Anyone here like Smash? :) - Page 2

**garricks** · 05-04-2012, 12:22 PM

That's the one place I never wanted to be.

I'm perfectly happy helping to make it happen.

**Virgo Nightingale** · 05-04-2012, 01:24 PM

Garricks, you should get together with my husband. He LOVES the Music Man to no end. He'd be jealous that you worked on in it in such a capacity. It's the only musical aside from Hair that he will admit that he loves. Actually, those are the only two musicals he doesn't hate.

**garricks** · 05-04-2012, 01:52 PM

It was a very odd production full of coincidences Virgo. That production was 20 years after my first time playing in a pit, for the CYC group that this production company evolved from, and the show 20 years before was The Music Man. I was literally teaching myself to play the clarinet DURING rehearsals, looking up fingerings...LOL The Harold Hill and Marion the Librarian were the same actor and actress that played those roles 20 years before, too. So the whole show had a big, nostalgic, reunion-y feeling.

It was a great run, down to the night the Shipoopi got out of control and went completely off the rails!

**Virgo Nightingale** · 05-04-2012, 02:33 PM

He wants to do a cover of the opening number on stage one day.

**garricks** · 05-04-2012, 02:44 PM

The train bit?

Awesome.

**Virgo Nightingale** · 05-04-2012, 02:51 PM

Yes.

I prefer melody over rhythm, so it's NOT my favorite piece. Hubby takes advantage of that, so when he feels like annoying me, he often does it with that song. I probably would like it more if it weren't for that.

Big brass bass, big brass bass! And the piccolo, the piccolo!

Arg.

**garricks** · 05-04-2012, 05:39 PM

And the piccolo, the piccolo! Unicorns too...

Oh, wait. That's not right, is it?

I think it's a clever representation of train sounds, and certainly a great way to open a show, leading you directly into the town.

I think my favorite tune is Lida Rose/Dream of Now. The combo of marian singing over the quartet is just cool.

Close to it is 'Til there was You.

From teh Wikis:

Quote:

Willson penned a number of very well known songs, such as "You and I", which was a No. 1 for Glenn Miller in 1941 on Billboard. It was also recorded by Bing Crosby, and by Tommy Dorsey with Frank Sinatra on vocals.

Three songs from The Music Man have become American standards: "Seventy-Six Trombones", "Gary Indiana", and "Till There Was You." The last was recorded by The Beatles' for their albums With The Beatles (UK release, 1963) and Meet The Beatles! (US release, 1964).

Individual songs include: "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas", "May the Good Lord Bless and Keep You", and "I See The Moon". He wrote the University of Iowa's fight song, and Iowa State University's "For I for S Forever". He also wrote the fight song for his hometown high school "Mason City, Go!" He honored The Salvation Army with a musical tribute entitled "Banners and Bonnets".

An oddity in Willson's body of work is "Chicken Fat", written in 1962. In school gymnasiums across the nation, this was the theme song for President John F. Kennedy's youth fitness program.[10] It was time to get the country's youth into shape, and Willson's song had youngsters moving through basic exercises at a frenetic pace: push-ups, sit-ups, jumping jacks, torso twists, running in place, pogo springs, and plenty of marching. With an energetic lead vocal by Robert Preston, orchestral marching band, and full chorus, it was likely recorded during sessions for the Music Man motion picture. In 1974 he offered a marching song "Whip Inflation Now" to the Ford Administration, but it was not used.

**Virgo Nightingale** · 05-06-2012, 08:39 AM

My hubby is RIGHT NOW quoting the Music Man, and talking about that cover he'd like to do someday.