Background
Leopold was born on April 18, 1882 in London, England, United Kingdom, the son of Annie Moore and Kopernik Stokowski, said by some to be a Polish diplomat and, by others, a cabinetmaker.
(How do you describe Leopold Stokowski in one word? Showma...)
How do you describe Leopold Stokowski in one word? Showman, impresario, visionary, firebrand, agent provocateur, magician? Take your pick as he all that and more. It’s 40 years since the passing of one of the most colorful characters in Decca’s roster and one of the most indefatigable innovators in music performance history. His complete recordings for Decca/Phase 4 are presented together for the first time, with a bonus audio documentary featuring an interview with the maestro himself, in a handsome Limited Edition 23-CD boxed set. • Stokowski’s complete Decca/Phase 4 recordings presented together for the first time marking the 40th anniversary of his passing • Includes the album ‘Inspiration’, recorded by Decca for RCA • All recordings presented with original artwork and programming • New essay by Stokowski life-long admirer and Stokowski expert Jon Tolansky • Includes bonus audio documentary with excerpts from rare recordings, rehearsals, recollections from collaborators and a private interview with the maestro “I believe that music is spontaneous, impulsive expression – that its range is without limit – that music is forever growing.” Leopold Stokowski Especially effective at projecting the unique Phase 4 experience were the recordings made by legendary conductor, Leopold Stokowski. It was the perfect musical marriage; at the same time, Phase 4 perfectly captured to the full the maestro’s unique imagination. “More tone! More tone!” was a favourite admonition of the Maestro to his orchestras – though what he did to obtain that ‘Stokowski Sound’ was only in part quantifiable: his brilliance as an orchestrator; strong and broad vibrato and free bowing from the strings; free breathing for the brass and woodwind; knife-edged precision of attack; and absolute perfection of ensemble. The rest was down to a telepathic communication of something less tangible that was surely down to the power of mesmerism. A relentless innovator, Stokowski experimented with orchestral seating, famously lining up the string basses across the rear of the stage and, in an early instance, massing all the violins on the left side of the orchestra and the cellos on the right. One of the first modern conductors to give up the use of the baton, Stokowski employed graceful, almost hypnotic, hand gestures to work his magic. In his pursuit of that “spontaneous, impulsive expression” he had a fundamentally different musical outlook to his contempoarries (and even sometimes his own musicians). Although, regardless of whether or not they agreed with his interpretations they greatly admired his results; he commanded one of the largest audience followings in conducting history, and his influence as a populariser of classical music was worldwide.
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(RCA Living Stereo classical LPs — the gold standard for t...)
RCA Living Stereo classical LPs — the gold standard for top quality orchestral performance and sound! Remastered from the original master tape and cut at 45 RPM by Ryan Smith at Sterling Sound Lacquers plated by Gary Salstrom and pressed on 200-gram vinyl at Quality Record Pressings! "These records are definitive." — Michael Fremer, editor, AnalogPlanet.com Winner of a Gruvy Award, chosen by AnalogPlanet's editor, Michael Fremer, for vinyl records that are musically and sonically outstanding and are also well mastered and pressed. http://www.analogplanet.com/content/gruvy-awards "These are the best vinyl releases of RCA LPs I've yet heard." — Jonathan Valin, executive editor, The Absolute Sound Maestro Stokowski is at the podium and Bob Simpson is at the 3-track Ampex recorder to capture the Rhapsodies from Liszt, Enesco and Smetana that give this issue its title. This is titanic sound that will sink most speakers and amps for that matter. A must. The original 3-track session tapes were used in mastering.
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( This album was inspired by my friend Charles Nixon's se...)
This album was inspired by my friend Charles Nixon's set of the Brahms Symphony Recorded April of 1927. I have utmost respect for the recording technicians from the 78 rpm days. I was always disappointed to hear the re-issues being done on LP - they seemed to lack the oomph that the original had. I found that by playing slow,and using a modern Shure cartridge, the sylus would have time to follow the mid-range more faithfully. What I seem to hear on a lp is crisp highs and the bass would be ok too - but the mid-range and dynamics were compromised, due to the flexing of the cantilever assembly. By playing at 33 1/3 everything becomes a low frequency, more easily tracked. You have a sense of becoming the microphone and the presence of these early electrically recorded discs is quite amazing. I have devoted this entire disc to the work of Leopold Stokowsi - born in 1882 and raised in London, England. He sang with the choir of St.Marylebone Parish Church, and later was the assistan organist with Sir Walford Davies at the Temple Church. By 1898, at the age of sixteen he was awarded a membership with the Royal college Of Organists. 1905 found him in New York, U.S.A.,and interested in conducting the Cincinnati Symphony which followed in 1909. His first official conducting position was of the Colonne Orchestra of France, performing Tchaikowsky's Piano Concerto #1. with his wife-to-be, pianist Olga Samaroff - born Lucy Mary Agnes Hickenlooper from Galveston, Texas. A well-known musician in her own right who also recorded for Victor Records. Stokowsky's tenure with the Philadelphia Symphony started in 1912, until Eugene Ormandy took over in 1936. Returning in 1960. Stokowski is credited as the first conductor to adopt the seating plan used by most orchestras today, with first and second violins together on the conductor's left, and the violas and cellos to the right. Enjoy the music ~Mickey Clark, Symphony #3 Leopold Stokowsky and the Philadelphia Orchestra CD272C Symphony #1 in C minor - Brahms 1. Un poco sostenuto-allegro VIC 6658 04/25/27 CVE-37483-37484 04/26/27 6659A 37485 2. Andante sostenuto VIC 6659B CVE-37486/6660A CVE-37487 04/26/27 3. Un poco alegretto e grazioso VIC 6660B CVE-37488 04/26/27 4. Adagio, piu andante, allegro VIC 6662 37491/37492-6663 29052/29053 04/28/27 5. Symphony #8 (Unfinished) Schubert 04/30/27 29056/29057 6. The Swan Of Tuonela VIC 7380 05/02/29 47973-05/03/29 47980 7. Toccata and Fugue in D Minor Bach HMV D-1428 04/06/27 37468/37469 8. Prelude to Afternoon of a Fawn DEBUSSY VIC 6696 03/10/27 21057/21058 When sold by Amazon.com, this product is manufactured on demand using CD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.
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Leopold was born on April 18, 1882 in London, England, United Kingdom, the son of Annie Moore and Kopernik Stokowski, said by some to be a Polish diplomat and, by others, a cabinetmaker.
As a young child, he studied violin, piano, and organ. In 1895, at age thirteen, he was admitted to the Royal College of Music (at the time the youngest student in the school's history), where he studied organ with Stevenson Hoyte and theory and composition with Walford Davies and Sir Charles Stanford.
Stokowski was awarded a diploma in organ performance in 1900.
In 1902 he was engaged as organist and choirmaster at the Church of St. James, Piccadilly, and in 1903 received his B. M. degree from Queen's College, Oxford.
In 1905 Stokowski accepted the position of organist of St. Bartholomew's Church in New York City (until 1908) while continuing to study during the summers in Paris, Berlin, and Munich. His first appearances as a conductor were in Paris in 1908 and in London in 1909. Herman Thumann, music critic of the Cincinnati Enquirer, recommended Stokowski for the position of music director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.
Stokowski conducted the orchestra from 1909 to 1912, revitalizing the musical life of the city. Admired by many as a gifted yet idiosyncratic conductor, he was rejected by others as too much the showman.
Stokowski's successes in Cincinnati prepared him for his next position, as conductor and, later, music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra. Their twenty-six-year relationship brought international renown to both director and orchestra; the Philadelphia Orchestra eventually rivaled the great orchestras of New York City, Boston, and Chicago. Stokowski led the orchestra from 1912 to 1936 and shared the position of music director with his successor, Eugene Ormandy, from 1936 to 1938.
He conducted the premieres of Rachmaninoff's Symphony no. 3, Piano Concerto no. 4, and Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, to name only a few.
In 1971 it was estimated that Stokowski had presented more than 2, 000 premieres in at least 7, 000 concerts. Stokowski's own compositions include a symphony, concertos for piano and for violin, choral works, and organ pieces. The Philadelphia audiences in the 1920's and 1930's were not always receptive to these new works. When listeners began to grumble during a performance of Webern's Symphony, Stokowski walked off the stage; after the audience quieted down, he returned and began the piece again.
During his tenure with the Philadelphia Orchestra, he took it upon himself to reprimand audiences for making too much noise, for not being receptive enough to new music, and for knitting during concerts. These reprimands were given in Stokowski's vague (clearly non-British) accent that no one could quite place. (His use of this accent, however, was not consistent, and some people questioned whether Stokowski contrived his accent to add an international flair to his public image. )
In addition to championing new works, Stokowski was well known for his orchestral transcriptions, particularly of the works of Johann Sebastian Bach. Harold Schonberg stated, "His Bach transcriptions were considered monstrosities by most musicians, who in addition were outraged over his free hand with the orchestration of sacred masterpieces. Intellectuals simply laughed at him. " These transcriptions renewed a phrase coined during Stokowski's Cincinnati days: "to Stokowski-ize. "
These disparate critical opinions concerning Stokowski's Bach transcriptions illustrate the great divide regarding the merits of the whole of his work. Virgil Thomson, for example, cited Stokowski's ambition and vanity as well as his "lack of a sound musical culture" and "lapses of musical taste. " Thomson was surprised that, given Stokowski's "violation of musical tradition, " he was held in such high regard. Indeed, Stokowski always had the support of respected musicians.
Rachmaninoff considered the Philadelphia Orchestra, under both Stokowski and Ormandy, the greatest with which he had performed. Rather than try to arrive at the ultimate judgment of Stokowski, it would be wiser to consider that his art was expansive, encompassing both vision and vanity. Although he has been criticized for having added percussion where none was called for by the composer, doubled passages with instruments of his choice, and made extensive cuts in the music, it is forgotten that most conductors of the period did the same, even the "purist" Toscanini.
Even Brook allows that his interpretations were not always consistent and that he allowed himself "to be 'carried away' by the music and, as a result, strongly emotional passages are sometimes exaggerated. " The overall effect was of the utmost importance to Stokowski; while he at times went painstakingly over the smallest details of a score, he would, on other occasions, concentrate almost exclusively on the "larger meaning" of the work at hand, often talking to his musicians about philosophical or literary topics that, at first, seemed unrelated to the purpose of the music.
Reputedly, Stokowski sometimes rehearsed only particular passages of a work, even new works; this led some to criticize passages that were not technically perfect. His supporters argued that it was Stokowski's spontaneity and freedom from rigid approaches to the music that led to the great sonority and lyricism of the orchestra and to the profound interpretation of the composition. Stokowski conducted most of the repertoire without a score.
In 1929 he went one step further and abandoned the use of a baton; this flamboyant approach, criticized by some as yet another example of his histrionics and vanity, was seen by many as the perfect medium by which Stokowski shaped the "Philadelphia sound. " (Some musicians did, however, consider him an extremely difficult conductor to follow. )
Stokowski encouraged free bowing and experimented with seating in an effort to improve the sonority of his orchestra; he placed the violins to the left and the cellos to the right and variously rotated or eliminated the position of concertmaster. Experimenting with lighting effects, Stokowski had spotlights focused on his head and hands, casting huge shadows on the walls and ceilings. Although he was called vain for some of these effects, he argued that the purpose was to allow the musicians to see his expressive gestures.
For all the debate about Stokowski's contributions to orchestral music, the consensus today is that Stokowski created one of the world's major orchestras, an ensemble of great power and subtlety.
Stokowski, an early advocate of orchestral recordings, made his first recording with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1917. He continued throughout his career to research methods of improving the quality of orchestral recording and became an expert in acoustics and recording techniques (at times in conjunction with record companies).
Stokowski was featured in several films: Disney's Fantasia (1941), for which he was music director, is his most famous appearance; he had important roles in 100 Men and a Girl (1937), The Great Broadcast of 1937 (1936), and Carnegie Hall (1947). In 1938, Stokowski left Philadelphia to begin an independent career that included not only guest conducting but founding new orchestras.
In 1940 he founded the All-American Youth Orchestra, with which he made a well-publicized tour of South America in the summer of 1940; the orchestra also toured the United States and Canada in 1941. In the 1940's, Stokowski occasionally conducted the NBC Symphony Orchestra, founded and conducted the New York City Symphony Orchestra (1944) and the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra (1945), and was a frequent guest conductor of the New York Philharmonic from 1946 to 1950.
From 1955 to 1960, Stokowski was the principal conductor of the Houston Symphony Orchestra, and in 1962 he was cofounder of the American Symphony Orchestra.
In 1972 he resigned as its conductor and returned to London, where, in celebration of his ninetieth birthday, he led the London Symphony Orchestra in the identical program he had conducted with this orchestra sixty years earlier. Shortly before his ninety-fourth birthday, Stokowski recorded an album of well-known overtures with the National Philharmonic. For Mozart's Don Giovanni Overture, he supplied a concert finale, as had Otto Klemperer and Ferruccio Busoni, to its inconclusive ending.
Stokowski continued to conduct until July 1975, at the Vence Festival in France, and recorded until 1977.
He died in Nether Wallop, Hampshire, England.
(RCA Living Stereo classical LPs — the gold standard for t...)
(How do you describe Leopold Stokowski in one word? Showma...)
( This album was inspired by my friend Charles Nixon's se...)
Stokowski was a strong advocate of modern music.
Quotations: When Stokowski felt he could "improve" the orchestration of even the greatest composers, he did not hesitate, stating, "You must realize that Beethoven and Brahms did not understand instruments. "
Stokowski's personality attracted the attention of newspaper columnists and society writers, and he did little to avoid publicity. He was tall, elegant, and always meticulously dressed, and had a halo of blond hair. He achieved the fame normally reserved for movie stars, receiving large salaries and exciting the public with his romantic adventures, such as his 1938 trip to Europe with Greta Garbo.
Quotes from others about the person
The Bach transcriptions were very popular with many; Donald Brook stated that Stokowski, "by making the many excellent (Bach) transcriptions has probably done more than any other musician in the United States to promote the understanding and appreciation of Bach's immortal works by the masses of American music-lovers. "
Sibelius is reported to have said of Stokowski, "He is a very fine man, I am sure, a very interesting man, and interested in many things - but not, I think, in music. "
Harold Schonberg stated, "More than any conductor in the history of music, Stokowski was governed by sound, pure sound. Sound meant more to him than construction, shape, or logic. Stokowski got more sound out of the music than others did. The other great conductors could get more music out of the music. "
David Ewen put it succinctly when he said, in 1943, "Stokowski is Stokowski, which is to say he is a genius and a charlatan in one, a great artist and a circus performer. "
He married Olga Samaroff, a pianist and critic, in 1911 (they were divorced in 1923) and became an American citizen in 1915. In 1926, Stokowski married Evangeline Brewster Johnson, heiress to the Johnson and Johnson fortune; they had two children and were divorced in 1937. In 1945, Stokowski married the millionairess Gloria Vanderbilt; he was sixty-three, and she was twenty-one. They had two children and were divorced in 1955.