Composer: Adolphe Charles Adam, Daniel François Esprit Auber, Johann Sebastian Bach, Claude Achille Debussy, Edward William Elgar, Gabriel Urbain Fauré, Christoph Willibald Gluck, Louis Joseph Ferdinand Hérold, Jules Emile Frederic Massenet, Franz von Suppe, Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky, Emile Waldteufel
Orchestra: New Symphony Orchestra of London, National Philharmonic Orchestra
Conductor: Raymond Agoult, Douglas Gamley
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Decca
Catalogue: ELQ4827339
Release: 2019
Size: 670 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: cover
Massenet: Thais
01. Act 2: Meditation
Tchaikovsky: Chant sans paroles, Op. 2
02. No. 3The New Symphony Orchestra Of London02:48
03. Fauré: Pavane, Op. 50
04. Elgar: Dream Children, Op. 43
Debussy: Suite Bergamasque
05. Clair de lune
06. Bach: Chorale Prelude BWV645 ‘Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme’
Tchaikovsky: String Quartet No. 1 in D major, Op. 11
07. 2. Andante cantabile
Gluck: Orfeo ed Euridice
08. Act 2: Ballo (Andante)
Massenet: La Vierge
09. Scene 4: The Assumption: Le dernier sommeil de la Vièrge (The Last Sleep of the Virgin)
Adam: Si j’étais roi
10. Overture
Auber: Les diamants de la couronne
11. Overture
12. Suppe: Leichte Kavallerie Overture
13. Suppe: Morning, Noon and Night in Vienna
14. Suppe: Overture “Pique Dame”
15. Hérold: Zampa – Overture
16. Waldteufel: Les Patineurs – Valse, Op. 183
17. Waldteufel: Mon rêve, waltz Op.151
18. Waldteufel: Toujours ou jamais – Waltz, Op. 156
19. Waldteufel: Les Grenadiers – valse militaire, Op.207
20. Waldteufel: Espana, Op. 236
21. Waldteufel: Dolores – Waltz, Op. 170
22. Waldteufel: Pomone, Op. 155
Three Decca albums of popular Romantic classics remastered complete for CD and compiled for the first time.
Recorded at London’s Kingsway Hall early in 1957 and first released in the US by RCA Victor, ‘Overtures in Spades’ was a collection of operatic openers that enjoyed more popular currency then than they do now: Suppé’s Light Cavalry still features on radio playlists, less so his overtures to Morning, Noon and Night in Vienna or The Queen of Spades, while three 19th-century pieces of polished craftsmanship by Adam, Auber and Hérold are hardly known today.
Reissued as ‘Overture! Overture!’ the album took another 12 years to be incorporated within the Decca catalogue, though the reviewers had enjoyed the dynamic Decca sound of the original recording as well as the full-bodied, exciting performances of a London studio band under the directorship of Raymond Agoult, a seasoned, Hungarian-born conductor of popular and light classics.
In 1958 Agoult and the New Symphony Orchestra made a second record for RCA/Decca – ‘Clair de lune’, featuring gentle Andantes and tender Adagios – by the likes of Debussy, Elgar, Tchaikovsky and Massenet.
Newly remastered from the original tapes, both albums are coupled on this Eloquence reissue with a rare LP of Waldteufel waltzes under the direction of another experienced, British-based session musician, the Australian-born Douglas Gamley. Waldteufel’s art lay in combining the easygoing feel and nostalgic pull of the Viennese waltz with a more brilliant, French style of orchestration: a synthesis that endeared him to English audiences in particular. This collection fills out a portrait of the composer beyond the ubiquitous Skaters’ Waltz to present six further waltzes and a Grenadiers march scored with surprising delicacy.
‘The recording … is a humdinger, with a resounding lower region, unbelievably powerful dynamics, excellent balance and marvellously sweet string tone.’ High Fidelity, August 1958 (Overtures in Spades)
‘There is plenty of care and musical feeling in the performances … Particularly successful are the Méditation, the Andante cantabile and the Dernier sommeil, in all of which the intense but really quiet string playing is highly commendable.’ Gramophone, June 1960 (Clair de lune)
‘The playing has marvellous life and flair and its spirit is essentially French … the National Philharmonic in spanking form.’ Gramophone, October 1982 (Waldteufel)