Opus 1968

SAHS Music Department: Opus 1968

Opus Goes Broadway

St. Albans High School, St. Albans, West Virginia — the “Red Dragons”

• Vocal Music Director: Joseph R. Ervin^*
• Instrumental Music Director: James R. Keadle

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Disclaimer:: These Opus 1968 LPs, like their predecessors, suffer from poor microphone placement and post-production, to say nothing of the SAHS gym’s acoustics and fifty years of storage. Pieces were chopped off abruptly at the end—by the engineers, not by moi!—with no attempt made at smooth fade-outs. They are what they are. Audio quality is best (sometimes really good) for the chorus selections, but attentive listeners will notice that the choruses seem to be “backwards,” with sopranos to the left and altos to the right. As of today (6/19/15), I have a lot of audio cleanup remaining to remove pops and clicks and to bring up audio levels in the band’s pieces. Hope you enjoy what I have thus far. I’ll work on these some more after the Class of 1968 Dinner this weekend.

Not on the LPs: “Me and My Shadow” by the band and all but the final minute or so of the Finale (from “Mame”). The LP may simply have lacked room.

For each selection, the embedded player appears above the description. For best results when downloading, right-click (Windows) or Control + click (Macintosh) and select the option to Save link as … .

Grand Opening:

1. Grand Opening, Seventy-Six Trombones,¹ Band and Boys Chorus, 03:51, 2.3 MB
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Band:

Suite from Porgy and Bess,² Band, 11:11, 8.1 MB (44.1K sample rate)
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Boys Chorus:

“Get Me to the Church on Time,” Boys Chorus, 01:23, 837 KB
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“Maria,” Boys Chorus, 02:04, 1.3 MB
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“There is Nothing Like a Dame,” 01:57, 1.2 MB
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More to come later: Selections from the Band, the Sophomore Chorus, “Small Group,” and the Jesters will be posted later on. For now, here are songs from the Junior-Senior Girls and Mixed Choruses and the combined Band and Senior Chorus in highlights from “The Man of La Mancha.” Most of “Mame” appears to have been deleted (or perhaps not recorded, at all), but we do get to hear the very end.

I seem to recall choreography and straw hats with “Papa Joe” spelled out by the “Small Group!” Anybody else remember that?

I haven’t undertaken any sonic repairs on these tracks that follow; I’ll try to improve them later on.

Junior-Senior Girls: Selections from “Gypsy,” “My Funny Valentine” (conducted by Mrs. Wanda Smith), and “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” 13:32, 8 MB as a single download (separate files to come!)

Download all three

Mixed Chorus:

“Good Night, Ladies (Pick a Little, Talk a Little),” 01:38, 990 KB
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“Lida Rose,” 03:34, 2.1 MB
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“September Song,” 03:56, 2.4 MB
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“If I Loved You,” conducted by Mrs. Wanda Smith, 04:29, 2.7 MB
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“The Pajama Game,” 06:28, 3.9 MB
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Band and Senior Chorus:

Selections from “The Man of La Mancha,” 07:25, 4.5 MB
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Finale:

Theme from “Mame,” 01:49, 1.1 MB
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NOTES:
All files: 22,050 16-bit samples per second/stereo/80Kbps bit rate, unless other wise noted.
^* Assisted where indicated by Mrs. Wanda Smith, vocal music student teacher from WV State College.
¹ Both the band and the Boys Chorus marched into place on opposite ends of the SAHS gymnasium during the Grand Opening, the band members first, followed by the chorus. Audio quality is all over the map as placement of instruments and voices changed over time. One bad skip at 02:02 and the guys are not really audible until about 02:30, some 45 seconds after their entrance.
² The end of this selection was unceremoniously chopped off by the engineers, so I added a little echo to smooth it out.