You may have already heard that Andrew Lloyd Webber is working on a sequel to The Phantom Of The Opera - The Phantom Of Manhattan. You may also have heard the tale that Andrew’s cat destroyed the entire score by messing up the computer the score was stored on.

As soon as I heard that tale, I was slightly suspicious…I mean, isn’t the music in his head? Didn’t he have print-outs of the music? I find it hard to believe that one can compose an entire score and lose it all with the click of a button. Well, looks like I was right to be suspicious…

According to this interview, there is only a “tiny bit of truth” to the cat tale. Andrew says that “the music I’d written was not really lost because I have it in my head”.

Sad thing though…the mischievous cat met its fate on the road several days later.

I just had the good fortune of stumbling upon the West Side Story 50th Anniversary Recording CD. Wow…Great stuff!

The CD features Vittorio Grigolo as Tony and Hayley Westenra as Maria. If you’ve never heard of them, they are both very talented classical crossover artists, and they both deliver great performances on this album.

Here is a short video clip of Tonight:

Honestly, I don’t think Hayley could do a live show. Her voice is not “big” enough, and her acting doesn’t seem to be too astounding. Her singing is too polished and not passionate enough for Broadway. Vittorio, I think, could play Tony quite well in a live production - he has more punch, I think. However, I do think that they both do a fine job on the recording, and it’s a great listen.

Other thoughts on the album - They made the tragic error of having Hayley sing Somewhere by herself. It would have been amazing if Vittorio had sung it with her. One Hand, One Heart is great. The second instance of Tonight (the version which is sung by the PRs, Jets, Tony, and Maria is probably my favorite track from the album. The orchestra on this CD seems to be fuller and smoother…overall, great.

My main beef with West Side Story is that the music doesn’t fit the setting and story. I love the music, but somehow, gangsters singing classical love songs hasn’t ever seemed to be the right fit to me. I’ve always thought that it would work better as a rock opera like Evita. This CD, of course, makes the music even more classical, which is amazing to listen to, but I don’t think it would work as well in a show. That’s just me, though…

Click Here To Buy West Side Story: 50th Anniversary Recording

OK, well since the tap dance video I posted was so popular, I guess I’ll have to make this a recurring post! I’ll try to post a funny video every week.

Here’s another one of my favorites: Family Guy does “Shipoopi” from “The Music Man”. What I love about this clip, like the other one, is that they don’t just do a 15 second rendition….this clip is over 2 minutes long! And the best part is that much of the choreography is the original choreography from the movie. Enjoy!

Eli Newsom

Eli Newsom is a professional tap dancer and creator of the DVD Tap Dance Made Easy.

Some of you out there may have seen this recent clip of Stewie dancing with Gene Kelly on an episode of “Family Guy”. The original clip was in the film Achors Aweigh (1945)….the song is called “The Worry Song”, and Gene Kelly danced with Jerry Mouse. The gang at Family Guy did some excellent work superimposing Stewie on top for the “Family Guy” version.

Here are both clips, side by side, where you can see how they superimposed Stewie over Jerry Mouse.

“I woke up one morning and realized I didn’t want to do dinner theater in Aspen for the rest of my life and I needed to go to New York.” ~Carey Anderson, currently playing Sophie in Mamma Mia!

If you want something, you gotta stop sitting around wanting it, and get up and get it, aye?!