First Recordings of Piston and MacDowell from the Boston Pops

Today's post is devoted to two important first recordings of American music made by the Boston Pops and Arthur Fiedler in the 1930s. First is Edward MacDowell's Piano Concerto No. 2, recorded in 1936 with soloist Jesús María Sanromá. The second is a suite from Walter Piston's ballet The Incredible Flutist, from 1939. My transfers come from one of the pseudynonymous 1950s RCA Camden reissue LPs, which ascribed the performances to the "Festival Concert Orchestra." I was not fooled.

I also have a bonus for you - Piston's orchestration of the Moonlight Sonata's first movement, as recorded in abridged form by the Pops circa 1954.

MacDowell's Piano Concerto No. 2

Edward MacDowell (1860-1908) was considered the leading American composer for quite some time, and many think the second piano concerto of 1890 is his best composition. The piece is sometimes likened to Grieg's concerto, although to me it is most reminiscent of Liszt. A high-Romantic work to be sure, and very effective in meeting its aims.

MacDowell lived in Boston from 1888 to 1896, and appeared with the Boston Symphony as a pianist. When this recording was made in 1936, he was still famous, enough so that he was memorialized on a 1940 postage stamp. Today his music is seldom heard, with the possible exception of his piano suite Woodland Sketches and its "To a Wild Rose."

Jesús María Sanromá

Considering the composer's renown, it is perhaps surprising that the second concerto was not recorded until 1936. But the performance by the Boston forces and particularly the soloist is all that one could hope for.

Sanromá (1902-84) was born in Puerto Rico and educated at the New England Conservatory. Soon after graduation he became the Boston Symphony's pianist, remaining in that post until 1940. Victor recorded him fairly extensively during this period, including Gershwin and Paderewski concertos with Fiedler; Bartók, Grieg and Rachmaninoff concertos with Charles O'Connell; music of Hindemith with the composer, and the Chausson Concert for Violin, Piano and String Quartet with Heifetz.

Piston's The Incredible Flutist

Walter Piston, Arthur Fiedler, Hans Wiener
and designer Marco Montedoro, 1938

Walter Piston (1894-1976) also had strong ties to Boston and the Boston Symphony. Educated at Harvard, he taught there from 1926-60. His students included many illustrious names among the succeeding generation of American composers - Leonard Bernstein, Elliott Carter, Irving Fine, Harold Shapero, John Harbison and many others.

Hans Wiener as
the Incredible Flutist

Piston's first symphony was premiered by the BSO in 1938, the same year as the ballet The Incredible Flutist was staged by the Pops. His Symphony No. 3 later was commissioned by the Koussevitzky Foundation and Symphony No. 6 by the BSO for its centennial. The orchestra recorded the latter work in 1956 under Charles Munch.

The Incredible Flutist is the only stage work in Piston's catalogue. It is an entirely delightful piece of music that must have made for an effective ballet. Piston wrote the scenario with choreographer Hans Wiener, who also took the role of the flutist. The setting is a marketplace; a circus comes to town with its main attraction - the magical flutist.

While Fiedler and his forces recorded a suite from the ballet in 1939, they technically did not give the public premiere of the work in that form - the Pittsburgh Symphony and Fritz Reiner did so in 1940.

Beethoven-Piston - Moonlight Sonata

I don't know the background of Piston's orchestration of the first movement of Beethoven's "Moonlight" sonata, only that the Pops and Fiedler recorded it in abridged form circa 1954. RCA Victor put it out on a single that I believe was backed by Piston's orchestration of Debussy's "Clair de Lune." I remastered the Beethoven transcription from a lossless needle drop on Internet Archive, but the Debussy was nowhere to be found.

Like The Incredible Flutist, the Beethoven arrangement is an  attractive work.

The sound from the 1930s items came up nicely, although the piano overshadows the orchestra in the MacDowell concerto. The Moonlight Sonata orchestration sounds good as well.