[78-L] David Hall. Was: Mercury [FWD]

[Michael Biel]

David's email is  dtdh at prexar.net  and his mailing address is POBox 257 
Castine Me 04421-0257
Last time I spoke to him on the phone he had just turned 90 a couple of 
days earlier and and said he was absolutely astounded at that!  He also 
said that he was just 25 when he wrote The Record Book and was amazed 
that all these people paid attention to the things he wrote as a young 
whippersnapper.  He had also just moved in with a lady friend, and he 
recommended it very highly!   He and Phil Miller were two of the first 
people I met at my first ARSC Conference in1971.  We had lunch together 
that first day.  I was awestruck.

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com

Thomas Stern wrote:
> Below is the WIKI entry for David Hall - seems to have retired to Maine in
> 1986
> and continued to be active through the 90's.
>
> White Pages returns the following:
> David D Hall
> Castine, ME
> (207) 326-9424
> Household:  Bob, Hazel
>
> Conclude that he is still with us.  Would be 93....
>
> Best wishes, Thomas
>
> David Hall (recorded sound archivist)
> >From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> Jump to: navigation, search
> David Hall (born December 16, 1916 in New Rochelle, New York) is a sound
> archivist and writer.
>
> Contents [hide]
> 1 Biography
> 1.1 Early life
> 1.2 Education
> 1.3 Career
> 2 References
>
>
> [edit] Biography
> [edit] Early life
> Hall's parents were Fairfax and Eleanor Raeburn (Remy) Hall. He married
> Bernice Dobkin on June 8, 1940. Their children are Marion Hall Hunt,
> Jonathan Hall, Peter Dobkin Hall, and Susannah Hall.
>
> [edit] Education
> After graduating from Phillips Exeter Academy, Hall received a B.A. from
> Yale University in 1939. He was a postgraduate student at Columbia
> University from 1940-41.
>
> [edit] Career
> At the urging of family friend, Saturday Review of Literature Editor Norman
> Cousins, Hall abandoned his graduate studies to write an annotated
> discography of recorded sound. The book instructed record collectors on "how
> to lay a solid foundation for a record library, what pitfalls to avoid in
> the buying of records, whether or not it is advisable to specialize, and how
> to distinguish between fair and excellent recordings of the same
> composition" (Hall 1940). The book also provided tips on playback equipment
> and offered detailed commentary on the whole range of recorded music, from
> classical through experimental music, jazz, folk, and spoken word. The
> Record Book appeared in 1940 and was followed by a series of supplements,
> and international edition (1948). The last supplement appeared in 1950. The
> series was an immediate hit, selling more than 100,000 copies.
>
> In 1940, Hall began a lifelong involvement with the record business, taking
> a job as an advertising copywriter with Columbia Records, then located in
> Bridgeport, Connecticut. In 1942, he became music program annotator for the
> NBC Symphony Orchestra -- the all-star orchestra conducted by Arturo
> Toscanini. In 1948, Hall joined forces with fellow Yale graduate John
> Hammond on a quest to post-war Europe on behalf of Mercury Records, then a
> Chicago-based produced of "pop" material.
>
> Wishing to enter the growing classical music market, Mercury executives
> realized that radio stations and governments in formerly Nazi-occupied
> countries held a gold mine in superb performances by Europe's top musicians.
> Hammond's and Hall's objective was to acquire these assets for Mercury.
> Hammond had hired Hall, "a well-known authority on classical recording, to
> handle the considerable job of cataloging Czech and German material. He was
> known and respected by the Czechs, who were interested in establishing an
> international records archive. David would be an asset in delicate
> negotiations" (Hammond 1977, 282). Hall and Hammond left Prague one step
> ahead of Soviet forces as they crushed Czechoslovakia's democratic
> government.
>
> Hall remained at Mercury Records until 1956 as classic music director. Under
> his leadership, Mercury began releasing its notable "Living Presence" series
> of classical recordings. Hall worked closely with sound engineering pioneer,
> C. Robert Fine. Fine's mobile sound studio toured the midwest, recording
> performances by the Detroit, Louisville, and Minneapolis symphonies and
> musical groups at the Eastman School at the University of Rochester. A 1955
> recording of the Minneapolis Symphony performing Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture
> under the baton of Antal Dorati became the best selling classical record of
> the decade.
>
> In 1956, Hall was awarded a Fulbright Teaching Fellowship, which enabled him
> to spend a year at the University of Copenhagen (Denmark) teaching advanced
> recording techniques to Danish engineers and musicians. Hall had long been
> interested in Scandinavian music, having directed the music center at New
> York's American Scandinavian Foundation from 1950 to 1957.
>
> On returning to the United States in the fall of 1957, Hall became music
> editor of Hi-Fi/Stereo Review (later Stereo Review). Hall contributed
> reviews of classic music and articles to the magazine until it folded in
> 1998. In his writings, Hall championed contemporary music. His 1964 article
> on Charles Ives included the first full discography of Ives's recordings.
>
> In 1963, Hall became president of Composers' Recordings, Inc., a nonprofit
> record label devoted to recording and distributing the work of contemporary
> composers. Among the notable recordings produced under his leadership were a
> series of performances by avant garde composer Harry Partch.
>
> In 1967, Hall was appointed curator of the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives
> of Recorded Sound, one of the units of the New York Public Library's
> performing arts collections at Lincoln Center. There he pioneered new
> techniques of cataloging recorded material as one of the initiatives of the
> Research Libraries Group, a consortium of the nation's leading research
> libraries. Hall and his associates also released an important collection of
> historic sound recordings, The Mapleson Cylinders, which captured the
> singing of Metropolitan Opera stars of the early twentieth century. This
> recording was awarded a "Grammy" by the National Academy of Recording Arts &
> Sciences in 1986.
>
> During this period, Hall helped to found the Association for Recorded Sound
> Collections (ARSC) in 1966. He served as the group's president, 1980-1982.
> In 2002, he received the ARSC Award for Distinguished Service to Historical
> Recordings.
>
> In 1986, Hall retired to the seaside village of Castine, Maine, where he
> continued to write record reviews and consult on recording projects. Through
> the 1990s, he chaired the classical records awards committee for the
> National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences. Currently, Hall is completing
> a biography of the twentieth century American composer, Roy Harris.
>
> In addition to introducing American audiences to the remarkable riches of
> recorded music in the years following the second World War, Hall played an
> especially important role as a champion of contemporary music. At least half
> the composers listed in the 1940 Record Book were still living. They
> included such notables as Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, Charles Ives, Harry
> Partch, William Schuman, and others. His writings also helped garner
> attention for jazz and folk musicians.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: 78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com
> [mailto:78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com]On Behalf Of Jeff Sultanof
> Sent: Sunday, September 27, 2009 12:38 PM
> To: 78-L Mail List
> Subject: Re: [78-L] David Hall. Was: Mercury [FWD]
>
>
> I distinctly remember reading of Hall's passing some years ago, but don't
> remember details.
>
> I used to go to the Rodgers and Hammerstein archive on an almost weekly
> basis to get an education in composition, arranging and sound recording.
> Back when I went, there were a great many recordings that I wanted to hear
> that were simply not available (and I couldn't afford to collect recordings
> back then; I was 17 when I first went up to the archive). Think Jimmy
> Mundy's big band on Varsity, Franklyn Marks on Master Records, and Kay
> Thompson on Viking.
>
> Hall was an imposing teddy bear of a man to my eyes. He seemed to have
> little use for me when I first went up to the archive, although he would
> look surprised at some of the obscure items I wanted to hear. Once I began
> asking him some questions about such composers as Harris, Siegmeister and
> the like, he could go on for quite some time with incredible information.
> >From that time on, he was very pleasant to me and forthcoming with new
> aquisitions that hadn't been catalogued yet (which used to piss off the
> other librarians).
>
> I have very warm memories of sitting in a booth and discovering many
> wonderful recordings. And he opened the door.
>
> Jeff Sultanof
>
> On Sun, Sep 27, 2009 at 3:06 AM, Mike Harkin <harkinmike at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>   
>> I read somewhere, long ago, that he was born in 1915.  The Record Book and
>> TRB Internataion edition opened my ears to tons of beaustiful music to
>> which I otherwise probably wouldn't have paid any attention....
>>
>> Long may he wave, or RIP, whichever is appropriate!
>>
>> Mike in Plovdiv
>>
>>
>>     
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