Hanson Conducts Grieg and Hanson, with Firkušný

I recently posted this transfer on another site in response to a request, and thought I'd offer it here as well. The request was for a recording of Grieg's Holberg Suite, and my version is by the Eastman-Rochester Symphony Orchestra conducted by Howard Hanson. The Grieg is coupled with the first recording of Hanson's own Piano Concerto. The soloist is the estimable Rudolf Firkušný, who introduced the work in Boston in 1948.

Howard Hanson

Hanson is known these days for his Mercury recordings from the 1950s and 60s. Earlier, however, he conducted his Eastman-Rochester forces for both Victor and Columbia.

I believe these are his earliest Columbia efforts, made in that label's 30th Street Studio in December 1950. Later Columbia had him tape a coupling of his second symphony and MacDowell's second piano concerto (with Jesús María Sanromá), and also Wallingford Riegger's third symphony. I believe I have the former but not the latter disc.

Rudolf Firkušný

The concerto allies Hanson's spacious, romantic manner (here almost quoting Rachmaninoff in the opening theme) with the percussive, motoric approach to the piano that was then in vogue. Firkušný's performance is all you could hope for. The pianist had made records as early as 1937, for HMV, and had become a Columbia artist in 1949.

The performance of the Grieg is spirited, although the string sound of the Rochester band lacks glamour.

I actually transferred this for the blog a few years ago but never posted it because there is a bit of surface noise in the first minute or so of the concerto. It does not now strike me as all that distracting, and the balance of the recorded sound is very good.

New Transfer of Knoxville: Summer of 1915

I had a request for a reup of the first recording of Samuel Barber's Knoxville: Summer of 1915, and decided to do a new transfer instead. My first attempt was done in the early months of this blog, and because the original LP was noisy, I used a reissued edition that had added reverb. This time I went back to the first 10-inch LP for the transfer, and the results represent a substantial improvement and are closer to the original intentions.

The piano pieces on the LP are also newly transferred, and there are fresh scans as well. All the noise problems have been addressed and the latest version (September 2023) is mastered in ambient stereo.

Samuel Barber and Eleanor Steber

Here is what I had to say about the music when first posted:

"Knoxville: Summer of 1915 is one of the high points of American music. It is a setting of a prose poem by composer Samuel Barber's exact contemporary, James Agee. Both the music and the words are inspired.

"This is the first recording of the work, done by the distinguished American soprano Eleanor Steber, who commissioned it and first performed it with the Boston Symphony and Serge Koussevitzky in 1947. This November 1950 recording is of the revised version for smaller orchestra.

Rudolf Firkušný

"The modest LP above is also notable for including what I believe to be the first recording of Barber's Four Excursions, in a jaunty performance by Rudolf Firkušný. These items are based on familiar idioms, somewhat akin to the Copland and Gershwin piano pieces that are discussed below. Composed in 1944, they also were recorded in November 1950 in Columbia's 30th Street studio in New York.

"Knoxville: Summer of 1915 is often considered a nostalgic idyll, but it is much more than that. in 1915, Agee was 5 years old, and the piece is a memory and meditation on an evening that summer, in the year before his father's death. Agee's words were set to music by Barber when his own father's death was near.

James Agee

"Agee places the themes of family, self, time, and place in a context that is at once extraordinarily specific and timeless, minute and cosmic; full of love for his family, the poem ends nonetheless with the remarkable observation that the members of his family "treat me, as one familiar and well-beloved in that home: but will not, oh, will not, not now, not ever; but will not ever tell me who I am." This unusual, rapt, evocative piece is set to music that could not be more right.

"Steber also recorded the Barber composition later for her own Stand label; an intense live version. This version is cooler, with Steber's ample soprano and cloudy diction making the interpretation seem a little distant."

I only want to add to my previous comments that the playing by the so-called Dumbarton Oaks Chamber Orchestra under William Strickland is fully equal to this extraordinary music.

Note (September 2023): the download now includes a 1949 interview with Samuel Barber about Knoxville: Summer of 1915, in an edition from NPR, which mixes it with excerpts from Dawn Upshaw's excellent 1988 recording of the work.

First Recording of Knoxville, Summer of 1915

Knoxville, Summer of 1915 is one of the high points of American music. It is a setting of a prose poem by composer Samuel Barber's exact contemporary, James Agee. Both the music and the words are inspired.

This is the first recording of the work, done by the distinguished American soprano Eleanor Steber, who commissioned it and first performed it with the Boston Symphony and Serge Koussevitzky in 1947. This November 1950 recording is of the revised version for smaller orchestra.

The modest LP above is also notable for including what I believe to be the first recording of Barber's Four Excursions, in a jaunty performance by Rudolf Firkusny. These items are based on familiar idioms, somewhat akin to the Copland and Gershwin piano pieces that are discussed below. Composed in 1944, they also were recorded in November 1950 in Columbia's 30th Street studio in New York.

Knoxville, Summer of 1915 is often considered a nostalgic idyll, but it is much more than that. in 1915, Agee was 5 years old, and the piece is a memory and meditation on an evening that summer, in the year before his father's death. Agee's words were set to music by Barber when his own father's death was near.

Agee places the themes of family, self, time, and place in a context that is at once extraordinarily specific and timeless, minute and cosmic; full of love for his family, the poem ends nonetheless with the remarkable observation that the members of his family "treat me, as one familiar and well-beloved in that home: but will not, oh, will not, not now, not ever; but will not ever tell me who I am." This unusual, rapt, evocative piece is set to music that could not be more right.

Steber also recorded the Barber composition later for her own Stand label; an intense live version. This version is cooler, with Steber's ample soprano and cloudy diction making the interpretation seem a little distant.

For this post, I have taken the soprano item from the 12-inch LP below (which has an excellent line drawing of Steber on the cover) because the source is much less noisy than the original issue. True to the usual form, the transfer engineer for the reissue has apparently added reverb. The piano pieces are from the 10-inch LP.