Saturday, December 7, 2013

THE SOUND OF MUSIC – A CD Review

I haven’t seen this TV production yet (that’s what happens when you live in Portugal) but this new recording of the famous score by Rodgers & Hammerstein can’t be compared with the fantastic movie soundtrack starring Julie Andrews, with which I fell in love at an early age. That doesn’t mean this isn’t good, but I missed Julie Andrews and the luxurious orchestrations from the movie, plus one of my favorite songs from the movie, “I Have Confidence”.

When I heard that a country singer would play the role of Maria I expected the worst, but Carrie Underwood has a nice voice and doesn’t try to imitate Julie Andrews. At first, her rendition of the title song sounds kind of strange, but than we warm to it. For me, her best moment is with “The Lonely Goatherd”.

The producers had the good idea of surrounding Carrie with several stage names and it worked. Audra McDonald is terrific as Mother Abbess and I just wish the other Sisters, Christian Noll, Jessica Molaskey and Elena Shaddow, had more singing time; their “Maria” hit all the right notes. In the supporting roles of Max and Elsa, Christian Borle and Laura Bennanti have an enjoyable time with “How Can Love Survive?” and “No Way To Stop It”, two songs that were cut from the movie production. As Captain Von Trapp, Stephen Moyer doesn’t shine in his songs, but the same can be said about Christopher Plummer in the movie. Finally, Michael Campayno and Ariane Rinehart had a good time with “Sixteeen Going on Seventeen”


Although I always liked this score, this isn’t by far Rodgers & Hammerstein best work, but it’s their most famous one. It’s true, this television soundtrack isn’t the best rendition of the score, but even so it’s a nice way for the new generations to discover it and maybe it’ll get them interested in other musicals. The fact is this SOUND OF MUSIC sounds better than I expected!

Rate: 6 (from 1 to 10)

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