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Two very special Vaughan Williams symphony recordings newly remastered
Notes on the recordings: I first received copies of these two remarkable and rare concerts back in February of this year in cassette form from Edward Johnson. We were both enthusiastic about the performances but just a little sceptical about the medium. I began by transferring the Ninth Symphony and set about its restoration, but soon realised that despite the finest Nakamichi replay equipment and all the digital restoration tools at my disposal, I would be unable to do full justice to the original recording from this particular copy. And so began the hunt for a better source. A few weeks later, Edward came back to me with the suggestion that the renowned writer, musicologist and expert on British classical music, Lewis Foreman, thought he might have copies of these on tapes stored “in his shed”, and would we like him to dig them out? One likes to hope that, tucked away in attics and sheds around the world are carefully preserved gems like this, as when Mr. Foreman's own tape-to-CD transfer of the 9th arrived I immediately knew we were on track for an excellent-sounding release. The recording was taken from a later BBC FM rebroadcast, and I've been able to add in announcements from the original broadcast, preserved in a second transfer by Mr. Foreman of discs prepared for overseas broadcasts by the BBC in the 1950s, but of lower overall sound quality. Aside from very occasional bursts of static, which have been largely eradicated, the sound quality was excellent throughout, and it is a pleasure and privilege to be able to make this historic world première recording available to the public. The Mitropoulos is another stunning and very rare recorded performance, and again Mr. Foreman's source has been used almost throughout (some small patches from Edward Johnson's cassette were required for the opening announcement). However, this originated in another era, and suffered a wide range of faults originating in the acetate 78s onto which it would have been first recorded. I have dealt as best I can with thousands of ticks, pops and scratches, aimed to reduce or eliminate where possible peak distortion, corrected multiple pitch variation problems and kept the sound as open and vital as I possibly can. Sonically, after the 9th; it takes a moment or two for the ears to adjust, but the listener will soon find him or herself drawn into Mitropoulos' magical recreation of Vaughan Williams' London. It really is a superb rendition of this classic English symphony, one which easily transcends the limitations placed upon it by the shortcomings of the original recording.
Andrew Rose Click here to view additional notes
Full Vaughan Williams biography: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Vaughan_Williams
Sir Malcolm Sargent Biographical notes from Wikipedia
Sir Harold Malcolm Watts Sargent (29 April 1895 – 3 October 1967) was an English conductor, organist and composer widely regarded as Britain's leading conductor of choral works. The musical ensembles with which he was associated included the Ballets Russes, the Royal Choral Society, the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, and the London Philharmonic, Hallé, Liverpool Philharmonic, BBC Symphony and Royal Philharmonic orchestras. Sargent was held in high esteem by choirs and instrumental soloists, but because of his high standards and a statement that he made in a 1936 interview about musicians' rights to tenure, his relationship with orchestral players was often uneasy. Despite this, he was co-founder of the London Philharmonic, was the first conductor of the Liverpool Philharmonic as a full-time ensemble, and played an important part in saving the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra from disbandment in the 1960s. As chief conductor of London's internationally famous summer music festival the Proms from 1948 to 1967, Sargent was one of the best-known English conductors. When he took over the Proms from their founder, Sir Henry Wood, he and two assistants conducted the two-month season between them. By the time he died, he was assisted by a large international roster of guest conductors. At the outbreak of World War II, Sargent turned down an offer of a major musical directorship in Australia and returned to the UK to bring music to as many people as possible as his contribution to national morale. His fame extended beyond the concert hall: to the British public, he was a familiar broadcaster in BBC radio talk shows, and generations of Gilbert and Sullivan devotees have known his recordings of the most popular Savoy Operas. He toured widely throughout the world and was noted for his skill as a conductor, his championship of British composers, and his debonair appearance, which won him the nickname "Flash Harry."
Full-length biography at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_Malcolm_Sargent
Dimitri Mitropoulos Biographical notes from Wikipedia
Dimitri Mitropoulos (Greek: Δημήτρης Μητρόπουλος) (1 March [O.S. 18 February] 1896 – 2 November 1960), was a Greek conductor, pianist, and composer. Also known as Dimitris Mitropoulos.
Life and career Mitropoulos was born in Athens, the son of Yannis and Angeliki Mitropoulos. His father owned a leather goods shop at No. 15, St Marks Street. He was musically precocious, demonstrating his abilities at an early age. From the ages of eleven to fourteen, when Mitropoulos was in secondary school, he would host and preside over informal musical gatherings at his house every Saturday afternoon. His earliest acknowledged composition - a sonata for violin and piano, now lost - dates from this period. He studied music at the Athens Conservatoire as well as in Brussels and Berlin, with Ferruccio Busoni among his teachers. From 1921 to 1925 he assisted Erich Kleiber at the Berlin State Opera and then took a number of posts in Greece. At a 1930 concert with the Berlin Philharmonic, he played the solo part of Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 3 and conducted the orchestra from the keyboard, becoming one of the first modern musicians to do so. Mitropoulos made his U.S. debut in 1936 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and he later settled in the country, becoming a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1946. From 1937 to 1949, he served as the principal conductor of the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra (now known as the Minnesota Orchestra). In 1949 Mitropoulos began his association with the New York Philharmonic, the peak of his orchestral career. He was initially co-conductor with Leopold Stokowski, and became the sole music director in 1951. Mitropoulos recorded extensively with the Philharmonic for Columbia Records and sought to reach new audiences through appearances on television and conducting a week of performances at the Roxy Theatre, a popular movie theatre in New York. Mitropoulos expanded the Philharmonic's repertoire, commissioning works by new composers and championing the symphonies of Gustav Mahler. In 1957 he was succeeded as the Philharmonic's conductor by a protégé, Leonard Bernstein. In addition to his orchestral career, Mitropoulos was an equally important force in the operatic repertoire. He conducted opera extensively in Italy and from 1954 until his death in 1960 was the principal conductor of the Metropolitan Opera in New York, although the Met did not officially use that title at the time. His musically incisive and dramatically vivid performances of Puccini, Verdi, Richard Strauss and others remain models of the opera conductor's art. The Met's extensive archive of recorded broadcasts preserves many of these fine performances. Mitropoulos's series of recordings for Columbia Records with the New York Philharmonic included a rare complete performance of Alban Berg's Wozzeck. Many of these have been reissued by Sony Classics on CD, including most recently his stereo recordings of excerpts from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet. For RCA he recorded with the Minneapolis Symphony during the 78-rpm era. He was also represented on the Cetra label, most notably with an early recording of Richard Strauss's Elektra. He was noted for having a photographic memory (which enabled him to conduct without a score, even during rehearsals) and for his monk-like life style due to his deeply religious, Greek Orthodox beliefs. Mitropoulos never married. He was "quietly known to be homosexual" and "felt no need for a cosmetic marriage". Among his relationships reportedly was one with Leonard Bernstein. He died in Milan, Italy at the age of 64, while rehearsing Gustav Mahler's 3rd Symphony. One of his very last recorded performances was Verdi's La forza del destino with Giuseppe Di Stefano, Antonietta Stella and Ettore Bastianini at Vienna on 23 September 1960. A recording exists of the performance of Mahler's 3rd Symphony given by Mitropoulos with the Cologne Radio Symphony on 31 October 1960, just two days before his death.
Impact on the music profession Mitropoulos was noted as a champion of modern music, such as that by the members of the Second Viennese School. He wrote a number of pieces for orchestra and solo works for piano, and also arranged some of Johann Sebastian Bach's organ works for orchestra. In addition he was very influential in encouraging Leonard Bernstein's interest in conducting performances of Mahler's symphonic works. He also premiered and recorded a piano concerto of Ernst Krenek as soloist (available on CD), and works by composers in the U.S. such as Roger Sessions and Peter Mennin. In 1952 he commissioned American composer Philip Bezanson to write a piano concerto, which he premiered the following year. His compositions include a piano sonata and other works.
Biography from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dimitri_Mitropoulos
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