Customer Reviews

Grease: A New 50's Rock 'N Roll Musical - The Original Broadway Cast Album

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3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The original Broadway version of Grease is much different that the movie version. The chief difference is that the biggest hits from the movie, the title song, "You're The One That I One Want" & "Hopelessly Devoted To You", were written specifically for the movie and do not appear here. The play also had a harder edge to it, taking place in an urban environment and was more explicit. Fans of the movie will recognize songs like "Greased Lightnin'", "Summer Nights", "Beauty School Dropout", "Born To Hand Jive" and "We Go Together" but other standouts include "All Choked Up", "Those Magic Changes" & "Freddy My Love".

At some point in the early 1970's, nostaglia for the 1950's started running out of control. At a time when America was dealing with many social changes, somehow the decade of the 1950's became yearned after for
fun, innocence, rock and roll, and postwar prosperity. The realty being it was a decade that also included
economic issues, open descrimination, and very tame music (the name "the quiet generation" was there for a reason).

Grease came to life as a parody of the 1950's nostaglia craze, and it painted a truer, grittier portrait of the late 50's at an urban high school. The movie that came out in 1978, and the Broadway revival of the 90's whitewashed the story, and cleaned up the language so much the original Broadway musical got lost in the shuffle.

The great score is lead by Adrienne Barbaue, Barry Bostwick, and Carol Demas, and a number of songs never made it to the film, including Those Magic Changes, and Freddy My Love. Yes, in the 1950's there still was a draft!. Adrienne's character of Rizzo steals the show with her numbers, Look At Me I'm Sandra Dee, and There Are Worse Things I Could Do, finally the "Bad Girl" is allowed to be human. Summer Nights, It's Raining On Prom Night, and Rock N Roll Party Queen speak to the teenager that remains in all of us.

Enjoy this very real trip into the late 1950's

Ken

Grease, here in its original form, is an adventurous, raw, rowdy, INSIGHTFUL show that paints a very accurate picture of a pivotal moment in American history when rock and roll was giving birth to the Sexual Revolution. Grease is not a silly, brainless 50s parody, but is instead a smart, insightful, alternative piece of theatre (inspired in many ways by HAIR), with real muscle, attitude, rawness, and a thrilling, subversive, over-sexed energy. If you want to hear what Grease SHOULD sound like, if you want to hear the real sound of early rock and roll, get this original 1972 recording. Forget the awful revival, and forget the movie (as fun as it may be) -- THIS is Grease. [...]

I saw the original production of Grease and it was hysterical. It was originally intended as an affectionate parody of the 50's and was a laugh riot. Then Hollywood got a hold of it and turned it into the cotton candy, pop fluff that the world see's it as now, totally missing the point (and losing alot of the fun). The original cast led by Barry Bostwick, Adrienne Barbaue and Carol Demas, were a blast! Stick to this version if you like real parody, humorous and true to the 50's rock style.

GREASE began at an off-Broadway theatre on Valentnes Day 1972. At first it didn't look like a hit, but it was a cheap show to run: Small cast, small orchestra, and a basic unit set and althouh not selling out, it was attracting enough of a crowd to warrant a move to the Royale theatre on Broadway where it ran..and ran..and ran. It was still running in 1978 when the movie came out and suddenly GREASE became a huge hit on screen and on stage. When it finally closed in 1981 it had become Broadway's longest running show. (A few years later A CHORUS LINE would overtake that record.)

The original cast album was done by M-g-M records and was not a well produced affair. Sound is not well balanced and the performers really seem to be overdoing it but after all, the stage show is a satire on the 1950s.

On CD the sound is acceptable and the whole score is here except for the opening of Act II (In the show, "Shakin' at the High School Hop" segues into "It's Raining on Prom Night." On the recording, just the latter song is heard.)

While GREASE wil never be ranked as one of Broadway's great shows, it is still frequently performed by community groups and high schools (though often with a censored script: the original is quite filthy!!) Because of the popularity of the songs written for the movie ("Grease", "Hopelessly Devoted to You", "You're the One That I Want" and "Sandy") many modern productions try to incorporate these songs. Its a mistake because the move script was re-written to set these numbers up and they don't really work in the stage production.

I bought the CD to use in rehearsals for my production of Grease that I am directing. It is very helpful as a guide to the original Broadway production. I actually prefer the music and renditions in this production over the revival.

sooo lively and fun! although some songs in the movie I think are better,(Sandy , Hopelessly Devoted to you) This is where all the great songs originally came from! Plus whoever doesnt love "All choked up" is crazy in the head!

I am one of those people hates when musicals are made into movies. Only because the best parts of the musical are always cut out... I had purchased the stage show script for grease, and it is true, the play is MUCH better. (Even though I can tell that Jim Jaccobs and Warren Casey must have cleaned it up a bit before they made it availible for amature/proffessional theatre productions, cuz it's not as dirty as they made it seem on VH1 Behind The Music...). I ordered the original cast CD after listening to the new broadway cast recording (That one had great vocals, but the Rock And Roll band simplicity wasn't there...). I got my CD, and I was dissapointed. Sandy sounds too gutsy to be a Sandy, she sounds more like a Rizzo. I think the girl who played Sandy should have switched parts with the girl who played Rizzo. Barry Bostwick (Of Rocky Horror and Spin City fame) was a great Danny, I have to give him that. But the rest of the cast (Especially in the group numbers) sounds like a bunch of drunk people in their late 20s trying to sound like 17 year olds, and are doing horrible at it. The music (The instruments) arent loud enough. I guess you can blame this on the fact that the album was recorded in the early 70s. I mean, sure, its cool to see where the Grease phenomonom began, but I think maybe with better recording equipment or something... I dont know.

As a high school theater director, I have taught this musical and this cast recording is the best resource for anyone who really wants to enjoy this show the way it was intended to be enjoyed. While some of the songs written specifically for the movie are absent from this recording, the original line-up is mostly intact (the only noticeable deletion is the "Beauty School Dropout (reprise)", which in the movie was used as the final verse of the song).

The singing in this original Broadway cast recording is very well done. The vocal performers handle the material very well considering there is a lot of falsetto parts in the guys (a lot of which was cut from the movie version). The orchestra does an outstanding job (especially the 1st tenor sax player's solo lines on "There Are Worse Things I Could Do"). The cover art contains the musical's original artwork and is colorful and fun with great liner notes and photos.

I own almost every recording of Grease there is (this one, '94 cast, '95 cast, '07 cast, London cast, movie soundtrack) and I have found this one to be my favorite, by far. If you are planning to perform Grease with a theater troupe, this is THE ONLY version that matches the original musical as it is the ONLY version that uses the original orchestrations and vocal lines.

And, if all that isn't enough ... you can't beat the price of $7.98! This is a steal! Buy now and be extremely satisfied. After 35+ years, the original Grease is still the word.

just heard the original Broadway cast soundtrack of Grease, and I couldn't believe it. It was so funny, so original, so interesting. lol, they should really make a movie out of this.

Don't get me wrong--I'm not quite that pretentious, yet--I always liked Grease; I was an American teenager for crying out loud. I played Jan in our school's production, and felt very cool for doing so. But, having the soundtrack on cassette for years, the only songs I've ever consistently listened to are "Those Magic Changes" sung by the Sha-Na-Nas, "Beauty School Dropout", and "Stranded at the Drive-In" (so wonderfully silly). And I could never figure out what was so "monumental" about the score as a whole.

So, by accident, my library gave me the original Broadway cast (I was trying to get the movie soundtrack for the Sha-Na-Nas numbers) and I gave it a listen. It was so freaking funny. All these years, it never occurred to me that Grease was supposed to be good for more than a few chuckles. I actually laughed out loud at the songs. I was in a constant state of "Oh. Ooooohhhh. I see. Oh. Well that's interesting. Wow."

I never knew that a lot of the songs in the background of the movie are full numbers in the musical; I know they did that in Cabaret, as well, but it really bugged me with this one (well okay, "don't tell mama" being cut out of Cabaret the movie bugged the hell out of me.) And, as much as I love the Sha-Na-Nas version of "Those Magic Changes", the character Doodie's rendition of it in the original musical totally made me get a crush on him now, which never would've happened with the movie's Doodie. All of the characters who are secondary in the movie are actually more well-rounded than the leads, who seem more like the joke-characters in the musical.

Interesting how, with much fewer instruments, and sillier intros into the songs, the numbers actually feel more realistic and spur-of-the-moment. It was a really original musical when it came out.

Anyway, it's one of those soundtracks (and this is how I gage Broadway for personal reference) that really made me want to live in that universe where people spontaneously break into musical numbers; or, if not spontaneously, then after being given a nice walk-in line like "But what if we can't pull it off?" or "I just love him so much."

I now have a Grease to call my own.