Les Mis... What's the big deal?

[jbsegal]

So, after The Star Wars Trilogy Musical Edition ganked something like 1/2 its music from Les Mis, I decided it should actually listen to the original.

I borrowed The Complete Symphonic Recording from dancingdeer.

I'm not impressed.

Thoughts: While I'm not much of a fan of opera, so I can't really compare, it really feels to me like 50%+ of the show is recitative and I don't like it.

Related: This is the most un-lyrical musical I've ever heard. Much of the time, it sounds like it wants to be a straight play but someone decided to graft on music.

Yes, musicals often have themes or leitmotifs, it often feels like this show has, alongside the 50% recitative, another 30% made up of the same... 3? 4? songs, reused and reused and reused.

There's not a thing about the recording that evokes 'France' for me. The occasional french phrase feels forced and artificial, especially alongside the cockney accents of the lower-class characters.

The use of synthesizers in the scoring is... anachronistic, in a way I can't let wash over me.

Specific to this recording: I hate Gary Morris' voice/accent. As he's a TX? TN? born country singer, this isn't that surprising.

So, why the heque is this such a popular show? Sure, there are a couple of nice songs, but they're a very small percentage of the whole. Is it totally different live? Really?

Comments

[xeger.livejournal.com]

There are a lot of dreadful cast recordings of les miz out there. I think of it as being candy fluff though - entertaining, occasionally catchy... much like watching TV.

[jbsegal.livejournal.com]

The sheer NUMBER of Les Mi[sz] cast recordings out there is really pretty disturbing.

That said, I gather that, in theory, The Complete Symphonic Recording is one of the best of them.

[rikibeth.livejournal.com]

London. London London London. It leaves OUT a lot of the recitative from the CSR that flattens out sadly when there's no staging to accompany it, the arrangements are more to the strings and less to the brass than the Broadway versions, and there are even differences in the LYRICS.

And, Frances Ruffelle as Eponine.

Okay, maybe I like it best because it's the closest to what I first SAW.

But... London.