This was the first recording in 35 years to use the original orchestrations of the Academy Award-winning movie version.

The cast was cut with some characters being combined; the original, lavish orchestrations were simplified.

Bennett's arrangements were largely based on Gershwin's original orchestrations for the opera.

More recently, Gottschalk's original orchestration has been found and recorded.

A piano score was published in 1913, but much of the composer's original orchestration was lost.

"Before then, numbers from shows were recorded with the original people, but not with the original orchestrations," he says.

Only recently have more recordings of his operettas appeared with the original orchestrations intact.

How much the original orchestrations add to the songs - especially the score's less familiar numbers - comes as a small revelation.

The character list was whittled down from 22 to 10, and the original orchestrations also underwent a reduction to a little band.

However, these recordings were not made with the original orchestrations.