Fauré in London

A long introduction before I get to the point I’m afraid on W.H. Squire's recordings of Fauré!

Sicilienne for Cello & Piano Op. 78 [1898]

William Henry Squire cello & [Hamilton Harty?], piano

Columbia L1759

(ⓦAX 1225)

Recorded: Wednesday, 23rd December, 1925

Issued September 1926 & deleted August 1931

FLAC file 16bit [15Mb]

Papillon for Cello & Piano Op. 77 [1898]

William Henry Squire, cello & [Hamilton Harty?], piano

Columbia L1977

(ⓦAX 1248)

Recorded: Friday, 15th January 1926

Issued June 1927 & deleted August 1930

FLAC file 16bit [13Mb]

(If you are not familiar with FLAC I can recommend Foobar2000 player)

During March and the beginning of April 1898 Gabriel Fauré spent a vacation with his friend and music patron Leo Frank Schuster (1852-1927). ‘Schuster was a music-lover and patron of the arts in the United Kingdom. His home overlooking St James's Park at 22 Old Queen Street, London, part of which now contains offices of The Spectator magazine, became a meeting-place for artists, writers and musicians, including Siegfried Sassoon, John Singer Sargent, Walter Sickert, Sir Edward Elgar and Sir Adrian Boult. He was a particular patron of Edward Elgar, and also did much to make Gabriel Fauré's name known in England’ [Wikipedia]

Film of Fauré having a smoke in 1913

It was on this visit that a meeting was set between Fauré and Mrs Patrick Campbell by Schuster. Mrs Campbell had been rebuffed by Debussy when asked if he could provide incidental music for Maurice Maeterlinck’s  Pelléas et Mélisande which she wanted to be produced in London in a translation by Jack Mackail. Mrs Campbell must have heard Fauré’s work and immediately set forth to commission Fauré to provide music in the places she felt most called out for music in the play. 

Mrs Patrick Campbell

Fauré composed some nineteen numbers very quickly and ‘On 21 June 1898 Fauré himself conducted the orchestra of the Prince of Wales' Theatre, Piccadilly (Coventry Street) for the premiere of the English version of Pelléas et Mélisande. In the audience were Maeterlinck, Charles van Lerberghe, Reynaldo Hahn, the Princess Edmond de Polignac (who was to be the dedicatee of the orchestral suite), the painter John Singer Sargent and all Fauré's London friends. The production was a great success with the public and the critics. Maeterlinck himself wrote an enthusiastic letter to Mrs Patrick Campbell which finished: in a few words, “you... filled me with an emotion of beauty the most complete, the most harmonious, the sweetest that I have ever felt to this day.”’ [See Jean-Michel Nectoux: Gabriel Fauré: A Musical Life.]

Today only the Suite Pelléas et Mélisande of four of the nineteen pieces is regularly played: Prélude-Fileuse-Sicilienne-La mort de Mélisande.

The Sicilienne had been originally written in 1892 as part of the incidental music for a production of Molière’s Le Bougeois Gentilhomme that never reached the stage.

The question, which is open to a lot of conjecture, is this. Had Fauré sent Squire the scores of both Papillon and the Sicilienne prior to Fauré’s stay in London from March 1898. I can’t be sure of this as I have not tracked down a programme for a concert given on the 12th February 1898 at the Queens Hall in which ‘Mr W.H. Squire produced three little violoncello pieces by Godard and Fauré with much success’ [The Musical Times, March 1898]. Another notice of the concert appeared in The Observer ‘Three graceful little pieces for violoncello and orchestra, by Godard and Fauré respectively, were brought forward by Mr. W. H. Squire, for the first time in London. Their value is not great, but as played by that talented artist and the Queen’s Hall orchestra they were pleasant enough to hear.' [The Observer,13 February 1898]. 

This asks another question, was Squire playing the Sicilienne in its Le Bougeois Gentilhomme form, and did it even have a title yet, or was he playing just the Elégie Op.24 which had been arranged for orchestra in 1895 and the other two pieces were by Godard? At least one of these pieces would have been played, one hopes anyway. Another anomaly is this, did Squire play them again at Schuster’s house from which Mrs Campbell approached Fauré to compose the incidental music? Squire is known to have played at the Schuster house frequently.

Schuster's house at 22 Old Queen St., London

One fact from this mountain of hypothetical conjecture was that Fauré, on his return to Paris, dedicated the score of the Sicilienne and inscribed the manuscript 'To Mons. W. H. Squire Sicilienne pour Violoncelle et piano Paris 16 avril,1898, Gabriel Fauré’. [This is now held in the Eugene Istomin Collection, New York]

I’m not wholly sure when Squire first met Fauré but they had met by 1896 for in a concert of the 1st May 1896 included Fauré’s piano quartet Op. 15 with the composer at the piano together with Adolph Brodsky, violin, Alfred Hobday, viola, and W.H. Squire, cello.

William Henry Squire

Now as far as I can judge Squire had not previously recorded any Fauré and was not to do so again. Were these two early electrically recorded Columbia sides made as homage to the composer who died the previous year? Did he think that the subtleties of the work could be brought out better with this new process? Had he just decided that Faure might just become popular! Very little of his work, appart from the songs, were recorded by the mid 1920s.

Also single potpourri pieces that Squire had so often recorded for both HMV and Columbia had by this time begun to give way to longer concertos and chamber works. With a new generation of cellists competing for gramophone recognition, Squire’s was, with his ‘old fashioned’ playing style, being slowly being ousted from the studios.

These two recordings can probably be regarded as ‘creator version.’ The Papillon, although written in 1884 was not published until 1898, is played so much slower than cellist play it today. In fact most cellist take it as some sort of exercise in prowess, rather than the delicate butterfly hovering about on a sunny afternoon. The Sicilienne too is also played quite slowly and both recordings use what today would be thought excessive portamento, but then I  like portamento and I don’t think that it's a dirty word. The piano accompaniment is excellent and although the pianist is unknown it may well be Harty as he was the de facto accompanist for most of Squire's pre-electric recordings.

Both these recordings are not in the best condition the Papillon appears to have a pressing problem, this was noted in The Gramophone and so was not given a review and may also account for the delay in issue - both recordings are a bit noisy.

I should mention what is on the 'B' side of each of these pieces: L1759 has W.H. Squire's Slumber Song and L1977 has Herbert Hughes' arrangment of The Sally Garden.

Fauré and Mrs Patrick Campbell,1898

Tangential versus linear speed

Band of H.M Welsh Guards

Under the direction of Lieut. Andrew Harris

Tchaikovsky: Casse Noisette Suite

1. March   2. Overture Miniature  3. Danse Arabe  

4. Dance Russe  (Trepak)  5. Danse des Mirlitons  

6. Danse Chinoise  7. Valse des Fleurs

Vocalion Long Playing Record W-39

(B.C 529 & B.C. 530)

Recorded 1925 

Flac file, Here at Mediafire. [about 46Mb]

One real problem to bedevil 78s before the advent of the LP age was the how much music could be fitted on each side.

Noel Pemberton Billing (1881-1948) had an aswer as he realised that if the needle could be made to travel through the groove of a disc at a constant speed then more could be recorded on each side.

Noel Pemberton Billing

Pemberton Billing was eccentric to say the very least. His biography on Wikipedia reads like some Boy's Own story. Early aviation pioneer and pilot in the WW1, independent Member of Parliament, politically very right of centre, getting carried out of the House of Commons for hurling abuse, publishing periodicals including one called the The Vigilante including such purple stuff by him as 'The Cult of the Clitoris', then defending himself in the ensuing liable case and winning, homophobic, inventor, the list just goes on and on, if not insane he made a very good impression of being barking mad. But this is getting off the point for his claim to fame on this blog is through the invention and marketing of World Records.

Some technical stuff. At 78rpm a standard 12 inch or 30cm record gets through some 275 metres of groove – at a constant 78rpm the outer edge of one turn of the disc traverses about 0.95 metres groove with the needle travelling at some 1.25 metres per second. By the time the record enters its last turn needle only has to get through 0.38 metres at about 0.50 metres per second.

Pemberton Billing noted that this 275 metres of groove was being traversed faster than was really necessary at the outset of a disc and it would be better if the speed could be made constant through the groove. At about 0.50 metres per second a record side could accommodate 9 minutes of recording time without any loss of recording quality.

World Record Controller

His invention, a fearsome looking lump of wheels and governor had to be screwed to the side of the turntable to manage the speed of the turntable. The patent explains the concept in the usual patent language but in simple terms a large rubber wheel ran on the record surface this was connected by a worm drive to a governor, this governor restricting the wheels rotation to a constant speed. The large wheel is also connected through a thread drive which allows it traverse across the record to the centre, something like a liner pick-up arm traverses the record towards the centre. By this arrangement the turntable speed could be slowly increased in speed from 30 to 80 rpm however the speed at which the groove travelled under the needle woodlouse be constant - maybe read the original patent as it is easier to show than explain [Patent]

Anyway this can be done by using software as long as we can know the initial and end pitch of the record and calculating the rate of acceleration over a side – I have pitch the record at A at 452Hz the standard Military Band pitch in the UK at this time. Each side actually has a timing printed on label; the first side comes to exactly 8m 50s the second side is printed at 8m 10s although I make it 8m 12s at A 452Hz– quite probably the pitch could have gone to A453.8 as the room temperature increased but this is so slight I have left both sides at A452. These timings printed on the labels must mean a stopwatch was probably used during the recording session – maybe printing on the labels was part of the advertising. An oddity in the recording is the slight hum on side one reducing from 216-210-204Hz and on side 2 moving through 222-211-213Hz – this must be to do with the recording mechanism but can't fathom what would cause such inconstancy – anyway it is not annoying

Enough of this waffle. World Records never had any star names – The performers included military bands, dance bands, quite a number transferred of which came from Emerson masters, vocal records that included Carrie Herwin, Robert Carr and John Thorne, a few educational records, Scottish Pipers and then good bit of Chamber music by Leo Abkov String Quartette – records I have never seen nor heard of anyone having; anyone out in the æther have any of these?

Vocalion Records manufactured the records with only 163 examples known to have been issued between 1922 and 1924.

Pemberton Billings left for Australia in 1923 endeavouring to further the export of the records and did not return to Britain until 1926. In the meantime Vocalion purchased all the rights to the records in January 1925 and began to issue there own Vocalion Long Playing Records Only 19 of these are known but the venture proved hopeless and by middle of 1926 the venture had stopped. These records are very uncommon, they must have been sold in very small quantities and of those sold very few seem to survive.

Of the artist on this particular example a short history can be found [here]  from which I quote:-

'The Welsh Guards are the youngest of the foot guards, being raised in 1915. On 8 September of that year, Mr Andrew Harris, of the Royal Artillery (Gibraltar) was appointed to be the first bandmaster, and in November the band itself was formed. The regimental history tells us that the funds to buy the instruments were provided by the City of Cardiff.

Band of H.M. Welsh Guards in London 1929

'With the prospect of having to live up to the high standards set by the existing guards bands, the Welsh Guards faced a tough challenge. Their first appearances on 1 March 1916, St David's Day, however, dispelled any doubts that may have been harboured; a guard mounting at Buckingham Palace followed by a performance at a Welsh Patriotic Meeting at the London Opera House with Lord Harlech and Major-General Sir Francis Lloyd in attendance, demonstrated clearly the musical quality of the new band.

'Coming together in the midst of The Great War, it was not long before the bandsmen were sent overseas. On 28 October 1916 they proceeded to France for duty with the Guards Division, meeting the 1st Battalion, then returning from the front line, a few weeks later and playing the guardsmen back to their billets.

'In May 1917 the Band, resplendent in full dress, formed part of the massed bands of the Brigade of Guards which gave concerts at the Trocadero and the Tuileries Gardens, Paris. Later the massed bands visited Italy performing in Rome and Milan; during the tour, each musician was presented with a silver cigarette case by Queen Elenor. In May 1918, at the request of the American Embassy, the Band played at the Memorial Service in Paris, and in July 1919 it took part in the great Victory March in Paris, where it had the honour of playing the Colours of the British Army through the Arc de Triomphe.

'Bandmaster Harris was commissioned as Lieutenant on 1 March 1919, and went on to become senior Director of Music, Brigade of Guards, finally retiring in the rank of major at the end of 1937. At his final appearance at the Albert Hall for the Festival of Remembrance, he was able to tell the audience that he would be sitting with them the following year as an old comrade having completed fifty years service.'

Pearl issued a CD of the band under Harris but mainly of short pieces – The performance oin this World record is good efficient stuff.

Two films on the Pathe site show the band in 1926 and 1929 Two short films of Pemberton Billing can also be found on Pathe too.

Much, if not all, of my information comes from World Records Vocalion "W", Fetherflex and Penny Phono recordings: a listing by Frank Andrews; Arthur Badrock; Edward Samuel Walker, 1992

Something Festive

With the Olympics going on but a few miles away from me to the north and the Proms to the west I though some musical offering was in order especially as there was once in the distance past Olympic medalists for Art competitions - more on that here. 

Debussy:  Nocturnes - No. 2  Fêtes 

Royal Albert Hall Orchestra cond. by Landon Ronald

HMV D 1000

[Cc 5863-III & Cc5684-II]

Recorded Tuesday, 10th March 1925

Score 

One Flac file, HERE at Mediafire. [about 16Mb]

One of the last acoustic orchestral recordings made by HMV the Debussy recording got decent reviews in its day, but I can't see the disc having been reissued on LP or CD. 

 (Alec Robertson 'N.P.' The Gramophone, July 1925 ) 'Debussy's Three Nocturnes (Nuages -  Fêtes - Sirines), composed in 1899, were played by the Queen's Hall Orchestra with the composer conducting at a concert of his works in February, 1909. Fêtes was encored, together with the Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune it is a most attractively scored work and has recorded exceptionally well - as anyone might have prophesied - but-, as is so often the case in Debussy's music, the composer is apt to repeat one rhythmic figure ad nauseam; a trick he probably learnt from the Russians. The gradual crescendo to a climax that the march reaches comes out finely. There are many delightful touches of colour, such as those afforded by the harps and drums and the muted trumpets. The title of the movement sufficiently indicates its programme, which may be supplemented by individual fancy.'

 (Discus in Musical Times, August 1925) 'Debussy's 'Fetes' (No. 2 of Three Nocturnes) makes a brilliant record. I know of few, if any, better in regard to vivid tone, colouring, and clarity of texture. It is a happy thought to record 'Fêtes ,' for gramophonists appear to have little of this side of Debussy-a side that records better (and wears better) than his more elusive (I had almost said invertebrate) essays. The performance of 'Fêtes ' is by the Albert Hall Orchestra, conducted by Sir Landon Ronald.'

Landon Ronald and the Royal Albert Hall Orchestra attempted to record the first side of Fêtes in on the 8th September 1922, the same day as the re-recording of  Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune  that was made to silently replaced the 1911 and 1916 version on HMV D 130. An attempt of making a recording of the first side of  Nuages was made 4th September 1923 so there may have been and idea to record the work complete. They where back in the Studio on the 10th March 1925 and this time managed the two side which were to be successfully issued in time for the July 1925 HMV Supplement. The recording was to last in the British catalogue until March 1930 even though the version of the Philadelphia Orchestra under Stokowski had been issued in September 1928 on HMV E 507. Considering the Acoustic 12 inch D 1000 cost 6s 6d and the 10 inch E 507  

Page from HMV Supplement July 1925 

The name 'The Royal Albert Hall Orchestra' [RAHO] began life in 1915. - The orchestra was really the same as the New Symphony Orchestra that was formed by John Saunders, concertmaster; Eli Hudson, flutist, and Charles Draper, clarinet. Edward Howard-Jones conducted their first concert and in 1906 Thomas Beecham became conductor, Beecham fell out with the orchestra as many of its members did not want to tour in the north of England - this was due to poor wages and most of the orchestral members also playing in the London theater orchestras to make ends meet. In 1907 Landon Ronald conducted the orchestra and was appointed permanent conductor in 1909 with a series of concerts at the Queen's Hall which ran to 1914. When the orchestra started to play at the Royal Albert Hall it changed its name for these concerts to the RAHO and from 1920 the orchestra used the RAHO name wherever it performed. However  C.B. Cochran, the general manager of the Royal Albert Hall put a stop to this and forced Landon Ronald to drop the RAHO name in 1929 when the orchestra became for a while known as the 'Orchestra formally known as the Royal Albert Hall Orchestra.' With the advent of the BBC and London Philharmonic Orchestras the RAHO was doomed and finally expired soon after Landon Ronald death in 1938.

Jon Tolansky make some interesting comparisons between recorded versions of this work in his article Performance Research and Conservation: Its Historical and Comparative Study, The Musical Times, Vol. 128, No. 1727 (Jan., 1987), pp. 21-23. 'We can hear on commercial recordings how some styles, and maybe even habits of orchestral playing and vocal performance, have changed in certain countries during the century. An interesting example may be found by listening to several recordings of 'Fetes' from Debussy's Nocturnes. In the middle section, in 2/4 and marked 'Modéré', Debussy portrays a distant brass band, in the open air, gradually drawing nearer to mingle with the sparkling brilliance of the carnival. After a barely audible suggestion of faraway marching drums, there is a magical moment when faint muted trumpets are heard, entering after a dotted-quaver rest, on the first beat of their bar. In the recordings made by Sir Landon Ronald and the Royal Albert Hall Orchestra (1924), Gabriel Pierné and the Colonne Concerts Orchestra (1930) and Piero Coppola and the Paris Conservatoire Orchestra (1935) the trumpets enter after nearly a double- dotted-quaver rest. On all the later recordings I have heard, including those by Pierre Monteux, who was nevertheless one of the first to conduct the Nocturnes, the trumpets enter after exactly a dotted quaver as written. Although Debussy never heard Pierné's recording, he is reputed to have expressed satisfaction at his interpretation.'

Centenary of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor

Well not only this year did the Titanic go down but also poor Coleridge-Taylor who succumbed to pneumonia a few days after collapsing at West Croydon Station in South London.

His music is quite out of fashion today and even in the first half of the 20th century very little of his output was recorded. Not to everyone's taste so I will spread the recording over the coming month or so.

Coleridge-Taylor:  Petite Suite de Concert, Op.77 (1911)

1. La Caprice de Nanette 2. Demande et réponse

3. Un sonnet d'amour 4. La tarantelle frétillante

De Groot and The Piccadilly Orchestra

HMV C1218 & C1233 

[Cc 6264-5 10th September 1925; Cc 6364-1 16th July 1925; 

Cc6957-1 & Cc6958-1 15 October 1925]
Piano Score at IMSLP

4 Flac files in a .rar file, HERE at Mediafire. [about 43Mb].

The records are kindly lent from:-  
CharmNick at Grumpy's Classic Cave

The earliest notice I have been able to find of a performance is recorded in The Musical Times of May 1911 'On  March 20 [1911],  a  new  amateur musical  organization, the  Birmingham Orchestral Society, gave  its  first concert  in  the  Temperance  Hall,  under  its  trainer and  conductor, Mr. Arthur Cooke, a  local pianist and teacher.  The hall does not lend itself acoustically to an orchestral concert, but one  was  nevertheless able  to judge  of the orchestra's capabilities, which promise greater things in the future.  One of the best things given was  Coleridge-Taylor's  picturesque 'Petite suite de Concert,' not heard in public previously.  Of the four movements, the first received the best exposition.' Oddly I discovered that eight measures of the opening suite were apparently suited to the 'Jealousy Theme' in The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, that 1923 blockbuster starring Rudolph Valentino. Sadly these arrangements are probably lost but one wonders at the dexterity and imagination of the arranger.

Almost a disc a month was produced by De Groot and the Piccadilly Orchestra during the 1920s mostly 10" light music but here two 12" records were needed, one issued in November 1925 ant the other in February 1926 as is clear from the matrix numbers there was quite a lot of difficulty obtaining a satisfactory recording with the new Western Electric recording process

Off for a week of work in the US (not on the Titanic, phew) so won't be able to play for a short while.