Making Records: The Scenes Behind the Music (24 page)

With my wife, Karen Ramone, and Barbra Streisand, 1983
Courtesy of David McGough

By the time I got to Hollywood, there had been numerous script changes, and there was a pressing deadline to start production. The issue of song selection also hung in the air.

When I arrived, Barbra was sifting through dozens of songs submitted by Paul Williams, Kenny Ascher, Rupert Holmes, Leon Russell, Kenny Loggins, and others. “Let me help you preview them,” I requested. “That’s part of the music supervisor’s responsibility, and as the film’s producer, you’ve got enough to worry about.”

One of the memories I savor is hearing “Evergreen” for the first time.

Barbra was learning to play guitar so her movement would look real in the film, and she’d improvised a pretty melody while practicing one night. The next day she came in and played it for us and it was superb—almost classical in its simplicity. She also played the song for Leon Russell, who also affirmed its beauty.

Barbra was very proud of “Evergreen.” She was reticent about contributing to the film something she’d written, but it was by far the finest song in the picture. Paul Williams took Barbra’s melody, added lyrics, and “Evergreen” became the movie’s theme. It went on to win both an Oscar and a Golden Globe for best song, and is still one of Barbra’s most-requested tunes.

Original tape box for mix of “Evergreen”
Phil Ramone Collection

To that point,
A Star Is Born
was the most ambitious project I’d ever done. We were recording live on the sets, then editing and mixing the sound in several places: in the sound truck on location, at the Burbank Studios, and at Todd-AO. To help us work efficiently I had forty Class-A phone lines installed between the Burbank Studios and Todd-AO, and we began feeding the mixes from Burbank to Hollywood, where Barbra was supervising the assembly of the D/M/E (dialogue, music, and sound effects) track.

When I called to request the forty phone lines, the head of Pacific Bell’s technical department asked if we’d like to use an experimental satellite to bounce music off Mount Wilson. It had never been done before, and when they said they’d give us sixty lines, I jumped at their offer.

The soundmen in Burbank thought I was crazy. There were trucks with receiving dishes scattered all around, and maintenance men constantly calling, “Where’s Phil? Where’s Phil?” We compared the sound of the satellite transmissions to that of the Class-A phone lines and found that the satellite worked very well.

I would prepare one or two mixes at whichever studio we were in and send it via satellite for Barbra to hear. Barbra would listen to the mix, fix the vocal line from where she was, and bounce it back to us wherever we were. I spent more than enough time driving back and forth between Burbank and Hollywood! The payoff came when everything Barbra had imagined came together and the studio, critics, and audiences reacted favorably.

One of the things I’m most proud of is that
A Star Is Born
was the first magnetic Dolby surround sound film, and that it premiered in true surround sound in fifteen theaters. The late dialogue mixer Buzz Knudson and I personally tested the print and equalized the first five theaters so they would sound like the mixing theater at Todd-AO. Then the Dolby technicians tuned each theater to what we called the “Todd-AO curve.”

While the pace of working on
A Star Is Born
was frantic, I had my share of fun, too.

Because Barbra and producer Jon Peters had disagreed with director Frank Pierson over the first cut of the film, Barbra decided to recut it herself. To accomplish this, she installed a full editing suite in a cottage on her Malibu ranch.

I spent a lot of time there with Barbra and Jon, and was treated to all of the estate’s amenities, including the gym and pool.

One night, I decided to take a swim in the buff.

It was late—maybe two o’clock in the morning—and no one else seemed to be alive. I dove into the cool water, and when I surfaced found the barrel of a gun pointed at my head.

The assailant was one of Barbra’s round-the-clock security guards—a serious bunch who patrolled the borders of the property. As I treaded water, I frantically tried to explain that I was not an intruder but an invited guest who was staying in the guest house. The guard eyed me dubiously.

I was splashing around, trying to stay above water, when I heard a familiar voice from the apartment above the cottage.

“Who’s that in the pool? Is everything okay down there?”

It was one of Barbra’s assistants, a lady who was staying in the apartment above me.

“Tell him who I am!” I screamed.

“Well, who
are
you?” she yelled back, having a good laugh at my expense.

She knew I was swimming in the buff, and all she wanted to see was my embarrassment when I was forced to come out of the pool naked. The story was the hot topic at breakfast the next day.

Flashdance
(1983) was a terrific film and a great challenge.

The team of Jon Peters, Peter Gruber, Jerry Bruckheimer, Don Simpson, and Dawn Steele were out to produce an original musical, and they asked if I was interested in producing the soundtrack. To help them capture a modern spirit, they signed Adrian Lyne to direct.
Although Lyne had only directed commercials, I admired his work and hoped I’d get the chance to work with him on his first feature film.

Because of the producers’ efforts,
Flashdance
has the two most important elements that make for an entertaining picture: a good story and exciting music. After reading a script that offered an elaborate view of the characters and plot, I signed on as coproducer of the music for the film.

For a musical to be successful there has to be a reason for each song, and the songs have to interlock with the story. Few people could write to the style of the period as well as Giorgio Moroder, who was at his peak.

Giorgio’s “What a Feeling” (sung by Irene Cara) was upbeat, and Michael Sembello’s “Maniac” provided the relentless, driving beat punctuating Jennifer Beals’s frenetic dance sequence. “Manhunt” has since become a camp classic, and the movie’s big ballad—“I’ll Be Here Where the Heart Is,” written by Kim Carnes, Duane Hitchings, and Craig Krampf—signaled a pivotal moment in the film, and in Kim’s career.

The dance form was far different in the early 1980s than it was during the days of Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, and Gene Kelly. Marrying music and dance can still be a Herculean task.

Dance is like an Olympic sport; it’s physically demanding, and professional dancers are as strong and agile as any athlete. Choreographing a tight dance routine for a film requires concentration and repetition. Allowing ample time for rehearsal is essential.

When we first ran through
Flashdance
’s dance sequences, we rehearsed in one half of a trailer on the studio lot. I quickly realized that doing so successfully would be damn near impossible.

I had Jennifer Beals and the other dancers streaming in and out to hear what we were doing with the music, and when they started dancing, the trailer shook like mad. When that happened, the writers on the other end of the trailer would yell,
“Shut up! Turn off the
music
—
we’re trying to write a script in here.”
The only place with enough room for our dance rehearsals was the commissary, which was available only between two and four in the afternoon.

To keep the peace, Jon Peters consented to renting us a house off the studio lot where the choreographer, songwriters, a few keyboardists and I could work without distraction. Being secluded from the rest of the production staff for those twelve to fourteen hours a day calmed our nerves and let us do much more than we would have otherwise.

One night when I was back in New York, I called Don Simpson and said, “You won’t believe this, but there are a group of kids on the corner of Fifty-ninth Street, playing music and spinning themselves around on a piece of cardboard! You’ve gotta see this—it’s incredible. It would be just right for the Pittsburgh scenes.”

Simpson sent a friend down to shoot some videotape of the break-dancers. He loved what he saw, and worked them into the movie.

“Should we write original music for the scene?” he asked.

“Giorgio Moroder and I agree that we don’t have to write anything new,” I explained. “Let’s lease the music track that the kids on the street were using.”

The kids had thrown their mix together from a bunch of dance records, and God only knew whose records they’d sampled. Today it would be unaffordable to license every sample they had used; when we made
Flashdance
it was easier—and far more cost-effective.

There’s a lot to be said for this kind of spontaneity, and that’s what made working on
Flashdance
so interesting.

I also have a special fondness for
Flashdance
because it let me work with the young woman who had recently become my wife—singer-dancer Karen Kamon, whom I’d met at a Peter, Paul and Mary concert in 1979. Karen was their production assistant, and I thought she was cute.

Karen’s coming to
Flashdance
happened in a funny way. I wouldn’t have suggested that she audition; I didn’t think that mixing business and family would be a smart move. But Ken Topolsky—my production assistant at the time—saw Karen’s potential and snuck her into the studio to do the demo of “Manhunt.”

For Karen, the song was a natural.

At the time she cut the demo, Karen was pregnant with our son BJ. There was a greater chance that the song would be cut from the movie; Karen never thought she’d be coming back in her eighth month to record her final vocals!

Karen was quite uncomfortable, and she called Donna Summer for advice. “How the hell did you record ‘Last Dance’ when you were pregnant?” Donna laughed. “Sing it in phrases,” she suggested. “Take a deep breath, hold on to your belly, and sing your ass off!” Donna and Karen were ahead of their time, singing to their babies in utero before it became fashionable.

Flashdance
also affirmed Ken Topolsky’s eye for talent. After leaving the A&R nest he moved to Hollywood and became a producer of the hit television series
The Wonder Years.

As actors Bob Hoskins and John Goodman have said, “No good film enjoys a trouble-free ride.”
Flashdance
was no exception.

The studio lost faith in the director and only halfheartedly supported the production, and no one expected the film to do well. But after the first preview, I got a call at home from Dawn Steele. She was so excited I could barely understand what she was saying. “They’re dancing in the aisles!” she exclaimed. “Come on—that’s what publicists write,” I retorted. “No, Phil—I’m not joking.
They are dancing in the aisles!
”

At the next screening there was more dancing, cheering, and jumping up and down, and
Flashdance
became one of the biggest films of the eighties.

With composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim
Phil Ramone Collection

Musical theater has always been a part of my life.

When I was a teenager, I could rarely afford tickets to a show, so a friend and I would go down to Broadway and search for discarded
Playbills
outside the theaters. The next night we’d go back to the theater, tuck the programs under our arms, and scavenge the ground for ticket stubs. During intermission we’d give the usher a story like, “We’re sitting upstairs—would you mind if we stand in the back of the theater for the second act?” Most of the time she’d let us in; many of the ushers were would-be actors who knew what it was like to crave something you couldn’t afford.

I’ve recorded a number of stage shows—both on Broadway and in London—and they’re among the sessions I get the most pleasure from.

The assignment of recording or producing such cast albums as
Promises, Promises; Pippin; The Wiz; Chicago; Little Shop of Horrors; Starlight Express; Passion; Company; A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum; Big (The Musical); The Wild Party; Seussical (The Musical); The Boy from Oz;
and
Billy Elliot (The Musical)
has brought me backstage, and into the minds of the composers,
producers, and performers who put every ounce of their body and soul into giving us a rich, satisfying theater experience.

The best stage musicals dazzle the audience with color, movement, and lighting cues that stimulate the senses, but the record producer doesn’t have the benefit of those elements when he or she is bringing the show from stage to record. This prompts the question, “Is it possible to transpose all that the audience sees and hears in the theater into a credible cast recording?”

It all depends on what your idea of a Broadway cast album is.

To me, a cast recording is more than a souvenir—it’s history. Because of Actors’ Equity union rules and music licensing issues, producers aren’t prone to film or tape a Broadway show for commercial purposes, so once a production closes it’s lost to the ages. A cast album lets you hear it over and over again.

A good cast album preserves the spirit of what the story is about, and what the audience saw in the theater. Since each person leaves the theater with a unique impression, structuring a cast album can be complicated.

As Hugh Jackman recently said:

“It’s deceptively hard to do a live version of a show album because the temptation is to make it like a studio recording. What often happens is that the cast recording doesn’t resemble the show. People who buy the CD want to remind themselves of what it felt like to be at the show.”

The producer’s mind-set has a lot to do with how a cast recording takes shape. Some shows make the shift from stage to studio more seamlessly than others.

Since I generally approach a cast recording as though it’s a radio broadcast of the show, including a bit of connective dialogue often helps smooth out areas with awkward transitions. Many contemporary musicals, such as those written by Stephen Sondheim, require a great deal of ingenuity to transform into a successful cast recording.

Sondheim wrote the lyrics to
West Side Story
(1957) and
Gypsy
(1959) with Leonard Bernstein and Jule Styne, respectively, but it is shows such as
A Little Night Music, Company, Sweeney Todd, Sunday in the Park with George,
and
Into the Woods
that made him a legend.

As one who has produced several of Steve’s cast recordings (
Passion
, 1994;
Company
, 1995; and
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,
1996), I can assure you that the twists and turns he takes with rhyme and meter place great demands on the performer, engineer, and producer. Only Burt Bacharach’s rhythmic complexities compare to Sondheim’s.

But when Sondheim writes a show, he has a complete understanding of the plot, his music, and the voices and characters before him. Since the choreography and staging of a Sondheim show are as elaborate as the music, bringing his productions to life on a cast album demands ingenuity.

Passion
was a complex show, and we agonized over how to transform its story and music so that the lead character—a tortured, unattractive woman—would be understood without visuals. I consulted with Steve and orchestrator Jonathan Tunick, and we decided that using orchestral sounds to heighten the sense of drama would be most effective.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
posed a different problem.

I’d always felt that Zero Mostel’s performance on the original cast recording (Capitol Records, 1962) was too aloof for the salacious character he played. I’m sure that the thinking at the time was, “This is a show with a lot of absurd moments, but it won’t play well on record because there aren’t any visuals.”

Audiences expected more from a cast recording in 1996, and I mentioned my feelings to Stephen Sondheim and Nathan Lane. I explained that I wanted to bring the zaniness and joviality that I saw on stage into the recording studio. “It’s okay to be over-the-top—to be the same character you play on the stage,” I told Nathan. “That’s
what the show is about, and that’s what I want on the record.” Sondheim felt the same way, but there were times during the
Forum
sessions when Nathan thought he was playing it up
too
much, and Steve and I had to reassure him.

Because the pace of bringing a show to Broadway is frenetic (music and script changes are made and rehearsed right up until the hour of the first performance), actors in a show have very little time off—especially during the first few weeks of a run.

Since a cast recording must reflect those last-minute changes, it’s usually made during the first week of the opening. And if the show is a runaway hit, you want the album to be on the shelves as quickly as possible.

That is why Broadway cast albums are usually recorded in a single day.

The practice dates to the late 1940s, when producer Goddard Lieberson (then president of Columbia Records) began recording shows like
South Pacific
and
My Fair Lady
. Back then, the cast would get a day off to record the entire album, for which they’d receive one week’s salary.

The limited time allowed for recording can cause considerable pressure and anxiety. It’s easy to fall behind when you’re packing so much work into such a short amount of time, so I map out trouble spots before we begin and parcel our time out carefully.

I start by seeing the show.

If I’m scheduled to record a show, I try to watch as many previews as possible. I’ll also try to see the play two or three times after opening night. It might sound excessive, but I’ve got to understand the author, composer, lyricist, and director’s concept of the show before I can determine what portions of it will work for the recording.

Before I produced the off-Broadway cast recording of
Little Shop of Horrors
in 1982, I spent almost two months watching the play. At the time, the production was tiny: it was housed in a small
theater on Second Avenue, and the pit “orchestra” consisted of only three musicians. During those preview sessions, Howard Ashman, Alan Menken and I sat and made judicious cuts for the recording. Making cuts is
always
difficult; the cooperation and consent of the writers, producer, and director are essential.

Since my production coordinator Jill Dell’Abate must painstakingly block out the entire day of recording segment by segment, she often joins me for the prerecording previews. With all of the singers, dancers, and actors involved in a Broadway production, the scheduling of meal breaks and such must occur so as to maximize the use of the talent we’ve got access to from eight in the morning to eleven at night.

When I record a show, I record the first run-through from start to finish. Then, I do at least two full takes on every number. I’m also a believer in playbacks; the actors should have the opportunity to feel the rhythm and hear the voice. I love getting the cast hyped up about what we’re doing.

In addition to conceptual and interpretive changes, there are certain technical considerations that accompany the recording of a cast album.

First, the pit orchestra often needs expansion.

What sounds pleasing in the theater can sound thin in front of the microphones, and adding two cellos, two violas, and some extra woodwinds gives the recording a much richer sound. I often bring in a spare trumpet player for the long day of recording, too.

There’s an art to physically arranging the cast in the studio, too.

Actors are accustomed to using their bodies while singing, and you can’t restrain that. They have to be comfortable and feel as though they’re on the performance stage.

For this reason, I like to put the whole cast in the back end of the studio so they can have a clear view of the conductor and the band. I’ll put up some screens, but everyone should be able to see the conductor on the podium. If arranging the studio that way is
impractical, we’ll set up a video monitor to make him visible to the entire cast.

It’s also important for me to remind the solo singers that singing into a microphone is much different than projecting their voice in the theater.

The seminal stage musicals of the 1940s and ’50s (such as Rodgers and Hammerstein’s
Oklahoma!, Carousel,
and
South Pacific
) contained songs that had simple inner rhythms. The lyrics weren’t crowded together, which helped the actors articulate (and audiences hear) the words more clearly.

Today the lyrics come fast and furious.

Contemporary composers and lyricists such as Stephen Sondheim, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Stephen Schwartz (
Godspell, Pippin),
Jonathan Larson (
Rent
), Marc Shaiman
(Hairspray
), Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx (
Avenue Q
), and Elton John, Tim Rice, and Lee Hall (
Aida, Billy Elliot
) all write with far greater rhythmical and lyrical complexity than their predecessors. Singers and dancers, therefore, make enunciation and articulation a priority.

This is when striking a balance is imperative.

What point would it serve to rein in a dynamic actor like Hugh Jackman?

When he goes for the big notes, I want him to pull from the bottom of his body to reach them. I give the performer plenty of room to work, and set things technically to deal with the energy being directed at the microphone.

How does recording a cast album in the digital realm differ from the way we did it in the 1960s?

Not all that much. Digital is well suited to recording cast albums, because it gives us more room on the hard drive, and we can make far better edits. But we still record everything in one day.

As I mentioned, Broadway cast albums are recorded soon after opening night, and the cast has gone through a grueling month to reach that point.

It may look like they’re fresh, but the truth is, when a show opens, the cast is usually worn out. When they come in to record they frequently have sore throats, colds, and other maladies that they’ve been able to prevent up to opening night.

It’s frustrating that there isn’t more time allotted to either break up the sessions or permit an actor to come back in for retakes. Why shouldn’t they have a chance to fix small mistakes? A performance of the show is fleeting; the cast recording will stand for all time.

You’d be surprised at what a little breathing room can do.

In London, the producer of a cast recording has almost unlimited access to the cast and plenty of time to work. Recording isn’t confined to a single day.

I recently recorded the London cast of Elton John’s
Billy Elliot,
and the absence of time constraints made working on it a pleasure.

The first Broadway cast recording I produced was
Promises, Promises
in 1968. The show was a musical adaptation of Billy Wilder’s
The Apartment,
starring Jill O’Hara and Jerry Orbach; Burt Bacharach and Hal David wrote the score. The show’s best-known song, “I’ll Never Fall In Love Again,” helped immortalize the production, making it an indelible part of the Broadway firmament.

Although I won my second Grammy for the cast recording of
Promises, Promises
, the show has special meaning for me because of my work on its sound production.

As Burt and Hal discovered, the sound inside of a Broadway theater left much to be desired. After a few acoustically dismal rehearsals, they stopped by A&R with a proposal. “Can you help us give audiences inside of the Shubert Theater the kind of sound they’re accustomed to hearing on a stereophonic record?”

As I’m sure you realize by now, I’m an inveterate problem solver, and I instantly took Burt and Hal up on their offer.

To meet the challenge Don Frey, Hank Cattaneo, Jim Scherer,
and I set out to do something for the theater that it long deserved: let the music enhance the visuals without overpowering them. “Why not swaddle the audience in sound, the way Walt Disney did with
Fantasia
?” we asked.