South Pacific In Concert from Carnegie Hall (CD)

Based on James Michener's Pulitzer Prize-winning collection of short stories Tales of the South Pacific, Rodgers & Hammerstein's own Pulitzer Prize-winning blockbuster was a landmark of post-World-War-II Broadway, a provocative romantic drama that beguiled audiences with a hit parade of instant standards. Last June, South Pacific reached new heights when, for one enchanted evening, Carnegie Hall presented a magnificent concert production with a dream cast headed by Reba McEntire, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Jason Danieley, Lillias White, and Alec Baldwin.

Directed for the concert stage by Walter Bobbie with musical director Paul Gemignani conducting the Orchestra of St. Luke's, the performance was acclaimed by The New York Times which called the production "a state of nearly unconditional rapture," and praised it for locating "the show's real staying power in its operatic respect for love as a force that hurts, teases, destroys and ennobles."