![]() ![]() Several cast albums have been released over the years. An abbreviated one-act version of the musical designed for performers aged 18 and under also exists, titled Godspell Junior. Many productions have followed worldwide, including a 2011 Broadway revival. The show was rescored for an off-Broadway production, which opened on May 17, 1971, and became a long-running success. Godspell began as a project by drama students at Carnegie Mellon University and then moved to the off-off-Broadway theater La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club in the East Village of Manhattan. The show is structured as a series of parables, primarily based on the Gospel of Matthew, interspersed with music mostly set to lyrics from traditional hymns, with the passion of Christ appearing briefly near the end. (Though the film was not a commercial success and took 25 years to get to video, the soundtrack album reached the Top 40 and stayed in the charts for almost a year.Godspell is a musical composed by Stephen Schwartz with book by John-Michael Tebelak. So, this was a less complete version of the score, but it was much better performed and produced, making this a rare instance in which the soundtrack album is better than the original cast album. Two songs, "Learn Your Lessons Well" and "We Beseech Thee," were cut, along with a reprise of "Day By Day," and one, "Beautiful City," was added. As a result, he was better able to realize the score's pop tendencies than he had on the cast album. With a bigger budget, Schwartz was able to augment the original musicians using key studio personnel such as lead guitarist Hugh McCracken (on "Prepare Ye ") and keyboard player Paul Shaffer, along with a horn section and half dozen strings. Meanwhile, David Haskell stayed on in the dual role of John the Baptist and Judas, and, naturally, Robin Lamont got to repeat her triumph singing "Day By Day." Though Joanne Jonas was an original cast member, she had not sung "Turn Back, O Man," which she here inherited from Sonia Manzano and did well with. Garber was a stronger singer than Nathan, and that improved things noticeably. The key casting change was the replacement of Stephen Nathan, who played Christ onstage, with Victor Garber, a talented young singer/actor who would go on to a distinguished stage career that would include two Stephen Sondheim musicals, Sweeney Todd and Assassins. As such, the soundtrack album offered him the opportunity to improve upon the cast album, and he did. Five of the ten ensemble performers were retained from the original cast, along with all four of the original musicians, and Schwartz produced the music, as he had on the cast album. Happily, composer Stephen Schwartz retained musical control, and the film, other than using various deserted New York City locations as its set, was quite faithful to the stage version. ![]() Bell Records, a subsidiary of Columbia Pictures, had released that cast album, and the film company quickly put a movie version into production. By then, the show had moved to off-Broadway and was well on its way to a run that would exceed 2,500 performances (and eventually reach Broadway itself). Godspell, the second musical of the early '70s to be based on the life of Jesus Christ (following Jesus Christ Superstar, which hit the record racks, but not the stage first), was something of a sleeper, opening off-off-Broadway in May 1971, with an original cast album that belatedly became a big success in 1972 after "Day By Day" was released as a single and hit the Top Ten. ![]()
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