MISS SAIGON, the Vietnam War update of Puccini's "Madame Butterfly," is the high-water mark for the Euro-musical, that Continental hybrid of opera, drama and spectacle that dominated Broadway for much of the last two decades. This double-disc recording of the 1989 world-premiere cast features Jonathan Pryce and
Lea Salonga, who both went on to win Tonys for their respective roles as a venal pimp and his teenage whore. The romantic score out-
Webbers Lord Andrew with such affecting and surprisingly intimate songs as "The Movie in My Mind," "The Heat Is On In Saigon" and "The Last Night of the World." Pryce's eye-popping paean to supply-side economics, "The American Dream," thrills even when separated from the show's amazing visual flash. "I'd Give My Life For You" and "Sun and Moon" finds Filipino soprano Salonga trilling with awesome power and conviction. Enthralling in its sweeping passions, MISS SAIGON captures both the chaos of war as well as the sensual ecstasies and romantic yearnings of the men and women caught up in its wake.