Customer Reviews

Babes In Toyland: Victor Herbert's Musical Extravaganza

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Warning: This CD is so bad that if it should be given away and a $10.00 bill included! I speak as an audiophile with over forty years in the hobby and a CD collection slightly in excess of 2,000. As you might imagine I have some clunkers in my collection but nothing comes close to this clunker in terms of a terrible performance, terrible sound, and a cost ($14.99) that is the first recorded instance of grand larceny committed on the Internet! I will not belabor the point. Don't purchase this clunker. If you have a Freudian need to spend $14.99 I would recommend a down payment on the Brooklyn bridge as a better way to spend your money!

Don't buy this if you're looking for a recording of the music from this operetta. This recording is hideous. I was hoping for a soundtrack but this is a children's retelling of the story--and they couldn't even get THAT right with poor recordings of some of the songs. I was terribly disappointed.

The Babes in Toyland record is well-made and the narration story line works for children. Of course, the wicked miserly uncle wants to murder his orphaned nephew and niece so he can have all of their money...and at Christmas time too....

This Babes in Toyland is a contemporary recording of good quality with narration, plus several historic recordings of Herbert conducting.

The historical pieces at the end are interesting to demonstrate Herbert's orchestra and style of conducting, but of course were recorded in the 1920s through 1950s (the last piece, sung by a woman in the original Broadway cast).

Given the scarce number of Herbert recordings existing today, it's a nice find.

The first section of this CD is a radio version of Babes in Toyland that was originally broadcast in the 1940s as part of the "Chicago Theater of the Air" radio series. Although greatly condensed, it basically follows the plot of the original 1903 operetta with Alan and Jane traveling to Toyland to escape the clutches of their greedy Uncle Barnaby who wants to murder them for their money. The CD also contains bonus tracks of composer Victor Herbert and his orchestra playing selections from Babes in Toyland, selections from the Victor Light Opera Company, and Bessie Wynn of the original 1903 cast performing the song Toyland. The sound quality is not that bad, considering the age of the recordings.