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The Berlin Philharmonic has a close encounter with fire. Some, but fortunately not too much, damage to the Philharmonie (above), so it wasn't the orchestra's darkest hour. But moving their concerts to alternative venues must bring dark memories. And close encounters with fire reminds me it happened not once but twice to the Philadelphia Orchestra. But the inferno at Britten's Snape Maltings was music's greatest tragedy and triumph.
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“I know there are other things in music that are more important,” he said in his eighties, “but after all, sound is what we’re selling. I hate nasty tone. Even the timpani should sing. I remember the cymbals in the Bruckner Seventh when Furtwängler did it with the Berlin Philharmonic – a shower of stars. Not a bang or a clap, which is what you seem to get these days. I don’t care what they say about Stokowski. He was good. He could achieve a lovely sound. I learned something from that.”
Another great conductor, Reginald Goodall, talks about Leopold Stokowski who was born on April 18th 1882. Quote from Reggie, the Life of Reginald Goodall by John Lucas, John Murray ISBN 1856810518
For Stokowski downloads take this path, to read about Fantasia click here.
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included for "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
The Prince of Wales and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall are in Philadelphia on Saturday as part of their current American tour, and it's great to see the royal couple taking in a cutting edge contemporary music concert at the city's famed Academy of Music. Here's the programme - The Philadelphia Orchestra, Christoph Eschenbach, conductor
Tom Brokaw, host, Deborah Voigt, soprano, Ben Heppner, tenor, Dongwon Shin, tenor, John Lithgow, vocalist
The Philadelphia Singers Chorale, David Hayes, music director, Peter Nero, piano
Special Guest Appearance by Rod Stewart, A Selection of Popular Songs
Ravel "General Dance," from Daphnis and Chloé
Puccini "Vissi d'arte," from Tosca
Giordano "Un dì all'azzurro spazio," from Andrea Chénier
Verdi "Di quella pira," from Il trovatore
Verdi "Libiamo ne' lieti calici," from La traviata
Bach/Stokowski, Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, & Dukas Fantasia Suite
Now take an Overgrown Path to some more progressive reflections on the Philadelphia Orchestra
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Infoshare, the excellent blog from the US Music Library Association pointed me in the direction of the Philadelphia Orchestra tour blog. It's a journal of the orchestra's current tour of Asia (photo to the right is cellists Alex Veltman and Udi Bar-David in Hong Kong). The blog is well worth visiting, and is a really good example of a blog working as a journal rather than a vehicle for personal rants.
Mention of the Philadelphia Orchestra reminds me of my brief involvement with them some twenty five years ago. I was with EMI/Angel at that time, and one of my roles was artist promotion. Riccardo Muti was the cat's whiskers and had just been appointed to the Music Directorship in Philadelphia in succession to Ormandy, and this gave us the opportunity to record there. Although the quality of the Philadelphia Orchestra was superb there had always been a feeling of disappointment with the sound of the RCA recordings with Ormandy made in the acoustically rather dry hall of the Curtis Institute in the city.
Angel Record's John Coveney found the acoustically excellent Met Church which started life as an opera house (see footnote for full history). The church at that time was in a very run down part of the city (it is probably now surrounded by expensive lofts). We recorded Ravel's orchestration of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and Stravinsky's Firebird among other works there. The Met Church posed unique problems including an antique heating system which ruined takes with metallic creaks during pianissimos, and lumps of plaster falling from the ceiling during fortissimos . The acoustics though were fine and the sound was wonderful, largely because we imported the production team of Michael Gray (sound engineer) and Christopher Bishop (producer) from the UK for the recordings. I still have the Mussorgsky on vinyl, the analogue sound is very exciting; but like much of Muti's work the interpretation strikes me as mostly circumference, and little circle.
I remember desperately trying to find a cab for Muti in the rather tough street outside the Met Church in tropical heat at the end of one session. Muti appreciated my efforts by saying - 'if this had been a Deutsche Grammophon session they would have arranged a limo.' Plus ca change....
Footnote from my sleeve note for Muti's 1979 Pictures at an Exhibition LP - The Met Church building was built as an opera house in 1908 by Oscar Hammerstein 1 (grandfather of the famous lyricist-librettist) and opened in November of that year. The first season stars included Garden, Melba, Tetrazzini and McCormack. It was the eleventh of thirteen theatres and opera houses he built in New York, Philadelphia and London (the now demolished Stoll Theatre). It was perhaps his most ambitious, most beautiful and near-perfect auditorium. An enormous hall seated 4,200 patrons, every one of whom had perfect sight-lines to the stage. In April 1910 it was purchased by the Metopolitan Opera Company of New York, and renamed the Metropolitan Opera House. As its use diminished over the following years it became the scene for everything from school graduations to prize fights, with very occasional appearances by the Philadelphia Orchestra. In May 1954 the building was acquired by the Reverend Thea Jones who allowed EMI/Angel to use it as a recording venue for the first time in 1978. That is what I wrote in 1978. What has since happened to the Met Church/Metropolitan Opera House? I can find no more recent information on the internet. Can any readers update the story?
If you enjoyed this post follow the overgrown path to My first classical record
The Berlin Philharmonic has a close encounter with fire. Some, but fortunately not too much, damage to the Philharmonie (above), so it wasn't the orchestra's darkest hour. But moving their concerts to alternative venues must bring dark memories. And close encounters with fire reminds me it happened not once but twice to the Philadelphia Orchestra. But the inferno at Britten's Snape Maltings was music's greatest tragedy and triumph.
