by Peter Cates

Cheers for Miss Bishop

starring Martha Scott, William Gargan, Edmund Gwenn, Sterling Holloway, Sidney Blackmer, etc.; directed by Tay Garnett; United Artists, 1941, 95 minutes, DVD.

I have seen and enjoyed this warm-hearted soap opera twice, if such a term can be employed. Martha Scott (1913-2003) portrays an English teacher, Ella Bishop, who serves for over 40 years at the college in her mid-western small town. William Gargan is a local businessman and loyal, lifelong friend, Sam, deeply in love with her forever but never having the gumption to declare it.

The story begins with Ella graduating from high school the year that the college opens. Both her character and academic work win over the president of the college, played by Edmund Gwenn with his consistent blend of understated class, to such an extent that, upon her college graduation and ambition to teach in one of the big cities, he immediately offers her a position.

She wins many hearts and minds with her passionate commitment to her work over the years but her heart is broken twice by suiters. Meanwhile, she raises a daughter born out of wedlock to a younger cousin dying during childbirth. Finally, upon retirement, she is honored at a surprise and massively attended alumni banquet that includes a number of former students who have attained world fame because of her inspiration to them.

Every member of the cast gave A-plus performances while the film, despite a rather predictable story, was shot and paced in such a vivid, agreeable manner, as has been the case of similar movies from the ‘40s, that viewers were, and still are, drawn in.

In 1960, William Gargan, had his larynx removed due to throat cancer, had to speak through a voicebox and became an activist for helping others who had experienced laryngectomies to learn to speak again.

Borodin: Prince Igor

Recitative and Air of Prince Galitsky
Feodor Chaliapin, bass, with orchestra; Victrola- 87361; ten-inch one-sided 78 shellac, recorded 1920.

Feodor Chaliapin (1873-1938) is arguably considered the finest bass singer who ever lived and gives an electrifying performance of the Borodin aria listed above. But he did not achieve his fame only through singing but also as an actor; he impressed the composer Rachmaninoff, with whom he had a long friendship, and many others with the painstaking detail with which he planned every line, movement and position in the roles he performed.

Finally, he was a notorious carouser who maintained two separate families with a wife and mistress.

Most of his many 78 records are available in CD form and for listening on YouTube.

Rachmaninoff

Symphonic Dances & Vocalise
Simon Rattle conducting the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra; Angel, DS 538019, recorded 10-23-1982 and 2-28-83, digital stereo LP.

Rachmaninoff completed his Symphonic Dances in October 1940, with the words, “I thank Thee, Lord!” and, due to poor health and constant fatigue, did little besides completing the final revision of his 4th Piano Concerto before his death during his 70th year in 1943. He would entrust the world premiere to the Philadelphia Orchestra, with whom he left recordings of his four concertos and the Paganini Rhapsody with himself at the keyboard, and still in print on CDs.

The Symphonic Dances make for exciting listening with their very colorful rhythms and captivating melodies. Sir Simon Rattle recorded very satisfactory performances of the Dances and the beautiful short Vocalise with its haunting passage for solo violin.

by Peter Cates

After the Ball

Joan Morris, soprano, with William Bolcom, piano. Nonesuch H-71304, stereo LP, recorded 1974.

Joan Morris and her husband, William Bolcom, have been serving up records and concerts for over 45 years since the early seventies, their specialty being popular songs and composers from the Civil War to the ‘50s Lieber and Stoller. One album spotlighted Henry Clay Work, who wrote My Grandfather’s Clock.

The above set collects classic and not so classic vaudeville hits – Meet Me in Saint Louis, I‘ve Got Rings on My Fingers, the title song, my special favorite Love’s Old Sweet Song and ten others – and Joan Morris gives her charming colorful soprano best with her husband’s skilled keyboard. Their approach is that of the Sunday afternoon drawing room or parlor at Aunt Blanche’s but it is one making for great listening, in small doses!

Stravinsky

Suite Italienne
Debussy: Sonata for Cello and Piano; Busoni: Kleine Suite, Op. 23; Foss: Capriccio for Cello and Piano – Gregor Piatigorsky, cello; Lukas Foss, piano; RCA Victor, LM-2293, mono LP, recorded 1958.

Gregor Piatigorsky (1903-1976) was a bear of a man in his physique as well as being one of the 20th century’s truly fine cellists and turning out recordings characterized by a special kind of electrifying intensity and sublime beauty. Two special favorites are his early ‘40s Dvorak Cello Concerto with Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra and the two Brahms Cello Sonatas from the ‘70s with pianist Artur Rubinstein.

This week’s record contains the listed works by four quite gifted and interesting modern composers. However, my favorite piece is the just over 10 minute Debussy Cello Sonata, one of the most beautiful examples of quiet sweet subtlety, mystery and bursting rhythm ever written by anyone and performed in the most alive, exciting yet delicate manner by the cellist and his partner, composer/pianist Lucas Foss.

Living Marimbas

Tijuana Taxis
RCA Camden, CAS-961, stereo LP, recorded 1966.

This batch of ten ‘60s Latin-American tunes, including the two classics, Spanish Eyes and Spanish Harlem, is arranged and performed by a studio group of carefully handpicked instrumentalists under the noted pop conductor, Leo Addeo, in an understated manner that is pleasant but not moving.

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by Peter Cates

Elvis Presley

Loving You; Teddy Bear
RCA Victor 47-7000, seven-inch picture sleeve 45 rpm, recorded 1957.

Teddy Bear was a huge number one hit on the rock, country and rhythm and blues charts for the great Elvis (1935-1977). Both songs here were also part of the 1957 film, with the same name, and its soundtrack LP, consisting totally of Presley performances. Teddy Bear’s lyricist Bernie Lowe (1917-2001) was also a businessman who established Cameo records in 1956, which later expanded to Cameo/Parkway. He would sign an unknown singer, Ernest Evans, to the label, who himself later changed his name to Chubby Checker!

Both are superb songs, performed in a first rate manner.

Gangster Story

directed by and starring Walter Matthau and Carol Grace; 68 minutes; released December, 1959.

Walter Matthau portrays a bank robber, Jack Martin, fleeing the police and needing cash. He then pulls a cleverly staged heist of a local bank in the town where he is hiding out, lays low at the library and becomes involved with a librarian, Carol Logan, played by his real life wife, Carol Grace; in fact, the couple married during the production of this film.

The main conflict is not only hiding from the cops but also from the local crime boss who wants a share of the loot.

I liked Matthau’s skilled acting, and directing, along with the shaping and development of the story. The obviously low budget cinematography brought out its own ‘50s small town ambiance – especially the beachside romance .

There are two delightful moments. When Jack is first scoping out the library, he asks Carol the rules. “No talking!” When sparks begin flying during their oceanside tryst, he asks again. “No talking!”

The DVD copy that I own was rather shabby but serviceable and part of an el cheapo three-movie package yet, despite these faults, the film was 68 minutes of captivating escapism.

Brahms

Symphony No. 2
Bruno Walter conducting the New York Philharmonic; Columbia, ML 5125, 12-inch mono LP, recorded December 28, 1953.

As I get older, I find it impossible to pick my favorite of the four Brahms Symphonies. They are all magnificent creations, each with a distinct quality that contributes to the number of times I listen to them again (not to mention the number of different recordings I own and to which I add).

Unlike the 1st Symphony which took ten years of effort before its 1876 premiere, the 2nd Symphony took final shape during a summer lakeside vacation a year later. The music is serene and comforting overall, although it too has its darker and more melancholy moments.

Bruno Walter (1876-1962) recorded it twice, the remake in stereo with members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and free lancers grouped together as the Columbia Symphony and released during the very early ‘60s. It was a poetic approach but lacking a bit too much in muscle and bite.

This week’s record is a different matter. Walter not only communicated the singing qualities throughout but brought to life the lights and shadows of the orchestration that was a major part of Brahms’s genius.He would also impose tempos that might seem too fast but worked in helping the music to sing even more beautifully.

And, despite the New York Philharmonic’s fearsome reputation for chewing up conductors they didn’t like with bad playing and snarky attitudes, they responded totally to Walter’s conducting with their best.

Recommended totally!

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by Peter Cates

How I started collecting records

My first experience of Mozart came with the beautiful set of his 40th Symphony, three Columbia 78s recorded in 1937, that were given to me in seventh grade – I remember to this day the captivating, rolling rhythms of the opening movement. The conductor, Sir Thomas Beecham (1879-1961), had a knack, at his best, for making music heavenly sounding and he had a greater number of recordings than any other conductor, during the ‘30s and ‘40s, that were first class in both performance and sound.

Beecham was also quite the wit. A colleague of his, who remembered the conductor dismissing the composer, Brahms, as boring during his youth, noticed years later that Beecham conducted Brahms very well and asked if the latter had changed his mind: “No, Brahms still bores me but he bores me less. ”

Dark Mountain

starring Robert Lowery, Ellen Drew, Regis Toomey, etc.; directed by William Berke; Paramount Pictures; 1944; 57 minutes.

Dark Mountain deals with a newly promoted forest ranger, Don, who patrols the Dark Mountain region in an unnamed western state. At his boss’s insistence, he takes a long overdue vacation to visit his girlfriend, Kay, with a marriage proposal. However, because Don has been away for months, Kay has married Steve, a very successful businessman and exceptionally considerate husband to Kay.

Don returns early to his job, discouraged; meanwhile Kay finds out hubby Steve is a murderous racketeer and escapes to the mountain to hide, with Don’s help. Steve tracks her and the suspense accelerates. A high speed chase in a car loaded with explosives leads to Steve’s fiery death and a happily ever after for the predictably reunited lovers.

Although the story was ho-hum, I enjoyed certain aspects of this B film – the black and white footage of a forest fire at the beginning, with its quite convincing authenticity; and the classy acting and presence of Robert Lowery (1913-1971) as Ranger Don and the skillful sustaining of charm and menace from longtime character actor, Regis Toomey (1898-1991), fresh from his work in the classic Bogie film, The Big Sleep.

Lowery was later a fixture of ‘50s TV. In fact, I have a still vivid childhood memory of him as a friend of Clark Kent in a 1956 episode of Superman, ‘The Deadly Rock’, in which he too has a dangerous vulnerability to Kryptonite.

Beethoven

Symphony No. 3, the Eroica; Zdenek Kosler conducting the Slovak Philharmonic; DM-2-1009.

Ludwig van B’s 3rd Symphony was such an assertive, heroic, rhythmically-aggressive 45 minutes of glorious, at times noble and sublime music, needing a larger orchestra than the Symphonies 1 and 2 and it has received a fine performance from the late Maestro Kosler and his musicians, one of a very large number of quality recordings, of which I own and cherish dozens of them. It often stimulates the best efforts of players because of its monumental grandeur. And this performance is very cheap when available.

A little quibble. There is no information on the music and, while Kosler’s name is listed in two of the three spots ID’ing the conductor, another gifted maestro, Libor Pesek, has his in the third space. Personally, I believe Kosler is the right name due to its frequency of listing and the driving intensity of the performance while Pesek has a more lyrical poetic approach when he conducts. But I will not be dogmatic here!

REVIEW POTPOURRI

by Peter Cates

How I Started Collecting Records, Part 7

As I slowly edged into liking classical music, via cartoons and storybook records, I remember Beethoven being the first composer to grab my attention, through two symphonies – the 5th and 6th, better known as the Pastoral. The great conductor, Bruno Walter (1876-1962), would be the first to give me the intensive exposure to both pieces. Mom owned a 78 set of Walter’s 1941 5th, a very satisfying performance full of conviction and spirit.

My Uncle Paul Cates owned an LP of the sublime Bruno Walter/Philadelphia 1946 Pastoral that he left at the family homestead along with a pile of other interesting disks while he lived in West Berlin for much of the ‘50s and ‘60s. I played that record many times while visiting Grammie Cates. My introductions to the beauties of the composer’s Emperor and Violin Concertos followed within the year.

Spike Jones

Thank You, Music Lovers
RCA Victor, LPM-2224, recorded 1960.

A dozen of Jones’s wacky, weird 78s, featuring spoofs and putdowns of musical classics, such as Der Fuehrer’s Face, William Tell Overture , You Always Hurt the One You Love, My Old Flame, etc.; have been re-recorded in better sound and provide fun similar to Frank Zappa’s shenanigans from the ‘60s and ‘70s.

Telemann

Concertos for Oboe, 2 Flutes and Orchestra; Suite for Recorder and Orchestra
Kurt List and Zlatko Topolski conducting the Austrian Tonkuen­stler Orchestra; various soloists; Musical Heritage Society, MHS 743, recorded 1967.

George Philip Telemann (1681-1767) was quite the prolific composer, much of his music, whether sacred or secular, very pleasurable. This assortment of works are the most beguiling listening experiences I have encountered in a very long time, and receive top notch performances. During his lifetime, he achieved far greater popularity than his friend, Bach.

Maurice Ravel

Bolero, Rhapsodie Espagnole, La Valse and Scheherazade Overture
Jean Martinon conducting the Orchestre de Paris; Angel, S-37147, recorded 1975.

Most every recording of Jean Martinon (1911-1976) that has come my way has given enduring pleasure, whether Beethoven or the Rus­sian, Sergei Prokofiev. His career as the conductor of the Chicago Symphony after succeeding the phenomenally brilliant Fritz Reiner was cut short mainly by hostile music critics.

However, he returned to Paris and recorded a series of LPs devoted to the complete works of Debussy and Ravel that were superbly balanced, tasteful and yet musically alive examples of really great conducting. And the above record was every bit as fine as the others I have heard.