“The Broadway
Musicals Yearbook” will be heard on Artsound FM 92.7 at 5pm on Sunday 24
July and repeated at 11pm on Monday 25 July.
The show is produced and narrated by Len Power, Canberra theatre critic,
music critic and radio presenter.
This week – the musicals of 1975
1975 saw the openings of three shows destined to become musical theatre legends – ‘Chicago’, ‘The Rocky Horror Show’ and ‘A Chorus Line’. Other shows that opened that year included ‘The Wiz’, a black cast version of ‘The Wizard of Oz’, ‘Goodtime Charley’, about Joan of Arc and the Dauphin of France, ‘Shenandoah’, the story of a family caught up in the American Civil War and a nostalgic revival of 1915’s couple-swapping farce,‘Very Good Eddie’, with music by the great Jerome Kern. Of the big name shows here, surprisingly, not all of them were big hits at the time.
You’ll hear songs from all of these shows including ‘All That Jazz’ (from ‘Chicago’), ‘Home’ (‘The Wiz’), ‘Next To Lovin’ I Like Fightin’ (‘Shenandoah’), ‘One’ (‘A Chorus Line’, ‘Babes In the Wood’ (‘Very Good Eddie’), ‘The Time Warp’ (‘The Rocky Horror Show’) and ‘To Make The Boy A Man’ (‘Goodtime Charley’).
Performers include Chita Rivera, Jerry Orbach, Stephanie Mills, John Cullum, Pamela Blair, Reg Livermore, Joel Grey, Ann Reinking, Hugh Panaro and Rebecca Luker.
Listen Now: https://artsound.fm/shows/the-broadway-musicals-yearbook/
