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.

Hanson Conducts MacDowell

This post is in response to a note from our benefactor 8H Haggis, who has left so many splendid records for us to enjoy. (See posts below, but please be aware that these items will only be available for a matter of days now.)

Our friend was looking for a transfer of Edward MacDowell's Second Suite, in the performance by Howard Hanson and the Eastman-Rochester Symphony. I've transferred my copy for him, but now that I have looked into the matter, I am not sure this is the record (or pressing) he is seeking! It seems that Hanson took a whack at this music three different times, per Michael Gray's Classical Discography. He recorded the Dirge in 1939, the full suite in 1953 (represented by the LP at hand), and supposedly the complete suite again in 1961 (which actually may be a reissue of the 1953 effort). Perhaps 8H wanted the later version or pressing?

MacDowell portrait by Chase Emerson

In any case, this is a fine performance of music that is not often heard these days. MacDowell was a contemporary of his fellow American composers Arthur Foote and Charles T. Griffes, whose music has appeared before on this blog. Today, if MacDowell is performed at all, it is usually his Piano Concerto No. 2. This was not always the case: Hanson's is the third recording of the suite in full. The first was from the Columbia Symphony and Howard Barlow in 1939, available via my friend Bryan's excellent Shellackophile blog. Then in 1951, the American Recording Society published a version directed by Dean Dixon.

According to the cover notes, the themes in this composition are derived from Theodor Baker's Music of the North American Wilderness; thus the subtitle "Indian." But there is little that is stereotypically "Indian" about the work, which dates from 1892. (Speaking of stereotypical, check out the cover. It is by George Maas, who provided the art for many Mercury LPs.) The cover notes liken MacDowell's music to that of Grieg, albeit "less lyrically intense as well as more broadly noble in its lyrical expression and more rugged in its dramatic moments."

Hanson's recording was made for Mercury, which was then achieving fame for its "Living Presence" sound. This particular LP sounds a bit harsh and dry, however. I've adjusted the frequency response to address the harshness. And I've added a small amount of convolution reverberation to the mix, and am offering that as an alternative to the "dry" transfer. Links to both can be found in the comments.