NBC Symphony Orchestra
Encyclopedia
The NBC Symphony Orchestra was a radio orchestra
established by David Sarnoff
of the National Broadcasting Company
especially for conductor Arturo Toscanini
. The NBC Symphony performed weekly radio concert broadcasts with Toscanini and other conductors and served as house orchestra for the network, beginning November 13, 1937 and continuing until 1954.
Mr. Sarnoff spared no expense in creating the NBC Symphony. Artur Rodziński
, a noted orchestra builder and musical task master in his own right, was hired to mold and train the new orchestra especially for Toscanini. Prominent musicians from major orchestras around the country were recruited for the orchestra. Conductor Pierre Monteux
was engaged to help in the effort as well. In addition to creating prestige for the network, there has been speculation that one of the reasons NBC created the orchestra was to deflect a Congressional inquiry into broadcasting standards.
The orchestra's first broadcast concert aired from NBC's Studio 8-H
on November 13, 1937 under the direction of Pierre Monteux. Toscanini conducted ten concerts that first season, making his NBC debut on December 25, 1937. In addition to weekly broadcasts on the NBC Red and Blue networks, the NBC Symphony Orchestra made many recordings for RCA Victor of symphonies
, choral music
and opera
s. Televised concerts began in March 1948 and continued until March 1952. In the fall of 1950, NBC converted Studio 8-H into a television studio (currently in use for NBC's late-night comedy program Saturday Night Live
) and moved the broadcast concerts to Carnegie Hall
, where many of the orchestra's recording sessions and special concerts had already taken place.
Toscanini led the NBC Symphony for 17 years. Under his direction the orchestra toured South America in 1940 and the United States in 1950. The orchestra's guest directors included most of the leading conductors of the day: Monteux, Ernest Ansermet
, Erich Kleiber
, Erich Leinsdorf
, Charles Munch
, Fritz Reiner
, George Szell
, Bruno Walter
, and the young Lorin Maazel
, among others. The Italian conductor Guido Cantelli
, Toscanini's protege, was a frequent NBC conductor in the orchestra's last seasons.
Leopold Stokowski
served as principal conductor from 1941-1944 on a three-year contract following a dispute between Toscanini and NBC. During this time Toscanini continued to lead the orchestra in a series of public benefit concerts for war relief. He returned as Stokowski's co-conductor for the 1942-43 and 1943-44 seasons, resuming full control thereafter. Upon Toscanini's retirement in the spring of 1954, NBC disbanded the orchestra, much to Toscanini's distress. The final broadcast concert (recorded in both mono and stereo) took place at Carnegie Hall on April 4, 1954, and the final recording sessions were completed in early June 1954.
, Henry Clifton, Felix Galimir
, Josef Gingold
, Daniel Guilet
(concertmaster 1952-54), Harry Lookofsky
, Mischa Mischakoff
(concertmaster 1937-1952), Albert Pratz
, David Sarser
, Oscar Shumsky
, Herman Spielberg and Andor Toth
; violists Carlton Cooley
, Milton Katims
, William Primrose
, and Tibor Serly
; cellists Frank Miller
, Leonard Rose
, Harvey Shapiro
and Alan Shulman
; double bass
ists Homer Mensch
and Oscar G. Zimmerman
; flutists Carmine Coppola
, Arthur Lora and Paul Renzi; clarinetists Augustin Duques, Al Gallodoro, David Weber
and Alexander Williams; saxophonist Frankie Trumbauer
; oboists Robert Bloom and Paolo Renzi; bassoonists Elias Carmen, Benjamin Kohon, William Polisi, Leonard Sharrow
and Arthur Weisberg
; French horn players Arthur Berv, Harry Berv, Jack Berv and Albert Stagliano; and tuba player William Bell
, among others.
. Under GM's sponsorship the NBC Symphony broadcasts went out under the title of General Motors Symphony of the Air, not to be confused with the later orchestra of the same name. Other sponsors included the House of Squibb
, the Reynolds Metals Company, and the Socony Vacuum Oil Company
.
and Franz Joseph Haydn's Symphony No. 88
were the first works to be recorded. The orchestra recorded initially in Studio 8-H, but producer Charles O'Connell soon decided to hold most of the studio recording sessions in Carnegie Hall. However, many live broadcast performances originating in Studio 8H were also released on records, and subsequently on CD. The famously dry acoustics of Studio 8-H, designed for broadcasting, were found to be less than ideal for recording. Acoustical modifications in 1939 were thought to have greatly improved the sound of Studio 8H; some recording sessions were held there as late as June 1950. From the fall of 1950 until the orchestra was disbanded, all concerts and recording sessions took place in Carnegie Hall.
RCA
released the orchestra's recordings on its flagship Red Seal label on the then standard 78-rpm records. In 1950, a 1945 recording of Ferde Grofé
's Grand Canyon Suite
became the NBC Symphony's first LP release (LM-1004). A mainstay of RCA's catalog through the 1950s, many of the NBC Symphony's recordings were later reissued on the lower priced RCA Victrola
label, where they remained until the demise of the LP. In the 1980s, RCA began issuing digitally remastered recordings of the orchestra, including a complete issue of all Toscanini's RCA recordings in 1990 on CD and audio cassette. Later advances in digital technology has led RCA (now Sony/BMG Classics) to further enhance the sound of the magnetic tapes for additional reissues. RCA has only reissued recordings that were personally approved by Toscanini, even off-the-air ones such as the seven complete operas he conducted at NBC between 1944 and 1950; however, other labels have released discs taken from off-the-air recordings of NBC broadcast concerts. Toscanini's final two broadcast concerts, in the spring of 1954, were experimentally recorded in stereo, but he did not approve the release of these recordings; it was many years before they were finally issued on labels other than RCA Victor.
The complete series of ten NBC Symphony telecasts has been issued on VHS and Laser Disc by RCA in 1990 and on DVD by Testament in 2006.
One of the NBC Symphony Orchestra's most ambitious projects was the recording of the 13-hour musical score for NBC Television's 1952 series Victory at Sea
. Robert Russell Bennett
conducted the orchestra in his arrangements of Richard Rodgers
' musical themes for the 26 documentary programs (recorded in Rockefeller Center's Center Theatre). The series is currently available on DVD. Some of the music was released by RCA Victor on LP. In the early 1960s, Bennett re-recorded music from Victory at Sea in a famed series of three stereo records for RCA Victor, conducting a studio orchestra, the RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra (members of the Symphony of the Air). These have all been reissued by RCA on CD.
In 1954, shortly after the orchestra's final concerts, Stokowski made recordings for RCA of excerpts from Prokofiev's ballet Romeo and Juliet and Menotti's ballet Sebastian. The recordings were originally issued as "Leopold Stokowski and his orchestra," but reissued as "members of the NBC Symphony Orchestra." On April 6, 1954, Guido Cantelli made a recording in Carnegie Hall of Cesar Franck's "Symphony in D minor." The performance was initially issued in mono by RCA, but a stereo version (which had been taped in the same session) was issued in the 1970s; it was eventually reissued on CD.
(principal cello
) and Leonard Sharrow
(principal bassoon
) with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra
. However, many former NBC Symphony members, in an attempt to stay together and preserve the orchestra, regrouped as a new ensemble called the "Symphony of the Air". They made their first recording on September 21, 1954, and gave their first public concert at the United Nations
9th Anniversary Celebration on October 24. On November 14 they appeared on the acclaimed Omnibus
TV program in which Leonard Bernstein
, making his first television appearance, discussed Beethoven
's Fifth Symphony
, and Bernstein led the Symphony of the Air during its first season. With an Asian tour under the auspices of the State Department and an attendance of 60,000 at concerts in the Catskills
that summer, the first season was a huge success.
For nearly a decade, the Symphony of the Air performed many concerts led by Stokowski
, the orchestra's music director from 1955. The orchestra recorded widely (on Columbia, RCA, United Artists and Vanguard) under leading conductors, including Stokowski, Bernstein
, Monteux
, Reiner
, Bruno Walter
, Kondrashin, Beecham
, and Josef Krips
. Only once more did they use their old name, in the 1963 telecast of Gian Carlo Menotti
's written-for television opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors
, with an all-new cast. The orchestra disbanded in 1963.
Radio orchestra
A radio orchestra is an orchestra employed by a radio network in order to provide programming as well as sometimes perform incidental or theme music for various shows on the network. In the heyday of radio such orchestras were numerous, performing classical, popular, light music and jazz...
established by David Sarnoff
David Sarnoff
David Sarnoff was an American businessman and pioneer of American commercial radio and television. He founded the National Broadcasting Company and throughout most of his career he led the Radio Corporation of America in various capacities from shortly after its founding in 1919 until his...
of the National Broadcasting Company
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
especially for conductor Arturo Toscanini
Arturo Toscanini
Arturo Toscanini was an Italian conductor. One of the most acclaimed musicians of the late 19th and 20th century, he was renowned for his intensity, his perfectionism, his ear for orchestral detail and sonority, and his photographic memory...
. The NBC Symphony performed weekly radio concert broadcasts with Toscanini and other conductors and served as house orchestra for the network, beginning November 13, 1937 and continuing until 1954.
History
Tom Lewis, in the Organization of American Historians Magazine of History, described NBC's plan for cultural programming and the origin of the NBC Symphony:- David Sarnoff, the president of RCA who had first proposed the "radio music box" in 1916 so that listeners might enjoy "concerts, lectures, music, recitals," felt that the medium was failing to do this. By 1937, RCA had recovered enough from the effects of the Depression for it to make a dramatic commitment to cultural programming. With the most liberal terms Sarnoff hired Arturo Toscanini to create an entire orchestra and conduct it. On Christmas night, 1937, the NBC orchestra gave its first performance—Vivaldi's Concerto Grosso in D Minor—in an entirely refurbished studio in the RCA Building. "The National Broadcasting Company is an American business organization. It has employees and stockholders. It serves their interests best when it serves the public best." That Christmas night, and whenever the NBC orchestra played over the next 17 years, he was right.
Mr. Sarnoff spared no expense in creating the NBC Symphony. Artur Rodziński
Artur Rodzinski
Artur Rodziński was a Polish conductor of opera and symphonic music. He is especially noted for his tenures as music director of the Cleveland Orchestra and the New York Philharmonic in the 1930s and 1940s.-Biography:...
, a noted orchestra builder and musical task master in his own right, was hired to mold and train the new orchestra especially for Toscanini. Prominent musicians from major orchestras around the country were recruited for the orchestra. Conductor Pierre Monteux
Pierre Monteux
Pierre Monteux was an orchestra conductor. Born in Paris, France, Monteux later became an American citizen.-Life and career:Monteux was born in Paris in 1875. His family was descended from Sephardi Jews who came to France in the wake of the Spanish Inquisition. He studied violin from an early age,...
was engaged to help in the effort as well. In addition to creating prestige for the network, there has been speculation that one of the reasons NBC created the orchestra was to deflect a Congressional inquiry into broadcasting standards.
The orchestra's first broadcast concert aired from NBC's Studio 8-H
NBC Radio City Studios
NBC Radio City Studios is the name given to radio and television studio complexes in New York's Rockefeller Center, San Francisco, and the former radio-TV complex located at the northeast corner of Sunset Boulevard and Vine Street in Hollywood, California....
on November 13, 1937 under the direction of Pierre Monteux. Toscanini conducted ten concerts that first season, making his NBC debut on December 25, 1937. In addition to weekly broadcasts on the NBC Red and Blue networks, the NBC Symphony Orchestra made many recordings for RCA Victor of symphonies
Symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, scored almost always for orchestra. A symphony usually contains at least one movement or episode composed according to the sonata principle...
, choral music
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
and opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
s. Televised concerts began in March 1948 and continued until March 1952. In the fall of 1950, NBC converted Studio 8-H into a television studio (currently in use for NBC's late-night comedy program Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live is a live American late-night television sketch comedy and variety show developed by Lorne Michaels and Dick Ebersol. The show premiered on NBC on October 11, 1975, under the original title of NBC's Saturday Night.The show's sketches often parody contemporary American culture...
) and moved the broadcast concerts to Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
, where many of the orchestra's recording sessions and special concerts had already taken place.
Toscanini led the NBC Symphony for 17 years. Under his direction the orchestra toured South America in 1940 and the United States in 1950. The orchestra's guest directors included most of the leading conductors of the day: Monteux, Ernest Ansermet
Ernest Ansermet
Ernest Alexandre Ansermet was a Swiss conductor.- Biography :Ansermet was born in Vevey, Switzerland. Although he was a contemporary of Wilhelm Furtwängler and Otto Klemperer, Ansermet represents in most ways a very different tradition and approach from those two musicians. Originally he was a...
, Erich Kleiber
Erich Kleiber
Erich Kleiber was an Austrian conductor.- Biography :Born in Vienna, Kleiber studied in Prague...
, Erich Leinsdorf
Erich Leinsdorf
Erich Leinsdorf was a naturalized American Austrian conductor. He performed and recorded with leading orchestras and opera companies throughout the United States and Europe, earning a reputation for exacting standards as well as an acerbic personality...
, Charles Munch
Charles Munch
Charles Munch may refer to:*Charles Munch , American artist*Charles Munch , orchestral conductorSee also:*Charles Munch discography, recordings of Munch, the conductor...
, Fritz Reiner
Fritz Reiner
Frederick Martin “Fritz” Reiner was a prominent conductor of opera and symphonic music in the twentieth century.-Biography:...
, George Szell
George Szell
George Szell , originally György Széll, György Endre Szél, or Georg Szell, was a Hungarian-born American conductor and composer...
, Bruno Walter
Bruno Walter
Bruno Walter was a German-born conductor. He is considered one of the best known conductors of the 20th century. Walter was born in Berlin, but is known to have lived in several countries between 1933 and 1939, before finally settling in the United States in 1939...
, and the young Lorin Maazel
Lorin Maazel
Lorin Varencove Maazel is an American conductor, violinist and composer.- Early life :Maazel was born to Jewish-American parents in Neuilly-sur-Seine in France and brought up in the United States, primarily at his parents' home in Pittsburgh's Oakland neighborhood. His father, Lincoln Maazel , was...
, among others. The Italian conductor Guido Cantelli
Guido Cantelli
Guido Cantelli was an Italian orchestral conductor.-Biography:Born in Novara, Italy, Cantelli was named Musical Director of La Scala, Milan on 16 November 1956 but his promising career was cut short only one week later by his death at the age of 36 in an aircraft crash in Paris, France.Cantelli...
, Toscanini's protege, was a frequent NBC conductor in the orchestra's last seasons.
Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...
served as principal conductor from 1941-1944 on a three-year contract following a dispute between Toscanini and NBC. During this time Toscanini continued to lead the orchestra in a series of public benefit concerts for war relief. He returned as Stokowski's co-conductor for the 1942-43 and 1943-44 seasons, resuming full control thereafter. Upon Toscanini's retirement in the spring of 1954, NBC disbanded the orchestra, much to Toscanini's distress. The final broadcast concert (recorded in both mono and stereo) took place at Carnegie Hall on April 4, 1954, and the final recording sessions were completed in early June 1954.
Musicians
Some notable musicians who were members of the orchestra include violinists Samuel AntekSamuel Antek
Samuel Antek was a violinist in the NBC Symphony Orchestra under conductor Arturo Toscanini. He joined at the orchestra's inception in 1937 and played with it until its dissolution in 1954....
, Henry Clifton, Felix Galimir
Felix Galimir
Felix Galimir was an Austrian-born American-Jewish violinist and music teacher.He studied with Adolf Bak and Simon Pullman at the Vienna Conservatory from the age of twelve and graduated in 1928. With his three sisters he founded the Galimir Quartet in 1927 to commemorate the 100-year anniversary...
, Josef Gingold
Josef Gingold
Josef Gingold was a Russian-Jewish-born classical violinist and teacher, who lived most of his life in the United States...
, Daniel Guilet
Daniel Guilet
Daniel Guilet was a French, and later, American, classical violinist, best known for founding the Beaux Arts Trio....
(concertmaster 1952-54), Harry Lookofsky
Harry Lookofsky
Harry Lookofsky was an American jazz violinist. He is also the father of keyboardist-songwriter Michael Brown, a member of The Left Banke.-History:...
, Mischa Mischakoff
Mischa Mischakoff
Mischa Mischakoff was an outstanding violinist and concertmaster for 70 years, from the age of ten until the age of eighty....
(concertmaster 1937-1952), Albert Pratz
Albert Pratz
Albert Pratz was a Canadian violinist, conductor, composer, and music educator. He was awarded the Canadian Centennial Medal in 1967. His compositional output was modest and consists of only instrumental works...
, David Sarser
David Sarser
David Sarser is an American musician, audio engineer and electronics designer. He played violin with the NBC Symphony Orchestra in the 1950s under Arturo Toscanini and worked with Les Paul in the design of the first 8 track recording deck He has not played the violin since his Stradivarius was...
, Oscar Shumsky
Oscar Shumsky
Oscar Shumsky was an American violinist and conductor born to Russian-Jewish parents.-Biography:...
, Herman Spielberg and Andor Toth
Andor Toth
Violinist Andor John Toth , earned international celebrity as a soloist, concert artist, conductor and educator with a musical career spanning over six decades...
; violists Carlton Cooley
Carlton Cooley
Samuel Carlton Cooley was an American violist and composer.-Biography:...
, Milton Katims
Milton Katims
Milton Katims was an American violist and conductor. He was music director of the Seattle Symphony for 22 years . In that time he added more than 75 works, made recordings, premiered new pieces and led the orchestra on several tours. He expanded the orchestra's series of family and suburban...
, William Primrose
William Primrose
William Primrose CBE was a Scottish violist and teacher.-Biography:Primrose was born in Glasgow and studied violin initially. In 1919 he moved to study at the then Guildhall School of Music in London. On the urging of the accompanist Ivor Newton, Primrose moved to Belgium to study under Eugène...
, and Tibor Serly
Tibor Serly
Tibor Serly was a Hungarian violist, violinist and composer.He was one of the students of Zoltán Kodály. He greatly admired and became a young apprentice of Béla Bartók. His association with Bartók was for him both a blessing and a curse...
; cellists Frank Miller
Frank Miller (cellist)
Frank Miller was a principal cellist and music director whose professional career spanned over a half century. Miller studied at Curtis Institute of Music, under Felix Salmond and at age 18, joined the Philadelphia Orchestra...
, Leonard Rose
Leonard Rose
Leonard Rose was an American cellist and pedagogue.Rose was born in Washington, D.C., his parents were immigrants from Kiev, Ukraine...
, Harvey Shapiro
Harvey Shapiro
Harvey Shapiro was a New York-born American cellist of world renown.-Childhood and early career:Harvey Shapiro, of Russian parentage, was born in New York City. His first cello teacher was Willem Willeke , who was both a medical doctor and a well-known cellist of the early 20th century...
and Alan Shulman
Alan Shulman
Alan Shulman was an American composer and cello virtuoso. He wrote a considerable amount of symphonic music, chamber music, and jazz music. Trumpeter Eddie Bailey said, "Alan had the greatest ear of any musician I ever came across. He had better than perfect pitch...
; double bass
Double bass
The double bass, also called the string bass, upright bass, standup bass or contrabass, is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra, with strings usually tuned to E1, A1, D2 and G2...
ists Homer Mensch
Homer Mensch
Homer Mensch was a prominent classical bassist who was a former member of the Pittsburgh Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, the New York Pops, and the NBC Symphony...
and Oscar G. Zimmerman
Oscar G. Zimmerman
Oscar G. Zimmerman was an American musician, teacher and double-bass player.-Biography:Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1910, Oscar Zimmerman was the double bassist with the Rochester Philharmonic for 36 years and professor emeritus at Eastman, was a member of the first graduating class of...
; flutists Carmine Coppola
Carmine Coppola
Carmine Coppola was an American composer, flautist, editor, musical director, and songwriter. Coppola was a composer and conductor who contributed to many of the musical scores in The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, The Godfather Part III, and Apocalypse Now directed by his son Francis Ford...
, Arthur Lora and Paul Renzi; clarinetists Augustin Duques, Al Gallodoro, David Weber
David Weber (clarinetist)
David Weber was an American classical clarinetist known for the beauty of his tone, his inspired playing, and his influential teaching of the clarinet.-Early life:...
and Alexander Williams; saxophonist Frankie Trumbauer
Frankie Trumbauer
Orie Frank Trumbauer was one of the leading jazz saxophonists of the 1920s and 1930s. He played the C-melody saxophone which, in size, is between an alto and tenor saxophone...
; oboists Robert Bloom and Paolo Renzi; bassoonists Elias Carmen, Benjamin Kohon, William Polisi, Leonard Sharrow
Leonard Sharrow
Leonard Sharrow , was one of the foremost American bassoonists of the 20th Century. Born in New York City, he joined the NBC Symphony Orchestra when it was first organized, eventually becoming principal bassoonist ; he also served in the U.S. Army in World War II...
and Arthur Weisberg
Arthur Weisberg
Arthur Weisberg was an American bassoonist, conductor, composer and author.-Biography:Weisberg was born in New York City. He attended the Fiorello H...
; French horn players Arthur Berv, Harry Berv, Jack Berv and Albert Stagliano; and tuba player William Bell
William Bell (tuba player)
William Bell was the premier player and teacher of the tuba in America during the first half of the 20th century. In 1921 He joined the band of John Philip Sousa, and from 1924 to 1937 he served as Principal Tuba with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra...
, among others.
Sponsorship
In the first several seasons the NBC Symphony broadcasts were "sustaining" programs, meaning that they were paid for and presented by NBC itself. In later years the broadcasts were commercially sponsored, primarily by General MotorsGeneral Motors
General Motors Company , commonly known as GM, formerly incorporated as General Motors Corporation, is an American multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and the world's second-largest automaker in 2010...
. Under GM's sponsorship the NBC Symphony broadcasts went out under the title of General Motors Symphony of the Air, not to be confused with the later orchestra of the same name. Other sponsors included the House of Squibb
Bristol-Myers Squibb
Bristol-Myers Squibb , often referred to as BMS, is a pharmaceutical company, headquartered in New York City. The company was formed in 1989, following the merger of its predecessors Bristol-Myers and the Squibb Corporation...
, the Reynolds Metals Company, and the Socony Vacuum Oil Company
Mobil
Mobil, previously known as the Socony-Vacuum Oil Company, was a major American oil company which merged with Exxon in 1999 to form ExxonMobil. Today Mobil continues as a major brand name within the combined company, as well as still being a gas station sometimes paired with their own store or On...
.
Recordings
RCA Victor began making studio recordings of the NBC Symphony for commercial release in 1938; Mozart's Symphony No. 40Symphony No. 40 (Mozart)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote his Symphony No. 40 in G minor, KV. 550, in 1788. It is sometimes referred to as the "Great G minor symphony," to distinguish it from the "Little G minor symphony," No. 25. The two are the only minor key symphonies Mozart wrote....
and Franz Joseph Haydn's Symphony No. 88
Symphony No. 88 (Haydn)
The Symphony No. 88 in G major was written by Joseph Haydn. It is occasionally referred to as The Letter V referring to an older method of cataloguing Haydn's symphonic output.The symphony was completed in 1787...
were the first works to be recorded. The orchestra recorded initially in Studio 8-H, but producer Charles O'Connell soon decided to hold most of the studio recording sessions in Carnegie Hall. However, many live broadcast performances originating in Studio 8H were also released on records, and subsequently on CD. The famously dry acoustics of Studio 8-H, designed for broadcasting, were found to be less than ideal for recording. Acoustical modifications in 1939 were thought to have greatly improved the sound of Studio 8H; some recording sessions were held there as late as June 1950. From the fall of 1950 until the orchestra was disbanded, all concerts and recording sessions took place in Carnegie Hall.
RCA
RCA
RCA Corporation, founded as the Radio Corporation of America, was an American electronics company in existence from 1919 to 1986. The RCA trademark is currently owned by the French conglomerate Technicolor SA through RCA Trademark Management S.A., a company owned by Technicolor...
released the orchestra's recordings on its flagship Red Seal label on the then standard 78-rpm records. In 1950, a 1945 recording of Ferde Grofé
Ferde Grofé
Ferde Grofé was a prominent American composer, arranger and pianist. During the 1920s and 1930s, he went by the name Ferdie Grofé.-Early life:...
's Grand Canyon Suite
Grand Canyon Suite
The Grand Canyon Suite is a suite for orchestra by Ferde Grofé, composed during the period from 1929 to 1931. It consists of five parts or movements, each an evocation in tone of a particular scene typical of the Grand Canyon...
became the NBC Symphony's first LP release (LM-1004). A mainstay of RCA's catalog through the 1950s, many of the NBC Symphony's recordings were later reissued on the lower priced RCA Victrola
RCA Victrola
RCA Victrola was a budget label introduced by RCA Victor in the early 1960s to reissue classical recordings originally issued on the RCA Victor "Red Seal" label. The name "Victrola" came from the early console phonographs marketed by the Victor Talking Machine Company...
label, where they remained until the demise of the LP. In the 1980s, RCA began issuing digitally remastered recordings of the orchestra, including a complete issue of all Toscanini's RCA recordings in 1990 on CD and audio cassette. Later advances in digital technology has led RCA (now Sony/BMG Classics) to further enhance the sound of the magnetic tapes for additional reissues. RCA has only reissued recordings that were personally approved by Toscanini, even off-the-air ones such as the seven complete operas he conducted at NBC between 1944 and 1950; however, other labels have released discs taken from off-the-air recordings of NBC broadcast concerts. Toscanini's final two broadcast concerts, in the spring of 1954, were experimentally recorded in stereo, but he did not approve the release of these recordings; it was many years before they were finally issued on labels other than RCA Victor.
The complete series of ten NBC Symphony telecasts has been issued on VHS and Laser Disc by RCA in 1990 and on DVD by Testament in 2006.
One of the NBC Symphony Orchestra's most ambitious projects was the recording of the 13-hour musical score for NBC Television's 1952 series Victory at Sea
Victory at Sea
Victory at Sea is a documentary television series about naval warfare during World War II that was originally broadcast by NBC in the USA in 1952–1953. It was condensed into a film in 1954. The music soundtrack, by Richard Rodgers and Robert Russell Bennett, was re-recorded and sold as record albums...
. Robert Russell Bennett
Robert Russell Bennett
Robert Russell Bennett was an American composer and arranger, best known for his orchestration of many well-known Broadway and Hollywood musicals by other composers such as Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern, Cole Porter, and Richard Rodgers. In 1957 and 2008, Bennett received Tony Awards...
conducted the orchestra in his arrangements of Richard Rodgers
Richard Rodgers
Richard Charles Rodgers was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II...
' musical themes for the 26 documentary programs (recorded in Rockefeller Center's Center Theatre). The series is currently available on DVD. Some of the music was released by RCA Victor on LP. In the early 1960s, Bennett re-recorded music from Victory at Sea in a famed series of three stereo records for RCA Victor, conducting a studio orchestra, the RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra (members of the Symphony of the Air). These have all been reissued by RCA on CD.
In 1954, shortly after the orchestra's final concerts, Stokowski made recordings for RCA of excerpts from Prokofiev's ballet Romeo and Juliet and Menotti's ballet Sebastian. The recordings were originally issued as "Leopold Stokowski and his orchestra," but reissued as "members of the NBC Symphony Orchestra." On April 6, 1954, Guido Cantelli made a recording in Carnegie Hall of Cesar Franck's "Symphony in D minor." The performance was initially issued in mono by RCA, but a stereo version (which had been taped in the same session) was issued in the 1970s; it was eventually reissued on CD.
Symphony of the Air
After the NBC Symphony Orchestra disbanded, some members went on to play with other orchestras, notably Frank MillerFrank Miller (cellist)
Frank Miller was a principal cellist and music director whose professional career spanned over a half century. Miller studied at Curtis Institute of Music, under Felix Salmond and at age 18, joined the Philadelphia Orchestra...
(principal cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
) and Leonard Sharrow
Leonard Sharrow
Leonard Sharrow , was one of the foremost American bassoonists of the 20th Century. Born in New York City, he joined the NBC Symphony Orchestra when it was first organized, eventually becoming principal bassoonist ; he also served in the U.S. Army in World War II...
(principal bassoon
Bassoon
The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...
) with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Chicago Symphony Orchestra
The Chicago Symphony Orchestra is an American orchestra based in Chicago, Illinois. It is one of the five American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five". Founded in 1891, the Symphony makes its home at Orchestra Hall in Chicago and plays a summer season at the Ravinia Festival...
. However, many former NBC Symphony members, in an attempt to stay together and preserve the orchestra, regrouped as a new ensemble called the "Symphony of the Air". They made their first recording on September 21, 1954, and gave their first public concert at the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
9th Anniversary Celebration on October 24. On November 14 they appeared on the acclaimed Omnibus
Omnibus (US TV series)
Omnibus is an American, commercially sponsored, educational television series.-History:Broadcast live primarily on Sunday afternoons at 4:00pm Eastern time, from November 9, 1952 until 1961. Omnibus originally aired on CBS, and later on Sunday evenings on ABC. The program finally moved to NBC in...
TV program in which Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
, making his first television appearance, discussed Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
's Fifth Symphony
Symphony No. 5 (Beethoven)
The Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67, was written by Ludwig van Beethoven in 1804–08. This symphony is one of the most popular and best-known compositions in all of classical music, and one of the most often played symphonies. It comprises four movements: an opening sonata, an andante, and a fast...
, and Bernstein led the Symphony of the Air during its first season. With an Asian tour under the auspices of the State Department and an attendance of 60,000 at concerts in the Catskills
Catskill Mountains
The Catskill Mountains, an area in New York State northwest of New York City and southwest of Albany, are a mature dissected plateau, an uplifted region that was subsequently eroded into sharp relief. They are an eastward continuation, and the highest representation, of the Allegheny Plateau...
that summer, the first season was a huge success.
For nearly a decade, the Symphony of the Air performed many concerts led by Stokowski
Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...
, the orchestra's music director from 1955. The orchestra recorded widely (on Columbia, RCA, United Artists and Vanguard) under leading conductors, including Stokowski, Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
, Monteux
Pierre Monteux
Pierre Monteux was an orchestra conductor. Born in Paris, France, Monteux later became an American citizen.-Life and career:Monteux was born in Paris in 1875. His family was descended from Sephardi Jews who came to France in the wake of the Spanish Inquisition. He studied violin from an early age,...
, Reiner
Fritz Reiner
Frederick Martin “Fritz” Reiner was a prominent conductor of opera and symphonic music in the twentieth century.-Biography:...
, Bruno Walter
Bruno Walter
Bruno Walter was a German-born conductor. He is considered one of the best known conductors of the 20th century. Walter was born in Berlin, but is known to have lived in several countries between 1933 and 1939, before finally settling in the United States in 1939...
, Kondrashin, Beecham
Thomas Beecham
Sir Thomas Beecham, 2nd Baronet CH was an English conductor and impresario best known for his association with the London Philharmonic and the Royal Philharmonic orchestras. He was also closely associated with the Liverpool Philharmonic and Hallé orchestras...
, and Josef Krips
Josef Krips
Josef Alois Krips was an Austrian conductor and violinist.-Biography:Krips was born in Vienna and went on to become a pupil of Eusebius Mandyczewski and Felix Weingartner. From 1921 to 1924, he served as Weingartner's assistant at the Vienna Volksoper and as répétiteur and chorus master...
. Only once more did they use their old name, in the 1963 telecast of Gian Carlo Menotti
Gian Carlo Menotti
Gian Carlo Menotti was an Italian-American composer and librettist. Although he often referred to himself as an American composer, he kept his Italian citizenship. He wrote the classic Christmas opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors, among about two dozen other operas intended to appeal to popular...
's written-for television opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors
Amahl and the Night Visitors
Amahl and the Night Visitors is an opera in one act by Gian Carlo Menotti with an original English libretto by the composer. It was commissioned by NBC and first performed by the NBC Opera Theatre on December 24, 1951, in New York City at NBC studio 8H in Rockefeller Center, where it was broadcast...
, with an all-new cast. The orchestra disbanded in 1963.
Listen to
- Toscanini and NBC Symphony Orchestra (1947): Berlioz' The Damnation of Faust (13 minutes)
- Toscanini and NBC Symphony Orchestra (1953): Beethoven's Eroica, Third Movement