Reprise To Release Original Broadway Cast Recording Of American Idiot
By Jeffrey Hyatt
Reprise Records will release The Original Broadway Cast Recording of American Idiot on April 20 – the same day the show will premier at the St. James Theatre in New York City.
The official album features the 24-member cast accompanied by Green Day, marking another collaboration between the band and the 90-minute rock musical. Sondheim, it’s’ probably not, but the show has all the makings of a fun night out at the theater.
Directed by Michael Mayer and based on Green Day’s 2004 album American Idiot, the musical and the cast recording include every song from American Idiot, as well as several songs from the band’s current album 21st Century Breakdown.
Green Day’s singer/guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong, bassist Mike Dirnt, and drummer Tré Cool wrote the score to the show, which is about a young man named Johnny (played by Spring Awakening’s Tony-winning John Gallagher, Jr.) who journeys from the soulless suburbs in search of something greater, all in the post-9/11 age of media-saturation, fear and cynicism. Johnny is also known as Jesus of Suburbia, a name familiar to fans of the album.
The album’s arrangements and orchestration were done by Tony Award-winning composer Tom Kitt (Next to Normal), who is the show’s music supervisor, orchestrator and music arranger. Armstrong is the album’s producer.
Berkeley Repertory Theatre in California staged the world premiere of American Idiot in fall 2009.
If you are in NYC, or happen to find yourself in NYC sometime soon, any plans on catching the Green Day musical?
Wednesday, April 21, 2010 5:16PM
[...] As most of you know, Green Day’s “rock-opera” and hit album, American Idiot, has taken the stage with high anticipation from music and theatre fans. With a plot of “disaffected suburban [...]