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Kritzerland is proud to present two new CD releases – one classic musical revue, one new soundtrack CD release – a jam-packed Johnny Mandel spectacular:
THE VERDICT
THE SEVEN-UPS (unused score – complete for the first time)
and the world-premiere release of suites from
M*A*S*H – THE TELEVISION SERIES
Music Composed and Conducted by Johnny Mandel
Johnny Mandel has written many classic scores over the years, including The Americanization of Emily, The Sandpiper (which yielded the hit song, “The Shadow of Your Smile” for which he won an Academy Award), Harper, The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming, Point Blank, Pretty Poison, MASH, The Last Detail, Freaky Friday.Agatha, Caddyshack, and Deathtrap, to name a few. Here we present three great examples of Mandel magic.
The Verdict, with a screenplay by David Mamet, based on a novel by Barry Reed, tells the story of a once-promising attorney who was framed for jury tampering and who is now an alcoholic reduced to ambulance chasing. He takes on a case, and that case becomes a life-changer for him and a chance for redemption. Brilliantly directed by Sidney Lumet, with Paul Newman turning in one of his all-time best performances, The Verdict was a box-office and critical hit, garnering raves for Newman and the exemplary supporting cast, which included Charlotte Rampling, Jack Warden, James Mason, Milo O’Shea, Lindsay Crouse, and Wesley Addy.
For The Verdict, Mandel wrote a very short, very sparse, but hugely effective score. Running under fourteen minutes, but placed perfectly in the film, it’s amazing how such a little amount of music can still work so powerfully and make such an impact. Sometimes less is more and Mandel’s score for The Verdict is a perfect example of it.
Rare is the film composer who hasn’t had a score replaced at one time or another, especially from the 1970s on. And with The Seven-Ups it happened to Mandel. Producer Philip D’Antoni had already had a huge success with the film Bullitt, starring Steve McQueen, and The French Connection, starring Gene Hackman, Roy Scheider, and Tony Lo Bianco. For The Seven-Ups, D’Antoni brought back Roy Scheider and Tony Lo Bianco to star, and populated the film with excellent New York character actors.
Mandel turned in a terrific score, but it was very different in style to the score Don Ellis had done for D’Antoni’s The French Connection. In the end, D’Antoni went back to Ellis, who provided an excellent score that was much more in keeping with the feel of The French Connection. But thanks to the new Twilight Time Blu-ray, one can see exactly how the film would have played with Mandel’s score and, as always, that’s fascinating to watch. Much of it works really well and at times it seems to give the film an emotional underpinning that the Ellis score never does. As a listening experience, the Mandel score is tops.
The previous CD release only had about nineteen minutes of the Mandel score – here, for the first time, you get the complete score, close to forty minutes, plus some alternates. It’s a major score from a great composer.
Two years after the release of the 1970 smash hit film, MASH, writer/producer Larry Gelbart developed M*A*S*H for television. Starring Alan Alda, Wayne Rogers, MacLean Stevenson, Gary Burghoff, Loretta Swit, Larry Linville, and others, M*A*S*H hit the airwaves on September 17, 1972. While it would undergo several major cast changes over its eleven seasons, the show was must-see TV right through to its final episode, “Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen,” which aired on February 28, 1983. That extended finale was, at the time, the most-watched and highest-rated single television episode in U.S. television history, with a record-breaking 125-million viewers.
As with the film, Johnny Mandel provided some of the scores for the TV show, along with his iconic title theme. For this world-premiere release, we feature his main and end title from the show, plus suites from six season one episodes.
THE VERDICT/THE SEVEN-UPS/M*A*S*H is limited to 1000 copies only and priced at $19.98, plus shipping. CDs will ship by the first week of June, but never fear, we’ve actually been averaging three to five weeks early in terms of shipping ahead of the official ship date. To place an order, see the cover, or hear audio samples, just visit www.kritzerland.com.
JULIUS MONK PRESENTS DEMI-DOZEN
SONGS BY TOM JONES AND HARVEY SCHMIDT, CY COLEMAN AND CAROLYN LEIGH, AND OTHERS
37 West 56th Street. An address that in-the-know sophisticated New Yorkers knew very well in the mid-1950s – the resplendent reconverted townhouse of one John Wanamaker that served as the home to a delectably delicious series of cabaret entertainments presented at the Upstairs at the Downstairs by Julius Monk.
That room opened in 1958 with Demi-Dozen, another delightful Monk revue. Monk had an uncanny ability to not only cast his shows with brilliant revue performers, in this case Jean Arnold, Ceil Cabot, Jane Connell, Jack Fletcher, George Hall, and Gerry Matthews, but to find up-and-coming songwriters and in the cast of this album that included the team of Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt, who would soon go on to write the score to The Fantasticks. Also featured in this revue is a song by another up-and-coming team, Cy Coleman and Carolyn Leigh – their song for Demi-Dozen is a classic Coleman/Leigh song, “You Fascinate Me So.” But the majority of the material in Demi-Dozen is by Jones and Schmidt and their contributions are uniquely them and uniquely wonderful. The Monk revues were very much of their time, but they are still completely entertaining all these decades later.
DEMI-DOZEN is limited to 500 copies only and priced at $19.98, plus shipping. CDs will ship by the first week of June, but never fear, we’ve actually been averaging three to five weeks early in terms of shipping ahead of the official ship date. To place an order, see the cover, or hear audio samples, just visit www.kritzerland.com.
ATTENTION INDIEGOGO CONTRIBUTORS: IF YOU WISH TO RECEIVE THIS RELEASE YOU MUST OPT-IN BY SENDING US AN E-MAIL AND SPECIFY WHICH ALBUM YOU WANT – SEND TO kritzerland@gmail.com. IF YOU DO NOT WISH TO RECEIVE IT, YOU DON”T NEED TO DO ANYTHING. IF YOU ARE NOT AN INDIEGOGO CONTRIBUTOR, ORDER AS YOU NORMALLY WOULD. THANK YOU.
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I am very curious about the rest of the unused The Seven-Ups score, and am ecstatic to be getting some music from the M*A*S*H series.
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Isn't there a cue from The Verdict, where a drunk Paul Newman throws stuff around in his office that is practically note for note a cue from The Lion in Winter?
There was also a TV movie that Mandel scored about LBJ starring Randy Quaid that had a cue very very very close to a cue from The Wild Rovers. I think it was very early in the film.
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Neat Mandel release! I agree that maybe these should get separate threads so that the titles can actually be included (and searchable) in the titles...
Yavar
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Neat Mandel release! I agree that maybe these should get separate threads so that the titles can actually be included (and searchable) in the titles...
Yavar
I don't like taking up board space with separate threads, but I think I'll retitle this thread now.
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Whoa, MASH?!?!
This is awesome Bruce, thank you!
Can you say a bit about the material? I don't recall hardly any music in the later years, so was everything recorded in the first few years? How much is there altogether and how much is included? Also will we get some personal remembrances in the liner notes (wink wink)?
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I don't like taking up board space with separate threads, but I think I'll retitle this thread now.
I think that's wise, as I bet there are a lot of MASH fans who will be clicking on this thread now!
Yavar
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Posted: |
Apr 19, 2018 - 2:53 PM
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By: |
Last Child
(Member)
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Whoa, MASH?!?!
This is awesome Bruce, thank you!
Can you say a bit about the material? I don't recall hardly any music in the later years, so was everything recorded in the first few years? How much is there altogether and how much is included? Also will we get some personal remembrances in the liner notes (wink wink)?
Why not visit his site, play the cues, read the liner notes?
I only watch the first 3 seasons every couple years, so like Joe Buck says, "it'll be like money from home."
http://www.kritzerland.com/verdict.htm
As with the film, Johnny Mandel provided some of the scores for the TV show, along with his iconic title theme. For this world-premiere release, we feature his main and end title from the show, plus suites from six season one episodes.
This still leaves the Ellis score OOP. Too bad it wasnt included with the French Connection re-release.
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I know that Peter, but I got lazy. Sometimes even for Jerry I write SPYS instead of S*P*Y*S. 
Yavar
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Excellent release! I'll be getting this one, thanks Bruce!
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Whoa, MASH?!?!
This is awesome Bruce, thank you!
Can you say a bit about the material? I don't recall hardly any music in the later years, so was everything recorded in the first few years? How much is there altogether and how much is included? Also will we get some personal remembrances in the liner notes (wink wink)?
The MASH stuff runs about twenty minutes and is terrific. Neil Bulk has done a masterful and great job assembling the suites and the mono sound is wonderful, too.
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The interesting thing about the asterisks - the novel had them, the TV show had them, but all of the film's adverts did not - there it was MASH.
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Also just want to say that the additional twenty minutes of Seven-Ups is spectacular music.
I'm sure some label will come along and do the Ellis score again, coupled with something else. But I've just fallen in love with the Mandel score, and the sound is MUCH improved from the previous release and the extra music is just really top-notch. This has been in the works for quite a while, but I'm really glad we didn't rush it out without the rest of the the Seven-Ups music. The CD runs about seventy-six minutes or so.
For those who take notice of such things, we did drop the choir-only track of the end title for The Verdict - an artistic decision (and it would have brought the album to an uncomfortable length) - I just think it saps the score of its power to follow it with that track, and sticking it on as the closer of the CD is pointless and wrong. Plus, the choir just works so perfectly with the band.
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