 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: mr. matt
Date: 2005-11-30 03:33
Hey there, everyone.
We, the good folks of COYO (Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra), are playing Scheherazade for our second concert, and I've been assigned the principal clarinet part. =) Very exciting and...tantalizing(?). Word choice aside, I'm hoping to find a recording of Marcellus tackling the solos, most importantly in the 3rd mvt. I always try to take my listening from Marcellus recordings, as long as they're available.
I have Ormandy and Philadelphia on Sony Classics, and Reiner and Chicago on the Living Stereo label. Reiner's is far superior in my opinion. I also recently bought an LP of Maazel and Cleveland doing Scheherazade, hoping that Marcellus was on it, since it was 1977. I couldn't remember the years of his tenure, and instead I got Frank Cohen. Not like that's a bad thing, Cohen's insane. I just really wanted Marcellus. =\ Anyone know if Szell ever did a recording? Thanks!
- Matt
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Author: Gregory Smith ★2017
Date: 2005-11-30 03:58
Cleveland did not make a commercial recording under Szell. There is a live performance from the early 70's with Maazel conducting that was taped by WCLV Cleveland and then broadcast later during one of their fund raising radio marathons. Marcellus is playing on that performance.
Many fans of the orchestra taped the broadcast and the taped performance is floating around out there somewhere. Perhaps you can ask a member of the CO clarinet section like Dan Gilbert who may have a copy or know of someone that has one in the Cleveland area that you can borrow to listen to.
Even Maazel couldn't destroy what Szell had already built - at least by that point early in his tenure.
Best of luck-
Gregory Smith
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Author: mr. matt
Date: 2005-11-30 04:03
I will definitely look into that. I've talked with Mr. Gilbert before, and I might still have his number somewhere. We were trying to get a lesson together last year, but I was always too busy with school and stuff like that. I talk to Dan McKelway more often, so I'll probably check with him first, but I'll be sure to ask Mr. Gilbert if Mr. McKelway doesn't have one. Thanks! =)
- Matt
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-11-30 04:04
A good alternative would be to listen to the 2 different recorded Scheherazade performances by Daniel Bonade contained on Larry Guy's compilation CD "The Legacy of Daniel Bonade" ...GBK
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Author: crnichols
Date: 2005-11-30 19:25
The Boston Symphony Orchestra's recording under Ozawa is also excellent. Harold Wright sounds wonderful as always, I only have it on an old LP, I'm not sure if it's available on a CD or not.
Christopher Nichols
1st Infantry Division Band
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2005-11-30 20:13
The Bonade performances are wonderful. I've never heard the Marcellus aircheck, but it should be great.
My favorite version is Ralph McLane's, on a Columbia mono LP. Nobody got the "Fairy Princess" solo to dance more gracefully.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Alseg
Date: 2005-12-01 02:05
Kind of close:
"Locked in the Vault" did a CD reissue of the Odeysse LP of Szell/Cleve
doing Borodin Pol'n dances, and Rimsky-K Capric. Espanol....gives of good taste of how RM might have approached Scherez'de
Lani Spahr is the producer.
google Locked in the Vault. (altho I think they stopped doing web orders and just work off of email) GBK? lil. help?
Former creator of CUSTOM CLARINET TUNING BARRELS by DR. ALLAN SEGAL
-Where the Sound Matters Most(tm)-
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Author: mr. matt
Date: 2005-12-01 02:13
I actually have that CD with Szell/Cleveland doing Polovtsian Dances, Capriccio espagnol, Khovantschina, Pictures at an Exhibition, and something else. GREAT recording. I'm getting my hands on the Ozawa recording...Mr. McKelway highly recommended it as well (thanks crnichols!). And thanks to all that contribute! =)
- Matt
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2005-12-01 02:45
I have the (new I think) Artistry of Ralph McLane and think he was even better than Bonade. Boston Records puts it out.
Jeez was he good!! Great recording, highly recommended.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-12-01 02:48
Alseg wrote:
> Locked in the Vault" did a CD reissue of the Odeysse LP of
> Szell/Cleve
> doing Borodin Pol'n dances, and Rimsky-K Capric.
> Espanol....gives of good taste of how RM might
> have approached Scherez'de
> Lani Spahr is the producer.
> google Locked in the Vault. (altho I think they stopped
> doing web orders and just work off of email) GBK? lil. help?
The recording was reissued by Sony Classical/Legacy. The number is SK93019.
It consists of Cleveland Orchestra/Szell (Marcellus) recordings from 1958 and 1963.
Marcellus in his prime ...GBK
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Author: Gregory Smith ★2017
Date: 2005-12-01 03:29
For the ppp staccato passage alone, one should reference the Reiner/CSO recording with clarinetist, Clark Brody. The epitome of a perfectly executed light, stopped staccato. It is the finest example of that type of staccato I know of.
Gregory Smith
Post Edited (2005-12-01 03:38)
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2005-12-01 17:07
At a master class, Marcellus said he was playing on a GG crystal mouthpiece when the Russian Record was made. He had damaged or broken the Kaspar he had been using and was trying various replacements. He said George Szell asked him "Do you REALLY like the sound you're getting on that mouthpiece????" He took the hint and found a new Kaspar.
When the New York court decision came down holding that Naxos couldn't republish the Menuhin recording of the Elgar Violin Concerto without permission, Lani Spahr closed down his Locked in the Vault website. I don't think it has reappeared, but I did get a note that he is still selling the items via email orders.
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David -
Boston Records has a Bonade CD, but the site doesn't show a McLane CD. It must have come out very recently, with is great news, since it shows the company is moving forward after Wayne Rapier's death.
What's the catalog number?
I've collected all the McLane LPs in the discography published a few years ago in The Clarinet, but many of them are pretty crunchy, and they were on the older Columbia pressings (with the dark blue label), which need re-equalization to sound good. There may be more McLane recordings, since some recording dates are unknown.
One item not in the discography is a live concert tape from the Library of Congress of the Budapest Quartet, with McLane and others, playing the Schubert Octet and the Beethoven Septet. This tape was transcribed for broadcast a few years ago (I heard it on WQXR). If it could be issued on CD, that would be a cause for celebration.
A great CD to hear McLane is the Dvorak Cello Concerto played by Gregor Piatigorsky, Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0000029VD/qid=1133460268/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-5555880-5478366?v=glance&s=classical The piece has many, many clarinet solos, and McLane is gorgeous.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Gregory Smith ★2017
Date: 2005-12-01 18:52
The Library of Congress Schubert/Beethoven tape is wonderful and well produced. I happened per chance to be near my radio at the time of it's broadcast and copied it off of either an NPR feed or via WFMT Chicago.
It is the only time I'd ever heard McLane play sharp above the staff. For whatever reason, the upper twelfths were startlingly high, something that I had never heard from him up to then nor since that time. The new CD produced by Larry Guy is good evidence of how in tune a clarinet can sound.
Perhaps Moennig had just finished one of his sessions with McLane consisting of over zealous "tone hole undercutting" which, for whatever reason, many of the finest clarinetists of the day succumbed to - including Marcellus.
It was the only, slight weakness that I encountered while working with Moennig and have yet to this day find out why clarinetists, including myself, were wooed by that fatal siren. Many an A clarinet (and Bb's) were in need of a rebuild or worse after that experience.
Perhaps the weakness was with ourselves...
Gregory Smith
Post Edited (2005-12-01 18:54)
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Author: Ed
Date: 2005-12-01 21:05
I have always enjoyed the Wright and Brody performances in their respective recordings. Great moment in the Chicago/Reiner recording- At the beginning of the last movement, immediately after the opening tutti and then piano echo of the figure, before the violin solo, you can hear Reiner whisper "bravo!". You'll have to either turn it up pretty loud or listen with headphones to hear it.
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Author: DougR
Date: 2009-01-02 12:28
Ken--What do you mean, "the older Columbia pressings (with the dark blue label) ... need re-equalization to sound good"?
I'm asking because I have a copy of ML 4010 (Beethoven 6) on the way. Re-EQ how exactly? (I mean, how are they sonically deficient?)
thanks,
d.
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2009-01-02 14:42
Doug -
Acoustic recordings of course had no electronics, and the sounds went directly to disk. The low frequencies didn't have enough energy in them to play back well unless the performers stood right in front of a reverse megaphone. When they did, the grooves had to be cut further apart to avoid overlap. Also, the high frequencies were too wide for a cactus needle to track them. If you increased the tracking pressure for playback, the high frequency areas quickly wore out, resulting in blasting.
With electrical recording, the electronics could be adjusted to make the bass louder and the treble softer, provided the playback electronics made corresponding opposite adjustments. There were many experiments, and until the late 1950s, a home preamplifier needed several "equalization" settings to play records from various companies.
Eventually, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) promulgated an equalization curve that worked well, and it was universally adopted.
Columbia Records was one of the last to adopt the RIAA curve. Its 78 rpm disks and early LPs, which had dark blue labels, used the Columbia equalization, which sounded bad when played back with RIAA equalization. The bass was thick and "thuddy," and the treble was screechy. When Columbia switched to RIAA, it changed its label color to (mostly) gray and added 2 or 6 "eye" logos. The switch occurred approximately at the end of the Columbia ML 4xxx series. Most of the ML 5xxx disks are RIAA, but the way to tell is by the label color. Also, the earlier Columbia jackets had no printing on the spine, and did not have inner sleeves, which resulted in lots of tiny scratches. Also, few of the early Columbias had GrooveGuard, in which the edge and label areas are raised to prevent the grooves from rubbing against each other.
For more, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIAA_equalization and http://www.shellac.org/wams/wequal.html.
By the way, the McLane Beethoven 6th was reissued on an RIAA LP. Since it was conducted by Bruno Walter, you can find it through the Bruno Walter Society. I have a great complete Beethoven Symphony LP set with Walter and the NY Philharmonic, which has the Philadelphia 6th, since he didn't do it with the NYPhil. It's also been reissued on CD http://www.amazon.com/Beethoven-Symphonies-Nos-5-6/dp/B0000029YW.
McLane's Sheherazade was on a 1947 monaural LP, Columbia ML 4089, which has not been commercially reissued, but which may be available privately from a site in Japan http://www5a.biglobe.ne.jp/~philorch/MonoCD.htm. The the solos are on the Larry Guy's McLane CD. The "Little Princess" solo is the most elegant version I've ever heard.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Ed Palanker
Date: 2009-01-02 19:54
Just don't forget, what I tell my excerpt class, the interpretation may not be the players. Often the conductor has a definite way they want something to be played and the tell the player to do it their way. That's the reason you may hear two different interpretations of the same excerpt by the same player, different conductors. ESP
www.peabody.jhu.edu/457 Listen to a little Mozart, live performance.
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