Purcell: Harpsichord Suites (Sylvia Marlowe)

I have had occasion, in the recent past, to sing the praises of New York's Gramophone Shop, and to enumerate their album series called "Gramophone Shop Celebrities" - two of which, both organ recitals by Finn Viderø, I have posted already. Here is the first offering in that illustrious series, released in December, 1946, and featuring the first integral recording of Purcell's "Choice Collection of Lessons for the Harpsichord" comprising eight suites:

Purcell: Eight Suites for Harpsichord (Z. 660/3 and Z. 666/9)
Sylvia Marlowe, harpsichord
Recorded c. 1946
Gramophone Shop Celebrities Album GSC-2, five vinyl 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 122.19 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 77.73 MB)

This appears also to be one of the first recordings by Sylvia Marlowe to be circulated reasonably widely, although it is still far from common. Previous albums for General (1940 - containing boogie-woogie arrangements) and Bost (1942) do not appear to have survived wartime exigencies. 78 sets for Musicraft and American Decca would follow (one example of the latter, a jazzed-up version of Rameau's Tambourin, can be heard here), but her recording career would not truly blossom until the LP era, most notably for Capitol and, again, American Decca.

Finn Viderø at the Compenius Organ

The 1610 Compenius Organ, Frederiksborg Castle, Denmark
(as pictured in the booklet for the Gramophone Shop Celebrities Album)

Happy New Year! Here, without further ado, is the companion album for the Finn Viderø set I posted a few weeks ago, made by HMV for the Gramophone Shop in New York, a selection of 16th and 17th century music played on the oldest organ in Denmark, built by Esaias Compenius in 1610:

Compenius Organ Album:

Samuel Scheidt: Magnificat secundi toni

Girolamo Frescobaldi: Canzone dopo l'Epistola

Heinrich Scheidemann: Praeambulum in Dorian Mode

Antonio Cabezón: Diferencias sobre "El Canto del Caballero"

Antonio Cabezón: Tiento del cuatro tono

Jean Titelouze: Magnificat quinti toni

Melchior Schildt: Praeambulum

Orlando Gibbons: Fantasia

Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck: O lux beata trinitas - 2 variations

Jakob Praetorius: Praeambulum

Michael Praetorius: Alvus tumescit virginis

Finn Viderø at the Compenius organ in Frederiksborg Castle, Denmark

Recorded c. 1949

Gramophone Shop Celebrities Album 8, six 78-rpm records

Link (FLAC files, 146.36 MB)

Link (MP3 files, 92.45 MB)

There were nine of these special albums produced by the Gramophone Shop, which, for some reason, began their numbering at Album 2 and went up through Album 10.  Here is a list of these:

GSC-2: Purcell: Eight Suites for Harpsichord (Sylvia Marlowe)
GSC-3: Treasures from the Repertory of Maggie Teyte
GSC-4: Songs of Gluck, Wagner and Franz (Lorri Lail, soprano)
GSC-5: Baroque Cantatas of 17th Century North Germany (Mogens Wöldike directing)
GSC-6: Seventeenth Century Organ Music (Finn Viderø)
GSC-7: Italian Songs of the Renaissance and Baroque (Gabriella Gatti)
GSC-8: Compenius Organ Album (Finn Viderø)
GSC-9: Choral Music of the Renaissance (Wöldike & Danish State Madrigal Choir)
GSC-10: Alto Cantatas of Schütz nnd Buxtehude (Lorri Lail, Finn Viderø)

All of these were recorded and manufactured by HMV except the Purcell Suites, which were American-made and pressed in vinylite. No indication is given as to who produced them, though my guess would be American Decca, given that Sylvia Marlowe would later record extensively for that label.

Seventeenth Century Organ Music (Finn Viderø)

Finn Viderø

One of the most renowned record shops in America in the second quarter of the twentieth century was New York's Gramophone Shop, on East 48th Street. Begun in the spring of 1928 by William H. Tyler and Joseph Brodan, the store did a thriving business in imported recordings and eventually took to releasing esoteric fare under its own imprint, although in most cases the actual records were recorded and pressed by HMV. (Latter-day collectors have additional reason to bless the existence of the Gramophone Shop - the three editions of the Encyclopedia of Recorded Music which it sponsored, from 1936, 1942, and 1948, which remain standard reference works.) Among its albums under the heading of "Gramophone Shop Celebrities" is this marvelous collection by the Danish organist Finn Viderø:

Seventeenth Century Organ Music:

Buxtehude: Toccata in F Major, BuxWV 156

Froberger: 2 Ricercare - In the Phrygian Mode; in F-Sharp Minor

Louis Marchand: Dialogue in C Major

Franz Tunder: Prelude in G Minor

Matthias Weckmann: Toccata in E Minor

Pachelbel: Fantasia in G Minor; Ricercare in C Minor

Buxtehude: Prelude and Fugue in D Minor, BuxWV 140

Buxtehude: Canzonetta in E Minor, BuxWV 169

Finn Viderø at the organ of Jaegersborg Church, Denmark

Recorded c. 1948 by HMV

Gramophone Shop Celebrities Album No. 6, six 78-rpm records

Link (FLAC files, 130.42 MB)

Link (MP3 files, 84.19 MB)

Of the Gramophone Shop's two co-founders, Mr. Tyler, who had since at least 1925 been the manager of the record department at the New York Band Instrument Company (as we find out in the June, 1925, issue of "The Talking Machine World"), has a connection with my native city, Atlanta, as well. For, by the time these "Gramophone Shop Celebrities" sets were being made in the late 40s, Mr. Tyler had left New York to found his own shop down here, at 845 Peachtree Street, known as Tyler's Gramophone Shop. My old mentor Bill Brooks spoke of working for this shop (and indeed, the 1947 Atlanta City Directory lists him as a salesman there) - which would explain the large number of imported records that Mr. Brooks possessed, for Mr. Tyler worked as an importer here as he had in New York. His store didn't last long, unfortunately. It's listed in only two editions of the city directories, 1947 and 1948-49. Some twenty years ago I acquired a few 78s from a lady who had been one of his customers (this lady's name, alas, I cannot remember, but she attended the church I was playing for at the time). She remembered Tyler's Gramophone Shop as "a wonderful place," and that "it closed down after Mr. Tyler committed suicide." The original Gramophone Shop in New York closed its doors for good early in 1954.

I do not know whether I will post again before Christmas, so everyone accept my best wishes for a happy holiday season!