Search - Jerome Moross, John Latouche :: The Golden Apple (1954 Original Broadway Cast)

DESERVES A BROADWAY REVIVAL

Allan Segal | 01/15/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Here it is about 52 years after I played first trumpet in this show which started off Broadway then went into the Alvin Theater and the on to a limited run in Washington DC for about 10 days and then.......closed. It was and is a great show and of course the limited music on the CD does not do the show full justice. The music is brilliant and the orchestrations by Hershey Kaye is outstanding. We did the album in 2 seperate recording sessions and I remember that we recorded the overture which was very challenging last during the session. It was a perfect take the first time we played it. I still enjoy the music every time I listen to it and I only hope that some young producer gets his hands on the show and says, "this is a diamond worth doing again".."

An excellent musical

Byron Kolln | the corner where Broadway meets Hollywood | 10/03/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"THE GOLDEN APPLE is a musical retelling of Homer's "The Odyssey" and "The Illiad", re-set in the American Northwest at the turn of the 20th century. It first opened off-Broadway at the Phoenix Theatre in 1954, causing a sensation. It later reopened on Broadway at the Alvin Theatre, where it promptly shuttered 16 weeks later. What went wrong? How much of the magic was lost during the move to Broadway?Judging from the original 1954 cast album, you can't tell any problems. It featured a delicious cast headed by Priscilla Gillette and also featured Stephen Douglass (DAMN YANKEES), Kaye Ballard (RODGERS AND HAMMERSTEIN'S CINDERELLA), Jack Whiting and Bibi Osterwald (HELLO DOLLY!). Featuring in the ensemble were Jonathan Lucas and Portia Nelson. The score was written in superb fashion by Jerome Moross and John LaTouche (CANDIDE).The score features Kaye Ballard's now-classic rendition of "Lazy Afternoon", as well as "My Love is on the Way", "Windflowers", "Store-Bought Suit", "Circe", "Helen is Always Willing" and "The Sewing Bee".Priscilla Gillette sings with emotion and conviction in every note. The intervening narration between the numbers is charming and delightful.A lovely score. Highly recommended."

Not the greatest recording, but the only one available

Timothy Hulsey | Charlottesville, VA United States | 02/28/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Jerome Moross and John Latouche's "The Golden Apple" is two hours of wall-to-wall music: Like Bernstein's "Candide," it's an American opera in a distinctively Broadway idiom (though unlike "Candide," it seldom calls attention to the fact). Moross's score in particular is the sort of boisterous, genre-bending work that Flaherty's work in "Ragtime" should have been: It puts popular culture from the first half of the twentieth century into a blender, adds distinctive, unpredictable modernist harmonics, and serves with wit and verve.



Which makes the OCR of "Golden Apple" all the more unfortunate. Over half the score has been cut, entire scenes are missing, the segments that remain are linked with clunky rhyming narration, and the ending reflects the hokey "Broadway" ending rather than the finale Moross and Latouche originally wrote -- and preferred.



A few pieces are performed in their entirety, or something near to it: The bluesy "Lazy Afternoon" and the touching ballad "Windflowers" are the show's best-known songs, and the Act II vaudeville numbers -- often cited as a precursor to Sondheim's "Follies" -- are well represented. For the most part, however, the cuts show: This recording makes the show seem choppy and underdeveloped, with promising musical motifs that go nowhere. Sound quality, though generally acceptable, reflects the limits of mid-'50s mono technology; ensemble numbers tend to be overmodulated with garbled lyrics. (Worse yet, the CD booklet lacks a printed libretto.)



Until some enterprising soul undertakes a 2-disc recording of the entire "Golden Apple" score, this OCR will remain the only one available."