South Pacific (Original Broadway Cast 1949)

It's all about historical perspective.

Nowadays,when we think of South Pacific, we tend to view it simply as one more hit musical from the golden team of Rodgers & Hammerstein: a heartwarming show full of glorious songs.

But to the opening night audience, it was much,much more than that.

When the curtain rose on 7 April 1949, not even four full years had passed since the end of the Second World War. A musical drama set in the Pacific theatre, filled with soldiers loving, fighting and dying,was bound to have an emotional resonance that we can only guess at today.

By contrast, fourteen years passed from the end of the Vietnam War in 1975 to its depiction in Miss Saigon (1989). And if any musicals have been written about Operation Desert Storm or the recent conflict in Iraq,we've yet to see them.

Consequently, when you listen to this original cast recording, the experience will be intensified by heeding what's between the lines and behind the songs.

Nellie's cheerful A Cockeyed Optimist, for example, with its answer to the nay-sayers who insist "that we're done and we might as well be dead" takes on new resonance when you position it in a world where the first nuclear bombs are about to be detonated.

Some Enchanted Evening isn't just a passionate love song. It's about two people surrounded by death who are hoping a personal relationship could make sense of the insanity around them.

And a ballad with the heart-rending simplicity of Younger Than Springtime acquires added pathos when you realize that the solider who sweetly sings it is soon to die in combat.

The magic of the original South Pacific is that it didn't have to overplay the war card, because everyone in the audience remembered what had happened all too well.

But for us to appreciate the depth of its achievement now, it helps to put ourselves back in that 1949 mindset as much as possible.

It also makes sense for us to realize just where South Pacific sat in the timeline of the considerable careers of Rodgers and Hammerstein.

Each of them had already enjoyed success with other partners before they came together to write Oklahoma! in 1943.

Oscar Hammerstein II (1895-1960) was the elder of the two. As the grandson of famed producer and theatre owner Oscar Hammerstein, he came naturally to the business and had written his first Broadway musical, Always You, before his 25th birthday.

Through the years,Hammerstein wrote with an assortment of collaborators, most notably Sigmund Romberg, Rudolph Friml and Jerome Kern. Although his prolific output included the book and lyrics for hits like Rose Marie and Show Boat, he also had more than his share of flops. In fact, when Rodgers approached him about a partnership, he hadn't had a truly successful show in over a decade.