Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

1972
LP: Warner Brothers BS 2671
CD: none
Lyric by Don Black

1. Overture (4:31)
2. Curiouser and Curiouser (2:17)
3. You've Gotta Know When to Stop (2:09)
4. The Royal Procession (1:44)
5. The Last Word is Mine (2:02)
6. Dum and Dee Dance (3:03)
7. The Pun Song (3:03)
8. I've Never Been This Far Before (2:19)
9. Curiouser and Curiouser (2:15)
10. I've Never Been This Far Before (2:19)
11. Medley: Off with Their Heads, The Croquet Game, Off with Their Heads, The Moral Song, Off with Their Heads (4:16)
12. The Me I Never Knew (2:41)
13. The Lobster Quadrille (1:46)
14. Will You Walk a Little Faster (1:58)
15. They Told Me (0:55)
16. The Me I Never Knew (4:12)

The Movie

This is one of those star-studded remakes of Alice in Wonderland that gets produced every decade or so. This one features a British all-star cast: from Robert Helpmann, Ralph Richardson, and Flora Robson to Peter Sellers, Dudley Moore and Spike Milligan. This almost never plays in the US--I saw it once on a Sunday afternoon on broadcast. It is available on DVD but the quality is said to be marginal at best.

The Music

I love this soundtrack. I'm not a fan of musicals as a general rule--even Barry's musicals, but I enjoy this soundtrack throughly. Fiona Fullerton sings "Curioser and Curioser" and "The Me I Never Knew" which are great song with that weird Barry melody that make the songs so unusual. And the Royal Procession is as great a fanfare as I've heard anywhere. If I could choose any of Barry's as-yet-unavailable soundtracks to put out next on CD--this would be it.

Release Notes

The album jacket is folded to make it look like a double-LP, but as far as I know this is only a single album. It's available on LP and I still see it periodically when I root through used records. It was never commercially released as a CD and sadly never rated a bootleg edition. Barry saw fit to include a suite on his The Concert John Barry LP, and a single version of the song "Curiouser and Curiouser" shows up on the LP The Very Best of John Barry and CD The Best of John Barry. Nic Raine recorded the songs "Curiouser and Curiouser," "You've Gotta Know When to Stop" and "The Me I Never Knew" on his compilation CD Walkabout.