In Their Own Words

[Szykneij]

I recently acquired a lot of "Audition" lps from 1964-1966. Billed as "The Quarterly Sound Magazine of the Columbia Masterworks Subscription Service", these were basically vinyl "infomercials" for Columbia's classical releases. Most of the tracks are snippets of various recordings introduced by velvet-voiced announcers who occasionally give some interesting background information, but each record also includes commentaries by artists, conductors, and composers that I find fascinating. The voices on the records belong to:

Samuel Barber
Leonard Bernstein
E. Power Biggs
Alexander Brailowsky
Antal Dorati
Philippe Entremont
Harold Gomberg
Glenn Gould
Gary Graffman
Igor Kipnis
Andre Kostelanetz
Boris Kroyt
Eugene Ormandy
Leonard Rose
Mischa Schneider
Arnold Schoenberg
Isaac Stern
Igor Stravinsky
George Szell
Richard Tucker
Bruno Walter
Andrew Watts
John Williams

Hearing these renowned individuals speak of their own experiences, ideas, and opinions is much more powerful and insightful than reading them in print. Those I found most revealing were:

Samuel Barber – Given the character of his compositions and based on the photographs I've seen, I assumed Barber to be a serious and no-nonsense individual. In the recording, he is most witty and amusing. Speaking of his piano concerto, he humorously relates asking Schirmer for a swimming pool with underwater lights in lieu of a monetary commission and dealing with being behind schedule.

Glenn Gould – In contrast to his reputed quirkiness, he comes off as thoughtful and insightful.

Arnold Schoenberg – Even in labored broken English, his enthusiasm for both music and the visual arts comes through.

Igor Stravinsky – So much has been written and discussed about the "Rite of Spring" premiere, to have the composer himself relate the events and his reactions to them is a recorded gem.

Has anyone else had their perceptions of a composer or artist drastically changed after hearing or seeing them speak?

[secondwind]

I enjoy hearing composers talk about their works and about their creative process, so I frequently try to attend concerts at the Kennedy Center where composers of new works on the program will be present and will speak and answer questions at an "Afterwords" session in the hall following the performance.  However, since these are all contemporary composers and usually I'm hearing their work for the first time that night, they are not people I have formed an impression of before the day I hear them speak. 

The recordings you have acquired sound intriguing.  Is there any way you might share a few of them with the forum?

[Szykneij]

The recordings you have acquired sound intriguing.  Is there any way you might share a few of them with the forum?

I digitized the tracks with the artists comments on them (36 of them) and copied them onto a CD. I'd be happy to share them with anyone interested, although I'm not sure how best to do it. Suggestions would be welcome, in this thread or by PM. - Tony

[secondwind]

C'mon, Technodudes, is there a way to put some of these on the forum?   Inquiring minds want to know!

[George]

I digitized the tracks with the artists comments on them (36 of them) and copied them onto a CD. I'd be happy to share them with anyone interested, although I'm not sure how best to do it. Suggestions would be welcome, in this thread or by PM. - Tony

www.mediafire.com is free and easy to use to upload files. No download limits either. 100 MB allowed per upload and you can do at least 10 uploads at a time.

Or, you can upload to www.sendspace.com, where you can only do one upload at a time, but can do up to 300MB at a time. You'd just need to zip the tracks together. Use create archive on a MAC. 

I can help if you need assistance. I recommend converting the files to FLAC to minimize file size.

[Opus106]

I recommend converting the files to FLAC to minimize file size.

Wouldn't mp3 be enough, say, @ 128 or 256 kbps, since this is mostly going to be speech?

[Taxes-]

Wouldn't mp3 be enough, say, @ 128 or 256 kbps, since this is mostly going to be speech?

Yes, it probably would. But in the case of speech, FLAC does achieve much higher compression rates than with something like a full symphony, so the file most likely won't be all that large. The best option imho would be to encode it in something like LAME V0, or even V2 to get a mp3 file that sounds almost as good as FLAC but for a fraction of the size.

[George]

Wouldn't mp3 be enough, say, @ 128 or 256 kbps, since this is mostly going to be speech?

My practice with all trading is that I only do lossless. If people want to convert at the other end, they are free to do so. This preserves all the information from the original and in the case of special things like this, I only feel more strongly about keeping it lossless.

I get what you are saying though and you are certainly right. It would be enough, but since there is no need to reduce the quality, I personally wouldn't do it.

[Guido]

I would absolutely love to hear the Samuel Barber one.

[cliftwood]

Forgive the assumption, since I'm technology deprived, but if you've put it on a CD, can't you just burn copies?

I sure would love to hear that disc.

[Diletante]

Oh, I sure hope you can share them with us!

[George]

Oh, I sure hope you can share them with us!

I'm in the process of uploading CD 1 in FLAC format, it should be ready in a few hours. I will post a link in the morning. The CD-R was scratched a bit, so there's some minor digital noise on track one, but the rest ripped fine.

Perhaps another member could do the same for CD 2?

[George]

Download In Their Own Words - CD One in FLAC

[Sergeant Rock]

Has anyone else had their perceptions of a composer or artist drastically changed after hearing or seeing them speak?

I owned some those LPs in the 60s. Yeah, they were of enormous significance in my quest to gain insight into classical music at a time I could afford very few records. I learned about Saint-Saens 4th PC (still love that Entremont/Ormandy performance, which I bought a few years after hearing the "snippet" on the "commercial LP");  Ormandy, recalling the first performance of the Mahler 10th, said the final pages had left the audience in tears...and his telling the tale had me in tears. Still love that performance too. Another work I discovered for the first time due to those LPs: Nielsen 3. They played the big waltz tune at the climax of the development. Gave me goosebumps. Ah, those were the days...sniff.

Sarge

[Maciek]

Only found this thread today...

Download In Their Own Words - CD One in FLAC

Deleted...

[George]

Only found this thread today...

Deleted...

Sorry, I have become more and more careful about uploading stuff. 

[Maciek]

Oh, no problem. Tony has already solved the problem for me.

[Chaszz]

Not really on topic, as it is reading rather than hearing, but reading quotes by Richard Strauss, and knowing of his actions,  has greatly lessened my respect for him as a person, though not as a composer. He was always there to swoop in and grab the job of a Jewish conductor who had been barred by Hitler from working. His comment when told of the horrific fire-bombing of Dresden, where people breathed flame, was that it was unfortunate that his operas there had to be cancelled that evening. This is the moral midget who later wrote the Four Last Songs, which seem to exhude spirituality and wisdom. Go figure.