by Peter Cates

Soprano: Licia Albanese

Parnassus recordings, PAR 1001, lp reissue of 78s and live arias recorded from 1936-46.

Licia Albanese (1909-2014) had one of the most magnificently beautiful soprano voices ever to be heard on record and I say this as a big fan of Maria Callas, Angela Gheorghiu, Mirella Freni, Victoria de los Angeles yada yada. This LP gathered a number of 78s she recorded for the Italian label, La Voce Del Padrone, between 1936 and 1940, the latter year being when she made her debut at New York City’s Metropolitan Opera and became a regular for 26 years; the program of 13 selections also contained three live radio appearances during World War II and encompassed Neapolitan songs and operatic arias from Bizet’s Carmen, Donizetti’s Don Pasquale and Puccini’s Manon Lescaut, Madama Butterfly and Turandot. And every selection is a gem.

But instead of trying to use my own words in describing these gems, I will provide what the annotator for this album wrote:

“Magic is a mysterious thing, and there was no mystery about Licia Albanese’s greatness. She was perpetually engaged in a quest for beauty in opera, and she sang with beautiful tone and beautiful art. To Albanese, every movement and every sound was meant to express the character she was portraying-but never at the expense of beauty. She was a beautiful woman and opera at the Metropolitan during the ’40s, ’50s and ’60s was more beautiful because of her.”

Her most famous role was Cio Cio San in Madame Butterfly, which she sang more than 300 times. A lot of her singing, along with interviews, can be accessed on YouTube.

Poet: Alice Christiana Meynell

Victorian poet Alice Christiana Meynell (1847-1922) was a devout Catholic and feminist and actively campaigned for women’s rights and against poverty and cruelty to animals. She is little read today, which is an unfortunate omission. I offer her very eloquent, powerful poem, The Lady Poverty, published in 1895:

The Lady Poverty was fair;
But she has lost her looks of late,
With change of times and change of air.
Ah, slattern! she neglects her hair,
Her gown, her shoes; she keeps no state
As once when her pure feet were bare.

Or — almost worse, if worse can be —
She scolds in parlors, dusts and trims,
Watches and counts. Oh, is this she
Whom Francis met, whose step was free,
Who with Obedience caroled hymns,
In Umbria walked with Chastity?

Where is her ladyhood? Not here,
Not among modern kinds of men;
But in the stony fields, where clear
Through the thin trees the skies appear,
In delicate spare soil and fen,
And slender landscape and austere.

What resonates so much is this poet’s sense of anger and heartbreak and how beauty, truth, honor and justice are so elusive in this world. Things do not seem to have changed much in the 125 years since this poem was published.

by Peter Cates

Beethoven

Symphony # 7
Eugene Ormandy conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra; Columbia, M-557, five 12- inch 78s, Recorded 1944.

Back during the 78 rpm days, lasting the first half of the 20th century, the record sides were three to five minutes in duration; when longer classical works were recorded, the scores were marked at certain notes to indicate when a red light in the studio would go off overhead, signalling everybody to stop. These limitations created a hectic rushed tension in trying to meet the deadline.

Thus, when the long playing records were released to the public in 1948 with 20 to 30 minutes of playing time, conductors and players could relax more. And performance practices were influenced by recording technology as much as musical considerations.

Eugene Ormandy commented on these pressures during an interview in the late ‘60s. He often felt inhibited by the limited time of conducting for the shorter 78 record sides and welcomed the LP days because he said he and the players could really let themselves go as musicians with longer takes.

Interestingly, after listening for decades to Ormandy’s recordings, I have found that a number of earlier 78 sets of certain works he re-recorded later had more of an uninhibited excitement than the later stereo ones. A case in point is the Beethoven Seventh Symphony from 1944 and his 1966 one from 18 years after the LP era began.

The Symphony itself is a masterpiece in its dance rhythms and wonderful beauty in each of the four movements. The opening movement has two distinct sections – the beginning Poco Sostenuto with its grand procession of leisurely pacing and the sprightly intense Vivace building to one of the greatest musical crescendos in all of Beethoven’s writing.

The second movement Allegretto is akin to a sweet embracing waltz of elegance in the writing for strings.

The third movement Presto has rambunctious, slam bang high spirits while the final fourth movement Allegro con brio is fast moving, headstrong jubilation at a genius level.

Ormandy gave a performance on these old 78s that might be seen as driven and hectic in places but he conveyed joy and conviction in every note and bar.

This performance can also be heard on YouTube and is an enriching listening experience, highly recommended.

Footnote: the individual who wrote program notes for this Symphony’s first performance in December 1813, commented that Beethoven was depicting a social revolution in the music itself and was verbally murdered by the composer for misreading its meaning.

by Peter Cates

Sculptor
Camille Claudel (1864-1943)

Camille Claudel did a bust of her younger brother, the poet, essayist and diplomat Paul Claudel (1868-1955), when he was only 16 in 1884. One is captivated by the exceptionally vivid expressive lines in her brother’s face, the emotional vulnerability she brought out in bronze and the labor of affection she poured from her heart and soul in her tribute to him, a love that was betrayed by his treacherous institutionalizing of her in a psychiatric hospital in France from 1913 to her death, at 79, in 1943, with the full support of their mother and younger sister.

Camille was drawn to the artistic possibilities of soil, rock and clay at an early age, while the often bleak landscape of the northern France region of Villeneuve-sur-Fere, where her family spent several summers, appealed to her aesthetic and emotional sensibility, one that bore fruit in her art as evidenced in the 90 sculptures, drawings and sketches of her legacy that can be seen in museums listed in her Wiki biography.

She became a student of sculptor, Alfred Boucher (1850-1934), while living in Paris, and then Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) with whom she had a very passionate relationship of almost 20 years before he abruptly terminated it; some believe he resented her own work, feeling threatened by her rivalry.

Camille met English sculptor Jessie Lipscomb (1861-1952) and rented a workshop with her for several years and two other women sculptors, one of them having access to a foundry her family owned.

Although Camille did have an emotional breakdown during her 40s, the previously mentioned incarceration of her by her family was believed to have been based on their own selfishness in wanting the money her father left to her in his will after his death in 1913, and what they saw as immorality in her art. Within eight days, her brother signed her into the hospital against her will and only visited her seven times during the remaining 30 years of her life.

The 2013 film, Camille Claudel 1915, starring Juliette Binoche in the title role and which can be seen on YouTube, depicts Camille at the mental hospital after two years of living there. Binoche conveyed the writhing boredom, anger and emotional shutdown of the sculptor’s years there unerringly but the movie’s more than 90 minutes were agonizingly slow and the depicted scenes of institutional life frequently unpleasant.

Jean-Luc Vincent portrayed brother Paul as a monster of self-righteousness in his decision to leave her locked up for the rest of her life and was harrowingly convincing in his characterization; one wanted to break his neck.

One poignant scene occurs when the sculptor is walking on the grounds. She picks up some mud, starts shaping it with her hands, then angrily hurls it to the ground.

Unfortunately, there were no English subtitles on the YouTube. But, despite these quibbles, it is highly recommended!

by Peter Cates

Philharmonic

EMI, CDC 7474772, cd, recorded 1985-86.

Camille Saint-Saens (1835-1921) was displaying perfect pitch before he was three years old and would be a child prodigy on the piano by age five; however, his mother sensibly decided he was too young for any exposure to the rigors of public acclaim through an official debut but the boy was allowed to perform for family, friends and other small groups occasionally.

From 7 to 13 years of age, Saint-Saens studied with the gifted pedagogue, Camille-Marie Stamaty (1811-1870), who had certain unorthodox teaching tools; for example, he would set a bar in front of the keyboard, and insist that his students rest their elbows and forearms on it, relying only on their fingers and hands to play . The composer felt this was good training.

He gave his first public concert in Paris at 10 years old, performing Concertos by Mozart and Beethoven.

At age 13, he was admitted to the Paris Conservatory but, despite being an outstanding pianist, was strongly encouraged to study organ because of the prevailing view that employment opportunities for organists were far greater in France than for pianists, especially with the large number of churches. He switched his focus to that instrument, got a job as organist at 18 for one of the oldest Parisian churches, itself with 26,000 parishioners and made very good wages. Composer Franz Liszt declared Saint-Saens to be the greatest organist he ever heard.

One of Saint-Saens’s teachers introduced him to the music of Bach, which was one of his greatest loves.

While at the Conservatory, he was also an outstanding student in many other subjects, including French literature, Greek and Latin, philosophy, math, theology, astonomy etc., and would have a lifelong passion for learning.

He premiered the Organ Symphony in London in 1886 where it met with immediate success. Ironically, after 20 years of being a church organist, he cared little for the instrument yet wrote what I feel is his most moving work. It is scored for full orchestra, organ and two pianos and is given a very nice recording by organist Philippe Lefebvre, in a collaboration with the French National Radio Orchestra, under Seiji Ozawa, who was music director of the Boston Symphony from 1973 to 2002. Ozawa also included two very elegant tone poems based on Greek mythology, Phaeton and Omphale’s Spinning Wheel, on this mid-1980s CD.

As a young man, Saint-Saens championed the music of Schumann, Liszt and Wagner but grew quite reactionary with age. He was the teacher and lifelong friend of composer Gabriel Faure but considered Debussy and Stravinsky to be dangerous lunatics who deserved to be institutionalized, after hearing their music.

He gave his last recital in November 1921, at the age of 86, and was reported as being in vigorous health. A month later, he died suddenly of a heart attack while vacationing in Algiers.

Saint-Saens was so precociously talented from his earliest years that Hector Berlioz (1803-1869) commented that this young man lacked one important quality – inexperience!

by Peter Cates

Miscellany!

Placido Domingo

Opera singer Placido Domingo, who’s 79, has tested positive for coronavirus. We can all hope he will be fine, as people even older are recovering from this. But we need to continue with the suggested safety steps, too.

While on the subject of Domingo, I have some of his recordings – various complete operas, single arias, and three tenors collaborations with Pavarotti and Carreras. He also has had a long, professional singing career and seems to have paced himself, as opposed to some singers who ruin their voices earlier. His Cavaradossi on the Leontyne Price Puccini’s Tosca set conducted by Zubin Mehta is a good introduction to his artistry.

Dean Martin

Dream with Dean
Reprise LP, August 1964 release.

Dean Martin was a singer of talent, even if not on the same level as Frank Sinatra. He phrased with intelligence, suavity and an astute sense of timing.

This album featured him in a small jazz combo setting, accompanied by four very fine instrumentalists – guitarist Barney Kessel, pianist Ken Lane, bassist Red Mitchell and drummer Irv Cottler. Dino sang such staples as My Melancholy Baby, Fools Rush In, I’ll Buy That Dream and a scaled down, subdued Everybody Loves Somebody plus eight additional selections. And it can be heard on YouTube.

Gene Krupa and His Orchestra

It’s Just a Matter of Opinion; That’s My Home
Columbia, 37067, ten-inch 78, recorded mid-1940s.

Gene Krupa (1909-1973) was a truly gifted musician on the drums who expanded their boundaries from mere rhythm to outstanding artistic virtuosity on the 1930’s hit recording, Sing Sing Sing, by Benny Goodman’s orchestra. At various times during the ‘40s and ‘50s, Krupa led his own orchestra and recorded a number of 78s for Columbia Records.

Both sides feature the very good jazz singer, Buddy Stewart (1922-1950), who is joined in It’s Just a Matter… by Carolyn Grey, who was heard often during the big band days. The songs are not well-known staples but they are quality listening in their vocal and instrumental arrangements.

Krupa played frequent battles of the drums with friend Buddy Rich in concert and recording. He also struggled with heroin addiction but overcame it. Buddy Stewart was killed in a car accident at 27 while on a road trip to New Mexico to be with his wife and child. Carolyn Grey is still living at 98.