by Peter Cates Pietro Mascagni Italian composer Pietro Mascagni (1863-1945) experienced the most extraordinary success when, at the age of 28 in 1891, his opera Cavalliera Rusticana was premiered in Italy. It would receive over 14,000 productions between then and the beginning of World War I in 1914. It is one of my six currently […]
by Peter Cates Palace Records Grieg 2nd Peer Gynt Suite and Liszt 1st Piano Concerto; Kurt Baumann conducting the Viennese Symphonic Orchestra; Palace PST-610, 12-inch stereo LP released mid-1950s. Palace was one of many record labels that came and went during the 1950s. The jacket had a list price of $4.98 which was the usual […]
by Peter Cates Dionne Warwick Scepter records was the label that released albums by the very gifted singer Dionne Warwick. Back in 1968 the first record I ever bought of her was a 45 that I was able to special order from a vendor who set up a consignment rack at the Cates Country Store. […]
by Peter Cates Louise Dickinson Rich The Coast of Maine by Louise Dickinson Rich (1903-1991) was first published in 1956 and subsequently revised in 1962 and 1970. Dipping in it, I came across the following: “Considering its present and past eminence as a seaport, which always connotes-perhaps unfairly – sailors celebrating shore leave by bending […]
by Peter Cates The Five Scamps The Five Scamps, The Fishing Song; and Good Lover Blues. Columbia 30168, ten-inch 78, recorded 1949. The Five Scamps were an African American group of singers and instrumentalists who began performing informally in a WPA work camp in 1936 but then the story ends there until 1946, when their […]
by Peter Cates Johanna Fiedler In the Introduction to her 1994 memoir, Arthur Fiedler: Papa, the Pops, and Me, the late Johanna Fiedler (1944-2011) writes the following about being in New York City and watching the live CBS TV presentation of her father conducting the Boston Pops at the 1976 Bicentennial 4th of July concert […]
by Peter Cates Ken Marvin A ten-inch 78 (Mercury 6373) features two country and western songs – (A Heartsick Soldier on) Heartbreak Ridge; and Missing in Action; both sides focused on a soldier fighting in Korea and the horrors of separation from home, wife and family amidst the noise of exploding shells. The listed singer […]
by Peter Cates Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli Pianist Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli (1920-1995) had, like Vladimir Horowitz and Sviatoslav Richter , a superhuman lightning speed virtuosity at the keyboard that brought much deserved fame. Unlike Horowitz and Richter who left several different performances of certain pieces that varied in style and tempo, Michelangeli would record, for example, […]
by Peter Cates Barbra Streisand Although there was a time when I was quite enthralled by certain Barbra Streisand albums, such as 1969’s What About Today; the early 70s Stoney End, and Barbra Joan Streisand (especially Michel Legrand’s The Summer Knows from the movie Summer of ’42); and 1975’s Classical Barbra, I have not found […]
by Peter Cates Franz Liszt One of the very first classical records to give pleasure to me during seventh grade was a 12-inch 78 (Columbia Masterworks 12437) of the Second Hungarian Rhapsody, by Franz Liszt (1811-1886), as performed by Eugene Ormandy (1899-1985) with the Phildelphia Orchestra and recorded April 18, 1946. Lasting just under 10 […]