{"id":831,"date":"2010-06-01T20:51:00","date_gmt":"2010-06-02T00:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/clients.chrisvanpatten.com\/theatreaficionado.com\/2010\/06\/karen-morrow-sings-i-had-a-ball.html"},"modified":"2010-06-16T02:09:42","modified_gmt":"2010-06-16T06:09:42","slug":"karen-morrow-sings-i-had-a-ball","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/?p=831","title":{"rendered":"Karen Morrow sings "I Had a Ball""},"content":{"rendered":"

“She’ll sing the hell out of it.”<\/p>\n

That, my friends, is Jerry Herman’s ringing endorsement for the one and only Karen Morrow<\/a>, who possesses one of the best belt voices I have ever heard. Morrow got her start in the early 60s with a Theatre World Award for the off-Broadway musical Sing Muse! <\/span>and several shows at the City Center. Following a tour in The Unsinkable Molly Brown, <\/span>she found further off-Broadway success in a hit revival of The Boys from Syracuse.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, Morrow is another great voice cursed by a series of Broadway flops. She made her Main Stem debut in I Had a Ball<\/a> <\/span>playing the brassy belter opposite star Buddy Hackett (who thankfully kept his singing to a minimum and is the reason the show closed – check out Not Since Carrie <\/span>or the original cast recording for details). The plot is convoluted nonsense about romance on Coney Island (gee, where have I heard that recently…?) and gave Morrow the eleven o’clock showstopper: the title song.<\/p>\n

The first time I ever listened to the cast album, nothing really grabbed my attention. That is, until I this song popped on. I stopped what I was doing and proceeded to repeat this one song 13 times. It is, without a doubt, one of the most unabashedly joyous pieces of musical theatre ever written. The cast album features only a portion of the dance break, a bit of belly-dance music but it features one of the most brassily orgasmic transitions back into singing. A treat from start to finish.<\/p>\n

If Karen Morrow is on the album, I have it. I’m especially grateful that “The Babylove Miracle Show,” the absurdly infectious faith healer song cycle from The Grass Harp <\/span>is recorded in its entirety. Morrow basically entered and sang for 15 minutes non-stop, getting the likes of Barbara Cook, Carol Brice and Russ Thacker to speak in tongues (and “Time to hang the moulah on the washline”) – but that’s another post for another day.<\/p>\n

After I Had a Ball, <\/span>Morrow was featured in A Joyful Noise <\/span>in 1966 opposite John Raitt and Susan Watson. This show folded after a mere 12 performances and no cast album, even though Morrow tore things up with “I Love Nashville.” I’m Solomon <\/span>in 1968 which ran for 7 performances (and both played the Mark Hellinger Theatre). The Selling of the President <\/span>ran even shorter: 5 performances at the Shubert in 1972, a musical in which Morrow didn’t sing a single note – which I like to think is one of the main reasons it failed. (During her opening night curtain call, a gentleman near the stage called out, “You should have sang, honey!”) Her final Broadway appearance to date was much happier: she replaced Cleo Laine as the Princess Puffer in The Mystery of Edwin Drood.<\/span><\/p>\n

In spite of those flops, Morrow’s never wanted for work: performing in concerts, with symphonies around the country, numerous TV appearances (especially Merv Griffin, who adored her) – and she’s even won an Emmy. She’s one of Jerry Herman’s favorites, and whenever there is a concert in his behalf you can count on her being there. She also toured as Parthy in Hal Prince’s Show Boat <\/span>and was involved with White Christmas: the Musical, <\/span>and is featured on that original cast album.<\/p>\n

Anyway, here is Karen Morrow with the dancing company of I Had a Ball. <\/span>The choreography is by Onna White. Also, take note of what Buddy Hackett does during the song’s big finish.<\/p>\n

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“She’ll sing the hell out of it.” That, my friends, is Jerry Herman’s ringing endorsement for the one and only Karen Morrow, who possesses one of the best belt voices I have ever heard. Morrow got her start in the early 60s with a Theatre World Award for the off-Broadway musical Sing Muse! and several … Continue reading Karen Morrow sings "I Had a Ball"<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2543,2241],"class_list":["post-831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-i-had-a-ball","tag-karen-morrow"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=831"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/831\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":862,"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/831\/revisions\/862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theatreaficionado.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}