[78-L] Victor Herbert plays Mendelssohn..Mendelssohn loses

[Philip Carli]

A) "Victor Herbert's Band": the Zonophone records are  NOT connected with Herbert; they're by a Zonophone house group directed by Fred Hager, who had moved over from Edison around late 1901.  Herbert successfully sued Zonophone, as using his name on the records also implied the group was the internationally famous Band of the 22nd Regiment NYSNG, formerly led by Patrick Gilmore (and popularly known as "Gilmore's Band"), of which Herbert had become leader in 1898; this was very well known to the general public, as Herbert toured with the group as Gilmore had.  To make matters more confusing, Columbia was still releasing cylinders during this period credited to "Gilmore's Band"; it's hard to determine the legitimacy of this title, except that at least some of those _may_ be the 22nd Reg. Band from Herbert's tenure, as a number are quite beautifully played.  (I don't think Herbert necessarily conducted them, though -- it was probably an assistant.) Another possibility for the Columbias is that I believe Mrs. Gilmore was left in fairly straitened circumstances after her husband died in 1892 and was willing to sell off anything connected with him, including name rights, and some "Gilmore's" cylinders are Columbia personnel conducted by Tom Clark (Charles Prince's predecessor) or Prince himself, either as fraud or replacing worn-out masters.  (I have Columbias labelled "Gilmore" and announced "Prince" AND vice versa. Ow.)This is a subject that still needs clearing up, as it really makes my head swim.

B) Ghastliness: Band recording sessions tended to be marathon events prior to about 1906; if you look at some of the 1901-03 Sousa Band sessions under Arthur Pryor for Victor in James Smart's reconstructions, dozens of numbers were recorded and passed at single sittings.  Some of those early Sousa Victors are pretty roughly played (Louis Moreau Gottschalk's "Pasquinade" from 1901, for example), and may be at least partially attributable to stress and exhaustion.  If a well-drilled group like Sousa's could sound, well, a bit disorderly, think of a disparate group of session players brought in under the same circumstances; they may have been recording (and possibly sight-reading, or reading it with colleagues they'd never played it with before) at the end of the day.  (I have a Universal Zonophone of Hager's "Victor Herbert's Band" doing Louis Gillet's "Loin du Bal" and it's quite delicate and exact, for instance; might be from an earlier part of the session, or they simply knew it better.  Hard to imagine that against "Spring Song", though...)

C) Most band arrangements I've seen of "Spring Song" put it in Bb; A would be an unthinkable band key (5 sharps for cornets, clarinets, tenor saxophone; 6 sharps for alto & baritone saxes and Eb horns). Ab is another possibility, except the piece plays easier in Bb and Ab's more out-of-tune in the lower notes on cornet and euphonium -- it would be very noticeable when playing in unison or octaves with the clarinets.  (Minor point though.) Finally, what pitch were they using? -- A=435 or A=452?  The latter ("high pitch") was being generally phased out, but many American bands still used it up till 1910.  (Being recorded in NY, though, I'd incline toward A=435, but it wasn't extinct even there in 1902.)

More than you ever bargained for, I expect...

Philip


________________________________________
From: 78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com [78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com] On Behalf Of David Lennick [dlennick at sympatico.ca]
Sent: Tuesday, February 22, 2011 12:37 PM
To: 78L
Subject: [78-L] Victor Herbert plays Mendelssohn..Mendelssohn loses

Universal Zonophone C 5110, "Spring Song", played by Victor Herbert's Band who
sound as if they've never played it or any other piece before. Ghastly. But
amazingly well recorded for what, 1902? Ty has this listed as "Band" but it's
labelled and announced as Herbert.

What key do we like for this? Sounds good in A to me, which is down about 2.8%
from 78. Professor Carli?

dl

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