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Posted: |
Aug 21, 2018 - 12:25 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Baritone Thomas Allen's initial ambition was to be a doctor, but this was later abandoned when he won a place at England’s Royal College of Music in 1964, where he studied with Hervey Alan for four years, specializing in oratorio and Lieder until 1968. Allen then shifted his attention from Lieder and oratorio to opera, and in 1969, he made his debut as D'Obigny in Verdi's La Traviata with the Welsh National Opera.
In the decades since, Allen has focused primarily on opera, occasionally returning to Lieder, as in this 1988 recording of Robert Schumann’s Dichterliebe and Liederkreis, which he recorded with Roger Vignoles on piano.
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Posted: |
Aug 22, 2018 - 2:34 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Joseph Schwantner (born March 22, 1943 in Chicago) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer, educator and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters since 2002. He was awarded the 1970 Charles Ives Prize.
After completing his education, Schwantner obtained an assistant professor position at Pacific Lutheran University in 1968. He moved to a similar position at Ball State in 1969 and continued to the Eastman School of Music as a faculty member in 1970. Briefly leaving college academia, Schwantner was composer in residence with the St. Louis Symphony from 1982-84. In 1985, Schwantner's life and music were the subject of a documentary in WGBH Boston's “Soundings” series. The documentary focused mainly on the composition of his piece “New Morning for the World (Daybreak of Freedom),” for narrator and orchestra.
The narration in “New Morning” is based upon the writings and speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr. In this 1983 recording with the Eastman Philharmonia, the narration is spoken by Willie Stargell, Hall of Fame baseball player for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
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Posted: |
Aug 23, 2018 - 1:35 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Richard Strauss was still alive, and 78s were the audio medium of choice when Fritz Reiner and the Pittsburgh Symphony recorded the composer’s tone poem “Ein Heldenleben” (“A Hero’s Life). The recording was made on November 10, 1947. It would prove to be Reiner's last recording with the Pittsburgh Symphony. Reiner left Pittsburgh the next year to conduct at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City and went on to conduct the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. There, he would again record “Ein Heldenleben” with the CSO in 1954.
Reiner once said “The best conducting technique is that which achieves the maximum musical result with the minimum effort. The only general rule is to infuse all gestures with precision, clarity, and vitality.” True to his word, his was an extremely small beat, which forced the musicians to remain alert at all times. At one Pittsburgh rehearsal, a bass player put a telescope to his eye. When he explained to Reiner that he was "trying to find the beat," the conductor fired him on the spot!
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Posted: |
Aug 26, 2018 - 1:21 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Giuseppe Anneda (born Cagliari, Italy, 1 March 1912 – died Cagliari, 30 July 1997) was an Italian mandolin virtuoso who helped the mandolin gain more importance in the classical music world in the 20th Century. Anedda started out a child prodigy, who began to study the violin at 5 years old, but had to switch to mandolin because of the family's inability to afford a violin. He was performing in theater and the opera by the time he was 10 years old.
Anedda was able to gain access to rare manuscripts in museums, rediscovering works by Vivaldi, Pergolesi, Beethoven, and many others. On this 1984 cassette with the Rome Chamber Orchestra, he performs two of Vivaldi’s mandolin concertos.
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Posted: |
Aug 27, 2018 - 2:48 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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The compositions of Richard Wagner, particularly those of his later period, are notable for their complex textures, rich harmonies and orchestration, and the elaborate use of leitmotifs—musical phrases associated with individual characters, places, ideas, or plot elements. His advances in musical language, such as extreme chromaticism and quickly shifting tonal centers, greatly influenced the development of classical music.
This 1975 recording by Herbert Von Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic presents preludes from four of Wagner’s operas: Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (The Mastersingers of Nuremberg), his only mature comedy; Der Fliegende Holländer (The Flying Dutchman); Lohengrin; and Parsifal, his final opera.
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Posted: |
Aug 28, 2018 - 4:40 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Born in 1900, Jonel Perlea was a Romanian conductor particularly associated with the Italian and German opera repertories. In 1944, he and his wife were arrested in Vienna, Austria, while on their way to Paris. They were held under house arrest, or according to some sources, sent to Mariapfarr concentration camp, until the end of World War II. After the war, Perlea conducted mostly in Italy, notably at La Scala in Milan. Following a heart attack and a stroke in 1957, he learned to conduct with his left arm only, and preferred to concentrate on giving concerts and making records. He taught at the Manhattan School of Music from 1952 to 1969. He died in New York City in 1970, aged 69.
Billed as “Jonas” Perlea, he shares conducting duties with Leopold Stokowski on this recording of Tchaikovsky pieces. But the documentation on the cassette is so sparse that one cannot tell which man conducted what.
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Posted: |
Aug 29, 2018 - 3:44 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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In 1955, at the invitation of Erich Kleiber, German conductor Horst Stein conducted at the opening of the restored Berlin State Opera, and subsequently worked there as a Staatskapellmeister. From 1961 to 1963, he worked under the leadership of Rolf Liebermann as deputy chief conductor at the Hamburg State Opera. From 1963 to 1970, Stein served as chief conductor and director of opera at the Mannheim National Theatre. Stein held a regular post at the Vienna State Opera from 1969 to 1971, where he conducted 500 performances.
In 1973, Stein conducted the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra in its recording of Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony, which was released in Europe. The recording made its U.S. debut from Sine Qua Non in 1984. The next year, Stein would begin serving as Music Director of the Bamberg Symphony, a post he would hold until 1996.
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Hey Thor, thanks for creating a pop/rock thread!
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In 1989, MCA Classics had a brief CD series that they dubbed the "Double Decker" line. In those days of the "long box" retail display, MCA stacked one CD on top of another in the tall package and sold them at a discount price. Because these were catalog reissues, they sold for $12.99 or less, depending upon the retailer. In this set, Bruckner's Symphony No. 7 from the Pittsburgh Symphony had originally appeared on the Command Classics label, and Symphony No. 8 by the Munich Philharmonic had been released on Westminster. Because Symphony No. 8 is so long (93+ minutes), the first movement had to be on Disc 1, with the concluding three movements on Disc 2.
Fantastic performance. Huge Bruckner enthusiast here (actually, you might have guessed that given my avatar, Bruckner practically worshipped the big Dick).
The death of Scott Walker has been more hurtful for me than I thought it would be. I've been listening to his Drift, John Coltrane's Ascension, and selected Lutoslawski.
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Posted: |
Mar 29, 2019 - 10:05 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Born in 1899 in London of Italian and French parentage, Giovanni Battista (John) Barbirolli grew up in a family of professional musicians. He helped save the Hallé Orchestra in Manchester from dissolution in 1943 and conducted it for the rest of his life. He was also a guest conductor of many other orchestras, including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonia, the Berlin Philharmonic and the Vienna Philharmonic, with all of which he made recordings.
Both in the concert hall and on record, Barbirolli was particularly associated with the music of English composers such as Elgar, Delius and Vaughan Williams. The 1988 CD below is a compilation of Elgar recordings that Barbirolli made with the Philharmonia in 1963 and 1966. On the day he died, 29 July 1970, he spent several hours rehearsing the New Philharmonia Orchestra for a forthcoming tour of Japan that he was scheduled to lead.
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