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120787bk Oklahoma 17/12/04 4:43 PM Page 2 1. Overture 3:19 9. Pore Jud Is Daid 2:49 17. Oklahoma 2:55 20. Out Of My Dreams 3:32 Orchestra Alfred Drake & Howard da Silva James Melton with Al Goodman’s Orchestra Eleanor Steber with Al Goodman’s Orchestra Decca 23282, mx WW 71454-T4-A Decca 23286, mx 71456-AA & Chorus Victor 10-1143, mx D4RB-0721 Victor 10-1142, mx D4RB-0719 Recorded 22 December 1944, New York 2. Oh, What A Beautiful Mornin’ 2:32 10. Lonely Room 2:36 Recorded 22 December 1944, New York Alfred Drake Alfred Drake 21. Oh, What A Beautiful Mornin’ 3:06 Decca 23283, mx W 71455-T3-A Decca 23380, mx W 72172-A3 18. The Surrey With The Fringe On Top John Charles Thomas with Victor Young’s 3:26 Orchestra & The Ken Darby Chorus 3. The Surrey With The Fringe On Top 11. Out Of My Dreams 2:47 James Melton with Al Goodman’s Orchestra Victor 10-1144, mx D4RB-1059 3:07 Joan Roberts & Girl Chorus Victor 10-1142, mx D4RB-0720 Recorded 13 December 1944, Hollywood Alfred Drake Decca 23285, mx W 71479-T1-A Recorded 22 December 1944, New York Decca 23284, mx W 71459-T3-A 22. Kansas City 2:56 12. The Farmer And The Cowman 5:17 19. People Will Say We’re In Love 3:23 John Charles Thomas with chorus & 4. Kansas City 2:45 Ralph Riggs, Bette Garde & Chorus James Melton & Eleanor Steber with orchestra conducted by Victor Young Lee Dixon & Male Chorus Decca 23381, mx W 72170-A3, 72171-A3 Al Goodman’s Orchestra Victor 10-1144, mx D4RB-1060 Decca 23285, mx W 71475-T3-A 13. All Er Nuthin’ 3:09 Victor 10-1143, mx D4RB-0722 Recorded 13 December 1944, Hollywood Recorded 22 December 1944, New York 5. I Cain’t Say No 2:59 Lee Dixon & Celeste Holm Victor 10-1142/3/4 issued as album M-988 Celeste Holm Decca 23284, mx W 71458-T2-A Decca 23286, mx 71457-E 14. Oklahoma 2:30 Transfers and Production: David Lennick • Digital Restoration: Graham Newton 6. Many A New Day 3:05 Alfred Drake & Chorus Original discs from the collections of David Lennick, John Rutherford and the Belfer Audio Joan Roberts & Girl Chorus Decca 23283, mx W 71474-T3-A Laboratory and Archive, Syracuse University • Special thanks to Vince Giordano Decca 23287, mx W 71478-T2-A 15. Finale: Oh, What A Beautiful Mornin’ 7. It’s A Scandal 3:15 —People Will Say We’re In Love 3:10 Producer’s Note by David Lennick Joseph Buloff & Chorus Joan Roberts,Alfred Drake & Chorus The masters for Decca’s Oklahoma album were sources are quiet 78 pressings of the later dubs, 1 Decca 23380, mx W 72169-A3 Decca 23282, mx 71476-AA recorded at 33 /3 RPM on sixteen-inch glass- and Canadian pressings in the case of Volume II. 8. People Will Say We’re In Love 3:11 based lacquer discs which were then dubbed to Victor’s Oklahoma! set was also made very Joan Roberts & Alfred Drake 78 RPM masters, processed with wartime quickly and some sides have permanent wow Decca 23287, mx W 71477-T3-A materials and pressed on recycled shellac. Later and distortion built into them from their original pressings were on better material and better sources. The Symphonic Suite was issued on Original Cast with the Oklahoma Orchestra & Chorus conducted by Jay Blackton dubs were made from the masters, but the 78s as well, but luckily was also recorded by Decca 23282/3/4/5/6/7 issued as Album DA 359; recorded in New York, 20 & 25 October1943 original lacquers were showing signs of wear by Decca for its World Broadcasting division in a Decca 23380/1 issued as Album A 383; recorded in New York, 25 May 1944 the time Oklahoma! was transferred to LP and slightly different version and pressed on high 45, even though safety copies existed and some quality vinyl transcription discs for radio station 16. Oklahoma: Symphonic Suite 11:26 World Program Service 700-8424/5/6/7, alternate takes have been found. Thus, the best use. This is the version heard on this CD. (Arranged by Robert Russell Bennett) mx BB 40824-A5 Alfred Wallenstein and Philharmonic Recorded 4 August 1944, Los Angeles, Orchestra of Los Angeles concurrently with Decca 23357/8 NAXOS RADIO Over 50 Channels of Classical Music • Jazz, Folk/World, Nostalgia www.naxosradio.com Accessible Anywhere, Anytime • Near-CD Quality 5 8.120787 6 8.120787 120787bk Oklahoma 17/12/04 4:43 PM Page 1 one he had chosen. first and he laboured over them for weeks at a with the union in September of 1943. The Decca also capitalized further on Oscar Hammerstein II had once been a great time. He worried about what a character was album was recorded a month later. Oklahoma! mania by recording Robert Russell Oklahoma! lyricist/librettist with hits like Show Boat to his feeling, what the dynamics of a scene needed, It was released as a series of six 78 discs Bennett’s Symphonic Suite on themes from Music by Richard Rodgers • Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II credit, but his work in the past decade had not what would make a snappy opening and included most of the major songs of the the show in August of the same year. Original Broadway Cast and Bonus Recordings, 1943-1944 consisted of nothing but flops and he was number for Act II. show,carefully trimmed to suit the roughly By December of 1944, RCA Victor had generally perceived as yesterday’s man. His simple poetic images brought out a new three minutes that a side could accommodate finally settled with the Musicians’ Union as well, Sometime after 11:00 pm on 11 March 1943, the had been empty,started doing brisk business. The same thing with director Rouben Rodgers, with long, flowing melodic lines and in those days. and one of their first recordings was – you curtain fell at New Haven’s Shubert Theatre on Audiences liked this show. It opened the Mamoulian. He had once electrified Broadway rich foursquare harmonies. It was a Even in this somewhat strait-laced format, guessed it! – Oklahoma! the world première of a new musical entitled following week in Boston to even better with his stagings of the original play Porgy and collaboration that might have fallen on deaf ears you can hear the fresh, young charm that They turned to a cast from the Metropolitan Away We Go! reviews and the creative team kept honing and its operatic sequel, Porgy and Bess, but he in the Roaring Twenties or the Dirty Thirties, but captivated the world. Drake once described Opera for this version, featuring tenor James One of the first people up the aisle was working down to the wire. hadn’t done a legit show in eight years and his as America struggled to get through the Second Oh, What A Beautiful Morning as ‘the closest Melton, who had appeared in several 1930s Rose Bigman, personal secretary to Broadway’s Then on 31 March, the day it was set to once-soaring film career was in freefall. World War, it was just what was needed. thing to lieder ever written by an American’, movie musicals like Stars Over Broadway most feared columnist,Walter Winchell. She open on Broadway,a freak early spring Ballet-trained Agnes DeMille had been fired That’s the second major factor: timing. The and he sings it that way,with rich, pure tones. before concentrating exclusively on his classical wasted no time in sending a telegram to her snowstorm hit the city and that, coupled with as choreographer from her first two musicals, kind of simple, homespun affirmation that Joan Roberts’ clear, bright voice soars effort- work. boss telling him what she thought of the show: the low-key feeling about the show in the leading man Alfred Drake’s career had stalled Oklahoma! offered was balm to the soul of a lessly in numbers like Out of My Dreams, West Virginia-born soprano Eleanor Steber ‘No legs, no jokes, no chance’, was her now- theatre community,was responsible for a since he did Babes In Arms for Rodgers and nation mired in a war they were starting to Celeste Holm remains the most humorously was thirty when this recording was made and legendary message. première performance filled with empty seats. Hart, and high-powered Mary Martin had turned wonder if they could ever win. innocent of all Ado Annies and Lee Dixon has about to enter what many consider her ‘golden Some sources attribute the remark to But that would be the last time there were down the female lead to appear in a show The cynical Broadway crowd, obsessed with such easy charm that one can comprehend why years’ as the Met’s leading lady. And baritone producer Mike Todd, but that isn’t as likely, any empty seats for the next five years. The called Dancing In The Streets (which would nothing more than their own narrow kingdom, the cast chose to cope with his problem John Charles Thomas began his career on Broad- because he was spotted leaving during the next morning’s reviews were almost universally later close in Boston). couldn’t see that and felt the show was old- drinking – as well as the onion sandwiches he way,appearing in numerous musical comedies show so he could catch an early train back to ecstatic and by noon, the box office was under The final nail in the coffin was that the fashioned.

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