Sir Thomas Beecham and Sir Malcolm Sargent birthdays today

[salymap]

Sir Thomas [Tommy to all] born on the 29th April, 1879

Sir Malcolm {Flash Harry to some] born on this day in 1895

Any special recordings or memories welcome. I shall play a bit more of my recent Beecham box for starters.

Maybe the Elgar 2nd Symphony for MS.

[amateur51]

Sir Thomas [Tommy to all] born on the 29th April, 1879

Sir Malcolm {Flash Harry to some] born on this day in 1895

Any special recordings or memories welcome. I shall play a bit more of my recent Beecham box for starters.

Maybe the Elgar 2nd Symphony for MS.

I'm too young () to have seen either of them in concert, tho' I do remember Sir Malcolm's appearance at The Last Night of the prome when Sir Malcolm appreared for the final time, looking very ill poor man.

Memorable recordings? Well for Sargent it has to be his Elgar Dream of Gerontius with Heddle Nash, Gladys Ripley et al.

Beeham's file is somewhat larger ... Schubert symphony no 5 ... Dvorak symphony no 8 and Sibelius symphony no 2, in both recordings he can be heard exhorting the orchestera to greater heights vocally, great fun ... R Strauss Ein Heldenleben in UK and in New York (am I right? ) ... Sibelius 2, 4 & 7.

That's off the top of my very shiny bonce - more to follow I'm sure

[salymap]

Thanks ams. Don't remember Beecham conducting Dvorak but love his Schubert sym 5 and his lollipop type of things- His Berlioz overtures are wonderful too.

And Sargent's Gerontius with Heddle Nash is wonderful. Nash was known by some of the orchestras as 'Rainy Day', never found out why.
Sargent is underrated imho because he didn't leave all that many orchestral recordings but on a good day he was up there with the best.
He loved conducting Dvorak and Sibelius symphonies, Rimsky Korsakov Capriccio Espagnol, lively programme music. Smetana Ma Vlast was a work he often played. Then there was work with the various choral societies.

[rodney_h_d]

salymap - My first experience of the RFH and only time I heard Sir Thomas Beecham conduct was with a school friend who also played piano and violin to hear the RPO in Boccherini: Overture in D, Mozart: Sinfonia Concertante in E flat K.364 with Jean Pougnet [violin] Frederick Riddle [viola] and Schubert: Symphony No. 9 'Great C major'. We were both familiar with recordings of the Mozart and Schubert. but hearing the Schubert live made a particularly strong impression!

I heard Sir Malcolm Sargent frequently some years later when I started "arena Promming" and remember that year when he became ill and many of his concerts were conducted by somebody who, sadly, we have recently lost - Sir Colin Davis.

[jean]

I have a signed photograph of Sargent. Should I put it on ebay?

[salymap]

i don't think so jean. Every time we chatted to MS outside the artist's door at the RAH he signed 'MS' on everyone's programme they were carrying, sometimes twice by mistake ifthe conversation was lengthy.

[amateur51]

I've just remembered that I have a 'live' performance of Brahms symphony no 3 conducted by Beecham, a work that he did not record commercially. It's a very swift dramatic reading (lots of Tommy shouts of encouragement in the first movement :biggrin) and it's from the second half of a Toscanini Memorial Concert held in New York i23 January 1957.

It's available from Classic Recordings Quarterly as CRQ CD50 for £8 inc p&p. The CD is pretty short measure at 45minutes and the sound is not perfect by any means but I wouldn't be without it as an example of Beecham taking a piece by the scruff of the neck & creating musical magic.

http://crq.org.uk/crqeditions.php

[Gordon]

Sir Thomas on hearing that Sargent was on tour in the Far East: Flash in Japan!

When Sir Thomas set up the LPO in 1932 [out of pique at the BBC, and with someone else's money as usual] it was Sargent that did the first recordings with them and the Royal Choral Society.

I'm sure it was a very wary relationship on the part of Sargent. There are some very good recordings by Sargent from the 50s of classics like Eroica. Good performances in the shadow of bigger names back then. Come to think of it Beecham didn't do much Beethoven either. My favourite Beecham must be Heldenleben from 1958 - and that live Berlioz Requiem. His mid 50s Mozart symphonies for Philips are very disappointing. Much as he tried he never persuaded me to like Delius!!

Not sure I like Beecham the man.

[salymap]

Sir Thomas on hearing that Sargent was on tour in the Far East: Flash in Japan!

When Sir Thomas set up the LPO in 1932 [out of pique at the BBC, and with someone else's money as usual] it was Sargent that did the first recordings with them and the Royal Choral Society.

I'm sure it was a very wary relationship on the part of Sargent. There are some very good recordings by Sargent from the 50s of classics like Eroica. Good performances in the shadow of bigger names back then. Come to think of it Beecham didn't do much Beethoven either. My favourite Beecham must be Heldenleben from 1958 - and that live Berlioz Requiem. His mid 50s Mozart symphonies for Philips are very disappointing. Much as he tried he never persuaded me to like Delius!!

Not sure I like Beecham the man.

Beecham was very clever but had a cruel sense of humour. I heard it on several occasions and was the but t of it once.
Sargent was useful to him on many occasions and I think they had a good working relationship. On Beecham's last visit here,just before he died, Malcolm was one of the few visitors.

I still find Delius difficult. Beautiful but it sort of washes over one rather than anything else. I like one or two works though.

[BBMmk2]

Ah, salymap, what a great pity! Delius's music is a sheer joy!

I remember that famous LNOP when the conductor(was it sir Colin?), who said that he was just going to get Sir Malcolm onto the stage)

[salymap]

Well,Bbm, I love the Delius Violin Concerto, Paris, even the Walk to the Paradise Garden if it's not played too often. Quite a lot more but memory is bad now.

[verismissimo]

I bought a 3LP CBS set of Sir T conducting the RPO in Berlioz at an Oxfam in Bridport. One pound.

Tomorrow I'll discover if it was a good investment (the surfaces, not the playing).

[Ferretfancy]

Ah, salymap, what a great pity! Delius's music is a sheer joy!

I remember that famous LNOP when the conductor(was it sir Colin?), who said that he was just going to get Sir Malcolm onto the stage)

I think you would have to have a heart of stone not to enjoy Brigg Fair or Sea Drift, the whole human sense of loss in music.

[LeMartinPecheur]

I still find Delius difficult. Beautiful but it sort of washes over one rather than anything else. I like one or two works though.

I think I know what you mean, salymap. While still at school I got badly hit by The Walk to the Paradise Garden on a 10" disc (Collins??) in the school music room. But still rather waiting for the rest of Delius to do the same. Some works nearly do it (Brigg Fair, Appalachia, Sea Drift - nearly, but they don't quite stick), yet even WttPG has faded for me, which hasn't happened for most of the music that hit me in my teens. A very slippery fish somehow, our Frederick!

[Hornspieler]

I think you would have to have a heart of stone not to enjoy Brigg Fair or Sea Drift, the whole human sense of loss in music.

But who could resist the charm of that delightful piece La Calinda?

It reminds me of the famous Bristol "L" (which the Bristolians put at the end of words.)

We were playing a schools concert in Bristol and the local County Music Advisor insisted on introducing the programme.

All went well until ............

" ...and now the orchestral are going to play Larl Calindle from the Operal Koangle."

Only we all dissolved into laughter and our poor oboist choked on his reed!.

HS

BTW That reminds me of an interview on Radio Bristol with a dockworker from Avonmouth who found a large snake in a consignment of bananas.

"What sort of snake was it?" asked John Craven.

"I'm not sure." was the reply "It was either a cobral or a boal constrictal."

'morning all!