The Farmer and the Cowman Should Be Friends

The pioneering attempts to capture an original Broadway production were limited by the technology of the bulky 78 rpm album sets. Still, innovators such as Jack Kapp, producer at Decca Records, and Marc Blitzstein, creator of The Cradle Will Rock, attempted to package larger musical narrative experiences for the home listener. In the middle of a boycott from the American Federation of Musicians in 1943, Oklahoma! opened to phenomenal success on Broadway; Jack Kapp took advantage of a quick settlement with the AFM and put the cast album set to the show (twelve songs on six discs) out before Christmas, turning it into a financial blockbuster and reimagining the commercial product of a Broadway recording.