Jesus Christ Superstar | ||||
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Studio album by various artists | ||||
Released | 16 October 1970 [1] (UK) 27 October 1970 (US) [2] [3] | |||
Recorded | 10 October 1969 ("Superstar" single) 1970 | |||
Studio | Olympic, London | |||
Genre | ||||
Length | 86:56 | |||
Label | Decca/MCA/Decca Broadway | |||
Producer | Tim Rice, Andrew Lloyd Webber | |||
Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice chronology | ||||
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Singles from Jesus Christ Superstar | ||||
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Alternative cover | ||||
Review scores | |
---|---|
Source | Rating |
AllMusic | [4] |
Christgau's Record Guide | C− [5] |
Jesus Christ Superstar is a 1970 album musical by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice,on which the 1971 rock opera of the same name was based. Initially unable to get backing for a stage production,the composers released it as an album,the success of which led to stage productions. The album musical is a musical dramatisation of the last week of the life of Jesus Christ,beginning with his entry into Jerusalem and ending with the Crucifixion. It was originally banned by the BBC on grounds of being "sacrilegious". [6] [7] By 1983,the album had sold over seven million copies worldwide. [8]
The album's story is based in large part on the Synoptic Gospels and Fulton J. Sheen's Life of Christ,which compares and calibrates all four Gospels. However,greater emphasis is placed on the interpersonal relationships of the major characters,in particular,Jesus,Judas and Mary Magdalene,relationships that are not described in depth in the Gospels.
Lyricist Rice said he took inspiration from the Bob Dylan song "With God on Our Side". [9]
"Herod's Song" is a lyrical rewrite of "Try It and See",previously written by Lloyd Webber and Rice as a proposed British entry into the 1969 Eurovision Song Contest to be sung by Lulu,then recorded and released as a single by Rita Pavone. The writers had also included it (as "Those Saladin Days") in an aborted show called Come Back Richard Your Country Needs You.
The melody of "I Don't Know How to Love Him" also predates Jesus Christ Superstar;it was rewritten from a 1968 Lloyd Webber/Rice collaboration titled "Kansas Morning". [10]
For the recording,Lloyd Webber and Rice drew personnel from both musical theatre (Murray Head had just left the West End production of Hair ) and the British rock scene (Ian Gillan had only recently become the singer of Deep Purple). Many of the primary musicians—guitarists Neil Hubbard and Henry McCullough,bassist Alan Spenner,and drummer Bruce Rowland—came from Joe Cocker's backing group The Grease Band. Saxophonist Chris Mercer had also played with Hubbard in Juicy Lucy.
The first piece of Superstar released was the title song,as a single in November 1969 backed with the instrumental "John Nineteen Forty-One" (see John 19:41). The full album followed almost a year later.
The album topped the U.S. Billboard Top LP's chart in both February and May 1971 [11] and ranked number one in the year-end chart ahead of Carole King's massive hit Tapestry . [12] It also served as a launching pad for numerous stage productions on Broadway and in the West End. The original 1970 boxed-set issue of this two-record set was packaged in the U.S. with a special thin brown cardboard outer box ("The Brown Album") [13] which contained the two vinyl records and a 28-page libretto.
All compositions written by Tim Rice (lyrics and book) and Andrew Lloyd Webber (music).
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Overture" | 4:00 |
2. | "Heaven on Their Minds" | 4:23 |
3. | "What's the Buzz/Strange Thing Mystifying" | 4:13 |
4. | "Everything's Alright" | 4:36 |
5. | "This Jesus Must Die" | 5:11 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Hosanna" | 2:09 |
2. | "Simon Zealotes/Poor Jerusalem" | 4:49 |
3. | "Pilate's Dream" | 1:28 |
4. | "The Temple" | 4:43 |
5. | "Everything's Alright (reprise)" | 0:34 |
6. | "I Don't Know How to Love Him" | 3:41 |
7. | "Damned for All Time/Blood Money" | 4:36 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "The Last Supper" | 7:10 |
2. | "Gethsemane (I Only Want to Say)" | 5:33 |
3. | "The Arrest" | 3:24 |
4. | "Peter's Denial" | 1:27 |
5. | "Pilate and Christ" | 2:46 |
6. | "King Herod's Song" | 3:02 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Judas' Death" | 4:17 |
2. | "Trial Before Pilate (Including the 39 Lashes)" | 5:13 |
3. | "Superstar" | 4:16 |
4. | "The Crucifixion" | 4:04 |
5. | "John Nineteen Forty-One" | 2:10 |
Main players [14]
Supporting players
Other players
Musicians
Other musicians
Production
Weekly charts
| Year-end charts
|
Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
---|---|---|
Canada (Music Canada) [26] | Gold | 350,000 [27] |
France | — | 60,000 [28] |
Israel | — | 2,500 [29] |
Italy | — | 100,000 [30] |
Netherlands (NVPI) [31] | Gold | 250,000 [32] |
South Africa (SARI) [33] | Gold | 12,500 [33] |
Sweden | — | 90,000 [34] |
United Kingdom (BPI) [35] 1970 release | Gold | 180,000 [36] |
United States (RIAA) [37] | Gold | 4,500,000 [36] |
Summaries | ||
North America 1970-1972 | — | 3,500,000 [38] |
Worldwide | — | 7,000,000 [8] |
Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber is an English composer and impresario of musical theatre. Several of his musicals have run for more than a decade both in the West End and on Broadway. He has composed 21 musicals, a song cycle, a set of variations, two film scores, and a Latin Requiem Mass.
Jesus Christ Superstar is a sung-through rock opera with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice. Loosely based on the Gospels' accounts of the Passion, the work interprets the psychology of Jesus and other characters, with much of the plot centered on Judas, who is dissatisfied with the direction in which Jesus is steering his disciples. Contemporary attitudes, sensibilities and slang pervade the rock opera's lyrics, and ironic allusions to modern life are scattered throughout the depiction of political events. Stage and film productions accordingly contain many intentional anachronisms.
Sir Timothy Miles Bindon Rice is an English lyricist and author. He is best known for his collaborations with Andrew Lloyd Webber, with whom he wrote, among other shows, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Evita; with Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson of ABBA, with whom he wrote Chess; with Elton John, with whom he wrote Aida; and with Disney on Aladdin, the Lion King, both the stage adaptation of Beauty and the Beast and the live-action film adaption. He also wrote lyrics for the Alan Menken musical King David, and for DreamWorks Animation's The Road to El Dorado.
Yvonne Marianne Elliman is an American singer, songwriter, and actress who performed for four years in the first cast of the stage musical Jesus Christ Superstar. She scored a number of hits in the 1970s and achieved a US #1 hit with "If I Can't Have You". The song also reached #9 on the Adult Contemporary chart and number 4 in the UK Chart. Her cover of Barbara Lewis's "Hello Stranger" went to #1 on the Adult Contemporary chart, and "Love Me" was also #5, giving her 3 top 10 singles. After a long hiatus in the 1980s and 1990s, during which time she dedicated herself to her family, she made a comeback album as a singer-songwriter in 2004.
Jesus Christ Superstars is the fifth studio album by Slovenian industrial and electronic music group Laibach. Released in 1996 the concept album collects original and cover songs where religion is the central theme. The theme of religion is constructed around Christianity and the title references Andrew Lloyd Webber's rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar.
Evita is the soundtrack album to the 1996 musical film of the same name, performed mostly by American singer Madonna. It was released by Warner Bros. Records on October 28, 1996 in the United Kingdom and on November 12, 1996, in the United States. Directed by Alan Parker, the film was based on Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber's 1978 musical Evita about First Lady of Argentina Eva Perón, portrayed by Madonna. The soundtrack consists of reworked songs from its original 1976 concept album as well as a new song, "You Must Love Me". Additional performers on the soundtrack include Antonio Banderas, Jonathan Pryce and Jimmy Nail.
"Everything's Alright" is a song from the 1970 album and 1971 rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber. It is about the anointing of Jesus.
The Phantom of the Opera is the soundtrack to the 2004 film based on the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, There are two versions released, the standard 14-track release and a two-disc deluxe edition.
"I Don't Know How to Love Him" is a song from the 1970 album and 1971 rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar written by Andrew Lloyd Webber (music) and Tim Rice (lyrics), a torch ballad sung by the character of Mary Magdalene. In the opera she is presented as bearing an unrequited love for the title character. The song has been much recorded, with "I Don't Know How to Love Him" being one of the rare songs to have had two concurrent recordings reach the top 40 of the Hot 100 chart in Billboard magazine, specifically those by Helen Reddy and Yvonne Elliman, since the 1950s when multi-version chartings were common.
"This Jesus Must Die" is a song from the 1970 album and 1971 rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber, which also appears in the film version of Jesus Christ Superstar, and on the album of the musical. In the 1973 film, it is sung primarily by Bob Bingham as Caiaphas and Kurt Yaghjian as Annas; and on the 1970 album, by Victor Brox as Caiaphas and Brian Keith as Annas, with Paul Raven and Tim Rice providing the voices of the priests. In the 2000 film it is sung by Frederick B. Owens as Caiaphas and Michael Shaeffer as Annas.
"Superstar" is the title song from the 1970 album and 1971 rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice.
Theology is the eighth full-length album by Irish singer Sinéad O'Connor. It was released in 2007 on Rubyworks. The album consists of two discs, the acoustic "Dublin Sessions" and the full-band "London Sessions".
Jesus Christ Superstar or Jesus Christ Superstar – Original Australian Cast Recording is an album released in late 1972 on MCA Records. Jesus Christ Superstar is a rock opera created by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber in 1970. The earliest Australian version was staged from May 1972 to February 1974. This album features Trevor White, Jon English and Michele Fawdon. Together with other cast members, they performed vocals for a studio recording. It was produced by Patrick Flynn, the show's musical director and a conductor for Opera Australia. The album peaked at No. 17 on the Go-Set Albums Chart in June 1973, while it reached No. 13 on the Kent Music Report and remained on its charts for 54 weeks. It appeared in the top 100 on the 1974 End of Year Albums Chart. In May 1973, the album was awarded a gold record for sales of 50,000 albums.
Evita is a concept album released in 1976 and produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Having successfully launched their previous show, Jesus Christ Superstar, on record in 1970, Lloyd Webber and Rice returned to the format for Evita. The album was recorded at Olympic Studios in London from April to September 1976 and released in the United Kingdom on 19 November 1976.
Sings the Songs of Andrew Lloyd Webber is a studio album by Shirley Bassey, released in 1993.
The Premiere Collection: The Best of Andrew Lloyd Webber is a 1988 compilation album, bringing together some of composer Andrew Lloyd Webber's best known compositions at the time of release. It includes songs from the musicals The Phantom of the Opera, Tell Me on a Sunday, Evita, Cats, Jesus Christ Superstar, Starlight Express and Requiem. Co-writers of the songs include Tim Rice, Don Black, Richard Stilgoe, Charles Hart and Trevor Nunn.
Aspects of Andrew Lloyd Webber is the second studio album by Australian singer Marina Prior featuring Melbourne Symphony Orchestra conducted by Brian Stacey. It was released in November 1992 and peaked at number 22 on the ARIA Albums Chart. The album was certified gold for shipment of 35000 copies.
Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert is an American musical television special that was broadcast live on NBC on April 1, 2018 and rebroadcast on Easter Sunday 2020, April 12, 2020. Executively produced by Craig Zadan, Neil Meron, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice, and Marc Platt, it was a staged concert performance of the 1970 rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar. It received positive reviews from critics but had a smaller viewership than earlier musical specials.
Jesus Christ the Exorcist is the tenth progressive rock studio album by American vocalist, keyboardist and guitarist Neal Morse, released on June 14, 2019.
This is the discography of British singer and actor Murray Head.
...the complete Superstar hit the American market on October 27, 1970.
The Broadway opening was set for October 27, to coincide with the initial release of the album in the United States on that date a year before.
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: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)The hit love song from Superstar was a pop number Lloyd Webber and Rice had written earlier and sold to a publisher; its rights were bought back by David Land, then Lloyd Webber and Rice's manager, and it got a new set of lyrics. Thus the pedestrian 'Kansas Morning' became the soaring 'I Don't Know How to Love Him.'