| Wicked | |
| Type: | Cast |
| Artist: | Wicked Cast |
| Cover: | WickedCastRecording.jpg |
| Released: | December 16, 2003 |
| Recorded: | November 10, 2003 |
| Genre: | Showtunes |
| Length: | 70:37 |
| Label: | Decca Broadway |
| Producer: | Stephen Schwartz |
Wicked is a cast recording containing the majority of the songs from the Tony Award-winning Broadway musical Wicked, with music and lyrics by composer Stephen Schwartz and a book by writer Winnie Holzman. Released on December 16, 2003 by Decca Broadway both in physical and digital releases. The former contains a foreword and a short synopsis, provided by Gregory Maguire, who wrote the 1995 novel on which the musical is based, in addition to lyrics to those songs included.
Composer and lyricist of Wicked, Stephen Schwartz, produced the album aided by Frank Filipetti, Jill Dell'Abate, Jason Spears, Justin Shturtz, Jason Stasium and Ted Jensen. The original cast album of Wicked was recorded on November 10, 2003, with the full cast and orchestra, at then-Right Track Studios and mastered at Sterling Sound in New York City.
Though initial reviews were mixed, the album received positive reappraisal and substantive commercial success over the years. In 2005, it received the Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album. The album peaked at number 33 on the US Billboard 200 in 2024 and has been certified triple platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The album was recorded by the cast of the musical's 2024 film adaptation and released as .
In 2007, the original Stuttgart cast rerecorded the Wicked album in German, ahead of the opening of the German production in Stuttgart that year. The title of this album was Wicked Das Musical - Die Hexen von Oz. The German lyrics are by Michael Kunze and German dialogue by Ruth Deny, conducted by Sebastian de Domenico. The orchestral music conducted by Stephen Oremus and has identical musician credits—presumably the cast simply sung to the original orchestral recording.
Cast
Alternates
Ensemble vocals
A fifth anniversary special edition of the original Broadway cast recording was released on October 28, 2008,[1] with a bonus CD including tracks "Dancing Through Life", "Popular", "As Long As You're Mine" and "No Good Deed" from the Japanese and German cast recordings of Wicked, "I'm Not That Girl" by Kerry Ellis, "Making Good" – a song that never made the final show – by Stephanie J. Block, Menzel's dance mix of "Defying Gravity" and "For Good" sung by LeAnn Rimes and Delta Goodrem.[2]
The set of two CDs included new deluxe packaging featuring the show's tenth anniversary artwork, and a booklet with new essays by composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz, and Gregory Maguire, the author of Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, the novel on which the musical is based. The set was released digitally on October 29, 2013 and arrived in stores soon after on November 19th.
The album was re-released on February 8, 2019, with four bonus tracks. These tracks were taken from live performances on the show A Very Wicked Halloween: Celebrating 15 Years On Broadway, which was broadcast by NBC on October 29, 2018.[3] [4] [5]
This edition was released on CD, digitally, and on a Limited Exclusive Split Color Vinyl in green and black.
The cast recording received mixed reviews from critics at the time, though later reviews reappraised the music positively. AllMusic rated the score three out of five stars, deeming it "tuneful and the lyrics often witty." They also noted that Chenoweth received the "Broadway belting material" and Menzel the "more adult contemporary-type ballads" and felt that this suited their respective characters. They concluded that the music was "craftsmanlike and certainly efficient for this somewhat questionable project." Writing for Entertainment Weekly, Lawrence Frascella gave the album a negative rating of C+, expressing that it was "fresh evidence that Broadway needs a new, galvanizing musical direction." Frascella lambasted the songs as "a dreary melange of Disney and Sondheim", though he praised the "lushly produced CD" and the performances of Chenoweth and Menzel. He commended the former's "effortless" glides "from ditzy-blonde comedy to thrilling operatic trill" and the latter's "clamorous and ear-piercing" voice that "cuts through the fog of show-tune cliche."
The cast recording initially peaked at number 125 on the US Billboard 200 in 2003, and reached its peak at number 66 in 2014.[6] The album was certified platinum on November 30, 2006 by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). It was certified double platinum on November 8, 2010, and triple platinum on November 30, 2022.[7] It has sold 2,670,000 copies in the United States as of January 2017.[8] [9]
In 2007, Idina Menzel re-recorded "Defying Gravity" as a solo version and released it as a single for her third studio album I Stand (2008).
Julia Murney recorded "I'm Not That Girl" for her album I'm Not Waiting (2006). She recorded this particular song because she deemed it one song of the entire musical "that had nothing to do with flying or wizards".[10]
Kerry Ellis recorded rock versions of the songs "Defying Gravity" and "I'm Not That Girl" for her album Wicked in Rock (2008), produced by Queen's guitarist, Brian May.
In 2012, Mika recorded a dance-pop version of "Popular Song", featuring Priscilla Renea, for his album The Origin of Love. He then recorded the same mix of the song with Ariana Grande, which was put out as a single and later featured on Grande's debut studio album Yours Truly (2013).
| Peak position | ||
| South Korean Albums (Gaon)[11] | 4 | |
|---|---|---|
| US Cast Albums[12] | 1 |
| US Cast Albums[13] | 1 | |
|---|---|---|
| Chart (2007) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[14] | 1 | |
| Chart (2008) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[15] | 1 | |
| Chart (2009) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[16] | 1 | |
| Chart (2010) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[17] | 1 | |
| Chart (2011) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[18] | 2 | |
| Chart (2012) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[19] | 1 | |
| Chart (2013) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[20] | 1 | |
| Chart (2014) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[21] | 1 | |
| Chart (2015) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[22] | 2 | |
| Chart (2016) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[23] | 2 | |
| Chart (2017) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[24] | 3 | |
| Chart (2018) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[25] | 3 | |
| Chart (2019) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[26] | 4 | |
| Chart (2020) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[27] | 2 | |
| Chart (2021) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[28] | 2 | |
| Chart (2022) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[29] | 5 | |
| Chart (2023) | Position | |
| US Cast Albums[30] | 3 |