Post by Stephany on Aug 1, 2007 10:46:09 GMT
Hi everyone,
As you may have noticed, 'West Side Story' has now its own sub-board in the 'Albums' section. I am therefore compiling the existing reviews together in this new 'West Side Story - Reviews' thread.
New reviews will be posted in this thread.
Any further comments on these reviews should be posted here as well
Thanks!
Best wishes,
Stephany
__________________________________________
Review #1 (The Evening Standard)
Review #2 (The Northern Echo)
Review #3 (IndieLondon)
[/color] Grigolo too is wonderful to listen to – but should all American Tony have an accent?
Speaking of which, what has happened to Bernado? His contribution to America (that “better get rid of your accent”) had females everywhere lusting after him. Bernado was, of course, George Chakiris! Here, America is sung just by Anita and the Puerto Rican girls, as indeed it was in the original stage version when Chita Rivera played Anita, and as a result loses some of its bite . A pity….
Which leaves Connie Fisher who has only the one song, the haunting Somewhere, in which to prove herself. She does, of course, although her inclusion as ‘A girl’ is puzzling as the number belongs entirely to Tony and Maria. Could it be Fisher’s new-found fame, justified though it is, was just too tempting a lure?
For all that, this is a beautiful recording, one that fan’s of Bernstein’s highly acclaimed musical will love. It’s also a fitting tribute to a work that has stood the test of time and is as popular today as it was 50 years ago. [/size][/quote]
Review #4 (The Daily Express)
Review #5 (NewNoise.Net)
Review #6 (BBC.co.uk)
[/color], while Connie Fisher’s cavernously-recorded cameo in what should have been a show-stealing rendition of “Somewhere” is curiously unsatisfying. Just as disappointing is the job lot ensemble that make the hardened street-gang chorus sound decidedly camp.
Bernstein’s staggeringly inventive music is played by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic with conviction, if never quite the full palette of colours, and occasionally lacks the necessary punch and pizzazz. Even so, the material still shines through, and reminds you that in a good recording (try John Owen Edwards’ complete version on That’s Entertainment Records) this is certainly a work that is worth celebrating and getting to know, albeit, perhaps, not with this recording.
[/size][/quote]
Review #7 (The Mail on Sunday)
[/color]
A flavour of the controversy over inter-racial romance at this time can be provided by the surprised disapproval which greeted the marriage of pop singer Buddy Holly - a Baptist from Lubbock, Texas - to Maria Elena Santiago, a Catholic girl from Puerto Rico.
Fifty years on, however, West Side Story still packs a few surprises.
It continues to remain controversial. Puerto Rican activists frequently protest at performances, arguing that West Side Story stereotypes and demeans Puerto Ricans.
Once a popular show for high-school performances, it is now largely avoided by the educational establishment.
People are fearful of accusations of political incorrectness - even though it is regularly restated that the point of West Side Story is that love between a white man and a Puerto Rican woman can break down racial hatred.
Certainly times have changed since such love was considered a thing of scandal. For a tourist to New York, however, what surprises most is the way that the West Side of New York has been transformed since the Fifties. For the wealthy who lived in grand apartments on the East Side of Central Park, the West Side was traditionally something of a no-go area.
West of mid-town, for example, was Hell's Kitchen, a festering slum of poverty and vice, at which wealthy Manhattanites would have shuddered on their way to board opulent transatlantic liners.
HESE days, as you might expect, the area is now undergoing rapid gentrification. The lower West Side was always dirty and dangerous but the upper West Side was originally, from its development at the end of the 19th Century, a place of bohemian chic.
The streets which, by the Fifties, were being roamed by gangs of hoodlums, had only years before been the haunt of showbiz legends such as Irving Berlin and George Gershwin (who wrote Rhapsody In Blue on a battered upright piano in his Riverside apartment overlooking the Hudson). Ingrid Bergman and Igor Stravinsky were among the regular guests who stayed at the wonderful Art Deco hotel Essex House, now the Jumeirah Essex House and, more recently, a favourite of rock band Oasis.
The Dakota building on Central Park West was once visited by Tchaikovsky and was where Lennon lived and where he was shot dead in 1980.
There really was more than just a touch of the Wild West about the West Side. John Martin, for example, the original ticket-taker in the subway station at Broadway and West 103rd, had a unique claim to fame: he was the only survivor of the Custer massacre at Little Big Horn.
By the beginning of the Sixties, when Hollywood arrived to shoot the first scenes of its version of West Side Story, the area was changing fast.
The chosen area was West 61st Street near the junction with Amsterdam as several apartment blocks had been earmarked for demolition (the site was quickly redeveloped as the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts).
As you look up West 61st to Amsterdam, you have to use your imagination a little to recreate the opening scenes where the Jets confront the Sharks (the basketball court was actually located a couple of miles away on East 110th Street).
In truth, the Puerto Rican community was located much further north than 61st Street: east of 86th Street and beyond to the north.
Yet even around West 66th Street, now loomed over by the glass twin towers of the Mandarin Oriental, very strange things have happened.
It was here that film star Rudolph Valentino was laid out in the Frank Campbell Funeral Church after his untimely death from perotinitis in August 1926 - 80,000 adoring women fans arrived to pay their respects turning the event into a celebrity circus of a sort that became more familiar as the century grew older.
New York's West Side, it seems, has a million stories: the tale of the Sharks and the Jets is just one of them. [/size][/quote]
As you may have noticed, 'West Side Story' has now its own sub-board in the 'Albums' section. I am therefore compiling the existing reviews together in this new 'West Side Story - Reviews' thread.
New reviews will be posted in this thread.
Any further comments on these reviews should be posted here as well
Thanks!Best wishes,
Stephany
__________________________________________
Review #1 (The Evening Standard)
Various Artists - West Side Story
(Universal Classics and Jazz)
Evening Standard - London
July 20, 2007
By Norman Lebrecht
Just when you thought crossover could get no tackier, the company that put together Leonard Bernstein's nightmare cast for West Side Story has outdone itself with a 50th anniversary tribute album for the work's Broadway premiere.
Bernstein's nadir was a 1984 operatic cast led by Kiri Te Kanawa and Jos Carreras, whom the composer drenched in abuse for their inability to bend a street-cred line. The present line-up is drawn from the amplified charm school: Kiri's Maria is sung by Hayley Westenra, while the Carreras role is aped by pop-opera star Vittorio Grigolo. Where he belts, she winsomely tweets; any musical grit gets lost in tooth-gleam. Elsewhere, Connie Fisher, the BBC talent -show winner, sings Somewhere on the dumb side of nave.
The 1961 movie has been refurbished on DVD; it is preferable on every count.
(Universal Classics and Jazz)
Evening Standard - London
July 20, 2007
By Norman Lebrecht
Just when you thought crossover could get no tackier, the company that put together Leonard Bernstein's nightmare cast for West Side Story has outdone itself with a 50th anniversary tribute album for the work's Broadway premiere.
Bernstein's nadir was a 1984 operatic cast led by Kiri Te Kanawa and Jos Carreras, whom the composer drenched in abuse for their inability to bend a street-cred line. The present line-up is drawn from the amplified charm school: Kiri's Maria is sung by Hayley Westenra, while the Carreras role is aped by pop-opera star Vittorio Grigolo. Where he belts, she winsomely tweets; any musical grit gets lost in tooth-gleam. Elsewhere, Connie Fisher, the BBC talent -show winner, sings Somewhere on the dumb side of nave.
The 1961 movie has been refurbished on DVD; it is preferable on every count.
Review #2 (The Northern Echo)
News and reviews : 'West Side Story'
By Matt Westcott
26 July 2007
The Northern Echo
(c) 2007 North of England Newspapers.
Various (UCJ Music) West Side Story is one of the finest of all musicals, so recasting the story to mark its 50th anniversary is a somewhat daunting task. Making it relevant in 2007, while retaining the aspects that made it so well-loved is no mean feat, but on initial listening, it would appear it's been a success and an interpretation Leonard Bernstein would have approved of. Hayley Westenra takes on the role of Maria, joining Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo. Connie Fisher, winner of How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria? , also appears, while orchestration comes from the Royal Liverpool Philarmonic.
By Matt Westcott
26 July 2007
The Northern Echo
(c) 2007 North of England Newspapers.
Various (UCJ Music) West Side Story is one of the finest of all musicals, so recasting the story to mark its 50th anniversary is a somewhat daunting task. Making it relevant in 2007, while retaining the aspects that made it so well-loved is no mean feat, but on initial listening, it would appear it's been a success and an interpretation Leonard Bernstein would have approved of. Hayley Westenra takes on the role of Maria, joining Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo. Connie Fisher, winner of How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria? , also appears, while orchestration comes from the Royal Liverpool Philarmonic.
Review #3 (IndieLondon)
West Side Story
Fifty years old and still going strong – that’s West Side Story, a musical that broke new ground when it was launched on an unsuspecting public back in 1957.
Inspired by Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, West Side Story relocates to New York where the tension between two rival gangs – the all American Jets and the Puerto Rican Sharks – erupts into violence with tragic consequences for Tony and Maria, the young lovers from opposing sides.
As well as innovative dance routines and songs that wear their hearts on their sleeves, West Side Story tackles the thorny issue of racism, thereby making it as pertinent today as it has always been. Quite apart, of course, from the dangerous knife culture.
Now and to celebrate its 50th anniversary, comes a new ‘glitzy’ recording of this evergreen musical, featuring two of the biggest and youngest stars of classical cross-over in the world – Vittorio Grigolo as Tony and Hayley Westenra as Maria. Other stars include Connie Fisher, Will Martin (as Riff, leader of the Jets) and Melanie Marshall (as Anita, Maria’s brother’s girlfriend).
As you would expect, this is a classy recording and captures all the excitement and pathos of the original. And here I’m referring to the original sound track recording of the 1961 motion picture which, to me, will always be the definitive one – perhaps because it was my introduction to West Side Story.
There’s absolutely no doubt Westenra has a beautiful voice but it is sophisticated, something Maria definitely isn’t. She is, in fact, a simple girl from Puerto Rico, albeit a very pretty one, and in Westenra’s voice I feel something of her naivete is lost.
Fifty years old and still going strong – that’s West Side Story, a musical that broke new ground when it was launched on an unsuspecting public back in 1957.
Inspired by Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, West Side Story relocates to New York where the tension between two rival gangs – the all American Jets and the Puerto Rican Sharks – erupts into violence with tragic consequences for Tony and Maria, the young lovers from opposing sides.
As well as innovative dance routines and songs that wear their hearts on their sleeves, West Side Story tackles the thorny issue of racism, thereby making it as pertinent today as it has always been. Quite apart, of course, from the dangerous knife culture.
Now and to celebrate its 50th anniversary, comes a new ‘glitzy’ recording of this evergreen musical, featuring two of the biggest and youngest stars of classical cross-over in the world – Vittorio Grigolo as Tony and Hayley Westenra as Maria. Other stars include Connie Fisher, Will Martin (as Riff, leader of the Jets) and Melanie Marshall (as Anita, Maria’s brother’s girlfriend).
As you would expect, this is a classy recording and captures all the excitement and pathos of the original. And here I’m referring to the original sound track recording of the 1961 motion picture which, to me, will always be the definitive one – perhaps because it was my introduction to West Side Story.
There’s absolutely no doubt Westenra has a beautiful voice but it is sophisticated, something Maria definitely isn’t. She is, in fact, a simple girl from Puerto Rico, albeit a very pretty one, and in Westenra’s voice I feel something of her naivete is lost.
Speaking of which, what has happened to Bernado? His contribution to America (that “better get rid of your accent”) had females everywhere lusting after him. Bernado was, of course, George Chakiris! Here, America is sung just by Anita and the Puerto Rican girls, as indeed it was in the original stage version when Chita Rivera played Anita, and as a result loses some of its bite . A pity….
Which leaves Connie Fisher who has only the one song, the haunting Somewhere, in which to prove herself. She does, of course, although her inclusion as ‘A girl’ is puzzling as the number belongs entirely to Tony and Maria. Could it be Fisher’s new-found fame, justified though it is, was just too tempting a lure?
For all that, this is a beautiful recording, one that fan’s of Bernstein’s highly acclaimed musical will love. It’s also a fitting tribute to a work that has stood the test of time and is as popular today as it was 50 years ago. [/size][/quote]
Review #4 (The Daily Express)
Let's hear it again for a classic story
Marcus Dunk
27 July 2007
The Daily Express
(c) 2007 Express Newspapers
ALBUM OF THE WEEK VARIOUS: WEST SIDE STORY (UCJ)
It was inspired by Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet, is still one of the great American musicals and this year celebrates its 50th birthday. Half a century on, West Side Story continues to hold a special place in the hearts of fans in a way that perhaps only The Sound Of Music comes close to emulating.
From Maria and America through to Tonight and Somewhere, its songs have become standards, while its choreography has been copied, emulated and parodied by countless imitators over the years.
Not that it hasn't aged. Anyone who has recently watched the Academy award-winning 1961 film knows that at times it's difficult to stifle the giggles when supposedly hardened Jets and Sharks gang members begin to flounce around singing showtunes.
Yet it's also worth noting that from the beginning, this was a musical seen as being slightly out of step. Leonard Bernstein's showy and occasionally operatic score seemed to some to be ill-suited to the story of love amongst gang warfare in contemporary New York, while the gritty, contemporary setting was initially deemed too depressing for mainstream audiences to handle.
Of course, those concerns proved to be ill-founded but there is still a sense that this is a musical with its feet in different camps. It seems fitting then, that for this 50th-anniversary recording, the producers have chosen a number of classical crossover stars to take the lead roles, including superstar tenor Vittorio Grigolo as Tony, young soprano Hayley Westenra as Maria, and Sound Of Music star Connie Fisher as the girl who sings Somewhere.
Although they have their work cut out in competing with the definitive 1984 recording, which featured Jose Carreras as Tony, Kiri Te Kanawa as Maria and Leonard Bernstein conducting, this version has a y outhful, rough-around-the-edges vitality that the earlier release sorely lacked.
Long-term fans might not entirely approve but this energetic recording is a fitting birthday gift for this marvellous musical.
Marcus Dunk
27 July 2007
The Daily Express
(c) 2007 Express Newspapers
ALBUM OF THE WEEK VARIOUS: WEST SIDE STORY (UCJ)
It was inspired by Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet, is still one of the great American musicals and this year celebrates its 50th birthday. Half a century on, West Side Story continues to hold a special place in the hearts of fans in a way that perhaps only The Sound Of Music comes close to emulating.
From Maria and America through to Tonight and Somewhere, its songs have become standards, while its choreography has been copied, emulated and parodied by countless imitators over the years.
Not that it hasn't aged. Anyone who has recently watched the Academy award-winning 1961 film knows that at times it's difficult to stifle the giggles when supposedly hardened Jets and Sharks gang members begin to flounce around singing showtunes.
Yet it's also worth noting that from the beginning, this was a musical seen as being slightly out of step. Leonard Bernstein's showy and occasionally operatic score seemed to some to be ill-suited to the story of love amongst gang warfare in contemporary New York, while the gritty, contemporary setting was initially deemed too depressing for mainstream audiences to handle.
Of course, those concerns proved to be ill-founded but there is still a sense that this is a musical with its feet in different camps. It seems fitting then, that for this 50th-anniversary recording, the producers have chosen a number of classical crossover stars to take the lead roles, including superstar tenor Vittorio Grigolo as Tony, young soprano Hayley Westenra as Maria, and Sound Of Music star Connie Fisher as the girl who sings Somewhere.
Although they have their work cut out in competing with the definitive 1984 recording, which featured Jose Carreras as Tony, Kiri Te Kanawa as Maria and Leonard Bernstein conducting, this version has a y outhful, rough-around-the-edges vitality that the earlier release sorely lacked.
Long-term fans might not entirely approve but this energetic recording is a fitting birthday gift for this marvellous musical.
Review #5 (NewNoise.Net)
Various - West Side Story OST
By Chloe Kiely
Classical crossover – not a genre particularly regularly featured on these here New Noise pages, but then West Side Story is not a regular musical. Since its creation in 1957, it's been a staple of amateur school productions and – deny it as they will – you'd be hard pressed to find a vocalist today who, on their way to world rock domination, hadn't grappled with Sondheim's masterful lyrics as a whippersnapper.
This brand new recording celebrates the musical's 50th anniversary and features classical stars Vittorio Grigolo and Hayley Westenra, alongside Connie "sick note" Fisher. And it's a corker. The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra's lush and exciting sounds do Bernstein proud while, with themes of immigration, violence and thwarted love, it's as fresh and relevant as ever.
By Chloe Kiely
Classical crossover – not a genre particularly regularly featured on these here New Noise pages, but then West Side Story is not a regular musical. Since its creation in 1957, it's been a staple of amateur school productions and – deny it as they will – you'd be hard pressed to find a vocalist today who, on their way to world rock domination, hadn't grappled with Sondheim's masterful lyrics as a whippersnapper.
This brand new recording celebrates the musical's 50th anniversary and features classical stars Vittorio Grigolo and Hayley Westenra, alongside Connie "sick note" Fisher. And it's a corker. The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra's lush and exciting sounds do Bernstein proud while, with themes of immigration, violence and thwarted love, it's as fresh and relevant as ever.
Review #6 (BBC.co.uk)
Various - West Side Story OST
ALBUMS
Various Artists, West Side Story
By Michael Quinn (2007-07-26)
Few musicals straddle the much-contested divide between music theatre and opera as confidently and persuasively as Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story, a star-making, career-breaking reworking of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet with lyrics by Stephen Sondheim.
This new recording from the crossover division of Universal Classics marks the 50th anniversary of the work’s debut on Broadway and shies away from the operatic leanings of Bernstein’s compellingly crafted, adrenaline-driven music. Instead, it surfs along on sassily conceived but thinly woven textures, choosing to put its faith in opera-lite Kiwi starlet Hayley Westenra and emerging Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo.
Bernstein himself maintained that the most difficult aspect of this seminal work was casting, and so it proves here. As Maria, Westenra sings with sweet innocence and passably pleasing musicality, but her tendency to hug the top end of her voice imbues everything with a helium-filled, wobble-afflicted fluting sound that feels more Hampstead than Hell’s Kitchen.
Rapport with her fellow star-crossed lover, Vittorio Grigolo’s Tony, is conspicuous only by its sorry absence. Grigolo has heartthrob looks and sings with puppy-dog charm but not always with great diction, the echoes of José Carreras unfortunately calling to mind the near-disaster of Bernstein’s own monumentally miscast recording of the work in 1984.
Melanie Marshall’s rather clumsily approximated Anita seems as miscast as Westenra
Various Artists, West Side Story
By Michael Quinn (2007-07-26)
Few musicals straddle the much-contested divide between music theatre and opera as confidently and persuasively as Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story, a star-making, career-breaking reworking of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet with lyrics by Stephen Sondheim.
This new recording from the crossover division of Universal Classics marks the 50th anniversary of the work’s debut on Broadway and shies away from the operatic leanings of Bernstein’s compellingly crafted, adrenaline-driven music. Instead, it surfs along on sassily conceived but thinly woven textures, choosing to put its faith in opera-lite Kiwi starlet Hayley Westenra and emerging Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo.
Bernstein himself maintained that the most difficult aspect of this seminal work was casting, and so it proves here. As Maria, Westenra sings with sweet innocence and passably pleasing musicality, but her tendency to hug the top end of her voice imbues everything with a helium-filled, wobble-afflicted fluting sound that feels more Hampstead than Hell’s Kitchen.
Rapport with her fellow star-crossed lover, Vittorio Grigolo’s Tony, is conspicuous only by its sorry absence. Grigolo has heartthrob looks and sings with puppy-dog charm but not always with great diction, the echoes of José Carreras unfortunately calling to mind the near-disaster of Bernstein’s own monumentally miscast recording of the work in 1984.
Melanie Marshall’s rather clumsily approximated Anita seems as miscast as Westenra
Bernstein’s staggeringly inventive music is played by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic with conviction, if never quite the full palette of colours, and occasionally lacks the necessary punch and pizzazz. Even so, the material still shines through, and reminds you that in a good recording (try John Owen Edwards’ complete version on That’s Entertainment Records) this is certainly a work that is worth celebrating and getting to know, albeit, perhaps, not with this recording.
[/size][/quote]
Review #7 (The Mail on Sunday)
WEST SIDE GLORY
29 July 2007
The Mail on Sunday
(c) 2007 Associated Newspapers. All rights reserved
Half a century on, Frank Barrett revisits the fascinating, gritty New York district which inspired the mould-shattering musical
New York's Winter Garden is - surprisingly - one of just four Broadway theatres actually to be found on Broadway. This is where Al Jolson made his debut as a minstrel, Streisand made her name (in the musical Funny Girl) and Lloyd Webber's Cats played for a record-breaking 18 years.
But, for many, the theatre's greatest moment came 50 years ago this September - the opening night of West Side Story. With music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, stunning choreography by Jerry Robbins and a story, based on Romeo and Juliet, by Arthur Laurents, the show broke the mould of boy-meets-girl productions.
However tuneful, the songs - Maria, I Feel Pretty, America, Somewhere, Tonight - presented an unflinching view of racial strife in Fifties Manhattan where, each year, 75,000 Puerto Ricans arrived from their Spanish-speaking, US-controlled homeland. Some went to the West Side but most lived in the crowded tenements on the Upper East Side, turning a part of Harlem into Spanish Harlem.
It was the East Side that was the original inspiration for the show - the first idea Laurents and Robbins had in 1949 was to tell the tale of a young Italian-American who falls for a young, Jewish Holocaust survivor. The working title was East Side Story.
But when, years later, fights began to break out on the West Side between gangs of Puerto Rican and Polish-American boys, the idea was quickly revived as West Side Story.
Accustomed to more wholesome family musical fare, such as South Pacific and My Fair Lady, it was perhaps not surprising that the Broadway critics were taken aback by the jarring modernity of West Side Story.
Brooks Atkinson of the New York Times, for example, described the music of the opening scene as 'shrill' and the dancing as 'harsh and sinister'.
But after Tony and Maria's 'tender and affecting' balcony scene on the fire escape of 'a dreary tenement', he concluded that: 'West Side Story is an incandescent piece of work that finds odd bits of beauty amid the rubbish of the streets.'
To mark the 50th anniversary of the show's first performance, record company Universal has issued a new recording of West Side Story featuring New Zealand singer Hayley Westenra and Italian tenor Victor Grigolo.
'For me the musical conjures up all the drama and excitement of New York,' says Hayley. 'It was controversial, it captured a piece of history, how people felt at the time.'
29 July 2007
The Mail on Sunday
(c) 2007 Associated Newspapers. All rights reserved
Half a century on, Frank Barrett revisits the fascinating, gritty New York district which inspired the mould-shattering musical
New York's Winter Garden is - surprisingly - one of just four Broadway theatres actually to be found on Broadway. This is where Al Jolson made his debut as a minstrel, Streisand made her name (in the musical Funny Girl) and Lloyd Webber's Cats played for a record-breaking 18 years.
But, for many, the theatre's greatest moment came 50 years ago this September - the opening night of West Side Story. With music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, stunning choreography by Jerry Robbins and a story, based on Romeo and Juliet, by Arthur Laurents, the show broke the mould of boy-meets-girl productions.
However tuneful, the songs - Maria, I Feel Pretty, America, Somewhere, Tonight - presented an unflinching view of racial strife in Fifties Manhattan where, each year, 75,000 Puerto Ricans arrived from their Spanish-speaking, US-controlled homeland. Some went to the West Side but most lived in the crowded tenements on the Upper East Side, turning a part of Harlem into Spanish Harlem.
It was the East Side that was the original inspiration for the show - the first idea Laurents and Robbins had in 1949 was to tell the tale of a young Italian-American who falls for a young, Jewish Holocaust survivor. The working title was East Side Story.
But when, years later, fights began to break out on the West Side between gangs of Puerto Rican and Polish-American boys, the idea was quickly revived as West Side Story.
Accustomed to more wholesome family musical fare, such as South Pacific and My Fair Lady, it was perhaps not surprising that the Broadway critics were taken aback by the jarring modernity of West Side Story.
Brooks Atkinson of the New York Times, for example, described the music of the opening scene as 'shrill' and the dancing as 'harsh and sinister'.
But after Tony and Maria's 'tender and affecting' balcony scene on the fire escape of 'a dreary tenement', he concluded that: 'West Side Story is an incandescent piece of work that finds odd bits of beauty amid the rubbish of the streets.'
To mark the 50th anniversary of the show's first performance, record company Universal has issued a new recording of West Side Story featuring New Zealand singer Hayley Westenra and Italian tenor Victor Grigolo.
'For me the musical conjures up all the drama and excitement of New York,' says Hayley. 'It was controversial, it captured a piece of history, how people felt at the time.'
A flavour of the controversy over inter-racial romance at this time can be provided by the surprised disapproval which greeted the marriage of pop singer Buddy Holly - a Baptist from Lubbock, Texas - to Maria Elena Santiago, a Catholic girl from Puerto Rico.
Fifty years on, however, West Side Story still packs a few surprises.
It continues to remain controversial. Puerto Rican activists frequently protest at performances, arguing that West Side Story stereotypes and demeans Puerto Ricans.
Once a popular show for high-school performances, it is now largely avoided by the educational establishment.
People are fearful of accusations of political incorrectness - even though it is regularly restated that the point of West Side Story is that love between a white man and a Puerto Rican woman can break down racial hatred.
Certainly times have changed since such love was considered a thing of scandal. For a tourist to New York, however, what surprises most is the way that the West Side of New York has been transformed since the Fifties. For the wealthy who lived in grand apartments on the East Side of Central Park, the West Side was traditionally something of a no-go area.
West of mid-town, for example, was Hell's Kitchen, a festering slum of poverty and vice, at which wealthy Manhattanites would have shuddered on their way to board opulent transatlantic liners.
HESE days, as you might expect, the area is now undergoing rapid gentrification. The lower West Side was always dirty and dangerous but the upper West Side was originally, from its development at the end of the 19th Century, a place of bohemian chic.
The streets which, by the Fifties, were being roamed by gangs of hoodlums, had only years before been the haunt of showbiz legends such as Irving Berlin and George Gershwin (who wrote Rhapsody In Blue on a battered upright piano in his Riverside apartment overlooking the Hudson). Ingrid Bergman and Igor Stravinsky were among the regular guests who stayed at the wonderful Art Deco hotel Essex House, now the Jumeirah Essex House and, more recently, a favourite of rock band Oasis.
The Dakota building on Central Park West was once visited by Tchaikovsky and was where Lennon lived and where he was shot dead in 1980.
There really was more than just a touch of the Wild West about the West Side. John Martin, for example, the original ticket-taker in the subway station at Broadway and West 103rd, had a unique claim to fame: he was the only survivor of the Custer massacre at Little Big Horn.
By the beginning of the Sixties, when Hollywood arrived to shoot the first scenes of its version of West Side Story, the area was changing fast.
The chosen area was West 61st Street near the junction with Amsterdam as several apartment blocks had been earmarked for demolition (the site was quickly redeveloped as the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts).
As you look up West 61st to Amsterdam, you have to use your imagination a little to recreate the opening scenes where the Jets confront the Sharks (the basketball court was actually located a couple of miles away on East 110th Street).
In truth, the Puerto Rican community was located much further north than 61st Street: east of 86th Street and beyond to the north.
Yet even around West 66th Street, now loomed over by the glass twin towers of the Mandarin Oriental, very strange things have happened.
It was here that film star Rudolph Valentino was laid out in the Frank Campbell Funeral Church after his untimely death from perotinitis in August 1926 - 80,000 adoring women fans arrived to pay their respects turning the event into a celebrity circus of a sort that became more familiar as the century grew older.
New York's West Side, it seems, has a million stories: the tale of the Sharks and the Jets is just one of them. [/size][/quote]
