by Peter Cates

Cab Callaway

Cab Calloway and his Orchestra – Floogie Walk; The Ghost of Smoky Joe: Vocalion v4807, ten inch 78, recorded 1939.

Cab Calloway (1907-1994) was a character in the truest sense of the word. For all his accomplishment as a well above average singer/musician, his claim to fame was his sardonic insinuating delivery of lyrics in his classic 1931 hit 78 Minnie the Moocher, a 1940s Columbia disc of Johnny Mercer’s Blues in the Night and his 1959 rendition of Gershwin’s It Ain’t Necessarily So for the Porgy and Bess Soundtrack also on Columbia (Calloway was substituting for Sammy Davis Junior who sang in the movie but had an exclusive contract with Decca and couldn’t record for any other label.).

As part of his quite comical insinuating delivery, Calloway would intone the first few words of the song, and then a male chorus, often referred to as the Heigh Dee Ho chorus, would echo or rephrase the words back to Calloway. For example, Blues in the Night:

Calloway- “My mama done told me.”

Male chorus- “What did she tell you?”

Then the classic song of lost love and the resulting loneliness becomes a satirical spoof of adult crybabies.

The above Vocalion 78 has the rhythmically engaging big band instrumental Floogie Walk, which attests to the fine arrangements Calloway was recording and side two’s The Ghost of Smoky Joe, where the singer/storyteller delivers another example of his sardonic humor.

George Handel

George Frederick Handel – The Messiah (excerpts); Helmuth Rilling conducting the Oregon Bach Festival Choir and Orchestra; Discovery House Music, QT 130, recorded 2004, 1 cd.

Handel’s Christmas/Easter Oratorio masterpiece is quite appropriate for year round listening if one happens to be in the mood. The performances here include 16 excerpts – Comfort Ye, Every Valley Shall Be Exalted, O Thou That Tellest Good Tidings To Zion (sung eloquently by the unlisted contralto), For Unto Us A Child Is Born, Hallelujah Chorus, etc.

Maestro Helmuth Rilling, using a small sized chorus and orchestra instead of the massive ensembles heard, for example, in the otherwise very good recordings from the ‘40s and ‘50s of Sir Thomas Beecham, Sir Malcolm Sargent, Sir Adrian Boult, and Eugene Ormandy, conducted in a very spirited manner. Still living and active at 91, Rilling has directed a large number of recordings of Bach, Handel and other composers with distinction.

And Handel’s Messiah has been recorded many times with distinguished results. I remember the late record reviewer and biographer of Handel, Herbert Weinstock who once wrote that a classical record collector only needs one recording of a piece, only to admit in a later review of a new recording of the Messiah that he owned a shelf full of Messiahs.

Louise Dickinson Rich

In her The Coast of Maine, Louise Dickinson Rich described a lady back in the day who “made a career of paying visits of several days, not always at the convenience of her hostess. However, she talked so entertainingly and continuously of old scandals and excitements during her stay that in the end nobody could help being glad she came.”

Suddenly

The 1954 melodrama Suddenly had Frank Sinatra portraying an assassin John Barron, who is heading to a small California town because he has inside information that the President of the United States is going to visiting there; and Barron and his two sidekicks are being paid a million dollars for the contract. Highly recommended as early ‘50s black and white suspense.

The supporting cast includes Sterling Hayden, Willis Bouchey, Nancy Gates, Paul Frees and James Gleason.

At the world premiere, Sinatra was filmed in the theater booth dressed as the assassin, selling tickets and chitchatting with the public.

When Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, Suddenly and the more well-known 1962 Manchurian Candidate were withdrawn from circulation for years at Sinatra’s request.

by Peter Cates

Fred Gaisberg

For collectors of the early shellac 78s, the 1999 biography, Sound Revolutions by Jerrold Northrop Moore is a fascinating biography of recording pioneer Fred Gaisberg (1873-1951) who, from 1894 when he landed employment at the Berliner Gramophone Company (later to become EMI) to his retirement in 1939, would develop a massive catalog of recordings of many of the world’s finest musicians and singers- Caruso, Chaliapin, Heifetz, Rubinstein, Paderewski, Kreisler etcs.

Prior to the 1930s, the artists were mainly recording short selections – operatic arias, piano and violin pieces and single movements from Symphonies and String Quartets.

Then Gaisberg started seeing the potential for complete Symphonies, Concertos, Sonatas if the right artists were matched to the repertoire and the financing provided through advance subscription from interested collectors.

Two notable projects were the Beethoven Society complete Sonatas and Concertos recorded by pianist Artur Schnabel and the Sibelius Society sets of all seven Symphonies of the Finnish composer.

In 1930, Bruno Walter (1876-1962) recommended that Sir Malcolm Sargent (1894-1967) engage Schnabel for a series of concerts in London. Prior to that, Schnabel was known mainly as a highly respected teacher at a Berlin Music School.

The pianist achieved success immediately and acquired a huge following as an interpreter of Beethoven’s 32 Sonatas and five Concertos.

A large number of Schnabel 78s and LP reissues here at the house reveal a pianist who played those Beethoven works like no other pianist, no matter how gifted otherwise. The sense of spirited freedom, rollicking rhythm, rapid playful tempos and an uncanny ability to gauge the emotions behind the notes could be heard in the Emperor Concerto’s first movement where Schnabel’s fingers were dancing on the keyboard.

Gaisberg wrote about his initial encounters with the pianist:

“It was given out that Schnabel would never stoop to recording as he considered it impossible for a mere machine to reproduce the dynamics of his playing faithfully. Therefore, when I interviewed him he was coy, but all the same prepared to put his theory to the test, though he would need a lot of convincing. At long last I was able to overcome all his prejudice. Tempted by a nice fat guarantee, he eventually agreed that it was possible to his ideals with machinery.”

The biography is loaded with other anecdotes. The inventor of the flat disc and owner of the Berliner Gramophone Company, Emile Berliner (1851-1929) was recorded around 1894 reciting the Lord’s Prayer and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star in, as described by Gaisberg, “in his typically broken guttural English!”

Just before the Nazi takeovers of Czechoslovakia and Austria, Gaisberg produced two legendary recordings:

In April 1937, he was in Prague to record the Dvorak Cello Concerto with Pablo Casals (1876-1973) and George Szell (1897-1970) directing the Czech Philharmonic.

January 1938, had Gaisberg in Vienna to record a live concert featuring Bruno Walter conducting the Vienna Philharmonic in Mahler’s 9th Symphony.

A retirement banquet for Gaisberg at London’s Savoy Hotel on April 21, 1939, had an honor roll of almost 70 guests from the musical world including most of the ones listed above. He lived long enough to see the first releases of the LP in 1948 and of the 45 rpm in 1949.

Fred Gaisberg died in his sleep on September 2, 1951.