazza. I just came back from a production at the world famous Shaw Festival in Niagara on the Lake, Ontario and it simply left me speechless. Never has a musical moved me so deeply and purely. I've owned and listened to the cast album for a long time, but that was my first live encounter with the show. Hence why I feel compelled to review this recording.

Album Review: FEBRUARY HOUSE

What a pleasant surprise.

How do I find so many obscure musicals? I go to the iTunes Store and type in 'cast' to the search bar... 90% of the albums are musical cast recordings. I then browse through and pay attention to albums that catch my eye. That's how I discovered February House, a new musical with a score by Gabriel Kahane.

Who is Gabriel Kahane, you may ask? Don't worry, I had no idea either. It turns out that February House is one of Kahane's first forays into musical theatre. He's a young up and coming composer... further inspection found that much of his music is an appealing and quite beautiful combination of contemporary pop and classical sensibilities. You might almost classify his work as 'art songs'.

Album Review: PIPPIN

One of my earliest exposures to musical theatre was Pippin. When I was just a little kid, and my obsession with musicals was just beginning, I'd ransack my local library to find cast recordings of musicals I'd never heard of before. Some of them went over my head... such as Stephen Sondheim's Assassins and the original recording of Night of the Hunter. But one day, I discovered a VHS tape of the filmed production of Pippin starring William Katt, Chita Rivera, and the incomparable Ben Vereen (It also just so happened to be filmed in my hometown of Hamilton, at the theatre in which I now work). I watched it, and fell in love.

Album Review: KINKY BOOTS

I thought I was going to hate this album. Granted, I know next to nothing about the show, but so many factors made it seem like it wouldn't be my thing. Sure, Kinky Boots has been receiving rave reviews on Broadway and has the most nominations of any show at this year's Tony Awards... but I don't usually go for the big, flashy commercial shows (Which Kinky Boots totally is). Also, I was, admittedly ignorantly, turned off by the fact that Cyndi Lauper wrote the score. I've never been a fan of Lauper's work, and rock artists don't generally have a good track record of producing great scores for the theatre. So really, everything was in place for me to hate this cast recording.

I don't think I've ever been so wrong.

Album Review: FLOYD COLLINS

As I've stated, this blog isn't just for reviews of the latest cast albums... I'm also going to be reaching back into the realm of the old and/or obscure. And thus, I bring you Floyd Collins. Floyd Collins, based on the true story of a Kentucky caver who became trapped in a sand cave for weeks and was turned into a media sensation, is one of those "how the hell could that possibly work as a musical?" musicals. But composer/lyricist Adam Guettel and librettist Tina Landau found a way. In fact, they created one of the single greatest contemporary musicals of the past 20 years.