Stravinsky: Petrouchka (Coates)

Another Albert Coates birth anniversary is upon us (April 23 - Thursday, this year), so for this week I present his version of Stravinsky's Petrouchka. This is only the second recording ever made of that great ballet; Eugene Goossens' pioneering acoustical version with the Royal Albert Hall Orchestra, which Satyr has available, was the first. Coates' recording would have been intended to replace it, of course:

Stravinsky: Petrouchka (complete ballet)
London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates
Recorded October 19 and 24, 1927, January 5 and February 15, 1928
HMV Album 54 (D 1521 through D 1524), four 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 100.66 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 60.12 MB)

It's worth noting that this is one of the few Coates recordings made by HMV that did not get issued in the USA by Victor - an honor that even most of his acoustical recordings enjoyed. I presume that is because Koussevitzky recorded the Suite from Petrouchka at about the same time, as his first recording with the Boston Symphony, and Victor considered the Coates set, complete though it was, superfluous. (Victor had issued the Goossens recording in 1925.)

Mozart: Jupiter Symphony (Coates)

Last week we had Leopold Stokowski's 132nd birthday, and this week (April 23) we have the same for Albert Coates, that great gramophonic pioneer. And so I offer his first recording of Mozart's "Jupiter" Symphony (an electrically-recorded replacement succeeded it three years later). It isn't known whether it's the first complete recording of the work (an abridged one by the Victor Concert Orchestra had preceded it); the other contender would be a Deutsche Grammophon set conducted by Johannes Heidenreich, and since Deutsche Grammophon's recording ledgers were lost in the Second World War, we don't know when that recording was made. We do know that it was released in March, 1924, five months after the Coates version had been completed, but ten months before it actually appeared, having been held up by the need to record a suitable filler. (DG didn't bother about such niceties as suitable fillers - theirs was Richard Strauss conducting two movements from his "Bourgeois Gentilhomme" Suite!) What can be said about Coates' version is that it's probably the fastest on record - 28 minutes total, and that's with exposition repeats not only in the first movement and finale, but the slow movement as well, probably for the only time on 78-rpm discs for this particular symphony. (Had the repeats not been observed, the total timing would have amounted to only about 21 minutes.  Coates was well known for his speedy tempos.)

Mozart: Symphony No. 41 in C Major, K. 551 ("Jupiter")
Recorded August 27 and October 16, 1923
and
Mozart: Overture to "Der Schauspieldirektor" (The Impresario), K. 486
Recorded October 22, 1924
Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates
HMV D 942 through D 945, four 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 102.47 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 57.25 MB)

Stokowski and Vaughan Williams

Ralph Vaughan Williams and Leopold Stokowski, 1957

Thursday will mark the 131st anniversary of the birth of Leopold Stokowski, and so I present his only commercial recording of a Vaughan Williams symphony - his Sixth - which also happens to be the only non-British première recording of a Vaughan Williams symphony.  No doubt this latter circumstance was quite by accident, for a competing version, Boult's on HMV (which can be heard at the CHARM website), was made a mere two days later!  Stokowski's version is very exciting, and may be the fastest on record of this great symphony.  (For an appreciation of Stokowski's performances of Vaughan Williams, see this article by Edward Johnson at Larry Huffman's amazing site, www.stokowski.org - from which the above picture has been borrowed.)  As a bonus, a ravishing but slightly abridged version of the Fantasia on "Greensleeves," issued only on 78 at the time, is included:

Vaughan Williams: Symphony No. 6 in E Minor and Fantasia on "Greensleeves"
New York Philharmonic conducted by Leopold Stokowski
Recorded February 21, 1949
Columbia Masterworks set MM-838, four 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 82.47 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 43.08 MB)

Another important conductor anniversary on the horizon is that of Albert Coates, who was born five days after Stokowski.  In 2009 I first offered his recording of a Bach organ toccata, orchestrated by Heinrich Esser.  A few weeks ago I decided to use a different stylus to make a new transfer, the original one being afflicted by a swish towards the end.  I think this one sounds a little better:

Bach: Toccata in F, BWV 540 (orch. Esser)
London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates
Recorded February 18, 1932
Victor 11468, one 78-rpm record
Link (FLAC file, 24.70 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 9.35 MB)

The links at the original post have also been updated.

Rubinstein: Two Early Concerto Recordings



Arthur Rubinstein

For what is likely to be my last post of 2011, I present two of Arthur (spelled with an "h" on his earliest recordings) Rubinstein's earliest concerto recordings, which show the pianist, then in his early-to-mid-40s, as quite a firebrand.  The first of these is, I'm pretty sure, his very first concerto recording, with Albert Coates conducting:

Brahms: Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-Flat major, Op. 83
Arthur Rubinstein and the London Symphony conducted by Albert Coates
Recorded October 22 and 23, 1929
HMV D 1746 through 1750 (Album 90), five 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 11142.MB)
Link (MP3 files, 56.1 MB)

Rubinstein himself had strong reservations against the issuance of this recording; in his autobiography, he recounts how difficult the sessions were, with the piano placed in the back of the orchestra, far away from Mr. Coates! Nor had he any chance of consulting with Coates before the sessions.  Whatever the circumstances, an exciting performance emerges from these discs, surely one of the fastest on record of the Brahms B-Flat Concerto.  Listen and judge for yourself.

For his next concerto sessions in January 1931, Rubinstein had the services of John Barbirolli, with whom he recorded two works: the Chopin F minor concerto, and this concerto by Mozart:

Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major, K. 488
Arthur Rubinstein with the London Symphony conducted by John Barbirolli
Recorded January 7 and 8, 1931
Victor Musical Masterpiece Set M-147, three 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 61.15 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 29.1 MB)

This was among the earliest recordings of any Mozart piano concerto.  It was recorded and issued concurrently with Georges Boskoff's of K. 459 on Parlophone and Magda Tagliaferro's of K. 537 on French Decca; only Dohnányi's famous Columbia recording of K. 453 of 1928 is earlier than these.  It also remained in the catalogue well into the 1950's - in contrast to the Brahms, which was displaced by Schnabel's recording of six years later.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Albert Coates' 1923 Beethoven Ninth

This was one of my most popular uploads when I offered it before, back in November 2007, with over 300 hits.  It's the fabled acoustical recording of the Beethoven Ninth, by that great recording pioneer, Albert Coates (1882-1953).  I must say at the outset that the sound quality is not optimal - my source is a second-, possibly third-generation cassette dub sent to me by Frank Forman in 2003, but it's quite listenable, and gives some idea of what the recorders in 1923 were able to accomplish with an orchestra of 39 players and a mighty chorus of eight!  Frank's tape had, as a filler, short pieces by Liadov and Debussy that I also transferred, as a separate upload.

Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125
Symphony Orchestra and Chorus conducted by Albert Coates
Recorded in October and November, 1923
HMV D 842 through 849, eight 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 140.4 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 69.13 MB)

Liadov: Kikimora - Orchestral Fairy Tale, Op. 63
Debussy: Golliwog's Cakewalk (from "Children's Corner")
Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates
Recorded October 28, 1921, and April 25, 1922
HMV D 620, one 78-rpm record
Link (FLAC files, 16.74 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 8.24 MB)

A month after posting these, I posted the following additional early recording by Albert Coates:

Strauss: Tod und Verklärung, Op. 24
Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates
Recorded April 27 and May 11, 1923
HMV D 743 and 744, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 49.45 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 18.92 MB)

This posting represented the first in a long series of transfers of acoustically-recorded major symphonic and chamber works.  I had amassed quite a collection of these - some 150 discs - by 2003, mostly through various dealers (among them Raymond Glaspole, Dave Canfield, Peter Fülöp and others), when I was forced to dispose of most of my 78 collection.  Fortunately, a friend and fellow collector had the foresight to ensure that most of these very rare acoustical sets wound up in his hands, so that I was able to borrow them back for the purpose of making these transfers.

Finally, an electrical recording by Mr. Coates that I first offered in 2009, when his birthday (April 23) was being celebrated by various RMCR denizens:

Bach (orch. Esser): Toccata in F, BWV 540
London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Albert Coates
Recorded February 18, 1932
Victor 11468, one 78-rpm record
Link (FLAC file, 24.70 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 9.35 MB)