Your favorite mono recordings

[Jo498]

What I mean is that the audiences of Liszt or Chopin could not care less about amps, frequencies or whatever... yet I am convinced that their relaționship to music was more profound than ours.

Like 20 year olds today cannot imagine a world w/o smartphones and streaming, almost nobody in an industrialized/western country alive today can remember how special recorded music was or that all music had to be made live. My mother was born in the 1940s and she remembers that she was so excited/confused when making her first phone calls as a teenager that she hardly understood the person on the other end. (My paternal grandma, born 1908 did use a phone but she never introduced herself or properly ended calls. She just said something like "Someone needs to come around and pick up a basket of berries/beans etc. or do this and that. I wonder what happened if she got the wrong connection.)

What's also interesting is that there were supposedly "experiments" (more likely parlour games) in the early 20th century where listeners were apparently fooled by a 1900s horn gramophone vs. a musician or chamber group behind a heavy curtain.
There is even a (rather late, not very good) Holmes story where holmes uses a record to fool someone into believing that Holmes himself was remaining in some room playing violin.
Maybe they are just anecdotes, though.

[Todd]

What's also interesting is that there were supposedly "experiments" (more likely parlour games) in the early 20th century where listeners were apparently fooled by a 1900s horn gramophone vs. a musician or chamber group behind a heavy curtain.

That seems more akin to how people praised how realistic color looked in some early color photographs and movies.  That's something even today's cameras can't get right.  Both Fujifilm color science and Hasselblad Natural Colour Solution cannot be right, for instance.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

I listened to the Segovia very recently. These days I prefer the Bream.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0S1KDOC8is&ab_channel=pianopera

Charismatic playing!
I also checked some Schumann works by Cortot and I liked them.

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Charismatic playing!
I also checked some Schumann works by Cortot and I liked them.

Yeah!! 

PD

[Mandryka]

Charismatic playing!
I also checked some Schumann works by Cortot and I liked them.

And this morning I listened to his earlier recording of Chopin sonatas. This guy was just an outstanding musician and really, everything he ever recorded is well worth giving a shot.

[Jo498]

That seems more akin to how people praised how realistic color looked in some early color photographs and movies.  That's something even today's cameras can't get right.  Both Fujifilm color science and Hasselblad Natural Colour Solution cannot be right, for instance.

I grew up with b/w TV in the 1970s and when I watched color TV at relatives or friends I found the colors grossly artificial, as I guess many ca. 1980 color TVs were.
In Thomas Mann's Magic Mountain there is a whole chapter ("Fülle des Wohllauts", I am not trying to translate this, it's such a pretentious choice of words that it must be mixed with irony) with Hans Castorp enjoying the new toy of the sanatorium, a gramophone. This has a nice description of the sound reproduction, something like looking into the wrong side of a telescope or so. Nevertheless, Hans is quite impressed and I guess Mann who certainly didn't lack experience with high level live concerts was as well.
(I have been to a reading of the chapter with the pieces described played as far as possible; admittedly I am not and certainly was not over 20 years ago sufficiently versed in early 20th century acoustical recordings to tell if they really used such early ones or smuggled in some from the 1920s. One of the best demonstrations how well some old recordings can work might be Woody Allen's "Match Point")

[Todd]

This has a nice description of the sound reproduction, something like looking into the wrong side of a telescope or so. Nevertheless, Hans is quite impressed and I guess Mann who certainly didn't lack experience with high level live concerts was as well.

The novelty of recordings early last century would have been very impressive indeed, as would the steady stream of light offered by incandescent light bulbs when compared to flickering candles, and other new technologies that represented a major improvement in the quality of life.  Such novelty may have led some people to overstate the relative quality of what they experienced.

Given the inherent physical limitations of acoustic and early electrical recording technology, recordings from the era cannot reproduce instruments properly, and certainly not orchestras, which often had instrument changes anyway.  (If memory serves, Nikisch replaced double basses with tubas when recording, for instance.)  Early recordings were geared toward reproducing the human voice, so if you can get your hands on ancient acoustic 78s, a proper gramophone from the era, and a proper needle, you can hear what, say, Caruso fans heard a hundred years ago.  I think it would be fun, but I doubt it would sound realistic, even discounting surface noise completely.  But maybe such a recording would in fact put Caruso right in the room.  Modern digital transfers will sound materially different.

The conversion from B&W to color TV was fun to experience, as was the transition from broadcast to cable.  I used a B&W TV into the late 80s because it was free, and the screen was larger than the color TVs I had (affordable) access to.  Color TV color quality could not match even cheap Kodak color print film of the time, but who wanted to watch new, glitzy color broadcasts in B&W if they didn't have to?  I am still somewhat displeased with color monitor displays, even when calibrated.  Source material dictates what one sees, and if one ever edits digital content from different cameras, still or video, one can still see how 5600K looks different source to source.

[Mandryka]

Charismatic playing!

I like his Albeiniz very much, this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Agl1qZRTcOM&ab_channel=davidhertzberg

It's the rubato that makes it special I think, so natural and beautiful.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

I like his Albeiniz very much, this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Agl1qZRTcOM&ab_channel=davidhertzberg

It's the rubato that makes it special I think, so natural and beautiful.

What a tone! And it is well-presented by the mono recording.
This is a picturesque and three-dimensional performance. In the octave part, he (only) slightly lags the higher notes and it makes an echo-like effect.
Julian Bream's Asturias (RCA Living Stereo with a great recording sound) is very good as well, but it is so fast.
I prefer this version of Segovia.


P.s. when I said Charismatic playing, I meant the performance by Nyiregyhazi.

[Mandryka]

Yes it's nice for me to go back to those Segovia recordings - I remember there was a sequence of about a dozen Sor etudes he recorded which I loved. And the Tarrega Alhambra.

[Mandryka]

This is one way to do it - Albert Coates, Jupiter


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=87PTFPmQMtE

(Just hearing it again made me think that if  Bruno Maderna ever played it, it might sound like this.)

[Mandryka]

And now this, Scherchen Matthew Passion. Amazing really! Cuneod on very fine form.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RXajEfeoOBc

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Yes it's nice for me to go back to those Segovia recordings - I remember there was a sequence of about a dozen Sor etudes he recorded which I loved. And the Tarrega Alhambra.

Yes they are great. I didn't know his mono-era recordings. I think the recording below (compilation?) is a killer. Warm and hip recording sound!

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

And now this, Scherchen Matthew Passion. Amazing really! Cuneod on very fine form.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RXajEfeoOBc

Yes, sounds excellent!

[Mandryka]

How about Sofronitsky's 1949 Chopin barcarolle?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5H1gJwp8LvU

[Pohjolas Daughter]

And now this, Scherchen Matthew Passion. Amazing really! Cuneod on very fine form.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RXajEfeoOBc

Love Hugues Cuneod's singing.    I'll have to try and get ahold of that recording.   Do you have the complete one Mandryka?

PD

[Jo498]

The Scherchen SMP was on CD at least twice (MCA or Millenium classics and Tahra, I believe) but I never managed to secure a copy (fortunately a friend could provide me with a spare safety copy ).
It's probably my favorite pre-HIP Bach choral recording, despite some excentricities (like excruciatingly slow "O Mensch bewein" and "Wir setzen uns..." whereas the first chorus is quite fast, about as fast as more recent recordings). It's highly dramatic and most of the singers very good (I am not as fond of Munteanu as some others). Scherchen also did the b minor mass (twice, I only know the stereo) and the SJP even in stereo and they are also interesting but I don't find any as gripping as the SMP.
Scherchen also recorded a bunch of Bach cantatas and Messiah (I think once mono and once stereo) but I was not too fond of what I heard of them. (Neither of his Brandenburgs or Vivaldi (both probably solid for 1950s but hardly competitive later), but the Handel op.6 is worth seeking out, also excentric, quite interesting and expressive.)

[Pohjolas Daughter]

The Scherchen SMP was on CD at least twice (MCA or Millenium classics and Tahra, I believe) but I never managed to secure a copy (fortunately a friend could provide me with a spare safety copy ).
It's probably my favorite pre-HIP Bach choral recording, despite some excentricities (like excruciatingly slow "O Mensch bewein" and "Wir setzen uns..." whereas the first chorus is quite fast, about as fast as more recent recordings). It's highly dramatic and most of the singers very good (I am not as fond of Munteanu as some others). Scherchen also did the b minor mass (twice, I only know the stereo) and the SJP even in stereo and they are also interesting but I don't find any as gripping as the SMP.
Scherchen also recorded a bunch of Bach cantatas and Messiah (I think once mono and once stereo) but I was not too fond of what I heard of them. (Neither of his Brandenburgs or Vivaldi (both probably solid for 1950s but hardly competitive later), but the Handel op.6 is worth seeking out, also excentric, quite interesting and expressive.)

Thank you for the information.

I recall running across (and purchasing) one of Scherchen's Bach cantatas.  Trying to remember whether or not I kept it (Sometimes, once I get home and look at the LPs under better light--or play them--I then realize that they are not in good enough condition for me to be able to play and enjoy).  I'll take a look a bit later.  How is the sound on your copy (and which label was it on?)?  Ah, just checked through my LPs; I kept it (Westminster).  It has Lazlo on it but, alas, no Cuneod.

PD

[Mandryka]

I bought the Tara release of the Scherchen passion when it first came out, it sounds good to me. Cuenod is on particularly good form. The other interesting choral thing with Scherchen is the Haydn Seven Last Words - sound is not so good there.  And Schoenberg's Moses and Aaron.

I've never got into his Bach cantatas, he has some good singers though - Maureen Forester and Teresa Stich Randall. And I've never really got into his Mozart requiem. I have a B minor mass but I can't remember a thing about it. I've just put it on, possibly for the first time, and it sounds rather good actually.

[Jo498]

I don't remember which cantatas and what CD that was; probably some grey issue, dubbed from LPs. Sound was not as good but that was not the main problem, more that the style worked in the more dramatic passions but not really in the cantatas.

I have not heard the mono recording of the Mozart Requiem but the stereo is also one of my favorite (good soloists, rather mediocre choir, unfortunately), admittedly the Mozart Requiem is not such a favorite of mine (except for the Introitus and Kyrie). I also have the 7 last words (this was an MCA twofer with the Mozart Requiem in the early 1990s or so) but it's been too long I listened to it (I prefer the piece in the orchestral or quartet version anyway).