Chopin: Rondo, Op. 73 (Bartlett and Robertson)

Of the 32 issued sides recorded for American Columbia by duo-pianists Ethel Bartlett and Rae Robertson between 1940 and 1945, the two comprising this disc may well be the rarest, for they are the only two such sides by the duo not listed in the 1949 Columbia Catalog, nor does there appear to have been any other issue of them.  The piece thus honored, if you can call it that, is this charming Rondo by Chopin, one of five free-standing works he was to write in this form, and his only work for two pianos to be graced with an opus number (posthumously given, as it is early, dating from 1828):

Chopin: Rondo in C Major for Two Pianos, Op. 73
Ethel Bartlett and Rae Robertson, pianos
Recorded January 29, 1941
Columbia 71190-D, one 78-rpm record
Link (FLAC file, 17.72 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 13.62 MB)

Beethoven via Saint-Saëns, Bartlett and Robertson

Camille Saint-Saëns, c. 1875

Beethoven's birthday is upon us again (Dec. 16), and, to celebrate, I present the finest set of variations known to me on one of his themes by someone other than Beethoven himself.  This is Saint-Saëns' 1874 set of variations for two pianos, based on the Trio of the Menuetto from the Piano Sonata No. 18 in E-Flat, Op. 31, No. 3 - and notice how Saint-Saëns works in, at the very beginning of this piece, a sly reference to another great sonata from the same opus, the "Tempest" Sonata, with his arpeggios running up the keyboard in different keys!  The performance here is another gem by Bartlett and Robertson, from their all-too-meager series of recordings for HMV from the early 30s:

Saint-Saëns: Variations on a Theme of Beethoven, Op. 35
Ethel Bartlett and Rae Robertson, duo-pianists
Recorded July 22, 1932
HMV C 2483 and C 2484, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 42.31 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 25.38 MB)

I am aware of only three recordings of these Variations made during the 78-rpm era; this is the second.  The first was by Georges Bertram and Karol Szreter for French Odeon in 1927, and the last was a Victor set by Pierre Luboshutz and Genia Nemenoff issued in 1940.

Brahms: Haydn Variations (Bartlett and Robertson)

Rae Robertson and Ethel Bartlett

I've featured several recordings in the past by the British duo-piano team of Ethel Bartlett (1896-1978) and Rae Robertson (1893-1956), and here's another: the original piano duo version of Brahms' wonderful Variations on the St. Anthony Chorale, previously attributed to Haydn but more likely, according to the latest scholarship, to be by Haydn's pupil Ignaz Pleyel.  Of course, several recordings of the orchestral version had achieved wide currency when this recording was issued late in 1940, including ones by Toscanini and Weingartner, but this appears to be the first-issued recording of the piano duo.  (A year after this recording appeared, a version by Pierre Luboshutz and Genia Nemenoff was issued by Victor, but since I don't have access to Victor's recording dates, I have no way of knowing which was actually recorded first.)

Brahms: Variations on a Theme of Haydn, Op. 56b
Ethel Bartlett and Rae Robertson, duo-pianists
Recorded January 4 and April 3, 1940
Columbia Masterworks set X-181, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 41.29 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 25.26 MB)

Sadly, Bartlett and Robertson's recording career was not as extensive as artists of their caliber would warrant.  It began with several NGS recordings of works by Arnold Bax in the late 1920s, continued in the 30s with a dozen or so sides for HMV, and when they moved to the USA in the late 30s they signed with Columbia, where they recorded 32 issued sides before Vronsky and Babin, who had been at Victor, displaced them as the reigning piano duo.  In the early 50s, they made several LPs for MGM, which are so obscure that I knew nothing of them until researching for this post!  They included a second recording of the Brahms Haydn Variations and their only recordings of works by Stravinsky.

Debussy: En blanc et noir (Bartlett & Robertson)

Rae Robertson and Ethel Bartlett

In honor of D-Day, sixty-nine years ago today, I present a work by a Frenchman who was profoundly depressed by the events of a previous war - Claude Debussy, who actually abandoned composition for several months at the outset of World War I in 1914.  His return to it came in the form of this three-movement suite for two pianos, "En blanc et noir" - a masterpiece, whose second movement clearly evokes the war.  This recording by Bartlett and Robertson appears to have been only the second one made of the work; an earlier version, on French HMV by Marcelle Ruff and Dominique Jeanes, from 1929, had long been deleted when this one appeared, coincidentally, about the time of D-Day! - three years after it was recorded:

Debussy: En blanc et noir, for two pianos (1915)

Ethel Bartlett and Rae Robertson, duo-pianists

Recorded April 29, 1941

Columbia Masterworks set MX-241, two 78-rpm records

Link (FLAC files, 43.67 MB)

Link (MP3 files, 24.97 MB)

The National Gramophonic Society, Part 2

Paul Juon

Here's the second of two posts to deal with the re-uploads of my National Gramophonic Society sets, featuring two electrical recordings of chamber works in which woodwinds are prominent.  By far the lesser known of these works is the Chamber Symphony by Paul Juon (1872-1940).  This delightful work, which despite its title is really an octet for piano, woodwinds and strings, was published as such in 1905 with a dedication to Julius Block, the agent of Edison who recorded so many Russian musicians on cylinders, including Juon himself.  When I first uploaded this recording in 2007, I had done the side join in the first movement incorrectly, owing to the lack of either a score or a modern continuous-play recording.  Since then I have had access to a score (which can be had here at the Internationam Music Score Library Project), and this error has now been corrected.  Unfortunately the score also revealed that cuts had been made in the last two movements.  Despite this, it's a fine performance, featuring Rae Robertson (one-half of Bartlett and Robertson) on piano, and Leon Goossens on oboe:

Paul Juon: Chamber Symphony in B-Flat, Op. 27
New Chamber Orchestra conducted by Charles Kreshover
Recorded December 31, 1929, by Columbia
National Gramophonic Society 144 through 146, three 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 61.54 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 28.53 MB)

Leon Goossens also performs on the other work presented here, that of the Mozart Quintet for Piano and Winds, which features Kathleen Long as the pianist.  The ensemble is rounded out by Frederick Thurston (clarinet), John Alexandra (bassoon), and Aubrey Brain (horn):

Mozart: Quintet in E-Flat, K. 452, for piano and winds
Kathleen Long (piano) and ensemble
Recorded March 19, 1928, by Columbia
National Gramophonic Society 121 through 123, three 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 45.69 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 20.83 MB)

Bach by Bartlett, Robertson and Barbirolli

This time I present a fairly rare recording of a Bach concerto by the British husband-and-wife piano duo team of Ethel Bartlett (1896-1978) and Rae Robertson (1893-1956), pictured above with tenor Peter Pears on the left.  (The picture was taken by Benjamin Britten - who wrote three works for the Robertsons - while he and Pears were staying at the couple's California home during the summer of 1941.  It was while staying here that Britten ran across a magazine article about George Crabbe, that ultimately led to the creation of his most famous opera, "Peter Grimes.")  The Robertsons were of diminutive stature - notice how Pears is standing on a lower stair in the picture - but there was nothing diminutive about their piano-playing.

This recording of Bach's Concerto in C, BWV 1061, was made in London in 1933 with a pickup orchestra conducted by John Barbiroll (who in previous years had given cello recitals with Bartlett as his accompanist).  It seems to have been the first recording of the work, although a much more famous one was made only three years later, also by HMV, featuring pianist Artur Schnabel and his son Karl Ulrich Schnabel, with Adrian Boult conducting the strings of the London Symphony.  The Bartlett-Robertson version, however, must have still had some customers, as it was much cheaper - only 8 shillings for two Plum Label records, versus 18 shillings for three Red Label records in the Schnabels' version!  In any case, the Bartlett-Robertson records remained available until 1943.

Bach: Concerto in C for two claviers and strings, BWV 1061
Ethel Bartlett and Rae Robertson, pianos
Orchestra conducted by John Barbirolli
Recorded December 20, 1933
HMV C 2648 and C 2649, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 43.19 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 18.1 MB)

Over three years ago I posted to RMCR two other Bach recordings by Ethel Bartlett, one with her husband, one with Barbirolli in one of his rare cello recordings.  These are still available for download; the details:

Bach: Organ Sonata No. 1 in E-Flat, BWV 525, arranged for two pianos
Ethel Bartlett and Rae Robertson, pianists
Recorded July 20, 1933
HMV C 2614, one 78-rpm record
Link (FLAC file, 21.26 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 7.94 MB)

Bach: Sonata in G, BWV 1027, for viola da gamba and harpsichord
John Barbirolli, cello, and Ethel Bartlett, piano
Recorded July 1, 1929, by Columbia
National Gramophonic Society 133-134, 2 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 35.67 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 16.13 MB)