by Peter Cates Handel’s Messiah Donald Neuen conducting the Eastman Chorale and Philharmonia, Word, SPCN 7-01-892910, three lps, recorded 1984 at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. Handel’s Messiah has been recorded numerous times with choirs and orchestras ranging from huge to very small. I have a number of these sets and […]
by Peter Cates Some Christmas music! Bing Crosby-Merry Christmas; Decca DL 8128, mono vinyl LP, released 1955 and consisting of selections recorded 1942-51. Decades before the term came into use, Bing Crosby (1903-1977) was a true ‘multimedia star’ with his very many successful records, radio shows and films. His major talent was being one of […]
by Peter Cates Saturday, November 23: Philip Glass’s 1983 opera, Akhnaten, deals with the Egyptian pharaoh of that name who launches monotheism as the country’s faith upon replacing his late father, Amenhotep III, on the throne. He marries Nefertiti, throws out the pagan polytheism and its priests, lives in a very insulated world with his […]
by Peter Cates From Edward Lear, 1812-1888, the gifted poet of nonsense verse from London: There was an Old Man of Three Bridges Whose mind was distracted by midges; He sate on a wheel, eating underdone veal, Which relieved that Old Man of Three Bridges. A record has been left of the first Thanksgiving in […]
by Peter Cates Met Opera Links at WOH Recently I mentioned the live Met Opera links being seen at the Waterville Opera House. This past Saturday, Puccini’s Madame Butterfly was scheduled there, starting at 12:55 p.m., as were October 12’s Turandot and October 26 Massenet Manon, both of which I attended. Not googling its website […]
by Peter Cates Herb Alpert Magic Man A&M records, SP-3728, LP, recorded 1981. Now 84 years old, trumpeter Herb Alpert staked his claim to fame back in the early ‘60s with the series of Tijuana Brass albums that sold in the millions as vinyl LPs and continue to do well in CD formats. His A&M […]
by Peter Cates Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 “Pathetique”; Muir Mathieson conducting the Sinfonia of London. Camelot CMT 102, stereo LP, recorded 1958. Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s 6th Symphony was given its world premiere on October 28, 1893, nine days before he died at 53. He wrote a letter to his nephew that year describing his feelings […]
by Peter Cates Elizabeth Coatsworth “Outwardly I am 83, but inwardly I am every age, with the emotions and experiences of each period.” Born in Buffalo, New York, the writers Elizabeth Coatsworth (1893-1986) and her husband, Henry Beston (1888-1968), lived in an early 19th century farmhouse, Chimney Farm, alongside Damariscotta Lake, in Nobleboro, Maine. She […]
by Peter Cates The Headliners, Volume 3 Columbia Record Club, GB 11, LP, released December, 1962. A number of record collectors with very long memories, including myself, joined the now-extinct Columbia Record Club which started in 1955 and was based in Terre Haute, Indiana. Every year around Christmas starting in 1960, it would send a […]
by Peter Cates In last week’s column, I wrote about the pianist Glenn Gould and mentioned his classical hit record, the 1955 Bach Goldberg Variations for Columbia Records but failed to mention another million seller, his 1981 remake of the same work, of which many of his fans, including myself, also consider basic to any […]