1928 NIKOLAI SOKOLOFF Cleveland Or Rachmaninoff SYMPHONY NO 2 E-Minor Brunswick
$
65
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Description
A series of great Orchestra Records by great conductors on 78 rpm records
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This is one from the first recording session ever of the Cleveland Orch under their conductor Nikolai Sokoloff.
in a new revision made by Rachmaninoff for this recording
RACHMANINOV Symphony No. 2 (world première recording)
Sergei Rachmaninoff. Symphony no. 2 in E minor, op. 27
Cleveland Orchestra; Nikolai Sokoloff, conductor
Recorded in New York, 7-8 May 1928
I. Largo - Allegro moderato (0:00)
II. Allegro molto (15:37)
III. Adagio (23:47)
IV. Allegro vivace (36:08)
Two years later, Sokoloff and the orchestra began a series of recordings for the Brunswick label, then a major player in the American market alongside Victor and Columbia. Their recordings fall neatly into three periods: acoustic discs, which, after a single New York session in January, 1924 that produced the 1812 Overture, were made in Cleveland in October of the same year; early electric “Light-Ray” recordings, also made in Cleveland in May of 1926 in a warmly reverberant venue which was probably the Masonic Auditorium, used by the orchestra before Severance Hall was built in 1931; and a final group of electrics made back in New York two years later, most likely in the Chapter Room of Carnegie Hall, where Brunswick had previously recorded the New York Philharmonic under Mengelberg and Toscanini.
Far and away the most ambitious recording Sokoloff made with the orchestra was the gramophonic première of the Rachmaninov Second Symphony. The conductor had first approached Rachmaninov in 1919 about making cuts to the nearly hour-long work in order to make it more palatable to audiences. Rachmaninov agreed that he had been “more voluble” in his younger days, and proceeded to craft what was intended to be a new performing edition.
Not only did the composer cut music he considered redundant, but he also changed some harmonies and assigned a new tempo marking for the second movement. The 1928 set presented here is the only recording of this version. The next recording, made by Eugene Ormandy in Minneapolis in 1934, cut even more out of the score, and became the de facto performing version in the US and elsewhere until the 1960s.
Please see top of the page for condition
The founding conductor, Nikolai Sokoloff, of the Cleveland Orchestra
Two years later, Sokoloff and the orchestra began a series of recordings for the Brunswick label, then a major player in the American market alongside Victor and Columbia. Their recordings fall neatly into three periods: acoustic discs, which, after a single New York session in January, 1924 that produced the 1812 Overture, were made in Cleveland in October of the same year; early electric “Light-Ray” recordings, also made in Cleveland in May of 1926 in a warmly reverberant venue which was probably the Masonic Auditorium, used by the orchestra before Severance Hall was built in 1931; and a final group of electrics made back in New York two years later, most likely in the Chapter Room of Carnegie Hall, where Brunswick had previously recorded the New York Philharmonic under Mengelberg and Toscanini.
While the sound of the acoustic recordings compares well with their counterparts on Victor and Columbia, the early electrics were more problematic. The “Light-Ray” method was developed by General Electric as an offshoot of an early sound-on-film recording process, using photoelectric cells to transmit sound optically to a disc cutting head, rather than the electrical impulses used by the rival Western Electric system.
Only with the final sessions in 1928 do we see entire, uncut works being attempted. (The Schubert Unfinished even features the first movement repeat, a rarity in those days.)
What we hear on these recordings is an ensemble that already sounds superior to most of its European counterparts at the time, save perhaps for Mengelberg’s Concertgebouw Orchestra. String portamento is used surprisingly sparingly for the period, and reserved mainly for the Russian Romantic repertoire. Ensemble playing is generally good, as are the instrumental soloists, particularly Joseph Fuchs, the concertmaster heard in the 1928 recordings. And Sokoloff is revealed as an energetic, often imaginative interpreter (although some of the swift tempi - like the mad dash through the “Presto ma non assai” section of the Brahms Second Allegretto - seem more dictated by recording timing constraints than interpretive choice).
Far and away the most ambitious recording Sokoloff made with the orchestra was the gramophonic première of the Rachmaninov Second Symphony. The conductor had first approached Rachmaninov in 1919 about making cuts to the nearly hour-long work in order to make it more palatable to audiences. Rachmaninov agreed that he had been “more voluble” in his younger days, and proceeded to craft what was intended to be a new performing edition.
Not only did the composer cut music he considered redundant, but he also changed some harmonies and assigned a new tempo marking for the second movement. The 1928 set presented here is the only recording of this version. The next recording, made by Eugene Ormandy in Minneapolis in 1934, cut even more out of the score, and became the de facto performing version in the US and elsewhere until the 1960s.
After leaving Cleveland in 1932, Sokoloff was appointed director of the Federal Music Project (1935 - 1939), a New Deal program created to employ musicians and encourage music appreciation during the Depression. From 1938 through 1941, he was music director of the Seattle Symphony. In 1941, he settled in La Jolla, California, where he organized the La Jolla Musical Arts Festival Orchestra. With them, he made several LP recordings in the early 1950s, featuring works by Rozsa and Lopatnikoff for the Concert Hall label and by Dello Joio, Martinu and Britten for Alco Records. He died in La Jolla in 1965.
Following the 1928 sessions, the Cleveland Orchestra would not stand before the recording microphones for another eleven years, when it began a long association with Columbia Records - first under Artur Rodzinski, who had been its music director since 1933, and then, briefly, with Erich Leinsdorf before George Szell arrived for his long tenure (1946 - 1970). But the seeds of the Cleveland Orchestra’s later international success were already present in these recordings made within the first decade of its existence.
Recording technologies have come a long way since The Cleveland Orchestra cut its first commercial record in 1924. In those early days of recording, pieces often had to be modified to fit on 78 rpm discs, often leading conductors to condense musical works so that they could be commercially viable. Sometimes composers would listen to the concerns of orchestra conductors, revising their scores to be more acceptable for both live performance and commercial recording. One of those composers was Sergei Rachmaninoff, longtime friend of The Cleveland Orchestra’s first conductor, Nikolai Sokoloff.
From 1923 to 1942 Rachmaninoff visited Cleveland at the invitation of the Orchestra to perform his three piano concerti and his Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini. Cleveland was also one of the first cities in the United States to witness performances of Rachmaninoff’s symphonies, and The Cleveland Orchestra was the first ensemble ever to record his stunning Symphony No. 2 in E minor.
Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 2 was first performed in Cleveland by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1911, just three years after its world-premiere in St. Petersburg. During the summer of 1919, Sokoloff approached Rachmaninoff about making a revised edition of the piece for The Cleveland Orchestra to perform, as he felt the current version was too long for practical concert purposes. Rachmaninoff admitted that the score could stand to be shortened, and the two musicians prepared a new score to use for the upcoming performance of the work. In order to create a tighter (and more performable) version of the symphony, the composer altered tempi, made changes to the orchestration, and made cuts to all movements of the piece. The Cleveland Orchestra played the symphony for the first time as part of their second season in March of 1920, Sokoloff conducting from the score that reflected Rachmaninoff’s changes.
Setting this symphony to vinyl was no easy task. This landmark recording represents not only the Orchestra’s first major commercial release, but also the world-premiere recording of the symphony. In his unpublished memoirs, Sokoloff describes the recording experience and some of Rachmaninoff’s revisions to the score:
In spite of our calamitous start, we continued recording and, in 1928, even recorded for Brunswick the first “album” of a symphony ever attempted. This was Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 2, which took six twelve-inch records (that is twelve sides – twelve perfect wax bases!) to record. Fortunately, this was done in the Brunswick studios in New York and there were no make-shift seating arrangements to collapse under any musician [as had happened during an earlier recording session!].
Also fortunately, I had seen Rachmaninoff the summer before and, when I told him we were going to record his Second Symphony, he immediately said that he would like to make some cuts in it about which he had been thinking seriously for some time as the symphony was far too long. Also, that he wanted to make a change in the orchestration at the end of the slow movement and give me the exact tempo he wished in the Scherzo, which had been given an incorrect metronome mark when the score was published.
Rachmaninoff’s revisions and cuts are all recorded in my score, which I left with the Cleveland Orchestra. I feel sure the present librarian would be gracious enough to allow any conductor, wishing to know Rachmaninoff’s own final revisions, to look at it. Even with the cuts, it took us four hours of almost every morning of a week in New York to record it!
—from Eleanor Reynolds Sokoloff’s unpublished typescript of her husband’s memoirs, recorded in early 1965. Courtesy of Cleveland Orchestra Archives.
Thankfully, all of the hard work paid off – the recording was a huge success and received large amounts of press coverage. The September 1928 issue of Phonograph Monthly Review praised the recording as “a phonographic jewel of the very first water,” also suggesting that “it contributes a note to recorded music that has not been known before.” The recording sold for seven dollars (a little over $95 today!), and was prominently advertised in The Cleveland Orchestra’s 1928-29 season program books.
Condition:
VERY GOOD PLUS PLUS, basically unworn, but scffued, few light scratches on Valse, plays quiet
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Nikolai Sokoloff (28 May 1886 – 25 September 1965), was a Russia-American conductor and violinist. He was born in Kiev, and studied music at Yale. From 1916 to 1917 he was musical director of the San Francisco People's Philharmonic Orchestra, where he insisted on including women in his orchestra and paying them the same as men. Sokoloff was the founding conductor and music director of the Cleveland Orchestra in 1918 where he remained until 1932. Between 1935 and 1938 he directed the Federal Music Project, a New Deal program that employed musicians to perform and educate the public about music. From 1938 to 1941 he directed the Seattle Symphony Orchestra.
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