by Peter Cates

Bach selections

from The Joy of Great Music, Album 15, FW-515, LP, 1980 series of records usually peddled in supermarket chains.

Johan Bach

The above album contains the following examples of Johann Sebastian Bach, 1685-1750:

Side 1, Saint Matthew Passion excerpts. Soprano Laurence Dutoit, alto Maria Nussbaumer, bass Otto Weiner, with Ferdinand Grossmann conducting the Vienna Chamber Orchestra and Choir.

Side 2, Toccata and Fugue in D Minor; Prelude and Fugue in E-Flat Major. Organist Walter Kraft.

Both originally Vox releases from the 1950s.

Bach’s St. Matthew Passion is roughly three hours long but contains incomparable stretches of beauty in its arias, choruses and instrumental writing. The singers, especially bass Otto Wiener (1911-2000), are in peak form while Grossmann’s Viennese groups do good work. The performance is a large-scaled one, as opposed to smaller ones in recent years, yet a distinctive entry on its own terms and deeply moving.

Walter Kraft

Kraft’s performances of the Toccata, and the E-Flat Prelude and Fugue are solid.

Another LP from the Vox label’s exemplary catalog; the Bartok Bluebeard’s Castle, with Herbert Hafner conducting the Vienna Symphony Symphony, soprano Ilona Steingruber, and bass Otto Weiner again. Vox, OPX 100, 1962 release.

Based on a blood-curdling legend from the Middle Ages, the 1918 opera Bluebeard’s Castle is one roaringly exciting listening experience. This performance is a haunting atmospheric one, despite some critics taking issue with the singing in German instead of the original Hungarian. The 1910-20 World War 1 decade experienced a superb roll call of first performances – Prokofiev’s 2nd Piano Concerto, Janacek’s opera Jenufa, Debussy’s Martyrdom of St. Sebastian, Stravinsky’s Petrouchka, Rite of Spring and Soldier’s Tale and Puccini’s Trittico.

A Goethe quote pertinent to artistic creativity, “To be of all ages, be then of your own.”

by Peter Cates

The Joy of Christmas

Leonard Bernstein, New York Philharmonic and Mormon Tabernacle; Columbia MS 6499, stereo LP, recorded 1963.

A Golden Treasury of Christmas Music

Sir Alexander Gibson, chorus and orchestra; Columbia Record Club P2S 5170, two LPs, recorded 1967.

Leonard Bernstein

This week’s Xmas LPs, both released in the 1960s, are very good examples of seasonal music performed with taste, intelligence and vibrant beauty. Joy of Christmas features the late Bernstein, at that time music director of the New York Philharmonic, conducting the orchestra and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in their one time collaboration.

The 16 songs include the familiar staples and a few not so well known. High points are the Animal Carol, a lovely one that is not often heard nowadays as during my childhood many decades ago; the strictly orchestral showpiece Carol of the Bells; and an a capella Away in a Manger combining two different musical settings.

Sir Alexander Gibson

Golden Treasury is a two-record set offered in its U.S. release only to members of the now-defunct Columbia Record Club out of Terre Haute, Indiana, most likely as long as they were “members in good standing.” This collection of 36 songs has the late Sir Alexander Gibson, whom I have written about in an earlier issue of The Town Line, conducting an unnamed chorus and orchestra in both carols and popular songs, utilizing traditional and unpredictable arrangements.

Examples include:

• White Christmas, in a choir/orchestral popsy arrangement with trombones added and similar to one that might combine Nelson Riddle and Norman Luboff.
• The Holy City, gently subdued with woodwinds, trumpet, snare drum, and double bass.
• O Holy Night, saxophone, harpsichord and orchestra.
• Hallelujah Chorus, orchestra only.
• Joy to the World, a much more traditional chorus and orchestra but riveting rather than routine.
  And so forth.

The two albums have 10 selections in common. Even though their availability is spotty, they can be bought on internet sites for prices ranging from cheap to grossly overpriced.

Satirical verses from a Tom Lehrer Yuletide song – “On Christmas Day you can’t get sore/Your fellow man you must adore/There’s time to rob him all the more/The other three hundred and sixty four!”

Merry Christmas!

The Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir

by Peter Cates

Christmas at the Brooklyn Tabernacle

The Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir and Singers, with the London Studio Orchestra; Warner Alliance 9460042, CD, recorded 1995.

Brooklyn, New York’s Tabernacle church has this very good choir as part of its weekly services and worldwide ministry. This cd is one that should please those who enjoy the group’s singing.

The following list of five CDs feature the alto saxophone of the jazz musician Lee Konitz, with comments at the end. 1. Subconscious – Lee, Prestige 0JCCD1862./ 2. Konitz Meets Mulligan, Pacific Jazz. CDP7468472./ 3. Jazz at Storyville, Black Lion BLCD760901./ 4. The Real Lee Konitz, Collectables COLCD6370./ 5. Another Shade of Blue, Blue Note 7234982222.

Still living and, as far as I know, active musically, Lee Konitz had a strong influence on the alto saxophonists Paul Desmond and Art Pepper, although Konitz was younger than both of them. He and Charlie Parker were good friends but he was his own man, whereas other altoists fell under Parker’s Sway. I really like his combination of intelligence, vibrant musicianship and beauty.

The five titles, in addition to more than 200 other ones, attest to his productivity for over 70 years. For reasons of space here, those curious check further on my five very recommended choices.

by Peter Cates

Tchaikovsky

5th Symphony
Anton Nanut conducting the Ljublana Symphony Orchestra- Point Classics, 265023, CD, released 1994.

The catalog of recordings of this Symphony is teeming with very fine ones. This entry can be added to the honor roll. I have written previously in this column and elsewhere about the merits of Anton Nanut, who passed away after a long illness at the age of 84 on January 13, 2017.

Nanut’s approach is one of architectural balance; intelligence in pacing, phrasing and shaping; understated beauty; and brooding drama. I have listened to this three or four times in the last two weeks and found it wears very well with repeated hearings.

Pyotr Tchaikovsky

When I was 12 during the spring of 1964, a woman residing then down the street from my house gave me four very good 78 rpm sets of classical music. One was the justly famous 1944 RCA Victor album of Koussevitsky and the Boston Symphony of the 5th. She also called it the most beautiful Symphony she had ever heard in her life.

For those who might be curious about the other three sets, as I would be under similar circumstances, I will not stint their very appropriate interest:

The Victor early ‘40s Stokowski/NBC Symphony Stravinsky Firebird Suite and nicely orchestrated Tchaikovsky Humoreske as filler on side 6.

Another Victor, Bach’s Brandenburgs 2 and 5 from the mid to late ‘40s with Koussevitsky conducting BSO members.

The Columbia 1940s two records of Lily Pons singing four arias from Donizetti’s Daughter of the Regiment.

Depeche Mode

Speak and Spell
Mute records, C stumm-5, cassette, released October, 1981.

Depeche Mode is an English electronic band, with a variety of influences in their own music; they have been performing and recording for almost 40 years. Using synthesizers with expressive results, their music is quite listenable and captivating.

Their 1981 cassette, Speak and Spell,was, and still is a beautiful example of their work, with two hit singles, New Life and Just Can’t Get Enough.

Depeche Mode

Critical reactions to the album were mixed. Melody labeled it “a great album…one they had to make to conquer fresh audiences and to please the fans who just can’t get enough.” But Rolling Stone magazine considered it “PG-rated fluff.”

by Peter Cates

Louis Armstrong

Early Satch
Philips 429739BE, 45 ep, extended play, Holland release. Originally 78s from 1927-1928.

Louis Armstrong

Four sides from the group known as the Louis Armstrong Hot Five are contained in this mid-’50s Dutch Philips reissue. All were recorded in Chicago; two done in May,1927 with the others in December, 1928. Several highest quality instrumentalists joined Satchmo and his second wife, pianist and singer Lil Armstrong (they duet back and forth in the classic That’s When I’ll Come Back to You).

Fatha Hines does piano turns in Chicago Breakdown and Basin Street Blues. Kid Ory’s trombone, Johnnie St. Cyr’s banjo, Don Redman’s alto sax and Baby Dodds’s and Zutty Singleton’s drums blend their unique sounds, adding to the cornet and trumpet notes that leader Armstrong mastered so thoroughly and beautifully. And the 4th track, Tight like This, is in a class of its own.

Berlioz

Harold in Italy
Violist Guenther Breitenbach with Rudolf Moralt conducting the Vienna Symphony Orchestra; Vox Pantheon 6700, mono LP, recorded 1950.

Hector Berlioz

Composer Hector Berlioz wrote this Symphony with viola obbligato for his friend, violin virtuoso and composer Niccolo Paganini. The violinist then rejected the music because it wasn’t flashy enough for him and his constant need to show off his technique. However the work has become a huge favorite since its 1834 premiere.

This oldish, antique performance and recording is very good for its time and one eloquent listening experience in its individual musicality. I bought it in 2002 for $2 at the now gone annex of the NYC Tower records at Fourth and Broadway and played it several times since then. The late Harold C. Schon­berg’s annotations are astute and engaging.

Bluebloods

Tom Selleck

I have watched the first three episodes of this show’s 8th season on Netflix, where I enjoyed the previous seven seasons immensely. Tom Selleck, as the New York City police commissioner Frank Reagan, heads a superb cast of regulars who keep the story lines moving along.