Listening to musical soundtracks
So, while trying desperately to get my practical reports written by Wednesday, I've been listening to Les Miserables and Phantom of the Opera.
My conclusions so far:
Les Miserables is quite awesome, both in French and English, and I want to go and see it.
I've been listening to the original French Concept Album (for which I have just found lyrics) as well as the London Cast version. It's quite interesting how the songs differ between the concept album and the soundtrack from the performance in English.
Marius is a gormless twit in French as well as English (well, he is - poor Eponine).
Valjean and Javert are both damn awesome. They each have great solos, and a couple of very cool duets.
There's also an anime adaptation. Yumiko Kobayashi (yes, the one who played Poemi in Puni Puni Poemi, and Azuma Kazuma in Yakitate) plays Gavroche, and I am utterly, utterly unsurprised at such casting - her voice strikes me as perfect even without having watched the anime.
The Phantom of the Opera is reasonable, but not quite as good as Les Mis (either in terms of lyrics or music).
This is possibly because the situation in Les Miserables is of a world mostly in misery with revolution around the corner, and there are a large number of characters in it who have their own reasons to hate and fight against the world.
By contrast, the Phantom of the Opera has one guy in a cellar, the woman he's teaching to sing, her lover, a spoiled opera diva... and that's about it for the characters whose names I can remember.
I think the Nightwish cover of the title song may be better than the version on the soundtrack I've listened to.
Also, it's quite possible that the guy playing the Phantom on the soundtrack I have just isn't particularly good. However, I suspect it's more that the music isn't quite as interesting as Les Mis.
By that, I mean that Les Miserables has several musical themes that are associated with situations / characters that turn up throughout the musical:
* The theme that's used in Valjean's solo Who Am I? and then again in Javert's final solo Javert's Suicide.
* The theme of Javert's first solo Stars and then again at the end of Javert's Suicide.
* Work Song and the first half of Look Down.
* Master of the House and Beggar at the Feast (this is, in some way, Thenardier's theme).
In contrast, the only one I could determine for Phantom of the Opera was, well, the Phantom's theme; I think there's another theme which is a sort of Christine theme, but can't tell.
NB: I haven't listened to Phantom enough to really be able to pontificate about this. I suspect that when I listen to it more I'll pick out more. :)
My conclusions so far:
Les Miserables is quite awesome, both in French and English, and I want to go and see it.
I've been listening to the original French Concept Album (for which I have just found lyrics) as well as the London Cast version. It's quite interesting how the songs differ between the concept album and the soundtrack from the performance in English.
Marius is a gormless twit in French as well as English (well, he is - poor Eponine).
Valjean and Javert are both damn awesome. They each have great solos, and a couple of very cool duets.
There's also an anime adaptation. Yumiko Kobayashi (yes, the one who played Poemi in Puni Puni Poemi, and Azuma Kazuma in Yakitate) plays Gavroche, and I am utterly, utterly unsurprised at such casting - her voice strikes me as perfect even without having watched the anime.
The Phantom of the Opera is reasonable, but not quite as good as Les Mis (either in terms of lyrics or music).
This is possibly because the situation in Les Miserables is of a world mostly in misery with revolution around the corner, and there are a large number of characters in it who have their own reasons to hate and fight against the world.
By contrast, the Phantom of the Opera has one guy in a cellar, the woman he's teaching to sing, her lover, a spoiled opera diva... and that's about it for the characters whose names I can remember.
I think the Nightwish cover of the title song may be better than the version on the soundtrack I've listened to.
Also, it's quite possible that the guy playing the Phantom on the soundtrack I have just isn't particularly good. However, I suspect it's more that the music isn't quite as interesting as Les Mis.
By that, I mean that Les Miserables has several musical themes that are associated with situations / characters that turn up throughout the musical:
* The theme that's used in Valjean's solo Who Am I? and then again in Javert's final solo Javert's Suicide.
* The theme of Javert's first solo Stars and then again at the end of Javert's Suicide.
* Work Song and the first half of Look Down.
* Master of the House and Beggar at the Feast (this is, in some way, Thenardier's theme).
In contrast, the only one I could determine for Phantom of the Opera was, well, the Phantom's theme; I think there's another theme which is a sort of Christine theme, but can't tell.
NB: I haven't listened to Phantom enough to really be able to pontificate about this. I suspect that when I listen to it more I'll pick out more. :)