![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
igenlodeI was interested to discover that Rudolf Friml ("Rose Marie", "The Vagabond King") had written a musical "Three Musketeers" in the 1920s, which apparently had great success on both Broadway and in the West End and featured Dennis King in the lead (and Webster Booth as Buckingham!) Intriguingly, it is also advertised as featuring lyrics by P.G. Wodehouse, whom it turns out had a second career in musical theatre in the early part of his life.
But from all I have been able to find out about it, sadly, I think the reason why the work remains practically unknown is that the music just wasn't that good. It's always very hard to judge from period recordings as opposed to sheet music -- for example, the lovely harmonies in the duets "Someday" and "Only a Rose" from "The Vagabond King" sound thoroughly overblown and unmusical in their 1920s performances, due presumably both to the deficiencies of the recording apparatus and changes in vocal fashion -- but none of the songs seem particularly catchy, and some of the lyrics verge on the embarrassingly trite, even for operetta of the period.
The most popular, or at least the most widely extant now, appears to be the flirtatious song "Ma Belle" (originally sung, unsurprisingly, by Aramis), and I did manage to get the sheet music for that one and might try singing it. There is a duet "One Kiss (Before I Go)" that sounds as if it might be quite melodious if shorn of the period performances, and another pleasing duet, "Your Eyes", that doesn't appear on Wikipedia's listing of the musical numbers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three_Musketeers_(musical)
-- although the lyrics are still pretty glib:
Buckingham's songs "Queen of My Heart" and "Love is the Sun" have pretty much disappeared (although I did come across a very low-quality version of the former uploaded by a Webster Booth fan, although not sung by Webster Booth). The closest thing to a complete soundtrack that I found was a very much reduced 1952 American radio version on YouTube, and while it's obviously not fair to judge the plot and dialogue in any way on the basis of a version that had been cut down to squeeze seven musical numbers (and reprises) into the space of half an hour with as little talking as possible between them, much of it pretty facetious, it presumably does give you an idea at least of the music. I note that "Ma Belle" gets repurposed into the beginning of the first act as a love-song for d'Artagnan and Constance, whereas the music credits it to Aramis and chorus, and Wikipedia lists it as occurring in the second act, so this version clearly can't be taken as especially accurate in any other particular either :-p
(My guess would be that this was the 'hit' number fondly remembered from the show, but which (like "Another Suitcase in Another Hall" from "Evita") was originally performed by a minor character, so they couldn't very well leave it out and had to reassign it!)
But from all I have been able to find out about it, sadly, I think the reason why the work remains practically unknown is that the music just wasn't that good. It's always very hard to judge from period recordings as opposed to sheet music -- for example, the lovely harmonies in the duets "Someday" and "Only a Rose" from "The Vagabond King" sound thoroughly overblown and unmusical in their 1920s performances, due presumably both to the deficiencies of the recording apparatus and changes in vocal fashion -- but none of the songs seem particularly catchy, and some of the lyrics verge on the embarrassingly trite, even for operetta of the period.
We are the musketeers
Bold dashing musketeers
Stout comrade musketeers
Bound to ride
Side by side
True and tried
We've found for years and years
No foe can hide his fears
When faced by musketeers
He wisely disappears
War and daring
We are ever sharing
Strangers to dangers indeed...
The most popular, or at least the most widely extant now, appears to be the flirtatious song "Ma Belle" (originally sung, unsurprisingly, by Aramis), and I did manage to get the sheet music for that one and might try singing it. There is a duet "One Kiss (Before I Go)" that sounds as if it might be quite melodious if shorn of the period performances, and another pleasing duet, "Your Eyes", that doesn't appear on Wikipedia's listing of the musical numbers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Three_Musketeers_(musical)
-- although the lyrics are still pretty glib:
Your eyes, your eyes like beacons will light me
By night and day
Your eyes, your eyes to glory invite me
To carve[?] my way
Buckingham's songs "Queen of My Heart" and "Love is the Sun" have pretty much disappeared (although I did come across a very low-quality version of the former uploaded by a Webster Booth fan, although not sung by Webster Booth). The closest thing to a complete soundtrack that I found was a very much reduced 1952 American radio version on YouTube, and while it's obviously not fair to judge the plot and dialogue in any way on the basis of a version that had been cut down to squeeze seven musical numbers (and reprises) into the space of half an hour with as little talking as possible between them, much of it pretty facetious, it presumably does give you an idea at least of the music. I note that "Ma Belle" gets repurposed into the beginning of the first act as a love-song for d'Artagnan and Constance, whereas the music credits it to Aramis and chorus, and Wikipedia lists it as occurring in the second act, so this version clearly can't be taken as especially accurate in any other particular either :-p
(My guess would be that this was the 'hit' number fondly remembered from the show, but which (like "Another Suitcase in Another Hall" from "Evita") was originally performed by a minor character, so they couldn't very well leave it out and had to reassign it!)