The Boys from Syracuse (1963 London Cast)

While not as edgy as Pal Joey or as studded with consistently great songs as Babes in Arms, The Boys from Syracuse is one of the best, funniest Rodgers and Hart concoctions. Freely--very freely--adapted from Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors, the show sees the creative team letting loose with mistaken identities, lost twins, and the eternal war of the sexes, injecting the daffy plot with classics such as "This Can't Be Love," "Falling in Love with Love," and "The Shortest Day of the Year." The London cast of this long-out-of-print recording is game, even if it's not quite as good as the one in the 1997 Encores! production. In "Sing for Your Supper," for instance, Lynn Kennington, Paula Hendrix, and Maggie Fitzgibbon don't even get close to the divine harmonies of Rebecca Luker, Debbie Gravitte, and Sarah Uriarte Berry. What makes the CD really interesting is the bonus material tagged at the end, which consists of Boys' six best-known songs interpreted by Rudy Vallee and Frances Langford. Recorded six weeks after the show opened in 1938, they were introduced at the time as a "souvenir album" from the show, predating what we now know as cast recordings. --Elisabeth Vincentelli