120886bk Music Man:MASTER 3+3 1/9/09 5:50 PM Page 2 The Music Man 14. It’s You 1:23 All selections recorded in New York • Tracks 1–19 Stereo, 20–26 Monaural Original Cast, 1957 The Buffalo Bills Transfers & Production: David Lennick • Digital Restoration: Graham Newton • Special thanks to 15. Shipoopi 2:11 1. Overture 1:54 Music Library and Sound Recordings Archives, Bowling Green State University and to Jack Raymond Iggie Wolfington & Ensemble Orchestra Cover image © Petrafler / Dreamstime.com 16. Lida Rose—Will I Ever Tell You 4:15 2. Rock Island 3:34 Barbara Cook & The Buffalo Bills Paul Reed & Travelling Salesmen (Robert Evans, James Gannon, 17. Gary, Indiana 1:25 Also available in the Naxos Musicals series ... Russell Goodwin, Robert Howard, Eddie Hodges Robert Lenn, Vernon Lusby, Hal Norman) 18. Till There Was You 2:44 3. Iowa Stubborn 1:57 Barbara Cook & Robert Preston Ensemble 19. Finale 2:17 4. Ya Got Trouble 3:47 Entire Company Robert Preston & Ensemble Orchestra conducted by Herbert Greene 5. Piano Lesson 1:58 Capitol SWAO 990 Barbara Cook & Pert Kelton Recorded 29 December 1957 6. Goodnight My Someone 2:44 BONUS TRACKS Barbara Cook 20. Till I Met You 3:00 7. Seventy-Six Trombones 3:01 Eileen Wilson with Meredith Willson & Robert Preston & Ensemble His Orchestra 8.120786 8.120877 8.120878 8. Sincere 1:38 Decca 27334, mx W 80082 The Buffalo Bills (Bill Spangenberg, Recorded 25 October, 1950 Wayne Ward, Al Shea, Vern Reed) 9. The Sadder-But-Wiser Girl 1:40 Meredith Willson Conducts Robert Preston Selections from The Music Man 10. Pick-A-Little—Goodnight Ladies 1:55 21. Iowa Stubborn 2:09 Helen Raymond, Elaine Swann, Peggy Mondo, 22. Goodnight My Someone 2:58 Adnia Rice, Martha Flynn & The Buffalo Bills 23. Pick-A-Little, Talk-A-Little 1:16 11. Marian The Librarian 2:43 24. Marian The Librarian (including ballet Robert Preston music by Laurence Rosenthal) 5:55 C 12. My White Knight 3:01 25. Till There Was You 2:49 Barbara Cook 26. Seventy-Six Trombones 3:11 M 8.120885 8.120879 8.120887 13. Wells Fargo Wagon 2:12 Capitol T 991 Eddie Hodges & Ensemble Recorded January 1958 These titles are not for retail sale in the USA Y 5 8.120886 6 8.120886 K 120886bk Music Man:MASTER 3+3 1/9/09 5:50 PM Page 1 Wilson (only one “l”, no relation!) on 25 October and Willson finally turned to a friend named rhythmic, but unrhymed, lyrics were spoken to Matthew Broderick and Eric McCormack, but The Music Man 1950. Franklin Lacey to help him solve the book. rapid fire over a chugging accompaniment. Still, Preston remains unique. Music and Lyrics by Meredith Willson Except for the fact that the title phrase was Lacey’s major achievement was to convince once they caught on, they loved it. Listen to the snap, crackle and pop of his later changed to Till There Was You, it’s note Willson the janitor’s son had to go. He changed The score was – and still is – rich with sheer performing energy as he tears into the Original Cast, 1957 for note and word for word the same song that into the shy, stuttering brother of Marian the melodic invention, unexpected counterpoint show’s defining number, Ya Got Trouble, and anchored the second act of The Music Man Librarian and, as played by a young man named and music that can make you laugh, even you’ll know what musical comedy is really all Just call him ‘Iowa Stubborn’. This would have been exciting enough for a (and later became the only Broadway tune Eddie Hodges who had just made a success on a without lyrics. It also has some of the best about. It took Meredith Wilson eight years and 32 22 year-old musician who was still shaking the covered by The Beatles!). TV show called Name That Tune, he was a real character songs ever written, such as The Alas, Willson was pretty much a one-trick drafts to bring his childhood memories of Iowa hay off his Midwestern boots, but Willson soon By 1951, the hot producing team of Cy Feuer audience pleaser. Sadder-But-Wiser Girl and My White pony, with his next two Broadway shows (The onto the stage, but anyone who has ever sat slid into the even-more-popular world of radio and Ernie Martin (Where’s Charley?, Guys and Willson finally found a producer in the gentle, Knight, although the latter number has caused Unsinkable Molly Brown and Here’s Love) entranced by The Music Man will agree that it and before his thirtieth birthday, he was one of Dolls) optioned the show which Willson was at venerable Kermit Bloomgarden, more known for some serious debate over the years. proving pale imitations of his initial bountiful was well worth it. the major musical forces for NBC Radio. this point calling The Silver Triangle. his serious dramas such as The Diary of Anne The long introductory section, talk-sung, is originality. His final show, a musical look at the Willson was a strange amalgamation of small- And for a long time, that’s where it looked It dealt with a shyster salesman of non-existent Frank and The Crucible than his musicals. obviously vintage Willson, but what about the world of Christopher Columbus called 1491, town hick, classical musician and showbiz like Willson was going to stay. Except for a stint musical instruments and the noble piano teacher But Bloomgarden had the essential quality of rest? Many musical comedy historians insist closed on the road in 1969 and that – for all slickness … all of which somehow found their in the Army during World War II, he spent the who had the power to expose him. belief and he put together an ace production that Willson’s first supporter, Frank Loesser intents and purposes – was ‘Goodnight My way into his 1957 musical hit. next seventeen years at NBC, writing hit songs In that respect, it sounds just like the show team, headed by director Morton DaCosta and provided a cast-off melody from The Most Someone’ for Meredith Willson. He was born in Mason City, Iowa on 18 May such as “May the Good Lord Bless and Keep that opened on Broadway six years later, but in choreographer Onna White. Happy Fella to give Marian’s big aria the And that’s a shame, because, when you listen 1902 and it isn’t hard to see the show’s fictional You” and spending each week as the musical most other ways, it was a lot different. They had a lot of trouble, however, finding soaring touch it needed. to the joy with which he conducts the bonus ‘River City’ peeking out from under the thin supervisor for Tallulah Bankhead’s exercise in Willson was obsessed with a subplot about someone to play their leading character, the Doubters should look to the film version, tracks from The Music Man on this recording, disguise of the place Willson called home. His sonic mayhem called The Big Show. (in his words) “the school janitor’s son who was musical con-man now called Harold Hill. where Willson only replaced one song, My you’ll hear a man for whom music was all tied mother was also a much-loved music teacher, so But one day in 1949, the ingratiating Willson a spastic” and it was this serious chunk of the Danny Kaye, their first choice, said he couldn’t White Knight, with the vastly inferior “Being In up with happiness. And for one show, at least, it it’s also easy to find the inspiration behind was holding forth to a bunch of his friends story which eventually caused Feuer and Martin possibly see himself in the part. Dan Dailey, Phil Love”. Maybe he was trying to prove a point to all came true just the way he had always Marion Paroo, one of the most endearing of all about what it was like to grow up in Iowa. In to drop it in 1955. Harris, Gene Kelly and others all passed. someone? dreamed it would. musical comedy heroines. the crowd was composer Frank Loesser, who But just before they left, they gave Willson a Finally, a B movie actor best known for his Many performers have shone as Harold Hill But then came Chapter Two in Willson’s life, instantly thought Willson’s remembrances parting gift of a new title: The Music Man. “I villains in Westerns stepped onto the scene and over the years, from Van Johnson and Bert Parks Richard Ouzounian when he went to New York City after graduating should become a Broadway musical. always thought that The Silver Triangle sounded everyone soon wondered how they could have high school to enroll in the Institute of Musical He originally thought of Willson conducting like something Ibsen had written,” Feuer thought of anyone else other than Robert Art, which would later change its name to the the orchestra himself, turning around to the confided as he headed out the door. Preston. better-known Juilliard School of Music. By the audience to offer folksy reminiscences of what By now, Willson was committed to the The young and winning Barbara Cook, fresh age of nineteen, he was hired by renowned it was like back in that kinder, gentler time and project and he kept working furiously on it, but from Leonard Bernstein’s Candide, stepped into conductor/composer John Philip Sousa as first place.