Baby (1983 Original Broadway Cast) [Cast Recording]

David Shire, Martin Vidnovic, Richard Maltby, Kim Criswell, Todd Graff, Catherine Cox, Beth Fowler, Liz Callaway | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 10, 1999)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Cast Recording
• Label: Jay Records
• ASIN: B00000JT5V
• Also Available in: Audio CD
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (21 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #25,456 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Opening

2. We Start Today

3. What Could Be Better

4. The Plaza Song

5. Baby, Baby, Baby

6. I Want It All

7. At Night She Comes Home to Me

8. Fatherhood Blues

9. Romance

10. I Chose Right

11. The Story Goes On

12. The Ladies Singing Their Song

13. Patterns

14. Romance II

15. Easy to Love

16. Romance III

17. Two People in Love

18. With You

19. And What If We Had Loved Like That?

20. The Birth

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Oh, Baby!, September 14, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Baby (1983 Original Broadway Cast) (Audio CD)

In the mid-eighties the economics of Broadway really began to take its toll on smaller intimate musicals. "Baby" was a casualty of this sad state, closing with fewer than 250 performances. The best thing about "Baby" is the music by Richard Maltby and David Shire (who also wrote the musical version of "Big" in the 90's). The CD features Liz Callaway singing "The Story Goes On," which she later records again on her other CDs. Liz Callaway alone is enough reason to buy "Baby". But there are also the wonderful performances by the rest of the cast. Particularly exciting is the song featuring three pregnant women, "I Want It All."

This was out of print for a while and seems to be hard to come by every once in a while. Snap this one up while you can.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good, but not stellar, October 24, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Baby (1983 Original Broadway Cast) (Audio CD)

Okay, so I'll be honest: BABY, when staged, is a bizarre show. It waltzes breezily in and out of the lives of three multi-generational couples as they stumble down the road to parenthood. Oddly, the CD feels more lucid than actually watching the play, primarily because of the excision of various odd bits of dialogue and very odd scene changes.

The music here ranges from soaring torch-songs (Story Goes On) to rock ballads (I Chose Right) to touching duets (With You) to well-written comedy (Ladies Singing Their Song) to down-right badly written numbers such as Fatherhood Blues (which, despite the title, has not one ounce of bluesy feel, which may have well been the point, but was not carried across, and instead plays like one long song from a bad episode of Barney).

The cast is good, but not great; then again, this is a show from one of the transitional seasons on Broadway (when shows started moving away from crooners toward smaller voices) and it shows. Breakouts include Liz Callaway, who has gone on to garner a bit of fame on her own, and Todd Graff, both of whom were nominated for a Tony for this show (though listening to the CD, you won't understand why). Other members of the cast are okay, despite the total lack of vocal emotion of one cast member in particular.

This is a good CD to have simply because of the odd subject matter and presentation (the show starts out with a "Look Who's Talking"-esque sperm-meets-egg sequence). Those who are looking for under-appreciated music would also enjoy this CD as almost all of the above songs deserve a better (or SOME) reputation in musical theatre circles. But one might look for Maltby & Shire compilation discs instead as some of the performances here are mousy, despite the fun, if rather dated and schmaltzy, orchestrations by Broadway guru Jonathan Tunick.

Overall, I'd recommend this CD to die-hard musical buffs, but not to those who still think My Fair Lady starred Audrey Hepburn.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful Broadway score with top theater singers., September 8, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Baby (1983 Original Broadway Cast) (Audio CD)

BABY is a wonderful musical with a strong score, a good book, and some of Broadway's best performers, including Liz Callaway. The songs range for great duets like "Two People in Love" and "What Could Be Better?" to soaring ballads like "The Story Goes On." This has just been released commercially in the US on JAY Records. Buy it!