Gordon MacRae in Desert Song and Roberta - New Transfer

Gordon MacRae starred in radio's The Railroad Hour from 1948 to 1954. Sponsored by the railroad industry, the show concentrated on highlights from operettas and musicals, featuring MacRae and a succession of guest vocalists, including Dorothy Kirsten, Dorothy Warenskjold, Risë Stevens and Lucille Norman.

Capitol, MacRae's record company, saw some commercial potential in starring the singer in its own series of abridged musicals and operettas. The first effort was excerpts from Cole Porter's Kiss Me, Kate in 1949, with Jo Stafford, which has appeared on this blog. Next was Sigmund Romberg's The New Moon with Lucille Norman in 1950. Capitol must have liked the pairing - the two teamed for Rudolf Friml's Vagabond King in 1951. Capitol even used the same cover as The New Moon, just changing the name of the operetta.

Lucille Norman and Gordon MacRae

In 1952, MacRae and Norman again were matched for Romberg's The Desert Song and Jerome Kern's musical Roberta. The following year, Capitol combined these two 10-inch LPs into the 12-inch album that is the subject of today's post. Also in 1952, MacRae and Norman appared in Franz Lehar's The Merry Widow.

In 1953, MacRae was paired with Dorothy Warenskjold for Romberg's The Student Prince. The series came to an end in 1954 with two Victor Herbert operettas - Naughty Marietta with Marguerite Piazza and The Red Mill with Norman. Later on, Capitol had MacRae redo several of the operettas in stereo with Dorothy Kirsten.

1953 Music Views ad

I offered the Desert Song/Roberta LP here almost 12 years ago, and recently decided to re-transfer it so I could offer it in lossless format. Here is some of what I wrote about the record in 2008:

"The first side is The Desert Song. MacRae starred in the 1953 film of that Romberg work with Kathryn Grayson. You can find her version of the songs (made with Tony Martin) a few posts below this one [here].

"This Capitol recording is presented less as a string of songs and more as a potted version of the operetta, complete with overture and a supporting cast of Bob Sands and the great Thurl Ravenscroft, who is heard in 'Let Love Come.'

"The Kern-Harbach Roberta takes up the other side of the record. MacRae and Norman (a very good singer who also had an acting career) are joined by character singer Anne Triola, who has a little too much character for my taste. The arrangements and musical direction on both sides are by George Greeley. [Let me add belatedly that Greeley's work is excellent.]

1952 Music Views ad

"The problem with trying to cram a great score like Roberta into 25 minutes is that the individual items don't get much time. That's OK with me when it comes to 'Yesterdays,' which has been recorded by everybody from Washboard Sam to Helen Traubel (or so it seems), but not so with 'The Touch of Your Hand,' a gorgeous song that is too little heard, perhaps because it is not easy to sing. This record includes the hit songs both from the stage show and two that were interpolated into the 1935 film ('Lovely to Look At' and 'I Won't Dance')."

When these records came out, many people could still recall the heyday of operetta, which had been 30-40 years earlier. In the early 50s, there were several versions of Naughty Marietta competing in the record stores - besides MacRae and Piazza, the teams of Nelson Eddy and Nadine Conner, Earl Wrightson and Elaine Malbin, and Doretta Morrow and Felix Knight could be heard on LP. The last-named pair have appeared on this blog.

In 1952 There also were multiple editions of Roberta to choose from. M-G-M had adapted Roberta as Lovely to Look At starring Kathryn Grayson and Howard Keel, so Capitol came out with the MacRae-Norman Roberta LP and Columbia countered with a Jack Cassidy-Joan Roberts version. Several years earlier, there had been a Roberta studio album featuring Alfred Drake and Kitty Carlisle, which I transferred a while ago. It is still available here.

I doubt that any revival of this repertoire on record would achieve much of an audience today. But here we don't worry about such things, so I plan on transferring MacRae's Student Prince and Merry Widow soon.