The First Lady of the Harp

Mildred Dilling

During her lifetime, Indiana-born Mildred Dilling (1894-1982) was usually billed as the "First Lady of the Harp" - which seems corny nowadays, but I suppose it made sense back then, when the harp soloists most publicly visible were men (Grandjany, Salzedo).  And, if the picture is any indication, she certainly had glamour.  Her greatest claim to fame is that she was Harpo Marx's harp teacher. (Actually, Harpo was self-taught on the instrument, claims his son Bill, also a musician, on this website, but he did receive help from Dilling in breaking bad habits.)  She also owned the world's largest collection of harps - 65 of them, all kept in her Manhattan apartment!  She made, however, pitifully few recordings. Four issued sides for HMV in the late 20s, fourteen more for American Columbia in the 30s, and an LP or two for Urania is all I am aware of.  Here is the only one I have, one of the Columbia issues:

Prokofiev: Prelude in C Major, Op. 12, No. 7 and
Sibelius: Pastorale (from "Pelléas et Mélisande")
Mildred Dilling, harp
Recorded June 8 and 9, 1937
Columbia 17107-D, one 10-inch 78-rpm record
Link (FLAC files, 14.98 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 6.26 MB)

For those who would like to hear more of Mildred Dilling's playing, there is a 1940 short film on Youtube, in which she plays three pieces as well as talks about the harp.

Debussy and Ravel by Newell and Wummer (and others)

Laura Newell, John Wummer, Milton Katims

Two sets this week, the common denominator of both being not only French impressionism, but the same harpist and flutist.  These are Laura Newell, active in the 1940s and 1950s as a freelance harpist (she was Robert Shaw's choice for both recordings by his Robert Shaw Chorale of Britten's Ceremony of Carols), and John Wummer, principal flute of the New York Philharmonic from 1942 to 1965.  They're both joined by Milton Katims, who played second viola on a number of Budapest Quartet recordings of Mozart and Beethoven quintets, and later conducted the Seattle Symphony, for this Debussy trio:

Debussy: Sonata No. 2, for flute, viola and harp
John Wummer, Milton Katims, Laura Newell
Recorded April 24, 1945
Columbia Masterworks set MX-282, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 49.8 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 27.1 MB)

Cover design by Alex Steinweiss
(restored by Peter Joelson)

Laura Newell was also associated with the brothers Sylvan and Alan Shulman, all three being members of the group "New Friends of Rhythm" for which Alan Shulman wrote jazz-influenced arrangements and compositions.  So it's natural that she should have recorded Ravel's Introduction and Allegro with the Shulmans' Stuyvesant String Quartet:

Ravel: Introduction and Allegro
Laura Newell, harp; John Wummer, flute; Ralph McLane, clarinet
Stuyvesant String Quartet (Shulman-Dembeck-Kievman-Shulman)
and
Debussy: The Maid with the Flaxen Hair (arr. Grandjany)
Laura Newell, harp
Recorded March 22, 1940
Columbia Masterworks set MX-167, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 34.1 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 21.6 MB)

As I mentioned in an earlier post about the Stuyvesant Quartet, the two inner parts changed hands several times during their first few years of existence.  This appears to have been the only recording that John Dembeck, who that same year moved to Toronto and eventually became a Canadian citizen, made as their second violinist.

All my old files are now up and running; and the links from my blog have been changed to the new ones.

Dello Joio: Harp Concerto

Norman Dello Joio

Next year will see the centenary of American composer Norman Dello Joio (1913-2008), godson of Pietro Yon (famous for the Christmas carol "Gesu Bambino") and student of Paul Hindemith - although, unlike many of Hindemith's composition students, his music sounds nothing like his master's.  To get a jump on the celebrations, I present a work which, as far as I can tell, has received only this one recording, and that shortly after the work was written.  This is his Harp Concerto, a two movement-work consisting of an Introduction and Passacaglia, and a Scherzo-March.  This is masterfully played by Edward Vito, at the time principal harpist in Toscanini's NBC Symphony.

Dello Joio: Concerto for Harp and Orchestra (1944)
Edward Vito, with the Little Orchestra Society
conducted by Thomas K. Scherman
Recorded November 21, 1947
Columbia Masterworks set MX-339, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 45.09 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 23.4 MB)

Handel: Harp Concerto (Grandjany)

Marcel Grandjany

This week I offer something that should be a real treat for lovers of the harp (and really now, who doesn't love the harp?) - a wonderful performance of Handel's Harp Concerto by that master of the instrument, Marcel Grandjany (1891-1975), complete with his own cadenza.  These records were my introduction to this ever-fresh piece, way back when I was a tot, and this remains my favorite recording of it (I'm not familiar with Grandjany's subsequent recording, from the early stereo era, on Decca).  The set is unique in my experience for having not one, but three separate fillers - a fact about which Irving Kolodin loudly complained in the May 29, 1948, issue of Saturday Review - apparently so that the Handel Concerto could be played in one pass through an automatic record changer.  These three extras present Grandjany's transcriptions of Baroque lute and keyboard pieces, and I for one am quite pleased to have them!

Handel: Harp Concerto in B-Flat major, Op. 4, No. 6
Marcel Grandjany with the RCA Victor Chamber Orchestra
conducted by Jean Paul Morel
Recorded March 12, 1946

and

Gottfried Kirchhoff: Aria and Rigaudon
François Couperin: Soeur Monique
Antoine Francisque: Pavane et Bransles
Marcel Grandjany, harp
Recorded September 30, 1946

RCA Victor set DM-1201, three 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC files, 68.33 MB)
Link (MP3 files, 36.61 MB)

Ormandy-on-the-Water

Cover design by Alex Steinweiss

Two early Ormandy recordings with a nautical theme this week.  The first one is, perhaps, the more obvious - Ormandy's "arrangement" of a suite from Handel's "Water Music."  Actually, the orchestration sounds to me identical with the more famous arrangement by Sir Hamilton Harty; however, Ormandy has rearranged the order of the movements to more closely align with Handel's original.  In any case, here's the first of three recordings Ormandy was to conduct of the arrangement:

Handel (arr. Ormandy): Water Music Suite
Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Eugene Ormandy
Recorded January 12, 1946
Columbia Masterworks set MX-279, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 47.08 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 23.6 MB)

The second recording here spotlights Edna Phillips (1907-2003), harpist of the Philadelphia Orchestra from 1930 to 1946, and the first female member of the orchestra.  She commissioned a number of important works for the harp, the best-known of which is Alberto Ginastera's Concerto.  Paul White (1895-1973) wrote this gem of a miniature harp concerto, based on sea shanties, for her in 1942.  It can be played either with string orchestra or solo strings, as here:

Paul White: Sea Chanty, for harp and strings
Edna Phillips, harp, with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra
under the direction of Eugene Ormandy
Recorded October 24, 1945
Columbia Masterworks set MX-259, two 78-rpm records
Link (FLAC file, 38.96 MB)
Link (MP3 file, 22.12 MB)

Cover design by Alex Steinweiss

My thanks again to Ken Halperin of Collecting Record Covers for these two sets.