Amazon.com
Among the
many Kiss Me, Kate recordings, here's a curiosity. Ten years after their historic
original Broadway cast recording of Cole Porter's masterwork, principals Harold Drake, Patricia Morison, Lisa Kirk, and Harold Lang re-recorded the show in stereo. Some numbers are a bit lackluster in comparison to the original, while others are pretty much the same (running times in many cases are the same down to the very second). Advantages of the original include some connecting dialogue, the overture as a bonus track (the famous instrumental opening featuring the piano riffs is actually the entr'acte), and of course the authenticity that comes with being the "
original Broadway cast recording." Benefits of this version are a more spacious sound, a synopsis for those unfamiliar with the plot (but both sets of liner notes are good), and a very interesting version of "Brush Up Your Shakespeare" sung by the gangsters in parallel octaves, which according to one urban legend was sung by Drake overdubbing himself.
--David Horiuchi