Much More Early Pérez Prado

Those of you with a long history with this blog may recall that in the dim past I offered a few LPs by mambo king Pérez Prado that were devoted to his earliest recordings. Those posts date back to 2009 and 2015.

Today I've gathered 24 more of these Prado gems, all from the late 40s and early 50s.Compiled from lossless needle-drops of 78s found on Internet Archive, these greatly expand what I've presented before, filling out our knowledge of this exciting and influential band.

In addition to the new items, I've remastered my two earlier Prado posts - his first US LP, Plays Mucho Mambo for Dancing, and a later Camden compilation, Latino! All told, there are about 40 Prado selections in the collection.

As I wrote back in 2009, "Prado was born in Cuba, but in the late 40s he moved his base of operations to Mexico City, where his version of a new dance called the mambo became wildly popular."

Even before then, the bandleader had made some records in Cuba. A few of them came out on the Discos Cafamo label in about 1947 and circulated in the US as imports in March 1949. Two of these items - "Tu Ve, Tu Ve" and "La Clave" - later appeared on the small US Monogram label, and start off our collection. I haven't been able to date the Monogram release, but I suspect it was in the early 1950s, after Prado had achieved some popularity.

In mid-1949, RCA Victor's Latin-American department saw some promise in the band, and signed Prado to a contract. His first RCA release was "José" and "Macomé," which, as with all the subsequent items in this collection, were issued in RCA's International Series.

While his recordings of the time were all made in Mexico, Prado had his eyes on the much bigger American market. He tried to form an American band in early 1951, but New York union regulations prevented him from doing so. His break was soon at hand, though, in the form of a cover record.

Freddy, Sonny, Dave - no Pérez

In 1950, Prado had recorded what would become two of his most famous numbers on one single - "Qué Rico el Mambo" and "Mambo No. 5." (The latter was a hit as recently as 1999, via Lou Bega's version.) These display the instrumental precision, flamboyant brass playing and extraordinary rhythmic verve that characterize his music.

In 1951, American bandleader Sonny Burke took up "Qué Rico el Mambo" and turned it into the "Mambo Jambo," which became a hit and was covered by such unlikely advocates as sedate maestro Freddy Martin and pop guitarist Dave Barbour. I've actually featured Burke's Mambo Jambo LP, and it's not bad, but not Prado, either.

RCA must have been impressed by the "Mambo Jambo" sales - or embarrassed that it didn't have a hit with Prado's original and superior version - and soon announced that the bandleader would be recording both for the International series and for its pop series.

It took a while, but Prado would eventually have big hits in the American market - "Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White" in 1955 and "Patricia" in 1958 - plus a number of quick-selling LPs.

The records in this post, however, predate his most successful period. Most of them come from 1950-51, with the final two singles from 1953. One of those couples the title song from the film Anna with Prado's tribute to its star, Silvana Magnano.

I hope you enjoy these exceptional recordings from a remarkable band and bandleader.

Vaughan Williams' Pastoral Symphony and 'In the Fen Country'

My post of Ralph Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 5 and Serenade to Music elicited a request for his similarly seraphic Pastoral Symphony, again in the definitive reading led by Sir Adrian Boult.

Longtime friend David Federman wrote, "Given the present circumstances, and the elegiac purpose of the Third, why don't you share it with your followers. I can't think of a better piece of music for the 20th anniversary of 9/11."

Nor can I, David. I have previously presented Boult's 1953 recording of this symphony; here is the worthy remake, dating from 1968. Sir Adrian conducted the 1922 premiere of the work.

As I wrote in my 2018 post, Vaughan Williams' composition was both a meditation on the English countryside and on the war-scarred terrain of World War I France, where he served as a corpsman and where he began writing the symphony. 

"Vaughan Williams was confronted by death constantly. His response was to produce a symphony of remarkable beauty, heartbreaking and elegiac," I wrote then. "Among its effects are a solo bugle, whose sound he would have heard each evening in France, and also at the military funerals he attended; and a wordless soprano solo, perhaps an angel's voice comforting the souls of the dead and welcoming them to a better world.

"Or so I imagine. The work does not really have any stated programmatic aim, and can be enjoyed simply as an extraordinary piece of music."

The soprano soloist here is Margaret Price.

Boult and Vaughan Williams in 1935

In the Fen Country

The "symphonic impression" In the Fen Country, from 1904, was the first orchestral work that Vaughan Williams acknowledged, although earlier items have come to light. It's an accomplished piece of music, and with its meditation on the Fenlands in Eastern England, well chosen as a disc mate for the Pastoral Symphony.

In an enclosed Gramophone review, critic Trevor Harvey disagreed that In the Fen Country is well-matched to the symphony. He considered it an "undistinguished piece" that is inferior to the composer's Norfolk Rhapsody No. 1. I don't agree; In the Fen Country is well shaped and has memorable themes; what else could you want? The Norfolk Rhapsody is built on folk tunes, and while it is enjoyable enough, to me the tragic Captain's Apprentice fits uneasily next to the jaunty On Board a Ninety-Eight. (Robert Tear's brilliant recordings of these folksongs are still available here, a decade later.)

Boult's was the first recording of In the Fen Country.

From a September 1968 ad in The Gramophone

On the Recording

I mentioned in my post on the Symphony No. 5 that vinyl sources are preferable to the digital remasterings of these works, and that the UK pressings are usually superior to their US counterparts. For the Pastoral Symphony (unlike the Fifth), I don't own the UK pressing, only my US copy from nearly 50 years ago. While the LP is in good shape, it shows the familiar characteristics that drove American music lovers mad way back when - low-level rustle and muted high frequencies. I have matched my transfer of the US LP to the UK sound as closely as possible; the results are pleasing, I believe.

September 11, 2001

Most American adults will, I am sure, remember where they were and what they were doing on September 11, 2001. I happened to be in New York on that day. I was staying in the city on business, and had just arrived at a meeting taking place across the river in New Jersey.

When we heard that a plane had hit the World Trade Center, I thought it must have been an accident. We were in a building with a clear view across the river at the twin towers. Seeing smoke coming from the building was a strange site, but not as strange as the massive plume of dust - and nothing else - that soon would replace the iconic towers.

We soon were on our way home to the Midwest. So many people were not as fortunate as me - a spectator and not a victim or a participant in the aftermath. They all are in our thoughts today.

Vaughan Williams' Symphony No. 5 and Serenade to Music

Ralph Vaughan Williams' middle symphonies can be neatly separated into the visionary 3rd and 5th and the anguished 4th and 6th. Many conductors prefer the latter variety: the 4th has inspired 32 recordings; the elegiac Symphony No. 3 half that number.

That said, the mystical Symphony No. 5 has reached an avid audience since its wartime premiere. Recorded 34 times, it has been more popular than the apocalyptic Symphony No. 6, with its 25 recordings.

My own preference is for the composer's spiritual side as expressed in the third and fifth symphonies (and many other works).

The Symphony No. 3 (or "Pastoral Symphony" as it is often called) appeared here in its first recording, led by Sir Adrian Boult in 1953. Today we add Boult's 1969 recording of the Symphony No. 5, which has an exceptional discmate - the second recording of Vaughan Williams' setting of the Serenade to Music from Shakespeare utilizing 16 soloists, as did the first performance and recording led by Sir Henry J. Wood.

Symphony No. 5

The fifth symphony shares themes with one of the composer's greatest works, a staged version of The Pilgrim's Progress, John Bunyan's 1678 religious allegory. The latter work was not completed until 1951, even though Vaughan Williams had prepared one scene from it as early as 1921, which was mounted as The Shepherds of the Delectable Mountains.

During 1938-43, however, the composer had all but abandoned activity in connection with The Pilgrim's Progress, and began using some of its musical materials for his fifth symphony. Perhaps for this reason the struggles of the Pilgrim at times can be detected just below the surface of the fifth symphony's radiant musical surface.

It is indeed an extraordinarily beautiful piece of music that, despite the Bunyan connection, has no programmatic theme. That said, its warm reception in the depth of the war was surely inspired in part by the sense that the symphony is a great and noble journey similar to that of the Pilgrim and the English people during wartime.

Boult in the studio

This recording was the second led by Sir Adrian, 16 years after his Decca effort with the same orchestra, the London Philharmonic. The performance is well controlled; while not severe, it also is not overtly emotional. The music's striking beauty and eloquence are in full display.

Henry Wood was to have led the first performance in 1943, but fell ill, so the composer conducted. John Barbirolli and the Hallé Orchestra were responsible for the initial recording, in 1944.

Although Vaughan Williams completed The Pilgrim's Progress in 1951, it was not recorded until 1970-71, again with Boult in charge. However, Argo issued seven songs from the score with piano accompaniment in 1953, with John Cameron as the Pilgrim. These songs appeared here many years ago, and are still available.

Serenade to Music

Sir Adrian Boult, producer Christopher Bishop, Sheila Armstrong, John Carol Case

The Serenade to Music, with a text adapted from a passage in The Merchant of Venice, is one of Vaughan Williams' most beautiful and best-loved compositions. He wrote the work for Henry Wood to mark the 50th anniversary of Wood's first conducting engagement. In the score, Vaughan Williams indicated solo passages for 16 leading vocalists of the day. Sir Henry led the first performance on October 5, 1938, and he and the singers recorded the work with the BBC Symphony 10 days later. That recording is available on my other blog, along with five Vaughan Williams songs as performed by three of the Serenade to Music vocalists - Astra Desmond, Roy Henderson and Heddle Nash.

Vaughan Williams later arranged the work for four soloists, choir and orchestra, and a variety of other performing forces. There have been four commercial recordings of the original version; Boult's 1969 performance was the second, althougha live 1951 recording with the composer conducting also has surfaced. 

Boult's soloists included some of the best-regarded English vocalists of the time. The performers were: 

• Norma Burrowes, Sheila Armstrong, Susan Longfield, Marie Hayward (sopranos)
• Alfreda Hodgson, Gloria Jennings, Shirley Minty, Meriel Dickinson (contraltos)
• Ian Partridge, Bernard Dickerson, Wynford Evans, Kenneth Bowen (tenors)
• John Carol Case, John Noble (baritones)
• Richard Angas, Christopher Keyte (basses)

The download includes Shakespeare's text with a key as to who is singing what.

The photo above may be from the Serenade to Music session - or one of the 1970-71 Pilgrim's Progress dates, also led by Boult with Sheila Armstrong and John Carol Case among the vocalists, and the same producer, Christopher Bishop.

The download includes the usual cover scans, plus photos and reviews from The Gramophone, High Fidelity and Stereo Review.

The ad below proclaims that "the sound is magnificent, with unequalled internal balance which characterises Sir Adrian's work." This is not hyperbole: I transferred this record on request for its sound quality, which, I am told, is superior to the latter-day digital reissues. It comes from a UK pressing; as usual at the time, the sound on the English issue was and is superior to the American Angel release.  

Detail from ad in The Gramophone, March 1970