The Week's RECORDS

Radio Record, Volume XII, Issue 37, 24 February 1939, Page 8

The Week's RECORDS

NEWS that Richard Crooks, the American tenor, is due to open a concert season in. Auckland about the middle of May will be weleomed by many who know his art so well from his records. In his first tour of the Dominion he made thousands of fresh friends and supporters, and his lengthy list of records is being more eagerly seanned than ever. Richard: Crooks is @ native of New Jersey and began singing as a boy soprano in a chureh choir in his own city, where he remained between the ages of nine and fourteen. His choirmaster, Sydney Bourne, urged him to go into music as a profession and was at great pains to lay, for him, the necessary foundation in study. He went to New York, where he continued in church choirs, perfecting his knowledge of oratorio, then, with early maturity, went into the larger field

of concert work. in his records, Richard Crooks has kept to popular paths. His grand opera items are not numerous, but in ballads, musical comedy and sacred items there are sufficient discs to keep the average turntable spinning. Two great favourites are "Castles in the Air," from Paul Lincke’s "Frau Luna," and the "Waltz Song" from "A Waltz Dream," by Strauss (HMV DA1328). While the heavy gales of this record decided its popularity a fair time ago, it is pleasing to think that this is not the only Richard Crooks record that is in constant demand. Of the hundred-and-odd items that stand ’ to his credit in the catalogue, there is not a single one that would really disappoint. Best Sellers

Though nothing like so long a , list of records stands to the credit of Jeannette MacDonald and Nel- | son Eddy, as does to Richard © Crooks, the screen stars are best — sellers in every sense of the word. Naturally their duets, "Ah! Sweet Mystery of Life," from Victor Her- | bert’s "Naughty Marietta," and "Indian Love Call," from Friml’s "Rose Marie" (HMV DA1537), maintain something of a lead, but the soprano’s "Italian Street Song" and "Merry Widow" items hold their own. Nelson Eddy’s solo items from "Rose Marie" and "Naughty Mari--etta" in particular are always in strong demand, and he is gaining many new friends with.his more recent ballad creations, which are sympathetically sung. Included in Nelson Eddy’s latest records are two discs which contain four numbers from the film, "The. Girl of the Golden West," the music of which is by Siegmund Romberg, the brilliant

Hungarian composer of "The Desert Song," "The New Moon," and other stage and screen successes packed with love music. ‘the songs released by HMV are "Soldiers of Fortune" and "Who are We to Say?" (HMV DA1633), and "Sunup to Sundown" and "Senorita" (HMV DA1632). Romberg’s method of composing fs modern, to say the least of it. When an idea for a melody comes to him, he goes to his organ and roughly works it out. If he makes any notes, they are in a shorthand all his own. Next, he calls his musicai secretary, Miss Madeline Lupher, and says, "Please take a tune." She jots down her "notes" as he runs over his new inspiration, then goes to the piano across the room and plays’ the melody back to him, When, after several re-playings, Romberg is finally satisfied, the melody is written down in finished form and filed away. | :