Film Soundtrack, 1994 (Walt Disney Records) (3 / 5) The mega-hit animated Disney movie The Lion King spawned this mega-selling soundtrack recording, which includes the Oscar-winning best song “Can You Feel the Love Tonight?” A large orchestra with that distinctive, latter-day Disney-pop sound plays the five Elton John-Tim Rice songs, including “Circle of Life” and “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King.” Some of the celeb voices featured in the film can be heard in a couple of the songs: Jeremy Irons does “Be Prepared” with Whoopi Goldberg and Cheech Marin, and that’s Nathan Lane singing with Ernie Sabella in “Hakuna Matata.” The accompanying booklet helpfully includes lyrics to all of the songs for those who choose to sing along. The recording also has instrumentals by the gifted Hans Zimmer and ends with three of the songs in distinctive, electric renditions by Elton John. More often than not, you can indeed “feel the love” here. — Morgan Sills

Original Broadway Cast, 1997 (Walt Disney Records) (4 / 5) The Lion King is more than a musical; it’s a juggernaut. This time, Disney didn’t follow the route it had taken with Beauty and the Beast, the Broadway version of which was mostly a replication of the film with a few extra songs. Instead, Julie Taymor directed a show packed with visual splendor that creatively reimagined and expanded upon the movie of The Lion King and won the 1998 Tony Award for Best Musical. Elton John and Tim Rice’s pop-hit songs from the film are thrillingly performed here; they sit very well next to the new songs that the team wrote for the stage show, and some additional material by other writers. The sense of stylistic unity is aided by lush orchestrations by Robert Elhai, David Metzger, and Bruce Fowler that utilize authentic African rhythms and instruments. “Circle of Life” and “Can You Feel the Love Tonight?” retain their effectiveness, though their presentation here differs somewhat from that of the film’s soundtrack. “Hakuna Matara” is charmingly performed, and Geoff Hoyle as Zasu does a clever new number, “The Morning Report.” The best of the additions are “They Live in You” (sung by Samuel E. Wright, reprised by Tsidii Le Loka) and “Shadowland” (sung by Heather Headley). One quibble, which applies to many cast albums these days: The rough edges of a live performance have been so thoroughly smoothed over in the studio that the whole thing is an inch short of freshness. But that’s a relatively small complaint about this glorious audio souvenir of an enchanting Broadway perennial. — M.S.

Original Broadway Cast, 1956 (Columbia/Sony) (4 / 5) The cast album of this hit, faithfully adapted from Al Capp’s deep-fried comic strip, has a complicated history that’s worth telling because the recording warrants attention. One of the last monaural cast albums, it made a brief appearance on CD around 1990 in a no-frills transfer that quickly became a collectors’ item. Rumor had it that the entire album had been recorded in stereo, but it turned out that the binaural tracks were unusable because the orchestra was recorded entirely on one track, the singers on the other. Sony cleaned up the monaural tracks and added several items for this CD reissue: a full-stereo overture, a stereo version of the “Sadie Hawkins Ballet,” missing finale material, and some never-heard-before original-cast moments. To top it off, folded in as bonus tracks are a Rosemary Clooney single of a fine song that was cut from the show, “It’s a Nuisance Having You Around,” and a Percy Faith instrumental of another out-of-town casualty, “The Way to a Man’s Heart.” All of this stretches the CD’s length to a generous 72 minutes. The cast album portion of it is a first-class Goddard Lieberson recording of a quintessential Golden Age smash, with a score that boasts strong Gene DePaul melodies and incomparable Johnny Mercer lyrics. The rhymes are ingenious, the satire still pertinent (there’s even a funny song about genetic engineering), the Dogpatch idiom even more resonant than it was in Capp’s strip. Although Peter Palmer as L’il Abner sounds a little stiff on the recording, he was so ideally cast that he had a hard time thereafter getting casting directors to picture him in any other role. Edith (Edie) Adams sings sweetly and sexily as Daisy Mae, and Stubby Kaye’s Marryin’ Sam shines in show-stopping material. One only wishes that Charlotte Rae, as Mammy Yokum, had a whole song to herself instead of just a few bars of the opening number. Lehman Engel’s musical direction displays enormous verve from the overture’s first rockabilly notes. By the way, notice the gaffe in “Put ‘Em Back,” when a chorus girl comes in early and then stops herself short. — Marc Miller

Film Soundtrack, 1959 (Columbia/Sony) (2 / 5) Paramount’s film version of Li’l Abner was among the most faithful of its era, retaining a lot of the Broadway score and several of the leading players, as well as a stage-bound production design. So there are few surprises on this soundtrack album. Among the pluses: Peter Palmer has loosened up a lot, Nelson Riddle’s new arrangements are fresh and snazzy, and this recording is in end-to-end stereo. But there are minuses: Several stage songs are missing; the one new ballad, “Otherwise,” doesn’t equal the one it replaced, “Love in a Home”; some of Mercer’s lyrics were dumbed down for the movie; and Imogene Lynn, the voice double for Leslie Parrish’s Daisy Mae, hasn’t as much style as her stage counterpart, Edith (Edie) Adams. Still, the album is a pleasant souvenir of one of the better ’50s stage-to-screen transcriptions. — M.M.

Original Broadway Cast, 1997 (Sony) (4 / 5) The Life opened just as Times Square was being cleaned up and turned into a tourist-friendly theme park. It captured the Best Musical prize from the Drama Desk, Drama League, and the Outer Critics Circle, and ran for 465 performances. This tasty cast album preserves the two best elements of the show: its largely terrific, tuneful score by composer Cy Coleman and lyricist Ira Gasman, and vivacious, charismatic performances that practically leap from the recording. The score’s pulsating, rhythmic, lowdown groove is very different from other shows of the period, as one peak follows another. Sam Harris and company hit a home run early on with “Use What You Got.” Pamela Isaacs, the hooker with a head voice, gives out with the funky “A Lovely Day to Be Out of Jail” and the gorgeous ballad “He’s No Good.” The show-stopping, comedic “The Oldest Profession” is sung for all its worth by Lillias White. Chuck Cooper won a Tony for his performance as a “cold-blooded, sweet talkin’, jive ass, motherfuckin’ son of a bitch” pimp called Memphis; his “My Way or the Highway” and “Don’t Take Much” are here to be savored. Other delights include the show’s ensemble numbers, especially the toe-tapping “Hooker’s Ball,” led by Vernel Bagneris, and the ladies’ rocking, high-belt anthem “My Body.” The album concludes beautifully with Isaacs and White performing the touching duet “My Friend.” A few passages of recitative may strike some listeners as an uneasy fit with the overall style of the piece, but, all things considered, The Life is a welcome breath of grimy New York City air in an era when Times Square has been sanitized. — Morgan Sills

Original Broadway Cast, 1961 (RCA/no CD) (1 / 5) Apologies to songwriters Jay Livingston and Ray Evans, but here’s the show with arguably the worst title song in the history of Broadway — and that includes Happy Hunting. While the doleful tune isn’t heard until track six of the first side of the LP, by then, this pallid adaptation of Three Men on a Horse has already proven its lack of worth. The show starts with a chorus singing about how they must “Run, Run, Run” the rat race, but the melody erroneously suggests joy. Then comes the saccharine “The Nicest Thing,” in which a wife tells her husband why she loves him, followed by “Hey, Jimmy, Joe, John, Jim, Jack,” sung by George Gobel in his horribly nasal voice. That voice also spoils the score’s ace trump, “His Own Little Island,” a song that should be better known — which is more than can be said for “Broads Ain’t People.” Moving on, you’d expect that a song titled “Love, Let Me Know” would be plaintive, but the melody for it is brisk. There is an item that would spark the dullest party, the kitschy stripper’s song “I Wouldn’t’ve Had to Shake It.” Still, by the time you reach “There’s Something About a Horse,” you’ll have realized that little about Let It Ride is worth the trip. — Peter Filichia

New York Concert Cast, 1987 (Sony, 2CDs, paired with Of Thee I Sing) (4 / 5) This performance doesn’t vary much in character from the dully dutiful reading of the Gershwins’ Of Thee I Sing that accompanies it. But Let ‘Em Eat Cake, a 1933 George and Ira Gershwin-George S. Kaufman-Morrie Ryskind sequel to that Pulitzer Prize winner, is so darkly different, and the music so fascinating, that it’s easily the more rewarding listening experience. (Most of the score was previously unrecorded.) The show pokes fun at unions, socialists, capitalists, influence brokers, the League of Nations, and baseball. You can understand why it was rejected by critics and audiences — it’s too acerbic and almost hysterically bitter, with little of its predecessor’s sly good humor — but it’s stupendous from a musical standpoint. The riches start immediately as a dissonant, percussive overture segues into “Tweedledee for President,” and the score throughout is highly adventurous. (It’s as if we can hear George warming up for Porgy and Bess.) Maureen McGovern leads “Mothers of the Nation,” a real find with a mock-sanctimonious lyric wedded to a soaring, anthem-like melody. Incidental numbers and ensembles like “Union Square,” “They’re Hanging Throttlebottom in the Morning,” and the ferocious title song show two geniuses pushing against the walls of musical theater convention with all their might. The performances of Paige O’Hara and David Garrison are enormous assets here, as they are in Of Thee I Sing,  and Michael Tilson Thomas’s conducting sounds energized by the prospect of reintroducing so much marvelous material to the world. — Marc Miller

Original London Cast, 1985 (First Night/Relativity, 2CDs) (2 / 5) Claude-Michel Schönberg  (“musique”) and Alain Boublil and Jean-Marc Natel (“textes”) originally created Les Misérables as what amounted to a song cycle inspired by Victor Hugo’s massive novel of the same title. The 1980 French-language “concept album” of that work contains less than 90 minutes of material. No doubt assuming that every self-respecting Frenchman knows the novel well, the creators did not try to cover the entire plot in the songs they wrote. But when British producer Cameron Mackintosh saw a stage version of the work in Paris, he decided that Les Miz (or Les Mis), as it would come to be known the world over, should be translated into English and turned into a through-sung musical that would attempt to tell the full story of Hugo’s epic work. Herbert Kretzmer was hired to do the English adaptation, and he performed this herculean task probably as well as anyone could have done, but that doesn’t mean the result is an artistic success. The problem is that, although the Mackintosh Les Misérables is more than twice as long as the original French version, Schönberg wrote only a comparatively small amount of new music for it. The extra hour-plus of material consists of pages of banal sung dialogue and endless recycling of melodies and melodic fragments. To offer only two examples of the latter:  The gorgeous melody that’s first heard in Fantine’s deathbed lament “Come to Me” is later repeated note-for-note as Eponine’s “On My Own,” with only the key and lyrics changed; and the tune of the prostitutes’ Act I song “Lovely Ladies” recurs in Act II in a completely unrelated context, sung by a group of women mourning the dead revolutionaries. (Les Miz probably would undoubtedly have been better written with spoken-dialogue scenes, rather than as a sung-through work, which would have served the double purpose of allowing more of the plot to be covered in less time while avoiding the repetition of so many melodies with alternate lyrics.) Among the score’s best moments are “At the End of the Day,” a moving song for the wretched masses; the students’ stirring anthem “Do You Hear the People Sing?”; and Marius’ “Empty Chairs at Empty Tables,” affectingly performed by the young Michael Ball on this recording. Colm Wilkinson displays a magnificent, versatile voice in the role of Jean Valjean, though some listeners may find it hard to adjust to his odd accent and mannerisms. Patti LuPone is superb in the brief role of Fantine, singing the beautiful “I Dreamed a Dream” for all its worth; and Roger Allam is dramatically committed as Inspector Javert, if a little insecure from a vocal standpoint. As Eponine, Frances Ruffelle sounds mush-mouthed and whiny. Sue Jane Tanner and Alun Armstrong are somewhat amusing as the Thénardiers, but the fact that these originally evil characters are used for comic relief in the musical is indicative of the show’s larger problems. — Michael Portantiere

Original Broadway Cast, 1987 (Decca, 2CDs) (2 / 5) There are a few reasons to consider this album as an alternative or addendum to the one reviewed above. Randy Graff is a wonderful Fantine, Terrence Mann as Javert has better vocal technique than Roger Allam, and Michael Maguire is a stalwart Enjolras. This recording also contains some music not to be heard on the original London cast album, most notably Jean Valjean’s “Bring Him Home” — a truly beautiful song, even if its main melody sounds very much like that of the “Humming Chorus” from Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, a debt that Claude-Michel Schönberg has reportedly acknowledged. Otherwise, this two-disc set isn’t a whole lot different from its predecessor.  Colm Wilkinson and Frances Ruffelle are back as Valjean and Eponine, the latter an unfortunate return to the ears of some listeners. — M.P.

The Complete Symphonic Recording, 1988 (First Night, 3CDs) (1 / 5) The star here is Gary Morris, an American country-western singer who had played Valjean early in the run of the original Broadway production of Les Misérables. Unfortunately, Morris’ accent and mannerisms are just as odd as Colm Wilkinson’s in the role, and his voice isn’t nearly as good. As heard here, Morris has a vibrato so wide that it’s really a wobble; every sustained note he sings is really two notes, and it isn’t pretty. Given that his singing of the show’s central role is almost unlistenable, the strengths of this recording seem beside the point. Still, for what it’s worth: Philip Quast as Javert and Anthony Warlow as Enjolras are excellent, Michael Ball is back as Marius, and Tracy Shayne sings prettily as Cossette. Also, Debbie Byrne as Fantine delivers the high notes of “I Dreamed a Dream” without belting, and some listeners may therefore prefer her performance to Patti LuPone’s and Randy Graff’s. As Eponine, Kaho Shimada has a better voice than Frances Ruffelle — but, annoyingly, she seems to imitate Ruffelle’s inflections and enunciations. The London Philharmonia orchestra sounds huge and impressive. This is a complete recording of the score, but none of the extra music you’ll find here is worth writing home about. — M.P.

London Concert Cast, 1995 (First Night, 2CDs) (2 / 5) This is a live recording of a concert that was given at the Royal Albert Hall to mark the tenth anniversary of the opening of Les Misérables in London, and there’s quite a sense of occasion about it. In total, some 250 performers took part, and the orchestra is no less than the Royal Philharmonic, conducted by David Charles Abell. At the end of the second disc, Jean Valjeans from many worldwide companies may be heard delivering various lines of “Do You Hear the People Sing?” in various languages. If you want to choose only one recording of this score for your library, this may be your best option. To begin with, it’s the only one that gives you Colm Wilkinson as Valjean while allowing you to avoid Frances Ruffelle as Eponine, should you choose to do so. Here, Eponine is Lea Salonga, whose lovely, unaffected singing of “On My Own” and the rest of the character’s music is a great pleasure. Other major roles are filled by some of the most talented singing actors to have played them: Philip Quast as Javert, Ruthie Henshall as Fantine, Michael Ball as Marius, Michael Maguire as Enjolras, and Judy Kuhn as Cossette. Note that a video recording of this concert is also available. — M.P.

Manchester Concert Cast, 2010 (First Night, 2CDs) (2 / 5) Here’s a live recording of a concert that was presented at the Palace Theatre in Manchester, England on December 12, 2009 — but the album was released in 2010, hence the date on the packaging. With new orchestrations that were first introduced in 2006, the concert was intended to commemorate 25 years of Les Misérables in English; it should not be confused with the 25th anniversary concert that starred Alfie Boe, Norm Lewis, Nick Jonas, Lea Salonga, et al., separately available on video but not in the form of an audio-only cast album. (Some would say there are more recordings of Les Miz than necessary, and that a few of them are confusingly labeled.) The cast here is headed by John-Owen Jones as Valjean, Earl Carpenter as Javert, and Madalena Alberto as Fantine, with Gareth Gates as Marius, Katie Hall as Cosette, Jon Robyns as Enjolras, Rosalind James as Eponine, Katie Hall as Cosette, and Ashley Artus and Lynne Wilmot as the Thénardiers. All of the performances are fine if not especially distinctive, perhaps with the exception of Alberto; she brings to “I Dreamed a Dream” a sweet-yet-strong tone that allows her to communicate the emotional power of the song without sounding unpleasant when she gets to the high-belt sections of it. New orchestrations by Stephen Metcalfe and Chris Jahnke do not sound significantly different from the originals, so one might question the point behind them.  — M.P.

Film Soundtrack, 2012 (Republic Records, 2CDs) (1 / 5)  A box-office hit, the film version of Les Misérables earned some critical praise for director Tom Hooper’s big-screen adaptation of the musical in a way that made for somewhat clearer storytelling and more effective drama than the original stage production had to offer, yet both the movie and its soundtrack album must be regarded as failures in that at least two of the stars are seriously over-parted from a vocal standpoint. Hugh Jackman began his career in musical theater, and he had great success in that sphere in such roles as Curly in Oklahoma! and Peter Allen in The Boy From Oz, but it turned out that his voice is just not right for Jean Valjean in Les Mis in terms of timbre, range, or technique, often exhibiting a buzz-saw quality and a significant wobble. Even more of a trial to hear is Russell Crowe, who as Javert sounds like exactly what he is: a movie star with lots of screen presence but almost no singing experience or ability. Vocal honors go to Anne Hathaway as Fantine and Samantha Barks as Eponine, who respectively offer moving performances of “I Dreamed a Dream” and “On My Own.” Aaron Tveit, from Broadway, brings a strong baritenor to Enjolras, and Eddie Redmayne as Marius sings surprisingly well considering that he, too, was not previously known as a vocalist, but Amanda Seyfried’s soprano sounds wispy and fluttery in Cosette’s music. Sacha Baron Cohen is fun as Thénardier, and as his wife, Helena Bonham Carter is far more happily cast than she was in the film of Sweeney Todd.  Note: When this movie was released, much was made of the fact that a very large percentage of the singing in it was performed live during filming, which presumably was a further handicap for Jackman and Crowe in particular.  — M.P.

Original Broadway Cast, 1989 (RCA) (3 / 5) This show did not work onstage, but some of the songs and performances on the cast album are fun.  Peter Allen, though woefully miscast as a tough-guy gangster, rips joyfully into “When I Get My Name in Lights” and is very effective in the big ballad “Sure Thing, Baby.” He swings through “Steal From Thieves” with Randall Edwards, seems to be having a ball with Julie Wilson in “Only an Older Woman,” and makes the most of “Now You See Me, Now You Don’t.” Wilson takes the mediocre number “The Music Went Out of My Life” and wrings lots of emotion from of it, but the female trio “The Man Nobody Could Love” doesn’t quite land. This recording preserves a mediocre Peter Allen score with a few bright spots; you’ll probably want to use your remote to get to the good stuff. The album has some added interest in that quite a few of the Legs Diamond songs turned up again years later in the Allen biomusical The Boy From Oz. — Jeffrey Dunn

San Francisco Cast, 2001 (42nd Street Moon) (4 / 5) With political satire a mainstay of 1930s musicals (the Gershwins’ Of Thee I Sing, Rodgers and Hart’s I’d Rather Be Right, Irving Berlin’s Louisiana Purchase), Cole Porter’s turn came in 1938 with Leave It to Me! An amusing if none-too-penetrating look at U.S.-Soviet relations, the show was both a critical and financial success, but history remembers it only as the musical that made Mary Martin a star as she sang and stripteased her way through “My Heart Belongs to Daddy.” Martin’s role was subsidiary to those of Sophie Tucker, Victor Moore, William Gaxton, and Tamara; in hindsight, her success overshadowed the contributions of the stars and the rest of Porter’s score, highlights of which include “Get Out of Town” and the cheeky “Most Gentlemen Don’t Like Love,” the latter with its references to Sappho and rolls in the hay. As with many other Porter shows, Leave It to Me! was neither recorded (except for a couple of Martin cuts) nor filmed, and it is almost never revived. Fortunately, 60 years after the fact, San Francisco’s 42nd Street Moon company tackled it. While most of the original arrangements did not survive, musical director Dave Dobrianksy did a fine job of piecing together the enjoyable score — dance breaks and all. Of course, the lyrics are incredibly witty; in “I’m Taking the Steps to Russia,” Porter rhymes “Harlem rhythm” with “Communithm.” The cast is accomplished, the scaled-down orchestra is dandy, and Marc Miller’s notes are clever and informative. — Richard Barrios

Off-Broadway Cast, 1959 (Strand/AEI) (2 / 5) The “Princess Theater” musicals of Jerome Kern, Guy Bolton, and P. G. Wodehouse form an important chapter in musical theater history that is badly underrepresented on recordings. Although Leave It to Jane, a 1917 college musical, didn’t actually play the Princess, its tight construction, modest production values, and good humor make it a close relative. So let’s be grateful that a cast album was made for this revival, which was a big hit in a tiny theater. (To make their entrances, the actors actually had to go out to the street, down a transom, and through the audience.) That said, the recording is largely a botch. Kern’s graceful, lilting melodies are indestructible, and Wodehouse’s lyrics display his signature wit and self-effacement. But Joseph Stecko, conducting an underpopulated orchestra, wreaks havoc: “The Crickets Are Calling” is supposed to be slow and reflective, not a slapstick chase. Conversely, “There It Is Again” plods here. Kathleen Murray as Jane must have been very charming onstage, because she certainly can’t sing. Dorothy Greener puts “Cleopatterer” across but doesn’t convey the funny/sad pathos of “Poor Prune.” A young George Segal is in the chorus, but you won’t hear him. The show itself remains entirely stage-worthy, with a laugh-out-loud book and a score that’s eminently lovable. — Marc Miller

Concert Cast (Comic Opera Guild, 2003; available through comicoperaguild.org) (2 / 5) The Ann Arbor, Michigan-based Comic Opera Guild delights in resurrecting early musical comedy and operetta scores that no one else would think of recording. (The Ameer, anyone?) Their Leave It to Jane is typically dutiful and a little dull; Jane (Diane McEwen-Martin) has a pretty soprano but almost no characterization, nor does leading man Glenn Perry make much of an impression. Among the supporting players, only the Stub Talmadge of David Troiano exhibits some personality, and Katie Cillufo’s Flora misses all the jokes in “Cleopatterer.” Some of the choral lyrics are hard to discern (this is a live recording), and one number from Kern’s Oh, Boy! is bizarrely ushered in to buttress the finale. But hey, it’s a charming score, and the two-piano arrangements are occasionally quite tasty. — M.M.

Studio Cast, 1988 (Original Cast Records) No stars; not recommended. This vaguely autobiographical musical by composer-lyricist Brian Gari, with a book by Allan Knee, lasted for only 15 previews and four performances on Broadway, and it’s not hard to understand why. The plot, such as it is, concerns the off-and-on relationship between a pianist who wants to be a standup comedian and an “off-the-wall” (so the synopsis says) ballet dancer who keeps changing her name. Most of the songs are performed by Gari, whose thin, squeaky voice is even worse than his songs, and Julie Budd, whose singing almost manages to transcend the poor material. Michael McAssey (from the Broadway production) and Robin Kaiser put in special appearances; he and Gari function as the male chorus, she sings a terrible song in the guise of a hooker. The capper is the “bonus track,” an unintentionally hilarious number titled “Late Night Saga” in which Gari melodramatically recounts the sob story of his musical’s fate. It offers the recording’s sole moment of genuine enjoyment in the form of a quote from an unidentified theater critic: “Late Nite Comic, my friends, is so bad that when I went outside for intermission, I stood under the marquee of another theater.” — Seth Christenfeld

Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1970 (RCA) (2 / 5) Three years after their debut show, Now Is the Time for All Good Men, which was studded with well-crafted lyrics and lovely ballads, composer Nancy Ford and librettist-lyricist Gretchen Cryer appeared to have struck gold with The Last Sweet Days of Isaac. Very well reviewed and the winner of Obie, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle awards, the show seemed a shoo-in headed for a long run, but there was just one problem: It didn’t have a second act, and audiences balked. Act I, represented by more or less the first half of this recording, is literate, odd, and very funny. It introduces us to the self-dramatizing Isaac, convinced that his every moment on earth is his last, and Ingrid, an inhibited secretary who has always longed to be a poet. These two are stuck together in an elevator. Onstage, Austin Pendleton was genuinely hilarious and wildly endearing as Isaac; his recorded performance is also wonderful, especially in a terrific song titled  “My Most Important Moments Go By.” As Ingrid, Fredricka Weber was quirky and appealing, sang well, and even played the trumpet! Still, this was Pendleton’s show, if “show” is the correct word. I don’t think there’s a coherent moment in the second act, which again focuses on Isaac and Ingrid. Here, they’re locked in individual prison cells 14 years earlier, able to communicate only through video cameras. — David Wolf

Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1997 (EMG) (4 / 5) By the mid 1980s, plays about AIDS began to surface and continued to emerge thereafter, but with only a few musicals among them. Nevertheless, this one would likely stand out in a large field. At the request of his partner, librettist Jim Brochu, composer-lyricist Steve Schalchlin wrote 10 songs about his (Schalchin’s) experiences battling the plague. Brochu slotted them into a script about Gideon, a dying rock musician who intends to commit suicide after recording a final album. Not surprisingly, the recording session — for which three other singers and an engineer are present — and its aftermath do not go entirely as planned. This storyline is rife with potential pitfalls, but Schalchlin avoids them all with his unflinching lyrics; examples are “Somebody’s Friend” (about cure rumors) and “The Group” (about support circles). The melodies are unflaggingly propulsive. Since AIDS is not in the news as much today as it was during its urgent-headline days, the musical is now something of a period piece, but there’s nothing dated about the performances heard on this recording. Bob Stillman has all of the passion needed for Gideon. The others, singing at the top of their lungs about their feelings, are Stephen Bienskie, Dean Bradshaw, Amy Coleman, and Grace Garland. Schalchlin did the arrangements, which were enhanced by Stillman, an expert pianist. — David Finkle

Original London Cast, 2012  (JAY) (4 / 5) When The Last Session premiered Off-Broadway, medicine was only just beginning to successfully cope with AIDS, removing its label as a death sentence and placing it more firmly in the chronic-illness category. This raises thoughts about how any present-day production of the show is perceived. For those encountering it for the first time, it might be viewed as a dark historical document; but for those who experienced it back in 1997, any new staging or recording is a stark reminder of what was once everyday reality. Those auditors may feel as if they’re reliving a too-painful past, and may well feel renewed fury mounting and tears welling up. Memories of friends and loved ones lost are not  the sole reason for the fury and the tears; much of the credit for effect goes to Steve Schalchlin for the power and grace of his songs. Schalchlin writes brilliantly about Gideon and boyfriend Jack, Gideon’s parents, his AIDS support group. There’s not a song here — all of them written in a rock or folk-rock mode — that doesn’t break the heart. Perhaps the most crushing of all is “Somebody’s Friend,” which poignantly recounts the rumors of miracle cures that constantly circulated. The first-rate singers on this cast recording of a 2012 London production, directed by Guy Retallack and conducted by Tom Turner, are Darren Day as Gideon and Simone Craddock, with AJ Dean, Ron Emslie and Lucy Vandi as the others engaged in Gideon’s melancholy farewell recording. Call it strong medicine. — D.F.

Original Off-Broadway Cast, 2002 (Ghostlight) (5 / 5) Although The Last 5 Years received mixed to negative reviews and closed quickly Off-Broadway in 2002, it has received many subsequent productions — in part because this is a two-character musical that requires minimal sets and costumes, but also because it has an excellent score by Jason Robert Brown, and it tells a compelling story with vivid characters. Somewhat autobiographical, the piece charts the five-year relationship between a writer (Jamie) and an actress (Cathy). It’s really more of a song cycle than a traditional musical, which certainly doesn’t mean that that it lacks emotion or theatricality. The highly creative and intriguing concept here is that, through Jamie’s songs, we see the couple’s relationship moving from beginning to end, while Cathy’s songs progressively take the story backward in time from the couple’s breakup to the first flush of romance. Both characters are fully rounded human beings with their own virtues and flaws: Jamie is smart, witty, and a real charmer, but also rather full of himself, while Cathy is warm, loving, and funny but tends to see herself as a victim. The forward/reverse concept adds immeasurably to the emotional content of the score: The exact moment when the couple’s stories overlap chronologically, in the scene of their engagement in a boat on a lake in Central Park, is breathtaking, and the final sequence is deeply moving. There’s also plenty of comic relief at hand: Cathy’s “A Summer in Ohio” is a hilarious vision of summer-stock hell, while “Shiksa Goddess” is Jamie’s very funny spiel about his mother’s anticipated reaction to his dating a non-Jew. Another highlight is “The Schmuel Song,” in which Jamie tells Cathy a sweetly humorous story that makes a point about their relationship. On this first recording of the score, Norbert Leo Butz and Sherie René Scott bring Jamie and Cathy to life in all their joy and pain, and the chamber-size orchestra — basically a string quartet, plus Brown as pianist-conductor — sounds beautiful. The Last 5 Years is a modern masterpiece of the American musical theater, and one or another recording of it is essential to the collection of anyone who loves the art form. — Michael Portantiere

Off-Broadway Cast, 2013 (Ghostlight) (4 / 5) Jason Robert Brown himself directed an excellent 2013 Second Stage Theatre production of The Last 5 Years. With his admirably simple and straightforward staging, he completely solved all of the directorial problems that marred the storytelling of the show in its original Off-Broadway staging.  Although that great virtue of the production obviously can’t be experienced by listening to the cast album, the recording is commendable in its own right for the strong performances of the very well cast Adam Kantor as Jamie and Betsy Wolfe as Cathy. There are some moments where these two seem to be working a little too aggressively to differentiate their interpretations from their predecessors Norbert Leo Butz and Sherie Rene Scott, as in several lines that are spoken or exclaimed rather than sung. Still, overall, Kantor and Wolfe are compelling and highly listenable in these roles. Not surprisingly, Brown does a superb job as musical director, a capacity in which he served for all three presentations of his masterwork that are reviewed here. — M.P.

Film Soundtrack, 2015 (Ghostlight) (5 / 5) There are no significant changes or variations in the musical and textual content of The Last 5 Years among the three recordings of the score. The instrumentation is very similar if not exactly the same, down to the keys in which the songs are performed. And because of the way Jamie and Cathy are written, there isn’t a whole lot of latitude for widely varying interpretations of the roles. So a preference for any of these recordings over the other two — if, indeed, there is a preference — will depend on one’s feelings about the quality and timbre of the voices of the cast members. Jeremy Jordan is arguably the most vocally gifted of the three Jamies, and he acts the songs at least as well as Norbert Leo Butz or Adam Kantor, so some listeners will find his performance to be the most satisfying overall. More very good news: Anna Kendrick is wonderfully real as Cathy throughout the character’s wide emotional and vocal range. Over the years since it was written, The Last 5 Years has dated slightly in some of its specifics; for example, in the song “Shiksa Goddess,” when Jamie imagines all the weird things about a girlfriend that his mother would be willing to forgive as long as she were Jewish, he cites having a tattoo as a major oddity. (Can you imagine?) But the characters and the main concerns of their story are timeless, so new productions and recordings of this beautiful, heartbreaking chamber musical will always be welcome. It’s best to experience the film of The Last 5 Years as a whole in a movie theater or on home video, because Richard LaGravenese did such a fine job of directing the property for the screen, but the soundtrack recording is thoroughly enjoyable as an audio-only entity. — M.P.

Original Cast Recordings, 1941 (Platinum/Wave) (3 / 5) Gertrude Lawrence had a reputation as a poor singer; Kurt Weill was quoted as saying that she had “the greatest range between C and C-sharp.” Perhaps she was inconsistent in live performances, but as heard in her studio recordings of songs from Lady in the Dark, Lawrence is in command and on pitch most of the time. (There are a few questionable notes in “My Ship” and elsewhere.) With music by Well and lyrics by Ira Gershwin, all of the songs in this show, save one, appear in dreams that fashion magazine editor Liza Elliott (Lawrence) recounts to her analyst. Each dream becomes a mini-operetta, but these first recordings from the score feature only its major numbers; the exception is a medley from the “Glamour Dream” that includes “Oh, Fabulous One,” “Huxley,” and “Girl of the Moment.” (It’s fun to hear Lawrence handle the patter of “Huxley” with a vocal quartet culled from the show’s chorus; this gives us some sense of the original production.) The “Glamour Dream” continues with Lawrence blithely swinging through “One Life to Live,” then the “Wedding Dream” presents the star in a romantic ballad, “This Is New,” and a fairy tale, “The Princess of Pure Delight.” Kaye, who played Russell Paxton/The Ringmaster in the show, delivers “It’s Never Too Late to Mendelssohn” and his big showstopper, “Tschaikowsky (and Other Russians),” in which he races through the names of 50 Russian composers in a tongue-twisting tour de force. Lawrence then scores with another showstopper, “The Saga of ]enny. ” (Unfortunately, for this recording, Ira Gershwin had to sanitize some of his ribald lyrics for that song; another disappointment is that the arrangements and orchestrations on all of these recordings are watered-down versions of what composer Weill wrote. ) The show’s final number, “My Ship,” is the only one sung outside of the dream sequences, and it marks the conclusion of Liza’s therapy; she recalls the words to the song from her childhood, and is instantly cured! While these vintage recordings do not really convey the theatricality of Lady in the Dark, they are a valuable record of a show that holds a major place in the development of the modern musical. Note that this compilation has bonus tracks including separate recordings of songs from the score by Danny Kaye, as well as the incomparable Hildegarde singing “The Saga of Jenny.” — Jeffrey Dunn

Television Production Soundtrack, 1954 (AEI) (1 / 5) Taken directly from the soundtrack of a kinescope of a Max Liebman television production, this Lady in the Dark stars Ann Sothern as Liza. The orchestrations are by Irwin Kostal, and they bear little resemblance to Weill’s originals; the musical style is more 1950s Hollywood than 1940s Broadway. Sothern handles her dialogue well, and has the right glamour and archness for the role. Her “One Life to Live” is jaunty and cool, her “My Ship” is smooth if not overly complex, but her “Saga of Jenny” is incomplete and cleaned up for TV. The recording includes three long, extraneous dances to variations on Weill’s music; they were performed in the 90-minute TV special by Bambi Linn and Rod Alexander. These annoying entries aside, the bonus tracks on this CD make it worth purchasing. Among them are Lawrence’s studio recordings of several songs from the score, plus her live broadcast performances of “Jenny” and “My Ship” with MacDonald Carey of the original Broadway cast. — J.D.

Studio Recording with TV Cast, 1954 (RCA/no CD) (2 / 5) Before Lady in the Dark was performed live on television in 1954, the cast went into a studio and made this album. Irwin Kostal’s orchestrations sound much better here, without all the background noise and hubbub of the AEI release reviewed above. Ann Sothern comes across well, while Carleton Carpenter does a fine job as Beekman in the “Glamour Dream” and does not disappoint with the Ringmaster’s “Tschaikowsky.” Robert Fortier gets to sing a little as Randy Culver, the character’s name having been inexplicably changed from Randy Curtis. — J.D.

Studio Cast, 1963 (Columbia/Sony) (3 / 5) When originally released, this was the fullest recorded representation of the classic Kurt Weill-Ira Gershwin score for Lady in the Dark. While the notes claimed it was “musically intact .. complete with Kurt Weill’s original orchestrations,” there are many internal cuts that were probably made to fit the songs onto a single LP, and some of the orchestrations were fiddled with. Still, the recording gives listeners a sense of how the dream-sequence songs hung together to form mini-operettas — one of the things that made the show such a groundbreaker. The orchestra and chorus are jauntily conducted by Lehman Engel. As Liza, Rise Stevens brings requisite glamour to “One Life to Live,” some beautiful tones to “My Ship,” and does her darnedest to shed her operatic mannerisms in “The Saga of Jenny”(but ends the song with a glorious high note). If she is not fully convincing in the more dramatic moments of dialogue and recitative, this is still a hearty and well-sung performance. Adolph Green works too hard at times, but he’s nevertheless enjoyable and makes the most of “Tschaikowsky.” John Reardon is heard as film star Randy Curtis, the role originated by a barely musical Victor Mature; he sings the big ballad that Mature never sang, “This Is New,” with ringing baritenor tones. The smaller roles are also well handled.  — J.D.

Original London Cast, 1997 (JAY) (4 / 5) All things considered, this is the finest recording of Lady in the Dark. The original Weill orchestrations were used with some augmentation, and there are no cuts in the score. As a result, the recording is nothing less than revelatory. In the pivotal role of Liza Elliot, we have Maria Friedman, a brilliant star of the London musical theater. She is a much stronger singer than Gertrude Lawrence, possessing an exciting belt voice with a soprano extension. Her “One Life to Live” is very belt-y, but that sound of confidence, shaken at the end of the “Glamour Dream,” creates its own mystique. When she offers lighter soprano tones in “My Ship,” Friedman’s Liza sounds as if she is truly rediscovering the words and realizing for the first time what they mean to her. She does an equally great job with “The Saga of Jenny.” Another lovely discovery is that we can finally hear “This Is New” as originally conceived; singing it with Friedman, the American baritenor Steven Edward Moore sounds wonderful. James Dreyfuss won an Olivier Award for his performance as Russell Paxton/The Ringmaster, and he comes across fairly well on the recording, which also boasts excellent choral work. — J.D.

Original Broadway Cast Reconstruction, 1977 (Smithsonian/Hallmark) (5 / 5) Here is one of the great artifacts of the American musical theater — and it’s also a great listen. One of a series of Smithsonian reconstructions released during the 1970s, this album of the 1924 George and Ira Gershwin musical Lady, Be Good! is probably the best of them. After Fred and Adele Astaire finished the show’s Broadway run, they repeated their roles in London, where they recorded six of their songs (and English cast member William Kent recorded one more). George Gershwin himself played piano for four of the sides, and all of them are simply delightful. To be able to hear Fred and his legendary sister perform “Hang On to Me,” “Fascinating Rhythm,” “So Am I,” “Swiss Miss,” ”I’d Rather Charleston” (added for the London run), and “The Half-of-it-Dearie Blues” (in which Fred dances and clowns with Gershwin) is simply remarkable. In addition, original cast member Cliff Edwards, mostly remembered as Jiminy Cricket’s voice in Disney’s Pinocchio, sings a couple of numbers, and the duo-piano team of Phil Ohman and Victor Arden is also heard. A few Gershwin piano solos, drawn from old radio broadcasts and a 1924 piano roll, add more delights. — David Wolf

Studio Cast, 1992 (Roxbury/Elektra-Nonesuch) (3 / 5) This recording, like others of the well-intentioned Gershwin releases from Roxbury, fails to recreate the musical comedy spirit that made Lady, Be Good! a touchstone of the Roaring Twenties. Too often, it feels like an academic exercise, busily reconstituting original orchestrations and performing styles. It may be authentic, but it isn’t very enjoyable. Except for female lead Ann Morrison, most of the cast, especially the male principals, sing everything very squarely and right on the beat. However, John Pizzarelli is charming in emulating the vaudeville looseness of Cliff Edwards from the original cast. And when Jason Alexander arrives near the end of the first act with the title song and some terrible jokes, he offers a welcome burst of energy. As always with this label’s releases, the booklet accompanying the CD is extensive and terrific. — D.W.

Original Broadway Cast, 1983 (RCA) (4 / 5) Harvey Fierstein’s book for this musical closely follows Jean Poiret’s stage farce, the film version of which became a huge hit, about the chaos unleashed when the son of a St. Tropez gay couple, one of whom is a drag nightclub star, becomes engaged to the daughter of a conservative politician. But this La Cage aux Folles is the only version — including the American film remake, The Birdcage — that portrays the two men, Georges and Albin, as deeply in love. Indeed, Jerry Herman’s touching “Song on the Sand” is still one of the few gay love ballads to come out of Broadway. Among the other choice items are Albin’s delightful paean to drag, “A Little More Mascara,” and the title song about the nightclub (“You go alone to have the evening of your life / You meet your mistress and your boyfriend and your wife!”) Additional highlights of the score are “Look Over There,” an angry defense of gay parenting, and “The Best of Times,” with its live-for-today philosophy. The first-act closer, “I Am What I Am,” is in a class by itself, and George Hearn’s savage rendition of it is one of the great Broadway performances of the decade. Gene Barry does sensitive work as Albin’s spouse. JimTyler’s brassy orchestrations add a touch of Jacques Brel to Herman’s melodies. This show sends Sondheim fans into a tizzy for having snatched away the Best Musical Tony Award from Sunday in the Park With George, but in my book, the Tony voters were right. — David Barbour