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[0:00] Tim Rice: Hello, this is Tim Rice, and this is episode 63 of Get Onto My Cloud. Continuing my look at the first ever Joseph recording, starring David Daltrey as Joseph, the excellent 60s pop group The Mixed Bag, and a Colic Court School Choir, which I began in Get Onto My Cloud episode 62, still extremely available somewhere in the ether. I'm enjoying taking a closer butchers at my lyrics to see what alterations I might have made were I to write the show today. I still wish I'd got Jacob's sons in the right chronological order in the opening number, but by and large, most of what's on the album Andrew and I recorded in 1968 holds up pretty well. Of course, numbers like One More Angel in Heaven and Those Canaan Days aren't on that record, simply because they hadn't been written yet.

We had no idea back then that Joseph would ever progress beyond being a choral work for primary schools like Colic Court, and 30 minutes was about the right length of show for a music teacher to have a chance of knocking his charges into shape for an end-of-term concert. 30 minutes was also about the maximum that parents will be able to sit through. However, the first school concert of Joseph had gone down so well with the Colic Court mums earlier in the year, hardly any dads there on a Friday afternoon, we could have undoubtedly got away with more than the mere 20 minutes of the performance lasted. As it turned out, Joseph went down so well we had to perform the whole thing twice. When we were fortunate enough to get a recording deal for Joseph, Andrew and I needed to expand the work to fill up both sides of a long-playing record, which meant 30 minutes minimum.

This meant the extension of some songs and the inclusion of brand new ones. We ended up with 30 minutes and 53 seconds. This was achieved primarily with the addition of a song for Potifar, which, like many of Andrew's memorable melodies and orchestrations for Joseph, managed simultaneously to be in a different style from other numbers, and yet very much part of a seamlessly coherent whole. We already had a 1950s Elvis spoof in the show, but the successful insertion of Potifar, with its affectionate nod to 1920s dance music into the mix, was perhaps the move that made us realize the style of the show could be an amalgam of tributes to many styles of popular music. But as I always bang on about, story is king, more important even than Elvis.

Looking back at Potifar today, I think I'd give the words 8 out of 10. There's an impure rhyme, pyramids, and did. And the line, cool and so fine, is a little weak, but saved by a good gag about Genesis chapter 39. And the payoff, I don't believe in free love, is fun. But then again, the man who became our manager and mentor, before the word mentor ever came into fashion, David Land, always said that it was a line about buying shares in pyramids that convinced him we were worth investigating. He didn't worry about the impure rhyme.

[3:18] Tim Rice: Close Every Door to Me is the one truly serious moment in Joseph. It's a good song, but it depends on its success on strong performance more than many of the lighter scenes do. And I'm glad to say the sixteen-year-old David Daltrey delivered for us first time out.

[3:43] ♪ Musical number: "Close Every Door to Me" — performed by David Daltrey ♪

[6:33] Tim Rice: The tune is easily strong enough to carry an additional stanza or two. There was no intention within the song to make any unsubtle reference to contemporary political matters, albeit Middle East tensions were as complex in 1968 as they are 50 years later. Nonetheless, the mention of Israel has led to the occasional contre-temps. Notably a few years ago in New Zealand, when a multi-school broadcast performance of Joseph changed the lyric, Children of Israel, to Children of Kindness. I cannot begin to imagine what children of kindness are, but this was clearly a feeble attempt at some sort of political correctness. When I objected, those responsible said, in that case, they would not perform the song at all.

I said the show could not be performed without this major number, and I was not at all worried if the show did not go ahead. I understand it did in the end go ahead with the correct lyric. Children of kindness. Children of Kidderminster would have made more sense. I used Close Every Door as part of my defense in an argument when I agreed to go on a television program in New York to defend Jesus Christ Superstar against ridiculous charges of anti-Semitism. The program was a strange semi-chat show hosted by Leonard Nimoy, the Spock of Star Trek, who ditched the Spock ears when in TV presenter mode. It was September 1971, and the record album of Superstar had recently been number one in the United States.

The Broadway show was imminent, and the advanced publicity for the show led to quite a few well-organized protesters complaining about the content of the work, i.e. the lyrics. I did not know whether to be flattered or frightened by this, and mused that it was strange we hadn't had too much hassle in this regard as a result of the album's massive reach into all parts of the Union. A few nutters, but nothing official. On the Nimoy program to confront me was a rabbi representing the American Jewish Committee. He or they had compiled a hefty document which concluded that Superstar, quote, unambiguously lies the primary responsibility for Jesus' suffering and crucifixion to the Jewish priesthood, unquote, and found evidence of anti-Semitism throughout the work.

A fair chunk of the Leonard Nimoy Show consisted of Leonard reading his less than gripping poetry, but during the brief exchanges the rabbi and I were allowed, I made a fair fist of establishing my anti-anti-Semitic credentials by quoting Close Every Door from Joseph and pointing out that as both victim and oppressors in Superstar were Jewish, it was illogical to argue that we were siding with the bad guys. I never got into the more complex point that our Jesus, just like the Bible's Jesus, had plenty of opportunity to avoid his earthly fate, but accepted what he felt to be his destiny. In other words, he was largely responsible for his own mortal end. Neither did I get the chance to point out, cliché though it be, that many of my best friends, many involved with the Superstar production, were Jewish.

It was unlikely that my American critics had ever heard or heard of Close Every Door at that time. But I always feel that if your standpoint is assaulted from both sides, you were probably doing something right. The rabbi and I would have been as one versus the New Zealander's censorship attempt. On that Nimoy talk show, I was very grateful to Close Every Door. I don't think children of kindness would have helped me much in that argument. Anyway, back to 1968 and the original record. The Song of the King, Pharaoh's Big Number, was a showstopper from the first school concert onwards. It's been tried in a non-Elvis style, but frankly, it only works with the Ford Presley treatment. I remember a fine soul singer giving Pharaoh the James Brown treatment in Philadelphia, which was one of the very few occasions when the number was not encored.

On our original album, I had the chance to show off my Elvis impression, mainly because I was cheap and available. I featured my mercifully brief interpretation in Get Onto My Cloud episode 4. Seems a long time ago. Back then in 1968, the only dream Pharaoh had had was seven fat cows being eaten by thin ones. In later versions, he also had a dream about corn and a middle eight. Pharaoh's number usually gets reprised at least twice, which is at least one reprise too many, but I must admit, audiences can't seem to get enough of it. In an attempt to give Pharaoh something else to do, and possibly encourage directors not to reprise seven fat cows seven times.

[11:50] ♪ Musical number: "King of My Heart" — performed by Dean Collinson ♪

[14:12] ♪ Musical number ♪

[15:24] Tim Rice: Dean Collinson as an angst-ridden pharaoh. I loved that being included in the show, but possibly at that stage in the story, we need to race on to the climax, and as far as I'm aware, it hasn't made it into any subsequent productions. In the highly improbable scenario of my being asked to direct a production of Joseph somewhere, and even more improbably if I agreed to do it, I'd like to include King of My Heart. By the way, the hits in King of My Heart were Treat Me Nice, Any Place is Paradise, Burning Love, Way Down, I Feel So Bad, A Fool Such As I, Too Much, The Wonder of You, Slightly Altered to The Wonder of Me. Are You Lonesome Tonight, Playing For Keeps, Surrender, Suspicious Minds, Follow That Dream, and A Semi Nod To Love Me Tender.

Joseph, of course, ends with Any Dream Will Do, which, even before it became a number one hit record, thanks to Jason Donovan, was one of the best known songs from any British musical. My only lyrical worry here has been the impure rhyme of beginning and dimming. But try as I may, I haven't found a better true rhyming couplet to illustrate the full circle of the dreamer wanting to return to his or her dream rather than face reality. However, even the great Paul Simon rhymed friend and again at the top of Sounds of Silence. I think I may be ploughing a lonely furrow, always looking for perfect rhymes. But these days I'm stuck in it. The dreamer, preferring dreams to reality, is perhaps rather a heavy interpretation of such a popular and on the face of it, cheerful song.

But it's unlike the rest of the show in that it's nonspecific, abstract, even open to different interpretations. I do get the odd communication asking what I was on about in Any Dream Will Do. An apparently upbeat melody, coupled with a darker lyric, is often a powerful combination, as Bjorn and Benny have proved countless times with ABBA's superb catalogue. Despite the pessimistic undertones to the words of Any Dream Will Do, any doubts or unhappiness in the song have always been swept away by the triumphant music, and of course the happy ending. Joseph is a positive and optimistic story. Incidentally, the first person to have a hit with Any Dream Will Do was none other than Max Bygraves, number one in Australia in 1972.

I often wonder if Joseph will ever be altered or expanded yet again. At times we've said, that's it. It's been a full-length musical extravaganza, admittedly, thanks to the longest curtain call stroke megamix of all time, filmed direct to TV video starring Maria Friedman and Donnie Osmond, with many guest appearances by Joan Collins and Dickie Attenborough. It's been performed in literally thousands of schools and by hundreds of amateur theatrical companies and in quite a few foreign languages. Although Joseph, using so much English wordplay and slang, is far harder to translate or adapt than most operas or musicals, including most of our other shows. Right now I don't feel like saying that's it, as I know whatever happens to the piece down the line, even or especially after Andrew and I both shuffled off this mortal coil, the original spirit and simplicity of the school versions will keep going.

There have been quite a few attempts to produce a major new film version, both animated and live action, and things look quite promising on that front at the moment. And I do keep thinking of possible and plausible extensions to the story. For starters, Joseph had a sister named Dinah, a good name for rhymes, and despite the vital importance of the female narrator to any interpretation, a non-token addition of a woman to the story would not go amiss. Watch this space, I guess. I have for 54 years.

[19:22] ♪ Musical number ♪

[24:55] Tim Rice: That was episode sixty-three of Get On to My Cloud, written and presented by me, Tim Rice, and produced as ever by Peter Hobbes.