With GRAMOPHONE and RADIO

Radio Record, Volume III, Issue 36, 21 March 1930, Page 7

With GRAMOPHONE and RADIO

By

B Natural

New Releases Dance Music. THE March dance records issued by HLM.V. are well up to standard, and some of the world-famous orchestras contribute striking and tuneful orchestrations of a number of popular melodies of the day. The following are perhaps outstanding :-‘Mucking About the Garden" (fox-trot), and "Let Me Dream in Your Arms Again" (waltz), played by Jack Hylton and his orchestra (B5696); "On the Alomo" (fox-trot), and "Me Queres" (Do You Love Me) (fox-trot), played by Rudy Vallee and his orchestra. (HA620) ; "The Album of My Dreams" (fox-trot), and "Perhaps" (fox-trot), played by Rudy Vallee and his orchestra (BA 629) ; "Hittin’ the Ceiling" (fox-trot), and "Sing a Little Love Song" (foxtrot), from "Broadway;" played by Nat Shilkret and his orchestra (B5662). In each case there is a.vocal. refrain. Gladys Moncrieff. GLADYS MONCRIBEFF, Australia’s favourite musical comedy actress of the golden voice has revived for us memories of the good old "Maid of the Mountains." It is some fourteen years since this great comedy was first staged in London, where it ran for over a thousand performances, and was again revived about five years back. Miss Moncrieff shows two of the best-known favourites in ‘Love Will Find a Way" and "Vilia," and she sings them with her usual fervour and skill. (Columbia 101,784.) Wagner Played by :Band. DESPITE the difficulties attendant upon recording music of the character of the overture to "The Flying Dutchman," the Zonophone Company have made a surprisingly good job of it. The overture is played by the National Military Band, which enters with much zest into Wagner’s tempestuous music, though.they are just as earnest, if with a different objective, when the calm is reached. The woodwind is beautifully tender in the apotheosis on the redemption motif. Colourful Music. THE Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra, directed by its illustrous conductor, Leopold Stokowiski, has recorded two items from Bizet’s "Carmen." All the recordings by this wonderful orchestra are so splendid that no matter what it plays the performance is sure to be of outstanding merit. In the "Soldiers Changing. Guard," a little episode from the first act, the trumpet has come out with exceptional brilliance and realism, the echo of the hall in which the recording has been done being clearly heard. * The "March of the Smugglers" is from the beginning of the third act and precedes the card scene. As ever, the precision of attack and discipline of the members of the orchestra are superb. (H.M.V. D1618.) Galli-Curci. AMBLITA GALLI-CURCI has recorded by the electrical process Bisbop’s "Home, Sweet Home." On the reverse side is Moore’s "Last Rose

of Summer," which is sung in the second act of Flotow’s opera, "Martha." As in the past, her husband, Homer Samuels, accompanies her on the piano. On another 10-inch record Amelita Galli-Curci sings two duets from Verdi’s "Rigoletto," with the late Giuseppe de Luca, accompanied by the Metropolitan Opera House Orchestra, conducted by Giuseppe Setti. The first "Ah Veglia o donna," in which Rigoletto takes leave of his daughter, is from the second act. Both voices blend very well indeed, and de Luca sings his part with great precision. "Piangi fanciulla’ is from the third act. (H.M.V,, DAi011 and 1028:) Brilliant Orchestra Recordings. "THE Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra has certain qualities of brilliant ensemble and superb unanimity which thrill any hearer. It is undeniable. that to hear a great orchestra, which is so perfectly drilled that it becomes virtually a vast single instrument, is one of the most thrilling things 4 music lover can experience, In the new recording of "‘Tannhauser" and "The Damnation of Faust" the fine qualities of the orchestra’s performance are marvellously reproduced with full and satisfying volume. The subjectmatter needs no introduction, for both pieces are famous to a very wide public. The "Hungarian March" is, of course, a setting of the old Rackozki March tune, which in its time must have led thousands of Magyars into battle. , "Nut-Cracker" Suite. OTHING could be more delightful than the three records of Tchaikowsky’s Gasse Noisette (Nut Crackers) Suite, played by the Philadelphia Sym-. phony Orchestra, under Leopold Stokowski. The suite includes an "overture miniature," a little gem of tunefulness which can be best. described by the name which the composer gives it; a march of wonderful rhythm and vigour, the "danse de la fee dragee" -dance of the sugar plum fairy-in which Tschaikowsky experimented with the celeste which lad only just been invented-a delicious composition ‘in hearing which one can almost fancy that one sees the little fairy dancing upon the top of an iced cake; the Danses Russe-Trepak, Arabe, des Mirlitons and Chinoise, the last, although musical being excruciatingly funny, reminding one of the squealing of a Celestial who is pulled by his pigtail; and finally the exquisite Velse des Fleurs, with a melody as haunting as the famous Valse Trieste of Sibelius. (H.M.V., D1214-16.)