The Broadway Album
The Broadway Album is the twenty-fourth studio album by American singer Barbra Streisand, released by Columbia Records on November 4, 1985. Consisting mainly of classic show tunes, the album marked a major shift in Streisand's career. She had spent ten years appearing in musicals and singing standards on her albums in the 1960s. Beginning with the album Stoney End in 1971 and ending with the album Emotion in 1984, Streisand sang mostly rock, pop, folk, and disco-oriented songs for Columbia records. Noted Broadway composer Stephen Sondheim personally penned additional lyrics for the songs "Putting It Together" and "Send in the Clowns" on request of the singer.[3] The album, originally released on the Columbia label and subsequently re-released by Columbia and Sony Records, was a critical and commercial success. First certified gold by the RIAA on January 13, 1986, it reached four times platinum on January 31, 1995.
The Broadway Album
November 4, 1985[1]
Spring–Summer 1985[2]
- A&M (Hollywood)
- Evergreen (Burbank)
- Lighthouse (North Hollywood)
- Randy Waldman (North Hollywood)
- Village Recorder (Los Angeles)
- Westlake (Los Angeles)
47:44
- Richard Baskin
- Bob Esty
- David Foster
- Paul Jabara
- Peter Matz
- Kim Skalecki
- Barbra Streisand
The album was accompanied by a television special, Putting It Together: The Making of the Broadway Album.[4] The original LP and cassette releases contained 11 tracks, while the CD release included the bonus track "Adelaide's Lament".[5] Columbia re-released The Broadway Album in 2002 with an additional bonus track, originally cut in 1985, "I Know Him So Well". The album sold 7.5 million copies worldwide.
Production[edit]
Streisand started her career on Broadway, and so considered this album in sense returning to her roots, after two decades of recording popular music of the day. Streisand's record label, Columbia Records, objected to the planned content as it was not pop songs, but Streisand had signed a contract at the beginning of her career which gave her full creative control in exchange for lower earnings; at this point she stressed that, due to the contract, she had "the right to sing what I want to sing".[6]
She considers the tracks music she has great respect for, deeming it some of the best music and lyrics ever written. The lead single, "Putting It Together" from Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George, was rewritten to be about the dichotomy between art and commerce in the music industry. Streisand hired her previous The Way We Were director Sydney Pollack, as well as David Geffen, head of Geffen Records to play the parts of the antagonistic studio heads. Streisand wanted to record the entire piece live to capture the atmosphere of Broadway shows. Many of the musicians also played in Funny Girl 22 years earlier, and a month of rehearsals with Stephen Sondheim was undertaken before recording.[7]
The album's cover art was shot by photographer Richard Corman at the Plymouth Theatre in New York City in the summer of 1985. In addition to the photos used, showing Streisand sitting in a chair on the stage surrounded by sheet music, Corman shot additional portraits of her sitting in the seats.[8]