At this point, I'm not sure what those pressing matters were, but I have now gathered myself together enough to produce a transfer of this sterling album from 1952, one of the best of the many, many collaborations between the Boston Pops and their longtime conductor, Arthur Fiedler.
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| Arthur Fiedler |
Perhaps appropriately, considering the gruesome cover, the balance of the album consists of "bleeding chunks" from popular 20th century ballets - two excerpts from Copland's Rodeo, Stravinsky's Petrouchka and Gould's Interplay, three from Bernstein's Fancy Free and Falla's Three-Cornered Hat, and one each from Shostakovich's Age of Gold, Khachaturian's Gayne (the Sabre Dance, natch) and Menotti's Sebastian.
Even "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue," which annotator Irving Kolodin proclaims as being presented for the first time in its entirety, is cut. The Fielder rendition runs for eight minutes; the version on the 1983 LP of the On Your Toes revival lasts over 14. (Nor is it the original orchestration. I believe this version is by Robert Russell Bennett, which is generally heard in place of the Hans Spialek original.)
I'm just stuffy enough to sneer at such hacking away at integral works - but after all, most of these are intended as suites, and the superb results justify the means. This is quite the glorious record, in splendidly impactful sound from Symphony Hall.
It's perhaps worth noting that the scores for all but Petrouchka were written within 20 or so years of the making of this record. Could such a record be made today, I wonder?
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| Roger Voisin |
I've written before about the one-time ubiquity of the "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" music. This marks the fifth time I've presented some version of the music on this blog. in the wings is the soundtrack album from the 1957 film Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, in which stolid prosecutor Richard Egan takes on a waterfront mob boss, improbably played by Walter Matthau, to solve a killing on the docks - to the accompaniment of Herschel Burke Gilbert's arrangement of Rodgers's music.
Link (Apple lossless):
ReplyDeletehttps://www.mediafire.com/?vrcyucw1oc8ec6k
More Fiedler goodness, Buster. Great stuff. Thanks!!! "Slaughter" is one of those tunes you can't get outta your head when you hear it, and it's just as fun to perform.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteThank you!
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me that I had a couple versions of Ave Maria to share out that I think were arranged by Robert Russell Bennett, but I forgot to note it. Thanks for reminding me!
ReplyDeleteIt occurs to me that I must have heard only the Hans Spialek orchestration of Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, as I've encountered the piece only when seeing On Your Toes or listening to one of its cast recordings. (OK, the one from the 1950s has a Don Walker reorchestration, so there's that....)
ReplyDeleteThanks, all, for your notes!
ReplyDeleteJAC - The Spialek was only used, to my knowledge, for the 1983 revival (which I also saw) and the cast album. The Columbia LP from the 50s used the Don Walker version, as you note. Not sure what that subsequent 50s revival used.
Love this convincing compilation around my beloved Richard Rodgers ! The Menotti and Stravinsky under Fiedler look to be rarities !!
ReplyDeleteThanks Buster.
Worth every moment of the wait. I don’t think I’ve seen that photo of Fiedler before. I’m so used to the usual grandfatherly images, it’s always a bit of a jar to see him as a younger man. I’ve always been fond of 10th Ave music, truncated or not. Haven’t heard the 1957 soundtrack, so looking forward to that. Many thanks for remembering this.
ReplyDeleterev.b - You are welcome! That photo is approximately contemporaneous with this recording.
ReplyDeletethank you, Buster!
ReplyDeleteMarty - Now that's one I've never heard!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Buster! I bought this LP ages ago just for the cover, though the record itself is trashed. (Whoever the designer was, he was certainly literal minded. "OK--'Slaughter on 10th Avenue.' Street sign and blood. Got it. I'll be knocking off early today.") Glad I will finally be able to give the contents a real listen. - Jeff
ReplyDeleteOr not...
DeleteJeff,
DeleteThe link seems to work. Might want to try again, if you had a problem.
The designer was quite literal-minded. I am surprised he or she confined the blood to the word "Slaughter."
I first encountered this album as a very scratchy disc without a cover when I was a child. Through all the noise, many of the selection were memorable enough to stay with me into adulthood. Over the years, I’ve come across copies in better condition, but none nearly as flawless as the transfers you’ve shared here Buster. I just wanted to drop you a note of thanks for your fine work and thorough job here and elsewhere. Going by the number of comment you receive for each of your posts, many apparently join me this appreciation.
Deleterev.b - It is my pleasure to work on these records; I am glad that folks like you appreciate them!
DeleteBuster--
ReplyDeleteYou were right; who knows what my previous problem was but I am now really enjoying this delightful transfer! Thank you!
Jeff
thanks for this, buster.
ReplyDeletewow, scoredaddy!, you're a bit of a ghost from the past--at least, mine. you still posting somewhere?
Buster -- I just now caught up with your comment "The Spialek was only used, to my knowledge, for the 1983 revival (which I also saw) and the cast album." And of course for the original 1936 production, for which (typical of the period) we have no cast recording.
ReplyDeleteBut subsequently R&H made the reconstructed version with the Spialek orchestrations its official rental version, so who knows where all it's been performed over the years since (one of my students mentioned that his high school had done the show, so we can't rule anything out). For sure, it was used for the Encores! production in May 2013 -- I was there.
JAC - Yes, good point, and I have heard the Encores presentation myself (although I did not see it). I should avoid making sweeping statements!
ReplyDeleteI'm really enjoying this recording. Thanks Buster
ReplyDeleteRichard - You are welcome!
ReplyDeleteHaven't heard this in years, and I ask myself why haven't I? So good, and "Sterling" indeed. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteMediafire has blocked this download
ReplyDeleteRootie - I just tried it from an anonymous IP address and it seems OK. Try it again and if it doesn't work, I'll upload to Zippy.
ReplyDeleteI tried it again last night and it worked fine. Don't know what the issue was because it specifically came up with one track that it said was disputed. not a general folder access denial, though it wouldn't let me download anything.
ReplyDeleteRootie - Mediafire is peculiar that way.
ReplyDeleteBuster, this is really wonderful to have. I happened to know, personally, the producer of Fiedler's LAST record: the "Crystal Clear" direct to disk LP of Tchaikovsky's Capriccio Italien. I interviewed the producer, Ed Wodenjak, on my KDFC radio show "Direct to Disk" in 1979, and he told this anecdote:
ReplyDeleteFiedler was extremely complementary to Wodenjak and his recording team for the work they did on the album, which was done in effect "live" as there could be no editing as the stereo lacquer master was cut, using a minimalist, "purist" coincident pair miking scheme. Fiedler LOVED that! He said, approvingly, to Wodenjak: "This is great 'cause there's NO FUTZING!"
Well, if Victor FUTZED with these two 1953 recordings I am supplying, you can't tell, a they are among the finest monos by Fiedler on that label.
Meyerbeer "Les Patineus" suite, and Piston "Incredible Flutist" suite (the latter originally musically premiered in its original ballet form by Fiedler.) JUST missed being taken down in RCA's 1954 early "Living Stereo" sessions. I appended to the two files, however, the original single LM series cover for each release.
I used a 2-LP RCA Victor set "The Ballet Album", LM-6113, for the source material. Minimalist transfer of same.
https://www44.zippyshare.com/v/kwBQYyLS/file.html
(27 MB zipped mp3s)
File available for ONLY one month. After that it will expire, leaving all trace of my guilt behind until the heat-death of the universe.
8H Haggis
Thanks once again! The Patineurs is probably the suite concocted by Constant Lambert, who has recently been a constant presence on this blog.
DeleteA friend of mine, on the east coast, is a very talented musical arranger who specializes in producing transcriptions for concert bands. He has been working on the overture to "Il Guarany" by the Brazilian composer Gomes, and has heard darned near every record of it made since early 78s, reporting that by far, Arthur Fiedler's with the Boston Pops, for the celebrated old sixties Red Seal album "Jalousie", is the best performance. He's been trying to get his hands on the best sounding copy extant; owns an open reel RCA 1/4 inch tape which he sent me in a digital copy (it's appalling, with very limited dynamic range, no real lows or highs, and "loud", slightly gritty, obnoxious sound.) He asked if I could do anything with it.
ReplyDeleteI replied that, sadly, no: it was TOO HORRIBLE for any improvement. I then got out my own alternative, which is admittedly not first rate, based on a digitization I did more than 15 years ago from an old cassette tape dubbing I had made from my own sixties-era LP pressing. (I confess that I had made an early attempt to undo some of the 'squashing' imposed by the early Dynagroove process. Would my audiophile/arranger friend be able to STAND it?)
Well, he replied back at once that he felt it was *the best sounding one he'd heard so far* (which shocked me--it SHOULD be better than this!) He even said that he had obtained a UK-produced CD release on a label that had licensed RCA's tape--and that my antique LP-to cassette-to digital-to mp3 copy was BETTER...think of that! I cannot vouch for his opinion, as I've not heard his reference sources.
The album has been documented on several Discogs pages; this one for the Spanish release has a little more info, including composers, of the individual trax:
https://www.discogs.com/Boston-Pops-Arthur-Fiedler-Boston-Pops-Arthur-Fiedler/release/10509249
Well, for what it's worth: here's MY modest, obsolete, low-grade version. Let the buyer beware! The file will expire in thirty days after the upload date of 9/6/18, which certainly gives the honchos at RCA-BMG time to go back to Indianapolis and dig out the 3-track SESSION MASTER 30 IPS TAPES and give it a go again...surely they could make a better job of it than I have done. (I'd be curious to know if any readers who hear mine have an opinion as to whether or not they find it listenable.)
DIRECT LINK, bypassing all the Zippyshare funny-business:
https://www35.zippyshare.com/d/Z9thbhgG/20152/Jalousie%20-%20Boston%20Pops%2c%20Fiedler.zip
Or, if that doesn't work, the normal ZS link:
https://www35.zippyshare.com/v/Z9thbhgG/file.html
Have a brew on me as you recline by the Charles River, enjoying the fun!
8H Haggis
I wish I had seen this comment before. I dont have the mono Fiedler Meyerbeer-Lambert Les Patineurs Ballet Suite from Le CId (not to be confused with the more familiar (I think) Walteufel Les Patineurs aka. Skaters Waltz). It was originally a filler to the 1954 Gaite Parisienne on LM-1817 but as it was only mono, it was dropped when RCA put out LSC 1817 of just the Offenbach-Rosenthal confection. Same was true for the Piston which was originally on LM-2084 with the Ibert Divertissement & Rossini-Respighi Boutique Fantasque, but again as it was mono only, it was left off LSC-2084. I never had access to the recorded contents of LM-6113, so those two 1953 recordings are missing from my library while I have all the other recordings on that 3-LP set from other sources. Though Archive.org Does include scans of the booklet that was bound into that plush (as I recall) bound book-like album.
DeleteRootie - I think I might have the LM-6113 album. It would make an interesting post, assuming I can find it.
DeleteGlory be - I do have it and it was where it was supposed to be. That never happens.
DeleteThanks again - I have this LP somewhere or another. I think I inherited it from my mother. Fiedler is always worth a listen, as are your transfers!
ReplyDeleteWow, here I am, from years in the the future and grateful for long-lasting links! Thanks Buster.
ReplyDeleteYou're welcome, rev.b! Most of the links on this site should still work.
Delete