Leopold Stokowski | |
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| Born | Leopold Anthony Stokowski (1882-04-18)18 April 1882 Marylebone, Middlesex, England |
| Died | 13 September 1977(1977-09-13) (aged 95) Nether Wallop, Hampshire, England |
| Resting place | East Finchley Cemetery |
| Occupations |
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| Known for | Music director of thePhiladelphia Orchestra; Founder of theHollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra and theAmerican Symphony Orchestra |
| Notable work | Film: Walt Disney'sFantasia Carnegie Hall One Hundred Men and a Girl |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 5 |
Leopold Anthony Stokowski (UK:/stəˈkɒfski/stə-KOF-skee,US:/stəˈkɔːfski,stəˈkaʊski/stə-KAWF-skee, stə-KOW-skee;[1] 18 April 1882 – 13 September 1977) was a British conductor.[2] One of the leading conductors of the early and mid-20th century, he is best known for his long association with thePhiladelphia Orchestra. He was especially noted for his free-hand conducting style that spurned the traditionalbaton and for obtaining a characteristic sound from the orchestras he directed.[3]
Stokowski was music director of theCincinnati Symphony Orchestra, thePhiladelphia Orchestra, theNBC Symphony Orchestra,New York Philharmonic Orchestra, theHouston Symphony Orchestra, theSymphony of the Air and many others. He was also the founder of the All-American Youth Orchestra, the New York City Symphony, theHollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra and theAmerican Symphony Orchestra.
Stokowski conducted the music for and appeared in several Hollywood films, most notably Disney'sFantasia, and was a lifelong champion of contemporary composers, giving many premieres of new music during his 60-year conducting career. Stokowski, who made his official conducting debut in 1909, appeared in public for the last time in 1975 but continued making recordings until June 1977, a few months before his death at the age of 95.
Leopold Anthony Stokowski was the son of an English-born cabinet-maker of Polish heritage, Kopernik Joseph Boleslaw Stokowski, and his Irish-born wife Annie-Marion (née Moore). Stokowski's birth certificate[4] gives his birth on 18 April 1882, at 13 Upper Marylebone Street (now New Cavendish Street), in the Marylebone district of London. Stokowski was named after his Polish-born grandfather Leopold, who died in the Bethlem Hospital, Southwark, London, on 13 January 1879, at the age of 49.[5] Stokowski was the Polonised Lithuanian family name, originallyStokauskas, wherestoka means "lack" or "shortage".
On occasion in later life he altered his middle name toAntoni, in the Polish spelling. Compounding this, there were various rumours and inaccurate entries in otherwise authoritative reference works concerning his name. In Germany there was a rumour that his original name was simplyStock (German for stick). After he had achieved international fame with the Philadelphia Orchestra, unsubstantiated rumours circulated that he was bornLeonard orLionel Stokes or that he had "anglicised" it to "Stokes".[6] The 5th Edition ofGrove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1954) rendered his given names asLeopold Antoni Stanisław Bołesławowicz. These claims are readily disproved by reference not only to his birth certificate and those of his father, his younger brother and his sister, but also by the student entry registers of the Royal College of Music, the Royal College of Organists and The Queen's College, Oxford, along with surviving documents from his days at St Marylebone Church, St James's Church and St. Bartholomew's in New York City.[7]
There is some mystery surrounding his early life. For example, he spoke with an unusual, non-British accent, though he was born and raised in London.[8] On occasion, he gave his year of birth as 1887 instead of 1882, as in a letter to theHugo Riemann Musiklexicon in 1950, which also incorrectly gave his birthplace asKraków.Nicolas Slonimsky, editor ofBaker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, received a letter from a Finnish encyclopaedia editor that said: "The Maestro himself told me that he was born inPomerania, Germany, in 1889."
The mystery surrounding his origins and accent is clarified in Oliver Daniel's 1,000-page biographyStokowski – A Counterpoint of View (1982), in which (in Chapter 12) Daniel reveals that Stokowski came under the influence of his first wifeOlga Samaroff, an American pianist born Lucy Mary Agnes Hickenlooper. She was fromGalveston, Texas, and adopted a more exotic-sounding name to further her career. She "urged him to emphasize only the Polish part of his background" for professional and career reasons once he became a resident of the United States.
He studied at theRoyal College of Music, where he first enrolled in 1896 at the age of thirteen, making him one of the youngest students to do so. In his later life in the United States Stokowski conducted six of the nine symphonies composed by his fellow organ studentRalph Vaughan Williams. Stokowski sang in the choir of theSt Marylebone Parish Church, and later became assistant organist to SirWalford Davies atthe Temple Church. By the age of 16 Stokowski had been elected to membership of theRoyal College of Organists. In 1900 he formed the choir ofSt Mary's Church, Charing Cross Road, where he trained the choirboys and played the organ. In 1902 he was appointed organist and choir director ofSt James's Church, Piccadilly. He also attendedThe Queen's College, Oxford, where he received the degree ofBachelor of Music in 1903.[9]
In 1905 Stokowski began work in New York City as the organist and choir director ofSt. Bartholomew's Church. He was very popular among the parishioners, who included members of theVanderbilt family, but in the course of time he resigned this position to pursue a career as an orchestra conductor. Stokowski moved to Paris for additional studies in conducting. There he heard that theCincinnati Symphony Orchestra would be needing a new conductor when it returned from a long sabbatical. In 1908 Stokowski began a campaign to win this position, writing letters to Mrs. Christian R. Holmes, the orchestra's president, and travelling toCincinnati, Ohio, for a personal interview.
Stokowski was selected over other applicants and took up his conducting duties in late 1909. That was also the year of his official conducting debut in Paris with the Colonne Orchestra, on 12 May 1909, when he accompanied his future wife, the pianistOlga Samaroff, inTchaikovsky'sPiano Concerto No. 1. Stokowski's conducting debut in London took place the following week, on 18 May, with theNew Symphony Orchestra at theQueen's Hall.
His engagement as new permanent conductor in Cincinnati was a great success. He introduced the concept of "pops concerts" and, starting with his first season, he began championing the work of living composers. His concerts included performances of music byRichard Strauss,Sibelius,Rachmaninoff,Debussy,Glazunov,Saint-Saëns and many others. He conducted the American premieres of new works by such composers asElgar, whose2nd Symphony was first presented there on 24 November 1911. He was to maintain his advocacy of contemporary music to the end of his career. However, in early 1912 Stokowski became frustrated with the policies of the orchestra's board of directors, and submitted his resignation. There was some dispute over whether to accept this or not, but on 12 April 1912 the board decided to do so.[citation needed]
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Two months later, Stokowski was appointed the director of thePhiladelphia Orchestra, and he made his conducting debut inPhiladelphia on 11 October 1912. This position would bring him some of his greatest accomplishments and recognition. It has been suggested that Stokowski resigned abruptly at Cincinnati with the hidden knowledge that the conducting position in Philadelphia was his when he wanted it, or asOscar Levant suggested in his bookA Smattering of Ignorance, "he had the contract in his back pocket." Before Stokowski moved into his conducting position in Philadelphia, however, he returned to England to conduct two concerts at theQueen's Hall in London. On 22 May 1912, Stokowski conducted theLondon Symphony Orchestra in a concert that he was to repeat in its entirety 60 years later at the age of 90, and on 14 June 1912, he conducted an all-Wagner concert that featured the noted sopranoLillian Nordica. While he was director of the Philadelphia Orchestra, he was largely responsible for convincingMary Louise Curtis Bok to set up theCurtis Institute of Music (13 October 1924) in Philadelphia. He helped with recruiting faculty and hired many of their graduates.[citation needed]
Stokowski rapidly gained a reputation as a musical showman. His flair for the theatrical included grand gestures, such as throwing the sheet music on the floor to show he did not need to conduct from a score. He also experimented with new lighting arrangements in the concert hall,[10] at one point conducting in a dark hall with only his head and hands lighted, at other times arranging the lights so they would cast theatrical shadows of his head and hands. Late in the 1929–1930 symphony season, Stokowski started conducting without a baton. His free-hand manner of conducting soon became one of his trademarks. On the musical side, Stokowski nurtured the orchestra and shaped the "Stokowski" sound, or what became known as the "Philadelphia Sound".[11] He encouraged "free bowing" from the string section, "free breathing" from the brass section, and continually altered the seating arrangements of the orchestra's sections, as well as the acoustics of the hall, in response to his urge to create a better sound. Stokowski is credited as the first conductor to adopt the seating plan that is used by most orchestras today, with first and second violins together on the conductor's left, and the violas and cellos to the right.[12]
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Stokowski also became known for modifying theorchestrations of some of the works that he conducted, as was a standard practice for conductors prior to the second half of the 20th century. Among others, he amended the orchestrations ofBeethoven,Tchaikovsky,Sibelius,Johann Sebastian Bach, andBrahms. For example, Stokowski revised the ending of theRomeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture, by Tchaikovsky, so it would close quietly, taking his notion fromModest Tchaikovsky'sLife and Letters of Peter Ilych Tchaikovsky (translated byRosa Newmarch: 1906) that the composer had provided a quiet ending of his own atBalakirev's suggestion. Stokowski made his own orchestration ofMussorgsky'sNight on Bald Mountain by adaptingRimsky-Korsakov's orchestration and making it sound, in some places, similar to Mussorgsky's original. In the filmFantasia, to conform to the Disney artists' story-line, depicting the battle between good and evil, the ending ofNight on Bald Mountain segued into the beginning ofSchubert'sAve Maria.
Many music critics have taken exception to the liberties Stokowski took—liberties which were common in the nineteenth century, but had mostly died out in the twentieth, when faithful adherence to the composer's scores became more common.[13]
| External audio | |
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 Listen to Leopold Stokowski conductingSergei Rachmaninoff'sRhapsody on a Theme by Paganini with the Philadelphia Orchestra andSergei Rachmaninoff in 1934at archive.org |
Stokowski's repertoire was broad and included many contemporary works. He was the only conductor to perform all ofArnold Schoenberg's orchestral works during the composer's own lifetime, several of which were world premieres. Stokowski gave the first American performance of Schoenberg'sGurre-Lieder in 1932. It was recorded "live" on 78 rpm records and remained the only recording of this work in the catalogue until the advent of theLP Record. Stokowski also presented the American premieres of four ofDmitri Shostakovich's symphonies, Numbers 1, 3, 6, and 11. In 1916, Stokowski conducted the American premiere ofMahler's8th Symphony,Symphony of a Thousand, whose premiere he had attended in Munich on 12 September 1910.[14][15] He added works byRachmaninoff to his repertoire, giving the world premieres of hisFourth Piano Concerto, theThree Russian Songs, theThird Symphony, and theRhapsody on a Theme of Paganini;Sibelius, whose last three symphonies were given their American premieres in Philadelphia in the 1920s; andIgor Stravinsky, many of whose works were also given their first American performances by Stokowski. In 1922, he introduced Stravinsky's score for the balletThe Rite of Spring to America, gave its first staged performance there in 1930 withMartha Graham dancing the part of The Chosen One, and at the same time made the first American recording of the work.[citation needed]
Seldom an opera conductor, Stokowski did give the American premieres in Philadelphia of the original version of Mussorgky'sBoris Godunov (1929) andAlban Berg'sWozzeck (1931). Works by such composers asArthur Bliss,Max Bruch,Ferruccio Busoni,Julian Carrillo,Carlos Chávez,Aaron Copland,George Enescu,Manuel de Falla,Paul Hindemith,Gustav Holst,Gian Francesco Malipiero,Nikolai Myaskovsky,Walter Piston,Francis Poulenc,Sergei Prokofiev,Maurice Ravel,Ottorino Respighi,Albert Roussel,Alexander Scriabin,Elie Siegmeister,Karol Szymanowski,Edgard Varèse,Heitor Villa-Lobos,Anton Webern, andKurt Weill, received their American premieres under Stokowski's direction in Philadelphia. In 1933, he started "Youth Concerts" for younger audiences, which are still a tradition in Philadelphia and many other American cities, and fostered youth music programs. After disputes with the board, Stokowski began to withdraw from involvement in the Philadelphia Orchestra from 1936 onwards, allowing his co-conductorEugene Ormandy to gradually take over. Stokowski shared principal conducting duties with Ormandy from 1936 to 1941; Stokowski did not appear with the Philadelphia Orchestra from the closing concert of the 1940–41 season (a lackluster performance of Bach'sSt. Matthew Passion) until 12 February 1960, when he guest-conducted the Philadelphia in works of Mozart, Falla, Respighi, and in a legendary performance of the Shostakovich Fifth Symphony, arguably the greatest by Stokowski. The recording of this concert's broadcast had been circulated privately among collectors over the years, though never issued commercially, but with the copyright expiring at the start of 2011, it was released in its entirety on the Pristine Classical label.[16]
Stokowski appeared as himself in the motion pictureThe Big Broadcast of 1937, conducting two of his Bach transcriptions. That same year he also conducted and acted inOne Hundred Men and a Girl, withDeanna Durbin andAdolphe Menjou. In 1939, Stokowski collaborated withWalt Disney to create the motion picture for which he is best known:Fantasia. He conducted all the music (with the exception of a "jam session" in the middle of the film) and included his own orchestrations for Bach'sToccata and Fugue in D minor and Mussorgsky's/Schubert'sNight on Bald Mountain/Ave Maria. Stokowski even got to talk to (and shake hands with)Mickey Mouse on screen, in a famoussilhouette footage;[17] though, he would later say with a smile that Mickey Mouse got to shake hands with him.[18]
A lifelong and ardent fan of the newest and most experimental techniques in recording, Stokowski saw to it that most of the music forFantasia was recorded over Class A telephone lines laid down between the Academy of Music in Philadelphia andBell Laboratories in Camden NJ, using an early, highly complex version of multi-track stereophonic sound, dubbedFantasound, which shared many attributes with the laterPerspecta stereophonic sound system. Recorded on photographic film, the only suitable medium then available, the results were considered astounding for the latter half of the 1930s.
Upon his return in 1960, Stokowski appeared with the Philadelphia Orchestra as a guest conductor. He also made two LP recordings with them forColumbia Records, one including a performance ofManuel de Falla'sEl amor brujo, which he had introduced to America in 1922 and had previously recorded for RCA Victor with theHollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra in 1946, and a Bach album which featured the 5th Brandenburg Concerto and three of his own Bach transcriptions. He continued to appear as a guest conductor on several more occasions, his final Philadelphia Orchestra concert taking place in 1969.[19]
In honour of Stokowski's vast influence on music and the Philadelphia performing arts community, on 24 February 1969, he was awarded the prestigiousUniversity of Pennsylvania Glee Club Award of Merit.[20] Beginning in 1964, this award was "established to bring a declaration of appreciation to an individual each year that has made a significant contribution to the world of music and helped to create a climate in which our talents may find valid expression."[citation needed]
With his Philadelphia Orchestra contract having expired in 1940, Stokowski immediately formed the All-American Youth Orchestra, its players' ages ranging from 18 to 25. It toured South America in 1940 and North America in 1941 and was met with rave reviews. Although Stokowski made a number of recordings with the AAYO for Columbia, the technical standard was not as high as had been achieved with the Philadelphia Orchestra for RCA Victor. In any event, the AAYO was disbanded when America entered theSecond World War, and plans for another extensive tour in 1942 were abandoned.[citation needed]
During this time, Stokowski also became chief conductor of theNBC Symphony Orchestra on a three-year contract (1941–1944).Arturo Toscanini, the NBC Symphony's regular conductor, did not wish to undertake the 1941–42 NBC season due to friction with NBC management, though he did accept guest engagements with the Philadelphia Orchestra and continued to conductwar bond concerts with the NBC Symphony. Stokowski conducted a great deal of contemporary music with the NBC Symphony, including the US premiere ofProkofiev'sAlexander Nevsky in 1943, the world premieres ofSchoenberg's Piano Concerto (withEduard Steuermann) andGeorge Antheil's 4th Symphony, both in 1944, and new works byAlan Hovhaness,Stravinsky,Hindemith,Milhaud,Howard Hanson,William Schuman,Morton Gould and many others. He also conducted several British works with this orchestra, includingVaughan Williams'4th Symphony,Holst'sThe Planets, andGeorge Butterworth'sA Shropshire Lad. Stokowski also made a number of recordings with the NBC Symphony for RCA Victor in 1941–42, includingTchaikovsky's4th Symphony, a work which was never in Toscanini's repertoire, andStravinsky'sFirebird Suite. Toscanini returned to the NBC Symphony in 1942; he and Stokowski shared conducting duties for the remaining two years of Stokowski's contract.
In 1944, on the recommendation of MayorFiorello La Guardia, Stokowski helped form the New York City Symphony Orchestra, which they intended would make music accessible for middle-class workers. Ticket prices were set low, and performances took place at convenient, after-work hours. Many early concerts were standing room only; however, a year later in 1945, Stokowski was at odds with the board (who wanted to trim expenses even further) and he resigned. Stokowski made three 78 pm sets with the New York City Symphony for RCA Victor:Beethoven's6th Symphony,Richard Strauss'sDeath and Transfiguration, and a selection of orchestral music fromGeorges Bizet'sCarmen.
| External audio | |
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| Listen to Leopold Stokowski conducting his orchestral transcriptions of works byJohann Sebastian Bach with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1931–1941 at archive.org |
In 1945, he founded theHollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra. The orchestra lasted for two years before it was disbanded for live concerts, but not for recordings, which continued well into the 1960s. Stokowski's own recordings (made in 1945–46) includedBrahms's1st Symphony, Tchaikovsky'sPathetique Symphony and a number of short popular pieces. Some of Stokowski's open-air HBSO concerts were broadcast and recorded, and have been issued on CD, including a collaboration withPercy Grainger onEdvard Grieg'sPiano Concerto in A minor in the summer of 1945. He premiered "From A Moonlit Ceremony" (Moonlit Peace) byGeorge Frederick McKay in 1946 with Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra.[21] (It began giving live concerts again as the "Hollywood Bowl Orchestra" in 1991, underJohn Mauceri).[22] There was a 1949 cartoon spoof of Stokowski at the Bowl withBugs Bunny playing the conductor in "Long-Haired Hare" byChuck Jones.[23]
He continued to appear frequently with theLos Angeles Philharmonic, both at theHollywood Bowl and other venues. Then in 1946 Stokowski became a chief Guest Conductor of theNew York Philharmonic. His many first performances with them included the US premiere ofProkofiev's6th Symphony in 1949. He also made many splendid recordings with the NYPO for Columbia, including the world premiere recordings ofVaughan Williams's6th Symphony[24] andOlivier Messiaen'sL'Ascension, also in 1949.[25]
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However, when in 1950Dimitri Mitropoulos was appointed Chief Conductor of the NYPO, Stokowski began a new international career which commenced in 1951 with a nationwide tour of England: during the Festival of Britain celebrations he conducted theRoyal Philharmonic Orchestra at the invitation of SirThomas Beecham. It was during this first visit that he made his debut recording with a British orchestra, thePhilharmonia Orchestra, ofRimsky-Korsakov'sScheherazade. During that same summer he also toured and conducted in Germany, Holland, Switzerland, Austria, and Portugal, establishing a pattern of guest-conducting abroad during the summer months while spending the winter seasons conducting in the United States. This scheme was to hold good for the next 20 years during which Stokowski conducted many of the world's greatest orchestras, simultaneously making recordings with them for various labels. Thus he conducted and recorded with the main London orchestras as well as theBerlin Philharmonic, theOrchestre de la Suisse Romande, theFrench National Radio Orchestra, theCzech Philharmonic, theHilversum (Netherlands) Radio Philharmonic, and others.[citation needed]
Stokowski returned to the NBC Symphony Orchestra in 1954 for a series of recording sessions for RCA Victor. The repertoire included Beethoven's 'Pastoral' Symphony, Sibelius's 2nd Symphony, Acts 2 and 3 of Tchaikovsky'sSwan Lake and highlights fromSaint-Saëns'sSamson and Delilah withRisë Stevens andJan Peerce. After the NBC Symphony Orchestra was disbanded as the official ensemble of the NBC radio network, it was re-formed as theSymphony of the Air with Stokowski as notional Music Director, and as such performed many concerts and made recordings from 1954 until 1963. The US premiere in 1958 of Turkish composerAhmet Adnan Saygun's oratorioYunus Emre is among them. He made a series ofSymphony of the Air recordings for theUnited Artists label in 1958 which included Beethoven's 7th Symphony, Shostakovich's 1st Symphony, Khatchaturian's 2nd Symphony and Respighi'sPines of Rome. From 1955 to 1961, Stokowski was also the Music Director of theHouston Symphony. For his debut appearance with the orchestra he gave the first performance ofMysterious Mountain byAlan Hovhaness – one of many living American composers whose music he championed over the years. He also gave the US premiere in Houston of Shostakovich's11th Symphony (7 April 1958) and made its first American recording on theCapitol label.[citation needed]
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In 1960, Stokowski made one of his infrequent appearances in the opera house, when he conductedGiacomo Puccini'sTurandot at the New York Metropolitan, in memorable performances with a cast that includedBirgit Nilsson,Franco Corelli andAnna Moffo. At theNew York City Opera, he had led double-bills ofŒdipus rex (withRichard Cassilly) andCarmina Burana (1959), as well asL'Orfeo (withGérard Souzay) andIl prigioniero (withNorman Treigle, 1960).
In 1962, at the age of 80, Stokowski founded theAmerican Symphony Orchestra (ASO). His championship of the 20th-century composer remained undiminished, and perhaps his most celebrated premiere with the American Symphony Orchestra was ofCharles Ives's4th Symphony in 1965, which CBS also recorded. In addition, he continued to collaborate with noted contemporary soloists of the time including the pianistGlenn Gould in a recording of Beethoven'sPiano Concerto No. 5, Op 73 "Emperor Concerto" in 1966.[26] Stokowski served as Music Director for the ASO until May 1972 when, at the age of 90, he returned to live in England. On 3 January 1962, still showing his interest in using technological innovation, he was featured in a telecast forWGN-TV conducting theChicago Symphony Orchestra, which has since been made available on DVD.[27] One of his British guest conducting engagements in the 1960s was the first Proms performance ofGustav Mahler'sSecond Symphony,Resurrection, since issued on CD.[28]
Stokowski continued to conduct for a few more years, but failing health forced him to conduct only for recording sessions. An eyewitness said that Stokowski often conducted sitting down in his later years; sometimes, as he became involved in the performance, he would stand up and conduct with remarkable energy. His last public appearance in the UK took place at the Royal Albert Hall, London, on 14 May 1974. Stokowski led the New Philharmonia in the 'Merry Waltz' ofOtto Klemperer (in tribute to the Philharmonia's former Music Director who had died the previous year),Vaughan Williams'sFantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis,Ravel'sRapsodie espagnole andBrahms's4th Symphony.Stokowski's final public appearance took place on 22 July 1975 during the Vence Music Festival in the South of France. He conducted the Rouen Chamber Orchestra in several of his own transcriptions of Bach.[citation needed]
| External audio | |
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| 1: Listen to Leopold Stokowski conductingModest Mussorgsky'sPictures at an Exhibition with theNew Philharmonia Orchestra in 1965at archive.org |
Stokowski gave his last world premiere in 1973 when, at the age of 91, he conductedHavergal Brian's 28th Symphony in a BBC radio broadcast with the New Philharmonia Orchestra. In August 1973, Stokowski conducted the International Festival Youth Orchestra atRoyal Albert Hall in London, performing Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony. Edward Greenfield of The Guardian wrote: "Stokowski rallied them as though it was a vintage Philadelphia concert of the 1920s". Stokowski continued to make recordings even after he had retired from the concert platform, mainly with the National Philharmonic, another ad-hoc orchestra made up of first-desk players chosen from the main London orchestras. In 1976, he signed a recording contract with Columbia Records that would have kept him active until he was 100 years old.[29][30]
Stokowski died of a heart attack on 13 September 1977 at hisNether Wallop, Hampshire, residence at the age of 95.[31] His very last recordings, made shortly before his death, forColumbia, included performances of the youthfulSymphony in C byGeorges Bizet andFelix Mendelssohn's4th Symphony, "Italian", with theNational Philharmonic Orchestra in London.[32] He is interred atEast Finchley Cemetery.[33]
Stokowski made his very first recordings, with the Philadelphia Orchestra, for theVictor Talking Machine Company in October 1917, beginning with two ofBrahms'Hungarian Dances. Other works recorded in the early sessions were the scherzo fromMendelssohn'sA Midsummer Night's Dreamincidental music and "Dance of the Blessed Spirits" fromGluck'sOrfeo ed Euridice.[34] He found ways to make the best use of the acoustic recording process, until electric recording was introduced by Victor in the spring of 1925. He conducted the first orchestral electrical recording to be made in America (Saint-Saëns'sDanse Macabre) in April 1925. The following month Stokowski recordedMarche Slave byTchaikovsky, in which he increased the double basses to best use the lower frequencies of early electrical recording. Stokowski was also the first conductor in America to record all four of Brahms' symphonies (between 1927 and 1933).[citation needed]
| External audio | |
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| Listen to Stokowski conducting his orchestration ofFranz Liszt'sHungarian Rhapsody No. 2 with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1927at archive.org |
Stokowski made the first US recordings of theBeethoven 7th and 9th Symphonies,Antonín Dvořák'sNew World Symphony,Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's4th Symphony andNutcracker Suite,César Franck'sSymphony in D minor,Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov'sScheherazade,Sergei Rachmaninoff's2nd Piano Concerto (with the composer as soloist),Jean Sibelius's4th Symphony (its first recording),Dmitri Shostakovich's5th and6th Symphonies, and many shorter works. His early recordings were made at Victor's Trinity Church studio inCamden, New Jersey until 1926, when Victor began recording the orchestra in theAcademy of Music inPhiladelphia. Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra later participated in long playing, high fidelity, and stereophonic experiments, during the early 1930s, mostly forBell Laboratories[35] (Victor even released some earlyLong Playing Records around this time, which were not commercially successful for several reasons). Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra continued to make records exclusively for Victor through December 1940. One of his last 1940 sessions was the world premiere recording of Shostakovich's sixth symphony. In addition toRCA Victor, Stokowski recorded prodigiously for several other labels until shortly before his death, includingColumbia,Capitol,EMI/His Master's Voice,Everest,United Artists, andDecca/London.[citation needed]
In 1954, Stokowski made his first commercial stereo recordings with theNBC Symphony Orchestra for RCA Victor. These records were of excerpts from Prokofiev's balletRomeo and Juliet and the complete one-act balletSebastian byGian Carlo Menotti. From 1947 to 1953, Stokowski recorded for RCA Victor with a specially assembled 'ad hoc' band of players drawn principally from the New York Philharmonic and NBC Symphony Orchestras. The records were credited to 'Leopold Stokowski and His Symphony Orchestra' and the repertoire ranged fromHaydn (hisImperial Symphony) toSchoenberg (Transfigured Night) by way ofSchumann,Liszt,Bizet,Wagner, Tchaikovsky,Debussy,Ralph Vaughan Williams,Sibelius andPercy Grainger. Stokowski's recordings forCapitol Records in the 1950s were distinguished by the use of three-track stereophonic tape recorders.[citation needed]
Stokowski was very careful in the placement of musicians during recording sessions and worked closely with the recording staff to achieve the best possible results. Some of the sessions took place in the ballroom of the Riverside Plaza Hotel in New York City in January and February 1957; these were produced by Richard C. Jones and engineered by Frank Abbey with Stokowski's own orchestra, which was typically drawn from New York musicians (primarily members of theSymphony of the Air). The CD reissue byEMI included selections originally released on two LPs –The Orchestra andLandmarks of a Distinguished Career—and featured music ofPaul Dukas,Samuel Barber,Richard Strauss,Harold Farberman,Vincent Persichetti, Tchaikovsky,Mussorgsky, Debussy,Bach (as arranged by Stokowski), and Sibelius.[36] Although he officially used theRavel orchestration of the finale to Mussorgsky'sPictures at an Exhibition in his 1957 Capitol recording, he did add a few additional percussion instruments to the score. His Capitol recording ofHolst'sThe Planets was made with theLos Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. EMI, which acquiredAngel Records and Capitol in the 1950s, reissued many of Stokowski's Capitol recordings on CD; these recordings are now controlled byWarner Classics, as EMI ceased to exist in 2013. All of the music that Stokowski conducted inFantasia was released on a 3-LP set byDisneyland Records, in the 1957 soundtrack album made from the film. After stereo became possible on phonograph records, the album was released in stereo onBuena Vista Records. With the advent ofcompact discs, it appeared on a 2-CDWalt Disney Records set, in conjunction with the film's 50th anniversary.[citation needed]
In 1958, Stokowski signed a contract withEverest Records, which was noted for its use of 35 mm film instead of tape and the resulting highly vivid sound. One of Stokowski's most notable Everest recordings was a coupling of Tchaikovsky'sFrancesca da Rimini andHamlet with the New York Stadium Symphony Orchestra (the summer name for the New York Philharmonic). Stokowski's other remarkable Everest recordings includeVilla-Lobos' tone poemUirapuru, Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 and Prokofiev's ballet suiteCinderella. Several of Stokowski's televised concerts have been issued on both VHS and DVD, including Beethoven's 5th Symphony and Schubert'sUnfinished Symphony with the London Philharmonic on EMI Classics 'Classic Archive' label; the Nielsen 2nd Symphony with the Danish Radio Orchestra on VAI (Video Artists International); and Charles Ives'4th Symphony with the American Symphony Orchestra on Classical Video Rarities.
In 1973, Stokowski was invited by the International Festival of Youth Orchestras to conduct the 1973 International Festival Orchestra, numbering 140 of the world's finest young musicians, in a performance of Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony at the Royal Albert Hall, London. The Cameo Classics LP label recorded the concert, and also, by special permission of the maestro, the final rehearsals, which would make up a 2-LP set. Edward Greenfield inThe Guardian reported "Stokowski rallied them as though it was a vintage Philadelphia concert of the 1920s". Robert M. Stumpff ll (Leopold Stokowski Club of America) called the performance "The finest ever performance of this symphony". This unique Dolby recording was restored in 2014 by Klassik Haus and is available from Cameo Classics on CD (Nimbus Records Distribution).[citation needed]
Stokowski married three times. His first wife was American concert pianistOlga Samaroff, to whom he was married from 24 April 1911 until their divorce on 30 July 1923. They had one daughter: Sonya Maria Noel Stokowski (24 December 1921 – 19 March 2025),[37] an actress.
His second wife wasJohnson & Johnson heiress Evangeline Love Brewster Johnson, an artist and aviator, to whom he was married from 11 January 1926 until their divorce on 2 December 1937. They had two daughters: Gloria Luba Stokowski and Andrea Sadja Stokowski. In March 1938, Stokowski began a highly publicised relationship with film actressGreta Garbo after the two vacationed together in Italy, on the island ofCapri.[38] Whether or not their relationship was romantic or platonic was the subject of much speculation and scrutiny in thepress.
On 21 April 1945, Stokowski married heiress and actressGloria Vanderbilt. They had two sons, Leopold Stanislaus Stokowski (born 1950) and Christopher Stokowski (born 1952). They divorced on 29 October 1955.[39]
After Stokowski's death, Tom Burnam writes, the "concatenation of canards" that had arisen around him was revived—that his name and accent were phony; that his musical education was deficient; that his musicians did not respect him; that he cared about nobody but himself. Burnam suggests that there was a dark, hidden reason for these rumours. Stokowski deplored the segregation of symphony orchestras in which women and minorities were excluded, and, Burnam claims, his detractors got revenge by slandering him. Nevertheless, and notwithstanding Burnam's claims, attitudes towards Stokowski have changed dramatically since his death. In 1999, forGramophone magazine, the noted music commentatorDavid Mellor wrote: "One of the great joys of recent years for me has been the reassessment of Leopold Stokowski. When I was growing up there was a tendency to disparage the old man as a charlatan. Today it is all very different. Stokowski is now recognised as the father of modern orchestral standards. He possessed a truly magical gift of extracting a burnished sound from both great and second-rank ensembles. He also loved the process of recording and his gramophone career was a constant quest for better recorded sound. But the greatest pleasure of all for me is his acceptance now as an outstanding conductor of nineteenth- and twentieth-century music, including a lot that was at the cutting edge of contemporary achievement."[citation needed]
His collection of 935 orchestral scores and 215 orchestral transcriptions is now in the libraries of theUniversity of Pennsylvania.[40]
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| Listen to Stokowski conductingAntonin Dvorak'sSymphony No. 9 in E minorFrom the New World, Op. 95 with the Philadelphia Orchestra in 1927 at archive.org |
The Philadelphians' conductor is Leopold Stokowski, who was born in England—his real name is Stokes [sic]—but has Polish blood in him.
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