This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Robert W. Schneider: Dear friends, we are so sorry about the ads. They are a nightmare in every way, but with your donations, we can get rid of ads someday.

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[1:24] Kevin David Thomas: Thank you.

[1:25] Robert W. Schneider: Hi, I'm ROBERT W. Schneider.

[1:27] Kevin David Thomas: And I'm Kevin David Thomas.

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[1:45] Kevin David Thomas: One of the joys of doing this podcast is you get to meet folks who are just as big of a musical theater nerd as you are. Today's guest is one of our industry's most respected record producers, but he is also an Uber fan of musical theater who has helped preserve some of musical theater's most obscure gems. His Grammy nominations are for Sugar Babies, The Wizard of Oz, Gypsy, Ain't Misbehaving, Fela. Remember that. How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. Nice Work If You Can Get It. But for us, he was also the producer on the albums of Bring Back Birdie, Pretty Bell, Magdalena, Rags, So Long, 174th Street, Dance a Little Closer, and some that are still waiting to emerge. Oh, looks nice.

Ah, to tell us what it was like to work with such legends as Angela Lansbury, James Lipton, Charles Strouse, Lee Adams, Alan J. Lerner, Ann Miller, Stephen Sondheim, and so many more. Here is the man who just gave us the wonderful Desperate Measures on recording, which we're gonna talk about, which I got to see, which is so funny, it's ridiculous. Oh, sorry, the one and only ROBERT SHER.

[2:45] ROBERT SHER: Good afternoon, Radio World.

[2:47] Kevin David Thomas: Oh, ROBERT. We are so happy to have you. So we're gonna start right at the beginning.

[2:53] ROBERT SHER: Okay.

[2:53] Kevin David Thomas: Where did you grow up?

[2:55] ROBERT SHER: I grew up in a town called Hohokus, New Jersey, which is about 40 minutes away from here.

[3:01] Kevin David Thomas: Hohokus?

[3:01] ROBERT SHER: Yes, Hohokus. It's next to Ridgewood, Paramus, Saddle River, Ridgewood. I went to school. I was the last class from Hohokus to go to Ridgewood High School. My former classmates were Chester Walker. He was two years ahead of me at Ridgewood High. And Daryl Roth and her husband Joe live in Ridgewood. Yeah. Bruce Lunville, who is the head of Capitol Records Blue Note, he lived in Ridgewood. I'm trying to think of somebody that's current on Broadway comes from Ridgewood, one of the actors or performers comes from Ridgewood. We have that in common, I can't think of who it is at the moment. But we were close to New York, we were about a half an hour, 30, 40 minutes away. And a place that shows used to try out was Playhouse on the Mall, Paramus Playhouse on the Mall.

[3:58] Kevin David Thomas: Oh wait, I've heard of this. Would you tell us a little bit about Playhouse?

[4:01] ROBERT SHER: It's in a shopping center at Stearns was there, and it's on Route 4, and it was called Playhouse on the Mall. It was very big in the 60s and 70s, and they kind of just went out. But I mean, shows like Laugh a Little, Cry a Little tried out there. I saw the Broadway revival of Three Men on a Horse with Dorothy Loudon, the one that was in 1969, I saw that there that tried out there first. But you know, my father used to go there with my, well, my mother. My mother and my father divorced when I was, let's see, 1969. So that was a long time ago. And so my father used to keep it up. My uncle Leo was very much, you know, they had in those days they called it the play of the month club. So they would go, Uncle Leo and Aunt Ruthie would go to the play of the month club, and my father would like to keep up on it. My mother was on Broadway. My mother was the show business end of the comp family. My mother was in a show called Best Foot Forward on Broadway.

[5:01] Kevin David Thomas: Yes, Lizabanelli, yeah.

[5:02] ROBERT SHER: No, the original, 1940s. Oh my gosh. She was in that, and sorry. And let's see, June Allyson was in it, and Nancy Walker, and she was friends with all of those, and you, Martin, and in the show as well. Danny Daniels was in the show, and she was 13 at the time. She's on the cover of the playbill, by the way. If you get the way. Oh my gosh. I could point her out. She's, you know, I could show you the picture of her.

[5:32] Kevin David Thomas: That's so cool.

[5:33] ROBERT SHER: Yeah. So she was on that, and she then went on to do television. She was on the Arthur Godfrey TV show, and she was also a band singer that sang around the country with, and my grandfather used to play for Tommy Dorsey and Jimmy Dorsey, he was a reed player. My mother's father. But my father's side was not, they loved going to shows, but they were, you know, they were not in the, well, I take that back. My father's first cousin was Edwin Lee, who was the producer of Hawaii 5-0, the original, the original one. So there was a little show business on that side. But my mother was the one who encouraged all of it, and my father would follow in that suit. He tried to, but it was basically my mother who was involved with all the shows, and she knew all the, she was involved with show business. She knew, you know, Bill Todman and Lou Wasserman and all those people.

[6:29] Kevin David Thomas: Oh my god.

[6:29] ROBERT SHER: So she knew she was involved with all of that. My father was the insurance agent, and he used to go with all, you know, with whatever Uncle Leo wanted to do, you know. But we saw, I mean, I saw a lot of shows, well not really because of them, but because I wanted to. My mother was the one that started it all off.

[6:50] Kevin David Thomas: So you must have been watching, you must have been going to the city then in St. Broadway from a young age.

[6:54] ROBERT SHER: Yes, I would go to New York. The first time I went to New York by myself was when I was 14.

[6:59] Kevin David Thomas: Wow.

[7:01] ROBERT SHER: And from New Jersey on a bus. And my parents were divorced at that point, but my father, I used to go on Saturday matinees, so I got to see a lot of great shows, and I used to go based on the New York Times ads, because there was no computer.

[7:16] Kevin David Thomas: Oh, right.

[7:16] ROBERT SHER: So I used to, you know, and if I liked the New York Times, so I got to see Selling of the President.

[7:21] Kevin David Thomas: You were the one.

[7:22] ROBERT SHER: Yes, I was the one. And I got to see, I got to see Rachel Lily Rosenblum the next to the last closing. It was the Saturday matinee and they closed that night. So I saw the Saturday matinee. And I, you know, in those days you rode away for tickets. You sent away for tickets, so it was all mail order. So I did that. I saw, I mean, I saw some really great shows, and that really formed my basis. I mean, I got to see Smith, Selling of the President, Rachel Lily Rosenbloom, you name it. I saw the brainchild out of close out of town.

[7:54] Kevin David Thomas: With Tova?

[7:54] ROBERT SHER: Tova, I saw it twice. I saw the Prince of Grand Street first preview in Philadelphia, the closing performance in Boston, and that's another whole story. I went to the, what was the other show? Oh, I saw so many shows out of town. My first really out-of-town show, opening night, was a show called Over Here with the Andrew Sisters. And I went to the opening night in Philadelphia, and I was not legal age, very not even close to legal age, and I remember sitting down from this really tall drag queen, because I had never seen anything like that before. And I remember she kept on waving at me during, you know, before the show, and I never, I was anyway. That was my beginning of seeing shows out of town.

But my first actual show was the national tour. It was called the Tab version of Fiddler on the Roof. With it was at Caesars Palace, and what they would do is like Maine played there with Susan Hayward. The different shows would play there, and they would cut them down to 90 minutes. With no intermission. Right, right? Because they would do two shows a night. So I saw Fiddler on the Roof there with Theodore Piquel and Dolores Wilson. My father took me there. It was in, I'm gonna, I'm not gonna lie, it was in April of '68. And that was also my introduction to Disneyland, which was a big thing for me.

[9:11] Kevin David Thomas: When did you start listening to cast albums? Was that something that you were always doing when you were growing up as well? Did you, were you aware of cast albums?

[9:19] ROBERT SHER: Yes, it was Main was the first one, and then I think I had Fiddler on the Roof. But what happened as a result of all of it was my parents divorcing and all of that stuff. I got became very much interested in stereophonic equipment. So I had a real to real and I had, you know, the setup and my, you know, I remember getting known on the night when it first came out the album, and but I bought real to reels, you know, real to reels. So they had real to real gold. Oh, I also go saw a gold, I saw a lot of, I should say all the shows I saw. I saw, I did see Golden Rainbow, which I loved. And I saw 70 Girls 70 in previews, which I loved. I saw Frank Merriwell, well, it was supposed to be their opening night, but it wasn't. It was fine, it was five dollars, and I went with my father, and I can honestly tell you this is really balls.

It was at the Long Acre Theater, and I remember bringing a mini real to real tape recorder in and putting the mic on the ledge of the and taping the show on real to real. It was an experiment because before that I did use cassettes, but I did do it. And do you still have it?

[10:26] ROBERT SHER: Yeah, I have all that stuff. I have all of, I mean I can tell you have a lot of stuff. I mean, I had the very first preview, I went to see the very first preview of Chicago in Philadelphia, and I sat in the first row of the Mezzanine Center, and in those days I was, I had no concept. I was not, again, I was not legal age. So I would take and I had a stereo mic, I had a stereo cassette machine, so I would put two mics down the side of the light box.

[10:50] Kevin David Thomas: How in the world did you like with it?

[10:53] ROBERT SHER: I just did it. I just did it at the Forest Theater. Well, the sad story is Chicago, as you know, was three hours long originally, and I was not a big, I didn't hate it, but I didn't love it either. So at intermission, they took my mics away. But I did have, I still have the first act. I didn't bring up the second act, and I never got my mics back. But I had the first act.

[11:14] Kevin David Thomas: How dare they return the mics to this video?

[11:16] ROBERT SHER: Well, 10%, you know, 10% was in all the good stuff was in the first act. So yeah, yeah, yeah. So I had that, and you know, I saw the first preview of Miss Moffat. The tape that circulates is my tape, the one I made of where she forgets the lyrics. And it was the first, it was the first preview because you know they had scheduled to be in Baltimore and this was the first stop.

[11:37] Kevin David Thomas: So and I was in the third row of fourth row mezzanine at the Forest Theater, and I taped it, and that's the one that that's the tape that exists.

[11:43] ROBERT SHER: That takes guts.

[11:44] Kevin David Thomas: And that's the only history we now have of it, really.

[11:46] ROBERT SHER: I mean, well, thank you for doing it. Yeah, I put, well that and the same thing is true, another show I really liked, and people are gonna probably roll their eyes. Helzipop, and I saw the first preview with Jerry Lewis, yes in Baltimore, and then I saw the closing night in Boston. And I will go on record as saying this, and people can quote me. There's some great songs by Julie Stein and Carolyn Lee and BB and I thought I mean I did, I ended up doing Sugar Babies, you know, that was '76. That was I did Sugar Babies seven years later.

[12:21] Kevin David Thomas: Seven years later.

[12:50] ROBERT SHER: And it was a, you know, it was the same kind of idea, but you know, with all the infighting with Jerry Lewis and Alex Cohen, I don't know it would, there were some very good, there were very good things to it and I did like it. And what I'm gonna say is I think it has, of all the shows I've ever been to, some of the best orchestrations I've ever heard for a show ever. Ralph Burns did them and Elliot Lawrence and that was always a magical combination. When Elliot Lawrence and Ralph Burns worked together it was magical. It was great. When I was about 13 years old there was a magazine called Q Magazine and they used to review all the shows and it was a television guide but it also would have a thing about all the Broadway shows.

The Q Magazine you were able to list advertisements in Q Magazine in the back of the magazine it was like a, you know, for sale. So there was this guy saying he had live Broadway show tapes of unrecorded shows for sale. So like an idiot I answered, I was, you know, twelve or thirteen years old and the person's name was Bruce Yeko. Oh and he had he had live tapes of some of these shows like Georgie, things that were never recorded, I'm Solomon, things that I knew about but didn't, you know, so he would go and tape the shows so I became friendly with him and he thought I was much older than I was. I used to talk to him on the phone and this is when my, you know, when my parents were going through a divorce so he kind of took me under his wing he was not gay he was straight he was married to an Asian woman by the name of Doris and they did not have the best rep in the business.

[13:58] ROBERT SHER: Uh, not so much him. He was a nice guy, but she made it very difficult because it was their joint money, and uh, they didn't know anything about anything. They just loved, he loved the theater, and she just tagged along. And she was, I have to say this, she was a dragon lady, and she made his life miserable, and that's why they ended up divorcing. But, uh, and she ended up, uh, from what I've been told, ended up going insane. Oh. So, and moving to Hawaii, but I mean literally insane in a, like in a home. But, um, uh, he loved doing this, he loved supporting me. Uh, doing this, I mean we would both tape the shows. My tapes are always better than his because his he used to move around and he used to put it under.

He was, it was, he no. I used to be very much out there in the open because who was gonna stop me, this little kid. And with him, it was a different story. Sure. So I would be up in front, I would hold the microphone up, or I would hold, I would just, I would, and I would, I would, I would have the, I have a condenser microphone in the, you know, in the room, so, you know, I would point them recorder up. I would never cover it over, never. Um, there would be Michael Price at Good Speed Opera House knew me. And of course, he would, when he hear heard I was there, he would look for me because I was stopped by once or twice by him. But other times people came to my defense. Uh, you Wheeler was a very big supporter of mine.

Very big supporter, and, uh, he would let me get away with murder, literally. And, uh, he introduced me to Steve Sondheim and Pat Birch, who have become, you know, friends all these many years later. And you Wheeler was a great, great, great, great friend. Is there like a holy grail that you would still trying to find in terms of cast recordings? Nobody has heard a live tape of Kelly. Um, let me think one of the other shows. Um, that was in there, I think. Uh, yeah, Needle Gillette was in a Don Frank's, um, uh, what's her name? No Else. No, no, no, no, that's Judy. I think it's the one. Who is the who, uh, uh, uh, the one who was the star of Finney and Rainbow? David Wayne. No, the woman Ella Logan.

Ella Logan, she was in it. Yeah, she was in it. She was in it. Um, but, uh, there was a whole, uh, article, which I did a thesis on in the Saturday Evening Post, the magazine, uh, what happened to Kelly. Uh, yes, that's in the book. The, yeah, yeah. It was, uh, and I remember doing a whole thing on that. And, um, I remember going on a TV show in the early 70s with David Suskine and asking about it. I don't remember what he said. He was the producer, right? He was the producer, David Suskine was the producer. So I remember talking to him about that. I mean, briefly, but you know, nobody wanted to make mention of it because it was really a bad, bad thing at that point. But, uh, that show, I mean, there's shows that I would love to hear that that was one of them.

Uh, there were some shows that that we don't have live tapes of. Um, I mean, uh, I'm trying to think of some of the shows, like a show called, well, there's a, there is a tape, and, uh, I have a ladies' kind gentleman? No, is that I, well that's we, we we'll talk about that. We ain't need to talk about that. Okay, that's a big thing in my life. We do that now. We can talk about it now. We're gonna talk about Lovely Lady's kind gentleman. Okay. Um, as you know, there is an album of it. Yeah, yeah. I did the album in, uh, 18 years ago. It was recorded. All right, I'll tell you the whole story. It's a long story, but I'll tell you. We like a long story. Okay. Um, Stan Freeman was a longtime friend.

I knew him when I was 15, 16 years old. Wow. And I used to go to his house, and um, I don't want to say anything, but it was more than just a friendship. Sure. But that was not my choice. It was something he wanted. I didn't. But Stan and I became good friends after that, and I got to meet some very, I mean, I met John Myers there, Johnny Myers, uh, Orrin Riley. I mean, Laura Kenyon. I mean, there were great people I met, and he lived on East 82nd Street, and he took responsibility for me. And I mean, all I knew was he had done I had a ball, and Lovely Ladies. Right. So, uh, what happened is the closing night of Lovely Ladies, they, I don't know who did it, but I think Lou, his friend Lou, I can't think of his last name, Lou, whatever.

Lou, uh, videotaped the musical numbers of the show, right? Which I have, uh, in black and white. And, um, so in the beginning of this decade, uh, it was 2000. Bruce Yacko had been, and I was still working with him peripherally. Uh, the last thing I actually did with him was Georgie, you know, based on Georgia Girl. That's, that's another story. I'll finish that story. Lovely Ladies Kind Gentleman is all recorded, it's all recorded. It is probably for me one of the best albums I've ever made, period. And I'll tell you why in a moment. Um, it was, uh, it was he really Bruce Yaakko really wanted to do it. I wanted Stan Freeman was still alive, he was on oxygen, but he was still alive in California.

Uh, Franklin Underwood, I still kept in touch with when I saw him, but he wanted it done. So, um, we got the orchestrations, which were Samuel French. We didn't find, we didn't find the scores, we just had the parts, the orchestra parts, which was a problem. And, um, so we had done, I had done a couple shows in California. I had done Breakfast at Tiffany's, we had done Breakfast at Tiffany's there with local 47. Uh, and they were very, they wanted Local 47, which is the union out there, wanted to take New York shows, wanted to do New York shows there, meaning they wanted to take work away from local 802 here. So they made us great deals for recording them. For recording them out there. And we, they did.

It was great. It was great. Studio musicians in LA are famous for being absolutely the best. I mean, they are, they were terrific. Lovely ladies, we had the Carol Burnett Orchestra. Peter Matz, who was a great, great Peter Matz, this was one of the last things he did. Oh. Um, I get upset about it. No. Anyway, um, Peter, um, we had done, we had done breakfast. Peter didn't conduct Breakfast and Tiffany's, he did some of the new orchestrations on Breakfast Tiffany's. The two, there were two numbers for Sally Kellerman. Um, but on, uh, uh, on um Lovely Ladies, Peter had worked on the car, it was the Carabinette show, he was the conductor, and Stan Freeman, the later years had done all a lot of the special material in the carabinet show.

So I said to Stan, would that be okay? And he said, Ah, by all means. So when we got the show together, um, Stan Freeman, uh, Phil Lang was dead. Phil Lang had died in 85. And the orchestration said Phil Lang. They weren't Phil Lang's orchestrations, they were all redone when the show played Philadelphia before it came to New York. And, uh, Herman Levin, the producer who produced My Fair Lady, wanted the orchestrations to be very authentic Japanese, so they had to be very authentic, not whatever. It didn't work. So when the show went west to the Civic Light Opera, um, uh, Edwin Lester, who was sponsoring it out there, said, I want this to sound like Rogers and Hammerstein. So everything was thrown out, and Irwin Costell redid everything, except for one number, which was the opening of the second act because called called Call Me Back, which was Phil Lang's because it was a vaudeville number.

So it was appropriate. Erwin Costell did the most magnificent job, I think I've ever heard for a show. Other than Ralph Burns, this was one of the best orchestrating jobs I've ever heard. We had 37, 38 musicians. We did it, we recorded the orchestra at a new facility out there called Citrus College, uh, which was brand new, brand new, and it was the state of the art recording studios studio. It was right outside of Los Angeles. We were, you know, Mr. Yecko did not want to pay to record a Capitol, which was highly expensive, we're usually expensive. So we went to sit, which was, which Peter Matz and Joe Soldo, who was the orchestra contractor, had highly recommended. So we went, and it was. It was absolutely gorgeous.

So we went there, and, um, uh, in the beginning of this decade, the computerized orchestra parts were coming into play. Well, these were all handwritten orchestra parts from 1971. So the musicians, especially television musicians, which these were, were very, very not easy. Yeah. And they would say, we can't figure out what this note is. They would be very difficult because it wasn't printed out. It was all handwritten a little harder. Right. So, and we had these the people, Peter Matz had had the A team, and you know, you couldn't get any better. I mean, he had the greatest. So for the, uh, album, um, we had to cast it, and, uh, before we even got to California. So I, we figured who would be the best part parts for these people to do, you know, because it's not an easy show to cast.

So of course, I had work, I had a good relationship with Mickey Rooney. So this was the I had just done, uh, two years before I had just done Wizard of Oz with him and Mickey with Earth the Kid. And it was my second recording with him because I'd done sugar babies. So I called him up and or his wife and said, Does he want to do? Yes, he did it. So we got him. So the one who I really wanted, who ended up we had a wait several months from because he was doing TV was, uh, Lou Diamond Phillips. Oh, and he had just done King and I. Yeah, right. I can tell you that he is one of the nicest people I've ever worked with, works hard, works very hard. And, um, I don't know why he's not bigger than he is, but he was great.

Yeah, we, it was worth waiting for him. And special. He was very special and great. And then the part the Ron Usman part, uh, which was easy for me, was John Schneider from Duke's House because I done Breakfast at Tiffany's with him, and John and I have worked many times since that time. And then this is the heartbreaking part for the part of Remack Ramsay who did, uh, the speed song called I'll Grow a Garden for You and all these crazy, he was a comedian in the show. We hired Charles Nelson Riley, and he was the perfect, perfect one. Charles Nelson Riley and I became great friends as a result of it. Peter, when we would, Peter Mattz and I would rehearse with him in California. We didn't rehearse, all we would to do was talk about show business a little bit and blood.

And, you know, the way he is on television, that's the way he was and we bonded a great friendship with him. I mean, I did, but Peter knew him. And we, you know, even until he died, I just, I get very emotional about him. So he ended up doing, he didn't, because of the way he was, he rehearsed, he didn't learn all the material. He learned about two or three songs and did those. And he was supposed to come back. Well, he never did. So ROBERT Morse ended up finishing, re redid the whole, his whole part. So everything, and then in the, in the ensemble, and I really want to say that because he just died. Um, on the Carol Burnett show, uh, Peter Matz was not the vocal person. They had a vocal person by the name of Dick Williams.

And Dick Williams just died. He was Andy Williams' brother, the Williams brother. Dick was in the Harvey Girls, when and and we used to perform with Kay Thompson. Anytime Peter was involved with the project, Peter Dick would was with him. So Dick and I became great friends. Dick did all the vocal stuff on it. Um, and, um, Dick worked with everybody, and, uh, one of the greatest people I've ever known is Dick Williams. Wow. So that's your lovely ladies. You've worked with some incredible people. Yeah, so magical, but yeah, that I mean it's well the problem was, and then the why the album is not out of it. Exactly. Okay, the reason why is all these years later, Bruce Yucko, and I have to put it on him, did not could not find the money to finish it.

Um, and, uh, it needed a lot of work because of all the, because what happened was the orchestra was done first, which I don't and especially a show like that, I don't like doing the orchestra. It's an old fashioned, it should be done the same. Same at the same time. And, um, there was so many vocal issues with Lou and Mickey Rudy. I mean, the things that I can that are gonna sound glorious on an album today, Eleanor Calbus, John, and all that it's it's it's it's absolutely I mean, I've heard the raw track, absolutely thrilling. Um, so what I'm trying to say is he did not or could not fund the rest of it. Bruce was the producer, and you were like an assistant, or you were the engineer. No, no. I was the producer.

Oh. I was the, I did everything. Bruce Yacko just wrote the check. Gotcha. I just did. Bruce Yacko never produces anything. He sits there and smiles and crosses his legs and smiles. He doesn't do anything. He he has a great attitude about getting them done, but he lets other people do them. So I did all the work. And I retain the masters of Lovely Ladies and Georgie, which he paid for. What I want to say is that I need, you know, I'm one of the reasons I wanted to come on your show is I would love to finish the album of the Lovely Ladies and get it out there. I have great working relationships now with several of the major labels. I feel that, uh, when you do a cast album of a show, a major label is always a better way to go.

[27:19] ROBERT SHER: Yeah. Because basically, the smaller labels, their longevity is about 10 years, you know, there's no more base cities, you know, Varess Sarah band is gone. You for yeah, like Vince Fordin is gone. Um I get very nervous because people can't get their masters back. So I'm always anxious to get an album I do on a major label. Let me ask you, because I know there's a couple of shows I think that are, I hate to say collecting dust on your shelf, but Lovely Ladies is one, there's a couple of others that we want to get out there. Um, you know, you're the first person on our show who actually produces albums. What is the economic model for producing a cast album?

[27:59] ROBERT SHER: Well, um it depends. I mean, um because it and just for our listeners, you know, you've worked on things like, you know, the lovely ladies' kind gentlemen, but you've also worked on things like the How to Succeed revival, right? The Nice Work If You Can Get It. So it really runs the gamut, I think, in terms of well, the thing is now the whole economic situation for cast albums has changed. They used to sell a lot in the 90s and 80s and 70s, I mean hundreds of thousands of copies. Now what they're used for is to promote the show. And for the stock and amateur, if you have a show that's a hit, even a show that's not a hit, you can sell hundreds of thousands, even a lot of albums. I mean, Heather's like the only reason that show was like ran for like a minute off Broadway, and it's everyone knows it because of that cast album.

At least the teenagers. Well, that's why they do it. That's why we're why we do cast albums now because it promotes the stock and amateur and the secondary rights. So if you spend $300,000 on an album, once it's once the show is picked up by a stock and amateur company, you get that money right back.

[29:00] ROBERT SHER: So, you know, whereas a Broadway show, you have to spend millions of dollars, and there's a chance most of the times it doesn't work for a Broadway show. But for a cast album, it's an entity. It's a, uh, it's a, uh, what is it called? It's a, uh, the master becomes a tangible asset. So what mean what that means is the master can continually make continue make continually make money if you know if it's if the album is out there. And there's ways of doing it. When I did the cast album of Rags, which was a life and death situation for me, which it really really was, um that we went through a lot of um who is gonna pay for it kind of thing. And uh it was finally paid for by a woman by the name of Rhoda Herrick from the Herrick Theatre Foundation.

That when I and I was, and I also at that when I when I say life or death situation, uh what happened was we were supposed to record the album the day, the week the Monday after the show closed. We had a big meeting in Shirley Bernstein's office. Shirley Bernstein was Leonard Bernstein's sister, and she was also a wonderful person, and she was a great agent. She represented Stephen Schwartz. I knew Stephen because I had worked on The Baker's Wife.

[30:14] ROBERT SHER: Oh, yes, the album. The album. I was very young. I had no idea about it. It was like Bruce's one of Bruce's first. Well, it's a second second one. He'd done a small EP of a show called The Robert Bridegroom. Right. With Jerry Arbach and Virginia Vestal, which stupid me. I sold the C the 45 album outside the Biltmore Theater when they had no albums. I did it one weekend. Anyway, to make a long story short, Bruce, uh yeah. Bruce Yacko. So anyway, um, you know, I'm very grateful for what Bruce Yacko. I don't like what Bruce Yeko has ended up being and his what what his records ended up sounding like, but it was a great foothold for me to get like like a you know, getting like somebody to give me a book in the book.

And you know, uh in regards to Rags. Yeah, life and death or Rags. So what happened was Teresa Stratas had agreed to do the album for like 700, 800, and it was supposed to be done for CBS special products, which was the low end of C the Sony, the CBS totem pole. They had a special, you know, where they put reissues out on. In fact, ROBERT Bridegroom came out on that album and that label. That was the low, that was the bottom, that was the basement of C uh CBS Records. So we were doing it, and then Stratus decides that she's has problems with Stephen and Charles, and that basically she um she basically does not want to have anything to do with the album. So she fled to Canada. This is this is Friday in Toronto.

She has family up in Toronto. So then Lee Goober and Marty Heinfling and Marvin Krauss, but it was Lee Goober and Marty Heinfling, who were the lead producers, were gonna pay for the album. And that was the deal was as long as Stratus did it, they were gonna pay for it. Well, when she fled Friday afternoon, forget it.

[32:09] ROBERT SHER: So we said, look, the musicians, the orchestra's been booked. We were doing it, we were recording the orchestra, the album at the Calpin Astoria Film Studios. Uh the instruments had been delivered, percussion instruments had been delivered. So we said, let Christina Andreas was the understudy to Stratus. So I knew Christine. I said, let her do it, let her do the album, at least we'll get it down, let her do it. And uh Marty um Lee said to me, Lee Goober said to me, you know, Marty and I really don't want to do that. We really bargained to do it with Stratus. So Monday came around and there was nothing we could do. So Tuesday morning I had eaten something, and uh I went late to lay down on my couch, and I had this feeling I never had before, where tremendous fire, it was like heat in my stomach, and I called the ambulance and I my appendix had burst.

Oh my god. So and this is 1986, September of 1986. And um I went to the hospital, and and nobody knew what was wrong because my mother had told me my appendix had been taken out when I was a baby because I had a hernia. It wasn't the case. Anyway, I had a they had a I was there was a half a day before I died. They got me right away, and I was in the hospital for a month and a half. Stephen Schwartz felt responsible because Stephen kept on coming to the hospital, and I entertained a lot of people at that in those days. And so after I got out of the hospital after six weeks of being in the hospital, it went back again about who was going to pay for the album, and I was gonna let it go. So it was Stanley Schwartz, Stephen's father was gonna pay for it because he was a head of a big bank in New Jersey.

And that didn't work out for the second time. Stanley had said twice he was gonna do it, and he backed out twice. He didn't do it. So then Charles said he was gonna do it, he was gonna pay for it, which he could easily do. Because we were talking about in those days the budget was 150,000 to do it.

[34:03] ROBERT SHER: Oh. So different times. Different times. So um that didn't happen. So what happened was we had to find a star to do the album. So I talked to Charles and I said to Steve, who who did you have? Was there anybody else that read for this? And they said Julia McGuinness. Her name was Julie McGinnis Johnson. I said, Yeah, I know who she is. She was in Fiddler originally, and she had done it, she had gotten her a name for doing uh solo albums. I said, sure. And so she didn't want to do the show because she said she couldn't sing it eight times a week. So I went to her, I called, they told me who it was. I called her up, I called up her management was Maria Martone and Nick Savano. And Nick Savano and Maria Martone were famous because they managed and represented Frank Sinatra.

So I went to them, and I don't know, the three of us just hit it off. I can't, I don't know why, but I just because I was so young, I was in my early 20s. I just hit it off with them, and she said yes within 24 hours. We sent her a tape, we had a sound system tape of Teresa Stratas doing the numbers. We sent that to Julia, and she said it yes in 24 hours. Wow like that. Like that. Right away. So when I got out, and was uh well enough, then I went to this whole thing about getting the money together. And Charles is the one Charles Strauss was able to pull it all together because he knew Rhoda and Rhoda loved Charles and Rhoda did it and wrote the check. There was other drama between getting the check and going on, which I'm not going to go into.

But um Nick Savano and Maria Martone really are the responsible for me doing that album. So anyway, Rags exists today, but you know, I feel bad because everybody has profited from that show. The show is done all over the place, and you know, especially at you know, at Good Speed. I know Rhoda, Rhoda just died a year or two ago. I know she got her money back, and uh because she not only did she get her money from the album, but she got money from the Stock and Amateur and from the mechanicals. She made a sweetheart deal, and I'm the only one that didn't get anything out of it. So but the album's still on Masterworks, and I'm very grateful for that.

[36:11] Kevin David Thomas: Right. So let me ask you something. Um, you know, you're you're literally bending over backwards to make sure that what's on the album is as close to perfection as possible. Right. You're you're you're actually putting your life in jeopardy on the Rags album. Right. You're consistently trying to get these shows that only a few of us really care about out there. Why do you keep doing it?

[36:34] ROBERT SHER: Because if I hear good material, I want it to be exploited. And I mean, I I you know, I I I I what is the word? I don't know what the word is. I know I'm good at this. I know that I hear people's other producers' work, whether it's in the 70s, 80s, 90s, whatever. Uh and you know, Goddard Lieperson was the best. I mean, no, no five ways about it. He he really knew how to capture the show. And um not only did he get the dramatic intent right or what, but he also got the fact that you could hear the inner voices of the orchestra and the orchestration. And um I think Tom Shepherd carried that on to a certain degree. Um then uh there's a very good producer working today who I recommend highly if I can't do something.

His name is Steve Epstein. Uh he did uh uh the recent carousel recording, and he did um the Hello Dolly recording. And um he comes from the classical world. He's got many more nominations for classical recordings than I, you know, than I do, and he's older than I am, but he's very good.

[37:43] Kevin David Thomas: You know, let me jump back and ask you because I don't think we covered this. At what point did you make the transition from uh with uh a recording system to being an actual record producer?

[37:54] ROBERT SHER: Well, that was because in the 70s, well, 80s, and 90s, it was 70s and 80s, really. Not so much in the 90s, but I was taping the shows, and I would go home and listen to them. I wouldn't sell them, I would have them for me. And uh I'm glad I did I even taped plays. I remember one season, I was it 74, 70, I can't remember, and I was a kid. I taped every single Broadway show. Every place, I mean, I I have everything. I mean Moon, a moon for the misbegotten, I mean uh uh uh Thieves with Marlowe Thomas. Uh I mean I'm trying to think of things that I that didn't weren't successful. A show that was at the Bijou Theater, it came from Canada. I can't even think about it. I think the name of it. I did that.

I mean, I taped everything. Oh, uh, sorry, wrong number, but not sorry, no, Night Watch with Joe and Joan Joan, Joan Hackett, I taped. I mean, I uh I did every I every time I went into the theater, I I taped it. I taped a show. Every year, every uh everything. I didn't go in without a tape recorder.

[38:55] ROBERT SHER: Wow. And I never and people, you know, I'm thrilled because um Donald Inn Hilton at Goodspeed, who I really think the world of, uh, I'm gonna donate all my things to her. I mean, she's gonna take copies of everything. Archive. Oh, thank you. Thank God it should have it. They should have it. They should, I and I'm gonna do that. I'm I haven't done it yet, but I'm gonna do it. So it eventually transitioned to it being it just not being you by yourself, but it I mean, I'm sure Bruce helped with you know showing you how to produce that then and sell it or no on that no, no, no. He was no Bruce Yacko, all Bruce Yacko did was write the check and had enthusiasm. He there was a lot of uphill negativity against him because he was thought of as the bottom of the barrel, and they all knew that he taped the shows, and and I had to overcome a lot.

[39:47] Kevin David Thomas: How has technology changed uh the recording of an album in a positive way?

[39:52] ROBERT SHER: It's a good question. Um what has happened is in the olden days, I mean I'm going back to the 80s, everything was done on tape. And you, you know, to edit a song, you had to cut the tape. But basically, when somebody sang, that was it. You couldn't fix the pitch, you couldn't, you what you heard what is what you could what you get. Basically, what you could do is, you know, uh in the advent of 1970, they became multi-track recording. So up until 1970, it was four-track recording where the orchestra was done on two tracks and the vocals were done on two tracks. Um Company was the first cast album to use 16 tracks.

[40:33] ROBERT SHER: So you could do that 16 from four to sixteen.

[40:35] ROBERT SHER: Four to sixteen.

[40:36] Kevin David Thomas: Wow, correct.

[40:37] ROBERT SHER: So, uh, the company, by the way, that company video or the company documentary was a big, big thing in my life because I remember watching it when it was first on. My mother and my parents were divorced at that point, and my mother was living in Wyckoff, New Jersey.

[40:53] ROBERT SHER: And I remember taking an audio, you know, a cassette recorder and setting up a microphone in front of the speaker, taping what was on television, so I could, you know, have it.

[41:02] ROBERT SHER: But that document, it was great. I used to watch that all the time, just learning. And um, but um, today’s uh, you know, in it was like toward the end of the last decade, uh like ninety-eight, ninety-nine, we became involved with the computer age.

[41:19] ROBERT SHER: So um, the last show I did on tape had to be um, well, it had to be um, I know what it was. It was Lovely Ladies, Kind Gentlemen, and Georgie. Georgie was the last thing I did on tape. Um, but all of that can be put into Pro Tools, the same thing with Lovely. I mean, it’s all great. The shows that I did, I mean, I did Wizard of Oz with Mickey Runner on tape, on digital tape, I did 1776 on analog tape, the revival, and I did Follies on uh digital tape.

[41:57] ROBERT SHER: All of that stuff can be because you can put it near the computer, it’s called Pro Tools. Right. And it all can be loaded, and you can do amazing things. There’s things called Melodyne, you can fix the pitch. You can take keys. If a key is in the key of G, you can, and it has to be, you can transpose it down. I mean, you can. Tempos can be changed. Everything. It’s incredible. I mean, I wish I had it on Sugar Babies. Even though the singing on Syria is pretty consistent, but there are things I wish I could have done. Um, the same thing is true on um, well, thank God I have it on Lovely Ladies because Lou Diamond Phillips, uh, you know, and Eleanor, they all need a little help.

[42:35] ROBERT SHER: Uh, I’m doing uh finally after, I mean, I was supposed to do originally back in 1979, the recording of Peter Pan with Sandy Duncan and George Rose, and we never got to make it because of problems. And I was also way too young to make it. I was 20, whatever, 21, 20. Now you know how old I am. I didn’t, I was too young to do it. But Hillary Knight was gonna do all the artwork for the album, and uh, in those days when record companies only paid for albums, other than Bruce Yaco, nobody ever not paid. The record companies always paid for the albums.

[43:08] ROBERT SHER: So to make a long story short, I’m gonna speed this up as quickly as I’m possible, it didn’t happen. So last year I was sitting around, I’m friendly with Sandy. Jack had just died, and Jack had been after it for many years, and his assistant uh Jean Brown, who was with Jack for many years. I said, I called up Sandy. I’m friendly with her son Jeffrey, Korea. And I said to Jeffrey, do you want to do you think she can do it? And he said, Yes, because he I go to the gym with him. So Jeffrey said yes, so I called her up, and I threw her agent, Jim Wilhelm, who I’ve known for many years. He was uh Patrick Page’s uh agent on Grinch, and I but I’ve known Jim for 30 some odd years. Um, he uh said, yes, Sandy will do it.

[43:49] ROBERT SHER: So we had a big meeting last summer with Sandy. She looks the same. She sounds the same, and uh so we’re gonna do it, and uh we’re gonna do uh not only we’re gonna do it, but we’re using all of the orchestrations from that revival, which were by Ralph Burns and Michael Gibson. Oh, and we’re gonna, it’s about 40% were new for that production. So what we’re gonna do is we’re gonna use all of the Ralph Burns orchestrations. We’re gonna throw out all of the original ones, which were Albert Sendery. We’re gonna bump the show from the 50s to the 60s. So we’re gonna add Saxes to the orchestrations, a guitar. There were only one trombone in the orchestration. We’re gonna add three trombones now, so it’s gonna be a really nice sound.

[44:29] ROBERT SHER: Peter Pan, we have the cast, we have um, it’s Sandy’s doing original part. We have Martin Short playing Captain Hook. We have Jerry Stiller, who is semi-retired, he’s gonna be doing one of the pirates. We have Richard Kind, who’s gonna be playing Smee. Love Richard Kind. Richard Kind, and we have we’re trying to get a narrator now to do Mrs. Darling and also be the narrator on the album. Now, the exciting part about this is the Mary Martin recording is only 45 minutes. Right. The Kathy Rigby recording, which was done in 2014, is 54 minutes. They’re all severely edited or abridged. So now we’re doing the full version of the Broadway musical. Julie Stein and Camden and Green wrote a new song for Sandy called Happily Ever After, which was cut in Washington before New York. Oh my goodness. And it was orchestrated by Ralph Burns. That’s going back in.

[45:24] ROBERT SHER: Now, the great thing that I have to report is um Ben West, who uh who is a big uh Carolyn Lee uh aficionado, found 14 cut songs from the pre-Broadway version in 1954, which we are going to try to use most of Moose Charlotte. With Moose Charlotte, right? Yeah, right. We’re gonna try to use most because we want this to be the most comprehensive complete recording of Peter Pan ever. Hillary Knight, who is 91, who just did the Broadway Barks, is doing all the artwork for the album. Everything. Uh, the orchestra Marvin Laird is conducting. He’s and and the thing that I’m really proud about, other than Marvin doing, because Marvin and I are partners. We’ve done so many shows together, uh, and I wouldn’t do anything without him if I had the choice. Um, is that uh we’re gonna keep all of Jack Lee’s vocal arrangements routine. We’re not we’re not touching any of them.

[46:23] ROBERT SHER: Good. We’re not touching any of them. So his legacy remains intact. Yeah. His name will get out there even again. So and I made that promise to Gene, and I made it to Gene Brown, and I made that promise to Guy Strowman, who’s gonna be directing the album. We went we were gonna have Rob, we were gonna have Rob Iscove do it, but Sandy felt it would be easier if Guy did it. So Guy’s gonna put everybody in, and uh Gene is gonna teach everybody, but Marvin is gonna be the MD uh on all of this. And Marvin did work with Jack at certain points of his career, but uh we’re gonna keep all of the vocal arrangements. Yeah, no, it’s a great way to honor Jack and his legacy. Right there with you. I’m right there with you.

[46:59] ROBERT SHER: No, you guys are one of my biggest um supporters when I moved to New York. No, it’s so yeah, so anyway. Um, it’s we’re, I’m hoping I wanted to say this that um the album will be the album’s gonna be on Time Life and Warner Brothers. Good marvelous. Yeah. Um, and and we have a deal with Comcast. Comcast will be promoting the album. We have 15,000 commercial, 30-second commercial spots that’ll be going across the United States, plus a making of the album video, which will be shown on Comcast on Demand for three months. All right, goodness. So if anybody would love to have, we don’t have, you know, we’re just starting with all of us. We would love the financial support.

[47:37] ROBERT SHER: Right. And I can honestly tell you, this is going to be the orchestra size will be 45. Wow. We’ll probably record the orchestra. And sorry. In um, in in Europe, probably. Where we did, where we did um, we did some, we did uh Annie and we did the Annie 30th anniversary. We did the orchestra there, we did Sherry there, we did Georgie there, we did a Mother’s Kisses there. Um, what else did we do there? That’s and but also we might we might end up we might up end up in Seattle, which is the other place to go because Seattle is a um right to work state. Desperate measures just came out on Sony Masterworks. It’s a fabulous uh recording. We enlarged the orchestra. Uh we uh uh Philo Barnhart, who did the artwork for uh who’s a creator of The Little Mermaid uh for Disney did the artwork for the cover.

Um uh David Friedman is a genius, uh Peter Kellogg is another genius. America Set and Willette Klausner, but uh uh you know, helped get the project on. Mary Cassette is PR Cassette’s uh uh wife, and she is a wonderful human being, as is Willette Klausner. Pat Addis produced the show. We had great people helping us on the album, Jeff Beck, who helped me raise some of the money. Uh we recorded it at Germano, Troy Germano, who was the owner of the hit factory, terrific. My engineer Charlie Martinez did a fabulous job. My assistant Ricky Romano, it was a wonderful experience. And uh it just came out on the 13th of July, and I all I can say is go and buy it.

[49:13] Kevin David Thomas: Congratulations, too. Like do you even keep track of how many you’ve done?

[49:17] ROBERT SHER: No.

[49:18] Kevin David Thomas: How can you? I mean, the official and unofficial list.

[49:20] ROBERT SHER: Can I just say one thing which is important for me? I want to say I do need support. Anybody would like to be involved with these albums financially, they do pay off, and we’re willing to give Grammy nominated album credit, where you can be a Grammy nominated album producer. You can uh, you can come to the recording sessions. The next projects I’m doing, other than the Peter Pan, which is going to be a big deal. I’m doing Courtney Love’s new album for Sony Masterworks. And it’s with it’s it was called the Kansas City Choir Boy, and it was written, and it’s Todd Alman is always gonna be gonna be on it. He wrote it. And that’s gonna be from Masterworks. And I’m as of I’m not, I don’t know if I can say it, but I’m gonna say it. Um as of today, I might be doing the Fiddler on the Roof down at uh the Yiddish.

[50:08] Kevin David Thomas: Oh, yes, they seem a lot of buzz on that one.

[50:10] ROBERT SHER: Seems they seem to want to do it with me. Yeah, and then and the other show that I’m gonna do, if God forbid if it gets bad ruse, I’m doing Smokey Joe’s Cafe for from Time Life. Uh but um I I wanted to say another thing that uh Scott Farthing at Sony Masterworks has been absolutely a dream, uh, as well as uh my uh Mark Cavill, and uh they’re really uh behind me, hopefully doing these new projects uh, you know, as much as they can. And um not everything, but uh they did Desperate Measures and they’re doing Courtney Love and um and I also have Time Life uh, which uh I have to thank for they’re gonna do Smoky Joe’s, and um hopefully they’ll you know, between the two of them and uh I have an ongoing relationship with Capitol Records, so I’ll be doing stuff with them as well as Rhino.

I did uh two right I did uh Ain’t Misbehaven with Ruben Stutterd, the 30th anniversary, which I got nominated for a Grammy for. And I also did the last the brand new last year recording of the off-Broadway hit Ruthless.

[51:11] Kevin David Thomas: Yes, which was terrific.

[51:13] ROBERT SHER: Marvin Laird and Joe, the brilliant Joel Paley, who really made the fabulous Rita McKenzie, uh, you know, Peter Land, Gillian Lynn’s husband, uh, uh, you know, uh uh it was just it was just a terrific, terrific experience on that one as well, and that’s on Rhino. I just and and and uh as I say, I just feel that you have one chance to get these things right.

[51:35] Kevin David Thomas: We didn’t get to talk about how a cast album is made.

[51:38] ROBERT SHER: That’s okay.

[51:38] Kevin David Thomas: We’re gonna bring you back.

[51:39] ROBERT SHER: All right. I love it.

[51:40] Kevin David Thomas: It really is incredible this conversation because we’ve learned so much, but we also learned how much we appreciate you for what you’ve brought because you you single-handedly have preserved so much that would be a good thing. We lost the two to the generations. I can’t believe you you continue to produce it and you continue to fight a battle that is one of the hardest battles in the business, and that is making a cast recording.

[52:00] ROBERT SHER: Well, the thing is that what I want to say is not everybody knows how to make a cast recording, and unfortunately, the cast albums today on the whole are not being well preserved. And um, I really it’s not Goddard Lieberson or even to a lesser degree Tom Shepherd, but I tried to emulate both of them as best as I can. Steve Epstein tries to, and I really uh applaud those Steve Epstein, I applaud uh Tom Shepherd, and I do applaud uh of course Goddard Lieberson. And I’m I follow in the mold of those people.

[52:29] Kevin David Thomas: Well we applaud you.

[52:30] ROBERT SHER: Thank you.

[52:31] Kevin David Thomas: Yeah, you do proud. And I really can’t thank you enough, and for joining us.

[52:34] ROBERT SHER: Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate it. Really a pleasure.

[52:37] Kevin David Thomas: Same here.

[52:39] ROBERT SHER: Good day, Mr. Thomas.

[52:40] Kevin David Thomas: Good day, Mr. Schneider.

[52:42] Kevin David Thomas: Well, it has happened. We finally hit over 100 iTunes reviews, and would like to thank each and every person who took the time to do so.

[52:50] Kevin David Thomas: Huzzah. Now we want to climb those charts even faster. And that is where you lovely folks who have not yet rated us come in.

[52:59] Kevin David Thomas: The process is very simple. On your podcast app, tap the search tab, enter our name Behind the Curtain, Broadway's Living Legends. Tap the search key, tap our beautiful logo, tap the reviews, tap write a review, then tap your way into our hearts.

[53:14] Robert W. Schneider: Tap your troubles away.

[53:16] Kevin David Thomas: That’s nice, Rob. Once you are there, you can rate us from one star to five stars. Think of one star as Hervey Villechez. Oh, dear guy.

[53:20] Robert W. Schneider: Think of one star as Erve Via Jez. And Ima Sumac in Sideshow and five stars as front row seats to the opening night of Gypsy.

[53:36] Kevin David Thomas: But they keep me.

[53:38] Robert W. Schneider: Yeah, they keep me for the third time. I thought that was pretty good.

[53:41] Kevin David Thomas: I want to get good reviews, Rob.

[53:43] Robert W. Schneider: We want to get good reviews.

[53:44] Kevin David Thomas: Excuse me, Arthur Lawrence.

[53:46] Robert W. Schneider: Excuse me, for trying to liven up our commercial ads a little bit.

[53:50] Kevin David Thomas: Eight-minute long commercial.

[53:53] Robert W. Schneider: It’s an infomercial at this point.

[53:58] Kevin David Thomas: Look at this. You can put 400 pounds of manure in it, and it slides right out. Then you can make an island.

[54:05] Robert W. Schneider: You got another line, Kevin.

[54:07] Kevin David Thomas: I’m waiting for you to say plus you can leave your comment.

[54:08] Kevin David Thomas: Let us know if you like what guess we’re like.

[54:11] Kevin David Thomas: Plus, you can leave a comment, let us know what you are liking, what you’re not liking at this point, or what guests you’d like to hear next. So head on over to iTunes and let us know what you think of our little show.

[54:21] Robert W. Schneider: Speaking of little, I’ll tell you a story about Charles Lawton later. Thanks, guys.