973 stories by "Michael Portantiere"
Original Cast, 1970 (Ampex/no CD) No stars; not recommended. For years, this seemed the most ubiquitous of all show recordings. It turned up everywhere: at garage sales, school sales, librar…
Original Broadway Cast, 1951 (Capitol/DRG) Some types of comedy date very quickly, and this zany musical expedition into the world of vaudeville comics is an example of that. Still, it's a w…
Studio Cast, 1977 (Painted Smiles) The world's oldest collection of co-eds bops to a lower-drawer score by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart in this Ben Bagley recording of a 1939 hit that has…
Studio Recording, 1969 (MCA) Originally conceived for presentation on record, this seminal "rock opera" is thrillingly melodic and dramatic. Small wonder that it was subsequently adapted as …
Original Broadway Cast, 1997 (RCA) You'll be hard-pressed to find more beautiful choral singing than that heard on the cast album of Titanic, the musical about the sinking of that famed "shi…
New York Concert Cast, 1998 (New World, 2CDs) Enchanting piffle from 1925, Tip-Toes has a funny Fred Thompson-Guy Bolton book, a dancey Gershwin score, and an insuperable cast in this Carneg…
Original Broadway Cast, 1980 (DRG) Allegedly, this was the first-ever digitally recorded cast album. A cavalcade of early-20th-century Americana, Tintypes sounds splendid here as its five-me…
Original Broadway Cast, 1966 (Warner Bros./no CD) Based on Richard Llewellyn's popular book How Green Was My Valley, which inspired the acclaimed 1941 movie of the same title, A Time for Sin…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 2001 (RCA) This minor but appealing Off-Broadway effort was adapted by playwright David Auburn from a semi-autobiographical, one-person show that had been written…
Studio Cast, 2001 (PS Classics) Hats off to PS Classics for issuing the premiere recording of this interesting curio, a 1931 Vincent Youmans flop " and hats back on for their having made suc…
Original Cast, 2004 (Original Cast Records) In musicalizing the true story of Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, who murdered a boy in 1924 Chicago, composer-lyricist-librettist Stephen Dolgin…
Original Broadway Cast, 1952 (Capitol/Angel) The singing on this recording of a misfire by Abe Burrows and Ralph Blane is so gorgeous that you'll forgive Blane's score for being less than ri…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1954 (MGM/Decca) This is the Carmen Capalbo production that helped put Off-Broadway on the map. One of the most important musical theater works of the 20th centur…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1985 (Polygram/JAY) This three-character musical about the rise and ultimate dissolution of a gifted trio of young comedians has one big problem in that it's neve…
Original Cast, 2000 (DRG) It would be a wonderful thing if more full-length musicals could be as melodic and charming as 3hree, the triumvirate of one-act works that director Harold Prince p…
Original Broadway Cast, 2001 (Swing Music) In theory, it was an inspired idea to have Harry Connick, Jr. write the score for this Susan Stroman-David Thompson adaptation of Thérèse Raquin,…
Film Soundtrack, 1967 (Decca/MCA) There's no explanation for this bizarre camp exercise, which was designed to spoof the 1920s. Julie Andrews and Mary Tyler Moore play flappers seeking their…
Original Broadway Cast, 1942 (Decca) Shortly after the start of World War II, Irving Berlin created a new version of his World War I revue Yip! Yip! Yaphank. The resulting show, This Is the …
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 2004 (DRG) A sort of musical fairy tale for adults, The Thing About Men is based on Doris Dorrie's German film Männer. It shows us what happens when a philanderi…
Original Broadway Cast, 1978 (Casablanca) Neil Simon based his book for They're Playing Our Song on the real-life relationship of the show's composer and lyricist, Marvin Hamlisch and Carole…
Original Broadway Cast, 1949 (Decca) Although it is now forgotten, this mild satire on Texas politics ran out the season, and a near-hit song or two came out of its score by composer Robert …
Original Broadway Cast, 1960 (Capitol/Angel) It all starts with a marvelous opéra bouffe-style overture that sets the tone perfectly for this tale of the Tenderloin, New York's most notorio…
Studio Cast, 1998 (New World, 2CDs) This was one of the Gershwins' middling, mid-1920s musicals, chock-a-block with mistaken identities, society marriages, and principal comics delivering nu…
Original Broadway Cast, 1984 (Polygram) Onstage, it was an entertaining, beautifully put together, old-fashioned show, but the cast album of The Tap Dance Kid reveals an uninteresting score.…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1983 (Painted Smiles) One of the most colorful personalities in show business history, Tallulah Bankhead was so imitable that any impressionist worth his or her s…
