Hollingsworth Conducts Humperdinck and Grieg

The English conductor John Hollingsworth (1916-63) was a fine talent who died too young. We recently heard him conducting Malcolm Arnold's Tam O'Shanter Overture in a 1955 Philips LP where he shared conducting duties with the composer. Today he leads the Covent Garden orchestra in music by Engelbert Humperdinck and Edvard Grieg.

John Hollingsworth

These are good, well-recorded performances that came out on EMI's Parlophone label in 1953 and have not been seen again, to my knowledge. The M-G-M folks issued the recordings in the US.

At the time of the recordings, Hollingsworth had already gained experience in film industry working with Muir Mathieson, at Covent Garden both in opera and ballet, and at the Proms assisting Sir Malcolm Sargent. Hollingsworth would continue his film work in later years and was very active in that realm until his early death from pneumonia. The download includes a 1954 Music and Musicians article about him.

His commercial recordings, which are not many, are primarily of lighter music. The current selections fit into that category, and are most enjoyable.

The most recent Hänsel und Gretel production at Covent Garden

The German composer Humperdinck these days is remembered primarily for one work, but an enchanting one - his children's opera Hänsel und Gretel, based on the brothers Grimm story. Hollingsworth recorded five selections from the orchestral suite, all memorable.

The second side of the LP contains music by Grieg. First is a three-movement suite that the composer extracted from his incidental music for a production of Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson's play Sigurd Jorsalfar.

Grieg's Two Elegiac Melodies were orchestral transcriptions of two songs from a set of 12 with texts by Aasmund Olavsson Vinje. The melodies' titles, "The Wounded Heart" and "The Last Spring," are taken from those songs.

I've enclosed several brief reviews of the US M-G-M pressing; the reactions to the performances ranged from "admirable" to "competent."

Bonus - Ibert's Circus

In 1952, Hollingsworth recorded the Circus music that Jacques Ibert wrote for Gene Kelly's film Invitation to the Dance (a film that did not come out until 1956). The conductor led the Royal Philharmonic for that assignment.

M-G-M issued the music on a soundtrack disc, where it was paired with Andre Previn's brilliant pastiche, Ring Around the Rosy. Truthfully, neither the Ibert piece nor the recording is as good as Previn's music and his spectacular piano playing. As I wrote in 2014 when I first posted the soundtrack recording, "You will hear echoes of Britten, Khachaturian (!) and Gershwin, Kenton-style stentorian jazz, blues piano, salon music, mood music and much more."

I've now remastered the record, clarifying the sound of the Ibert while doing additional cleaning on the awful M-G-M pressing. You can find the link in the comments both to this post and the original item. 

Back to Hollingsworth: I also have his recording of Constant Lambert's Meyerbeer ballet score, Les Patineurs, which I'll post later on. It's coupled with the first recording of Bliss' Checkmate score, led by Robert Irving.

Bobby Troup on Capitol, Plus a Bonus LP

Two recent posts on my other blog were devoted to the earliest recordings by singer-composer-pianist Bobby Troup. (Thanks again to lafong for his contributions!) You can read about Troup's early exploits on those posts.

By 1953, Capitol had scooped up Troup, and his first LP was soon on record store shelves. I transferred that 10-inch LP many years ago and offered it here. I've now remastered it, added the four songs added to the album's 12-inch incarnation from 1955, and thrown in the three Capitol sides that were never issued on LP.

Here's some of what I wrote about the singer way back when:

Troup first came to notice as a songwriter, with "Daddy" as early as 1941, followed by "Route 66," a big hit for Nat Cole. Later compositions included "Girl Talk" and "The Girl Can't Help It." (Too bad Little Richard didn't do a whole album of Troup, eh?)

This album has three of Troup's own numbers - "The Three Bears" (offered here previously in two different Page Cavanaugh renditions), "Hungry Man" and "Lemon Twist." The latter is set to a familiar bop riff that I can't quite place.

Within the limits of his style, Troup was an enjoyable performer. He never had much of a voice, but what he had he used stylishly, although on these early sides the style can veer into mannerism. He sounds remarkably like Bob Dorough - who, I should add, did not begin recording until three years later.

The four songs added to the 12-inch LP included one by Troup - "You're Looking at Me," a particularly good one.

Capitol issued two Troup singles. First was "12 Five Days, Six Hours and Thirteen Minutes," included on the 12-inch LP, backed with the orphaned "When You're With Somebody Else," which I've added to the download.

Music Views, December 1954

The second single was "Instead of You," coupled with one of Troup's best known compositions, "Julie Is Her Name." Troup wrote the latter in honor of Julie London, the singer who was his protégé. When he moved to Bethlehem records and then Liberty he brought her along, producing her first hit, "Cry Me a River," for the latter. Julie Is Her Name became the title of her first LP. Troup and London would marry in 1959.

This last Troup single for Capitol came from 1954. Nelson Riddle was the conductor. That was the extent of Bobby's relationship with the label. He was soon to move to Bethlehem and Liberty.

Music Views, July 1954

Troup's First Liberty LP

An excellent article on the Jazz Research site gives the background to Troup's first Liberty album, which dates from 1955. At the time, his trio was playing at LA's Celebrity Room. His manager recorded the trio after hours in an empty club, and the tapes eventually became Bobby's first Liberty LP - just the second album issued on the label.

I transferred that LP in 2011 and have now remastered the results, almost entirely eliminating the surface noise that marred a few cuts.

Here is some of what I wrote 11 years ago:

Troup's troupe here includes multi-instrumentalist Bob Enevoldsen (playing bass on this recording), guitarist Howard Roberts and drummer Don Heath. Bobby sticks to standards for the most part, although he does slip in "The Hucklebuck" for irony's sake, with his piano solo quoting Charlie Parker's "Now's the Time," upon which the 1949 dance sensation was based.

Otherwise, his hipster mannerisms are fairly well in check, with the highlights a rendition of the great Bob Haymes tune "That's All" and a concluding tribute to his fellow singer-pianist-composer, Matt Dennis, with "Let's Get Away from It All." He also amusingly adds his own lyrics to Rodgers and Hart's "Thou Swell." No songs of his own, though!

But before the Liberty LP could be released, Bobby had to complete a commitment to Bethlehem records. For that label, he recorded a 10-inch LP, The Songs of Bobby Troup, which soon was expanded into the 12-inch Bobby Troup Sings Johnny Mercer. His final LP for Bethlehem was The Distinctive Style of Bobby Troup. I have all these albums and will transfer them in the future.

Links to both the Capitol and Liberty recordings are in the comments, as well as the comments sections of the original posts. 

Rhapsodies from Louis Lane and the Clevelanders

From time to time, I've been delving into the recordings of the Cleveland Orchestra conducted by George Szell's associates and predecessors - Nikolai Sokoloff (here and here), Artur Rodziński, Erich Leinsdorf, Robert Shaw and Louis Lane, the conductor of today's LP.

Beside rising at the Cleveland Orchestra from conducing apprentice to resident conductor, Lane was the music director of the Akron Symphony and later held positions with the Dallas and Atlanta Symphonies. In 1963, when this album was made, he was associate conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra and the conductor of the Cleveland Pops Orchestra, which he leads here.

The young Louis Lane, in his summer Pops garb

I believe the Cleveland Pops was analogous to the Boston Pops in that it was the Cleveland Orchestra minus some of its principals. In those years before Blossom Music Center was built, the orchestra performed summer concerts in Cleveland's Public Hall, which is much larger than Severance.

Lane devotes the LP to orchestral rhapsodies - Chabrier's España, Alfvén's Midsommarvaka (the Swedish Rhapsody No. 1, which I believe is a bit abridged here), Enescu's Romanian Rhapsody No. 1, Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 and the least familiar of the bunch, Victor Herbert's Irish Rhapsody.

It was common at the time to declare the Cleveland ensemble the best in America or even the world, and just as common to complain that it was almost too perfect. After the orchestra's 1965 European tour, the eminent horn player Barry Tuckwell wrote in the Telegraph that "in spite of my great enthusiasm for the orchestra, particularly the teamwork, corporate musicianship and professionalism in the best sense, I waited in vain to feel excited; in an extraordinary way it was too perfect, too calculated."

Similarly, in his High Fidelity review of this LP, Paul Affelder observed, "These performances are meticulously note perfect, right down to the last turn and trill. There is only one thing missing: excitement. Not that Lane's readings are dull - far from it - but they could have been just that much better had they been invested with a little more sparkle and zest."

There is another way to look at this phenomenon, as expressed by Andrew Porter in the Financial Times: "The character of the orchestra is somehow that of Cleveland itself, the most cultivated of American cities," he wrote. "The Cleveland players show the most unobtrusive and artistic kind of virtuosity. There is no striving for fat, sleek, overfed tone, not any attempt to wow us with brazen clangour. On the other hand their controlled soft playing ... can be breathtaking in effect."

Breathtaking the playing is on this LP, and I detect no lack of sparkle. What is missing is the "brazen clango[u]r" that we usually hear in such pieces as Liszt's rhapsody.

The sound on this LP was even brighter than usually offered by the Columbia engineers working in Severance Hall. I have adjusted it so that the balance is better.

The Young David Allyn - 1940-45

Vocalist David Allyn (1919-2012) is a particular favorite of mine. He never achieved great success, but was a well-respected artist among his peers, often being termed a "singer's singer." To me, that implies he can only be appreciated by other vocalists, but that's not the case. He was a warm, flexible and intelligent artist who was as comfortable with ballads as he was with jazz ensembles.

Most of Allyn's reputation rests on several LPs he recorded for World-Pacific, Warner Bros. and Everest in the late 50s and early 60s, but his career began much earlier. He was recording with the great trombonist Jack Teagarden at age 21 or so, and worked in the recording studios fairly regularly throughout the 1940s.

Today's post and a successor will cover all of his commercial recordings from that period (to my knowledge), adding in some transcriptions and live performances captured on airchecks. These come largely from my collection, with some additions from Internet Archive sources. This first installment includes 21 songs from 1940-45. The follow-up will offer 25 recordings covering 1946-49.

To demonstrate how far Allyn progressed from his early days until his late 50s record contracts, I recently posted his Warner Bros. LP from 1959. His singing there is spectacular.

The Jack Teagarden Recordings

Big T in the studio

Big T was both a wonderful instrumentalist and singer, but his big band never achieved much success. It was a good group even so, as demonstrated by the 1940 recordings he made for Varsity. "Now I Lay Me Down to Dream" is his first side to feature new singer David Allyn, who sounds mature but heavily under the influence of Bing and the Eberle(y) brothers.

On this song and the succeeding four, the arranger is the well-known Phil Moore. "Wait Till I Catch You in My Dreams" and "River Home" are run-of-the-mill pop tunes, smoothly done but not memorable.

At the beginning of 1941, Teagarden was the first artist to be issued on the short-lived Viking label, which quickly became known for its miserable pressings. Allyn is featured on two songs, "Here's My Heart," which isn't bad, and the terrific "It All Comes Back to Me Now." Even here, he has not really found his own style, dipping into the Crosby mannerisms here and there. The latter song has an excellent Teagarden solo.

On these early sides, Allyn is credited as "David Allen." He didn't switch spellings until c1945, and even so his surname would be spelled "Allen" periodically throughout his career. (His real name was Albert DiLella.)

In May and June 1941, Tea was in the studios making Standard Transcriptions, where Allyn can be heard to good effect, none the least because the technical quality was much better than Viking could provide. Dick DuPage is the arranger on the first two numbers. Allyn's first solo is "You're All That Matters to Me," which is done well, save for an ill-advised falsetto ending.

His next recording was a duet with the fantastically shrill Marianne Dunne, "Made Up My Mind." Much better was the fine song, "Blue Mist," one of Allyn's best early efforts (it also has a wonderful solo by the leader).

In June, Teagarden gave him two undistinguished pop tunes to handle, "These Things You Left Me" and "A Star Told a Story." Allyn does well, although he is not yet distinctive, nor entirely comfortable. 

October's "Sing a Love Song" is more of the same. Alec Wilder's "Soft as Spring" is a much better song. Its unconventional melody gives the vocalist some trouble initially, but he finishes well. 

For his final recordings with Teagarden, Allyn did "No Need to Be Sorry," followed by "This Is No Laughing Matter." On the latter, the Teagarden-Allyn duo is as good as most other versions I've heard of this current pop tune.

Allyn went into the Army when the war began, and was medically discharged a few years later.

Fellow on a Furlough

Bob Chester

By 1944, Allyn had become a much more polished and personal singer. There are no commercial recordings or transcriptions from this period, as far as I can tell, but we do have an excellent broadcast aircheck of the wartime "Fellow on a Furlough" with Bob Chester's band. Allyn's legato is much improved and he seems more into the material.

With Boyd Raeburn

Allyn's time with bandleader Boyd Raeburn, starting in 1945, was one of the high points of his career. The earliest performance in this set is another aircheck, this one from San Francisco dating from June 1945. On "There Must Be a Way," the singer sounds more relaxed than before, doing a smooth duet with Claire Hogan.

Boyd Raeburn

The next aircheck is from the following month, same locale. Allyn handles the then-new "Laura" beautifully, in the face of the band's fussy arrangement. Those odd, supposedly advanced charts were a defining feature of Raeburn's band.

George Handy

An August aircheck has a overly elaborate George Handy arrangement that does Allyn no favors, but he puts across the superior ballad "Out of This World" superbly, even so. He seemed to thrive on these challenging environments, and his lovely singing stands out even more as a result.

Also worthy is the following aircheck, from August, of another outstanding song, "There's No You." This also sounds like Handy, and his chart is even more distracting. Blasting, staccato brass incongruously leads into Allyn singing, "I feel the autumn breeze, it drifts cross my pillow as soft as a will o' the wisp." A good alto solo, possibly by Hal McKusick, also mitigates the odd arrangement.

Next we move into commercial recordings with one of Raeburn's most famous efforts, "Forgetful," a Handy composition with a chart that seemingly incorporates the Woody Woodpecker laugh, although this was a few years before that song became popular. "Forgetful" is not a good tune, but Allyn puts it across with authority. This is from the band's first date with the small Jewel label, in October 1945.

Another notable Raeburn song from this period is "Picnic in the Wintertime," here in a broadcast from Hollywood in late December 1945. A pleasant number, not helped by the showy Handy arrangement, or the bombastic Ernie Whitman announcements.

We'll complete Allyn's Raeburn sojourn in the second installment of this collection, then move on to his other commercial recordings and some airchecks from the late 1940s.

The Biggest Hits of '57, Not by the Original Artists

Today we have two RCA Camden budget LPs that cover the "Biggest Hits of '57," primarily with artists of a previous generation, including Tex Beneke, Stuart Foster and Robert Alda. Presumably the thought was that buyers would recognize both the songs and the performers, making a sale more likely.

The market for budget records exploded in the 1950s. With both the cheap labels and the low-price offerings of majors like RCA, performance standards could be surprisingly (but not invariably) high. Today's two LPs are examples - mostly good, but with a few clinkers.

Some Background

First a little background before we get to the records themselves.

Budget record releases have a long if not particularly distinguished history. For all I know they could go back as far as cylinders and single-sided 78s, but certainly the Great Depression was the stimulus for low-priced labels such as Hit of the Week, pressed on coated cardboard.

The advent of the LP in 1948 prompted even more budget productions. Inexpensive albums became inescapable in the 1950s, generally with lesser-known or even anonymous artists recreating the sound of the day's hits. 

My friend Lee Hartsfeld has been documenting and transferring these records on his blog, covering such labels as Parade, Prom, SPC, Allegro, Hollywood, Golden Tone and many others. A typical release might include a former big-band singer such as Loren Becker doing a current tune like "Blue Suede Shoes," along with similar such covers.

Lee has also occasionally taken note of the major labels' forays into inexpensive releases, most recently with a 1959 RCA Camden LP. That post inspired me to dig out a few of my own Camden budget albums, both covering 1957.

The Biggest Hits of '57, Vol. 1

I don't collect budget LPs per se, but the presence of two favored artists - Stuart Foster and Tex Beneke - led to my acquiring these examples of the genre.

Vol. 1 starts off with one of the most unexpected couplings of vocalist and material - Robert Alda, who originated the role of Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls, doing Jimmy Bowen's quasi-rockabilly hit, "Party Doll." Alda has an excellent sense of rhythm, so it works much better than I expected, as does his other contribution, Charlie Gracie's "Butterfly."

Robert Alda stares down the microphone

For this and most other cuts on the LP, the backing is led by New York-based arranger and bandleader Earl Sheldon, who had extensive experience with budget labels.

In contrast to Alda's cuts, bandleader and vocalist Tex Beneke brings an unreconstructed big-band sound to Melvin Endsley's "Singing the Blues," which was a hit for Marty Robbins on the country chart and Guy Mitchell in the pop market. Again, it works nicely for Tex and his lively band. The singer also does well with Sinatra's "Hey Jealous Lover," a rudimentary semi-R&B song that was one of Frank's lesser efforts (although it sold well).

Stuart Foster

The superb vocalist Stuart Foster, featured on this blog several times, was tasked with another Sinatra misfire, the awful "Can I Steal a Little Love." He also showed his range with covers of hits by Elvis ("Love Me Tender"), Sonny James ("Young Love"), Jim Lowe's pop novelty "The Green Door," and Pat Boone's "Don't Forbid Me."

Peter Ricardo

There were several calypso hits in the mid-50s, and RCA brought in the smooth Grenada-born and English-resident Peter Ricardo to sing them. The first was "Marianne," a traditional song that Terry Gilkyson and the Easy Riders appropriated and made into a hit. The second was "The Banana Boat Song," another traditional song that became closely associated with Harry Belafonte (who also recorded "Marianne"). Ricardo covers the Tarriers' version, which incorporated part of another traditional song, "Hill and Gully Rider."

I probably don't need to mention that Gilkyson and the Tarriers (one of whom was the actor Alan Arkin) claimed credit for writing these items.

Finally, the album has a rinky-tink version of "Just Walking in the Rain" by pianist Johnny Guarnieri and ensemble. The song, originally by the Prisonaires (who really had been prisoners), was a hit for Johnny Ray.

In all, a good album, probably worth its Nationally Advertised Price of $1.98 (about $20 today).

The Biggest Hits of '57, Vol. 2

Earl Sheldon was more to the fore on the second volume of 1957 hits. He starts things off with a florid version of "So Rare," a late-career hit for Jimmy Dorsey. Sheldon's alto saxophonist is not nearly as conservative as Dorsey and Sheldon's vocal arrangement emphasizes the R&B side of the song.

Similarly, Sheldon's thin-toned guitarist takes over "Around the World," missing altogether the romantic feel of Victor Young's version. Sheldon also does "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter," complete with the "oh yeahs" of Billy Williams' hit, but the vocals are buried in the mix and the ukulele accompaniment might not have been appreciated by Fats Waller, who popularized the song in the 1930s.

George DeWitt

New to the lineup of artists was George DeWitt, who was the host of television's Name That Tune, where he warbled a few notes and the contestants had to identify the song. Even though he made some albums (and I own at least one), he wasn't much of a singer, sounding anemic in the company of Stuart Foster and Robert Alda. 

DeWitt was tasked with the Everly Brothers' "Bye Bye Love," which was a mismatch, and with Marty Robbins' "A White Sport Coat (and a Pink Carnation)," where he misses the charm of the original. Finally, he is a weak substitute for Pat Boone's mellow voice in "Love Letters in the Sand."

Also new to the cast was Jim Stover, who does a good Elvis impersonation on "Teddy Bear." I know nothing about Stover. My guess is that he was one of Sheldon's studio singers. The guitarist also does well on this song.

Returning from the first volume were Ricardo,  Foster, Beneke and  Alda. 

Peter Ricardo offered another calypso associated with Harry Belafonte, a sly version of "Mama Look a Boo-Boo," originally recorded by Lord Melody. The three Ricardo songs are taken from his complete LP of calypsos issued by Camden.

Robert Alda sings "Who Needs You," a hit for the overbearing Four Lads. Alda is more intimate, but is not helped by Sheldon's backing. Alda's second number was a game attempt at "Why Baby Why," George Jones' first big country hit. [Correction: musicman1979 points out that this is a Pat Boone song.]

Tex Beneke

Tex Beneke and his band handle the instrumental "Petticoats of Portugal," which was a hit for Coral's Dick Jacobs. Tex presumably is the tenor sax soloist.

The excellent Stuart Foster has only one selection - Cole Porter's hymn-like "True Love," which Bing introduced in High Society.

These Camden records do make for a fun listen or two. Hope you agree.

More Camdens

A final note: RCA started Camden in 1953 to reissue classical recordings, at first under pseudonyms. The label later broadened to include pop and other reissues, then cover recordings such as the ones on view today, and even new recordings. There are examples of all these types on my two sites, including the records linked below:

Dolf van der Linden and His Orchestra - Floating on a Cloud and In a Casino on the Riviera

National Symphony/Hans Kindler - Tchaikovsky - Symphony No. 3

Ray McKinley - One Band, Two Styles

Stuart Foster - Today's Hits EP

André Previn - Mad About the Boy and Love Walked In

Cincinnati Symphony/Eugene Goossens - Vaughan Williams - London Symphony

Philadelphia Orchestra/Leopold Stokowski - Music by Wagner and Rimsky-Korsakov

Indianapolis Symphony/Fabien Sevitzky - Tchaikovsky - Symphony No. 1

Florence Henderson - Selections from Gypsy and Flower Drum Song

Philadelphia Orchestra/Ormandy and Stokowski - Music by Liszt, Barber, Menotti and McDonald

Indianapolis Symphony/Fabien Sevitzky - Tchaikovsky - Manfred Symphony

Perez Prado - Latino!

Bob Carroll - Two EPs of Today's Hits

Gisele MacKenzie - Today's Hits EP

Florence Henderson - The Best from Fiorello! and The Sound of Music

Recent Reuploads - Dinah, Buddy, Prado, Munsel, Copland et al

I remaster old uploads fairly frequently, and often forget to mention their availability, or do so only in passing. Here are several that I've done in the past year, although I probably am forgetting as many as I have posted below. The links take you to the original posts.

Aaron Slick from Punkin Crick. That's the title of a 1952 film, believe it or not. It did have good songs by Livingston and Evans and good people to present them - Dinah Shore and Robert Merrill. Participating in this movie got Merrill banned from the Met for conduct unbecoming a baritone.

Dinah Shore and Buddy Clark - 'S Wonderful. This item goes back to the first days of the blog, and features 1947 Columbia recordings by two favorite singers of mine and perhaps yours. It's mainly duets, but a few solo items slip in, too.

Buddy Clark - For You Alone. This is Buddy at the apex of his career, just a few years before his death in a 1949 plane crash. Designed as an album, rather than a collection of singles, it contains standards instead of the new songs of the day. Mitchell Ayres conducts.

Jo Stafford and Gordon MacRae - Kiss Me, Kate. Another favorite singing couple did well by the Cole Porter songs from Kiss Me, Kate, then on Broadway. Actually, they duet only on "Wunderbar," then split the other songs, except for "Too Darn Hot", which is given over to an anonymous vocal group.

Aaron Copland - Danzon Cubano, Three Blues, Our Town Suite. This is a relatively obscure LP of Copland recordings. The composer duets with the excellent Leo Smit on "Danzon Cubano," with Smit handling the rest of the program.

Perez Prado - Plays Mucho Mambo for Dancing. Prado's first RCA Victor LP, made in Mexico years before he had pop hits in the US. As I noted way back when, "The brass screams, the drums jump, and the saxes slurp" - it's terrific stuff, and highly influential.

Perez Prado - Latino! A second helping of Prado's early recordings, this features the fantastic "Ni Hablal" and the superb "Anabacoa" with the great vocalist Beny Moré. Also - anyone who wants a third serving of early Prado can find it via this link.

Patrice Munsel - Melba. The Met soprano starred in this 1953 bioflick of her predecessor Nellie Melba. The soundtrack LP includes popular arias, to which I've added a few Mischa Spoliansky songs written for the film, issued on a single but not included on the LP.

William Mathias' 'This World's Joie'

This is another in a series of choral-orchestral recordings from vintage EMI pressings that so far has been mainly devoted to Vaughan Williams. I will return to VW, but first here is a transfer of a favorite work of mine. It is This World's Joie, by the Welsh composer William Mathias (1932-92), in a particularly good performance and recording.

The piece is a setting of seasonal texts  from early medieval times to the 16th century. Mathias works his way through the cycle of seasons, ending with a celebration of rebirth.

William Mathias

As Mathias writes in his notably clear sleeve note, the work's four sections "are designed to reflect both the seasons of the year and the span of human life." He adds that, "This World's Joie is ultimately meant to be enjoyed by both listeners and performers... It is throughout an Act of Celebration."

The work is highly successful in meeting its aims, aided by Mathias' careful choice of texts and his brilliant orchestration. This all is underlined by a superb late analog recording from Abbey Road Studio No. 1 - and of course the excellent performers.

David Willcocks

Leading the work is David Willcocks, who has figured in most of the Vaughan Williams recordings I have posted. Here he conducts his Bach Choir, the Choristers of St. George's Chapel, Windsor, and the New Philharmonia Orchestra.

Kenneth Bowen, Janet Price, Michael Rippon

The soloists are among the finest then active in the UK - soprano Janet Price, tenor Kenneth Bowen and baritone Michael Rippon.

The download includes the usual scans, plus the text booklet and a Gramophone review.

I believe Mathias' work to an extent was inspired by Britten's Spring Symphony (and perhaps certain of Vaughan Williams' compositions). I have the excellent 1979 Previn recording of the Britten work in the queue for posting.

Gramophone ad, December 1976

More British Film Music of the 40s

A few years ago I put up a fairly extensive compilation of British film music from the 1940s in vintage performances. Here is a supplement, covering some notable pieces left out of the first collection, including music by Hubert Bath, Richard Addinsell and Arnold Bax.

Bath - Cornish Rhapsody

Hubert Bath wrote many film scores and much other music, but will be remembered most for his "Cornish Rhapsody," one of the best of the quasi-concertos that followed the success of Richard Addinsell's "Warsaw Concerto" of 1941.

Bath wrote the "Cornish Rhapsody" for the 1944 film Love Story, a wildly melodramatic love triangle set in Cornwall, with one character dying of heart disease and another going blind. Margaret Lockwood is the former party, a composer-pianist who writes and performs the Rhapsody during the proceedings.

Margaret Lockwood in Love Story

Hubert Bath

Lockwood could play piano, so she reportedly is convincing in the part. The performance heard on the soundtrack, however, was by Harriet Cohen, a distinguished pianist who also features in the Bax score discussed below. 

The composer conducts the London Symphony for this well recorded performance.

Addinsell - Music from Blithe Spirit

Noel Coward's 1941 stage fantasy, Blithe Spirit, was adapted for the screen in 1945. Margaret Rutherford, Fay Compton and Kay Hammond returned from the West End cast, but Rex Harrison replaced Cecil Parker. The American poster above claimed it was a "spicy screen comedy" and "in Blushing TECHNICOLOR," although it is hardly spicy and would make no one blush. It is witty and diverting, however.

Director David Lean and Richard Addinsell

This supernatural comedy did not call for the sort of pianistic dramatics that Richard Addinsell had employed for Dangerous Moonlight's concerto. These two excerpts - the Prelude and a Waltz - are much lighter in tone while conveying a bit of unease, in keeping with the goings-on in the film.

These recordings are again from the London Symphony, with the ubiquitous Muir Mathieson at the podium.

Bax - Music from Oliver Twist

David Lean was also the director for the 1948 film adaptation of Dickens' Oliver Twist. The film turned out to be both highly influential and controversial for what was considered to be an anti-semitic portrayal of Fagin.

The music for Oliver Twist was by Sir Arnold Bax (1883-1953), who wrote relatively little towards the end of his life, but did score a few films. The recorded excerpts include the "Oliver Theme," "The Pickpocketing," "The Chase," "Fagin's Romp" and "The Finale." Muir Mathieson conducts the Philharmonia Orchestra.

Harriet Cohen and Arnold Bax in 1921

Harriet Cohen is featured in the "Oliver Theme," which is lovely but diffuse, as Bax's music tended to be. "The Pickpocketing," "The Chase" and "Fagin's Romp" are largely busy music. "The Finale" is Elgarian, which would seem suited to the tale's uplifting ending.

Muir Mathieson in commanding form

The sound is very good in the Bath and Addinsell pieces, which come from 78s. The Oliver Twist music is from a 10-inch LP that also includes the "Cornish Rhapsody" and the "Warsaw Concerto." I've chosen to use a 78 transfer for the Rhapsody because it had better sound. The "Warsaw Concerto" can be found in my first compilation of British film music, taken from 78s. That collection also incudes my personal favorite of the quasi-concertos, Charles Williams' "Dream of Olwen" from While I Live.

The 78s are remastered from Internet Archive sources. The LP can be found in my collection. The download includes labels, cover scans and reviews.

Kisch and Wolff Conduct Overtures

I had a request for some of the early Decca-London FFRR (full-frequency range) recordings, so here are two such 10-inch discs featuring less-often heard but accomplished conductors who are worth remembering - Royalton Kisch and Albert Wolff. Plus there are a few bonus items. 

Both LPs feature the same generic kettle-drum cover that London was using on some 10-inch LPs in the early 1950s.

Royalton Kisch Conducts Gluck, Cimarosa and Smetana

The English conductor Royalton Kisch (1920-95) made quite a few records when he was young, and his career was progressing well until a back injury forced him to abandon the podium when he was only 44.

Kisch's full name was Alastair Royalton-Kisch, simplified for professional purposes. His London debut was in 1947, followed quickly by a Decca recording contract. His work for Decca over the next several years was primarily overtures and accompaniments, although he did sneak in a Haydn and a Mozart symphony.

Today's post starts with a transfer of Kisch's 1951 London recording of two 18th century overtures, both by Christoph Willibald Gluck - Alceste and Iphigénie en Aulide.

Royalton Kisch

Kisch was a proficient conductor. A Gramophone reviewer called the Iphigénie en Aulide recording "a beautiful performance, played with tension and exquisitely in tune: the music is of a quality that commands the players' best - a noble work." He found Alceste, in contrast, lacking in intensity and missing the tragic sense that informs the work.

In addition to the Gluck works, I've added two additional Kisch recordings from other LPs. Cimarosa's delightful Il Matrimonio Segreto (in a sparking performance) came from the 12-inch version of the Gluck release and was recorded at the same London Symphony session in Kingsway Hall.

Another bonus is Kisch's LSO recording of Smetana's The Bartered Bride overture, which comes from a 1950 Kingsway Hall date. It is neatly done but lacks the irresistible élan of the best recordings. The recording comes from a miscellaneous LP that also contains overtures conducted by Anthony Collins and Georg Solti, not included here.

The Gluck LP is from my collection; I remastered the bonus items from needle drops found on Internet Archive. The sound is excellent in all cases.

Albert Wolff Conducts Massenet and Saint-Saëns

From the young Englishman Royalton Kisch we switch to the very experienced Frenchman Albert Wolff (1884-1970). Here he conducts the orchestra of the Opéra-Comique, where he had once been music director and which was one focus of his career from age 22 on. Wolff also was at various times the principal conductor of the Pasdeloup and Lamoureux Orchestras.

Albert Wolff

The recorded works are two less-often heard overtures - Massenet's Phèdre and Saint-Saëns's La Princesse Jaune. As you might expect, Wolff's readings are highly idiomatic, and also strongly profiled. The Opéra-Comique was not on the LSO's level, but the recording certainly has its attractions due to Wolff's presence.

These are 1951 recordings from Paris' Maison de la Mutualité. The sound is adequate, but nothing revelatory to be sure. This is a remastered version of an LP that I first offered here well over a decade ago via this post.

Both downloads include a few reviews along with the usual scans, etc.