Jesus Christ Superstar

Forever, this musical has been destroyed…

Back in the day that this musical was produced, I was seven years old. By the time I was twelve, an older sibling had moved out of the house and left the album behind. The same took place at a neighbors home. His brother had moved out and my younger brother and our neighbor friend had gotten together to listen to music and make their own version of Jesus Christ Superstar. As it turned out, it was a comedy. A major comedy, much as the same as  Andrew Lloyd Webber’s original.  Never get your theology from Broadway. Everything is lost in translation. From what I heard, last nights live performance was running late and the Resurrection was cut. Honestly, proving my point.

I wish I had the original tapes from that day they were originally recorded to share. My brother and our neighbor friend, compiled the entire musical from a fifth graders point of view, in our grade school setting. Most of it dealing with the teachers being the bad guys, and the children being on the side of Jesus. They would play the album on our old turn table, at a 45 rpm speed, rather than the required 33 rpm, as the entire story played out. The laughter outweighed the entire story. If you seek to go back and listen to the original, during “Judas Death” scene, see if you can point out the Batman Theme Song. Once you hear it, you can’t un-hear it.

As last nights performance played live on television, I was taking care of other things. After a week of Easter preparations, I was simply exhausted, forgetting it was on. Logging on to my social media, I realized I had missed it. I began to search youtube for the videos, and found some from the original performance. The second I hit play, I began to laugh hysterically, remembering the Original Tapes of my brother’s rendition of the musical.

Nothing from Broadway is Sacred.

Thank you Lord for the memories, and a stunning Easter Triduum, still playing.  Still holding my full attention.