To purchase the Original Cast Recording of A CHORUS LINE, click on the image above.

4. “At the Ballet” from A Chorus Line

I almost chose the “Montage”. The “Montage” is one of my most favourite things about A Chorus Line. So is “The Music and the Mirror”. But “At the Ballet” won out in the end. I love how the three stories, using the common links of ballet and parent-child relationships, come together and, in a few minutes, represent everything that A Chorus Line and – though it sounds trite and bombastic, although that certainly isn’t the intention – life is all about. And of course, there is Maggie’s crescendo. The documentary about the Broadway revival of the show, Every Little Step spends quite a bit of time with this song and it seems clear that everyone involved knows how important this song is in the show. So here’s a question for you: with that knowledge in mind, why would anyone record the song the way they did for the cast album of the revival? It’s probably the most disappointing track on that CD, all the more so because the song is such a great one.

3. “A Little Priest” from Sweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street

It’s tough to choose a favourite song from Sweeney Todd, because the score throughout is so great. In fact, I was convinced that my choice would be the “Johanna” quartet which, although pruned down, not even the film managed to mess up. I just love that piece of the show. But whenever songs from Sweeney Todd are compared, it’s almost impossible for “A Little Priest” not to walk away with the first prize. There’s so much going on: the crazy puns, the nifty rhymes, the shifts in register, the musical build of the whole piece, the subtext beneath it all. It’s a breathtaking piece of work from a composer-lyricist who was at his peak. Sondheim’s work may have displayed more overt emotional depth in some of his later musicals – an offshoot that owes something to his collaboration with James Lapine, I think – but there’s nothing that tops his body of work in the 1970s for me.

2. “A Weekend in the Country” from A Little Night Music

A Little Night Music is a seamless piece of work: the score flows in and out of the book, and the quintet of singers and their songs are woven carefully with the characters and their songs into a fantastic dramatic experience. “A Weekend in the Country” represents that standard of theatremaking in a single musical number, which really functions brilliantly as a dramatic unit within the show. The whole world of the play has changed by the end of the number and the stakes for the rest of the action are outlined lucidly and effectively. What amazes me every time I hear this number is how the cast that performs it have to be equally adept at singing and acting. A weak singer can so easily get lost amidst the counterpoint later in the song, while with weak actors certain sections of the song can seem nonsensical. That also characterises much of the musical, although there are pieces like “Liaisons” and “Send in the Clowns” that require a brilliant actor first, or else one is doomed to listening to so much pretty noise. The point is when everything comes together in A Little Night Music, the piece is brilliant. So it is for “A Weekend in the Country”.