TIM MANGAN: MY FIRST CLASSICAL RECORD PURCHASE
My memory is a little foggy on some of the details. I was in high school, already a burgeoning trombonist, and already getting in amongst my mother’s collection of classical LPs. At some point, though, I decided to buy one of my own and that ended up being a recording of Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony, with Herbert von Karajan conducting the Berlin Philharmonic. To the best of my recollection, chairman, that was my first classical record. At any rate, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
Why Bruckner’s Fourth? I had never even heard of the composer, let alone his music, until about a week before. I was taking private lessons with a trombone teacher at Cal State Long Beach and he had gotten me started on what would come to be my daily bread for the next decade or so: orchestral excerpts. In those days they came in books (probably still do), just the trombone parts to famous and not so famous orchestral pieces that had significant contributions from the lower brass: the Overture to “William Tell,” “Ride of the Valkyries,” Schumann’s Symphony No. 3, “Bolero,” etc. Thumbing through one of the volumes during a lesson, we came across Bruckner’s Fourth and I remember my teacher playing the opening theme — two quarter notes, followed by quarter-note triplets, a characteristic Bruckner rhythm — and I thought it sounded pretty interesting and my teacher said it was a good piece, with good trombone parts. That was enough for me. I wanted to hear it.
How can I convey the impact that that record had on me? The sound of the Berlin Philharmonic, for one thing, was like nothing I had heard before, plush but gutsy, behemoth but placed by the sound engineers at a certain distance to add to the magisterial magic. Bruckner has a particular way of scoring for the trombones — the parts are often in octaves, and re-enforced by the double basses. This does something to the overtone series it seems, because the trombones sounded huge, monumental. The Berlin trombonists also had a way of adding an extra edge to their tone when playing fortissimo. It sounded like ripping cloth. As a young trombonist I related to it strongly; these Berlin trombonists were my heroes. I imagined myself in their place.
I’d listen over and over, very closely, to this record, on headphones. I remember the glow of the amplifier lamps, the glow of the Deutsche Gramophone vinyl, and the special whoosh it made with the needle in the grooves. (It didn’t sound like my mother’s RCA and Columbia records.) I also remember the liner notes in three languages, and the glossy cover with a picture of a frozen white wing, nestled in snow. All of it added up to a kind of teenage fetish. Needless to say, I still have the record, thirty years on.
Special thanks to Tim Mangan, classical music critic for the Orange County Register.
You can also read much more from Tim by visiting his blog: Classical Life, click here to visit it.
March 26th, 2009 at 4:45 pm
Hi Tim, I’d be interested to know your thoughts re: comparing the sound of this Bruckner on vinyl vs. the same recording on CD.
March 27th, 2009 at 4:53 am
A great post indeed!
March 27th, 2009 at 9:11 am
I prefer vinyl, all things being equal, but I’m not a stickler. I haven’t heard this exact recording on CD. I have Karajan and the Berliners playing the same on an EMI CD; it’s actually a different recording. I like the DG vinyl way better.
March 30th, 2009 at 8:43 pm
Here, here. My first was Pictures at an Exhibition with Rene Leibowitz conducting on an RCA “Sonic Spectacular.” From there it was Shostakovitch Fifth, Orff, Mahler, Stravinsky Petruschka, Sibelius.
Why, when adults take the time to introduce teenagers to classical music, do the kill it with Beethoven and Brahms? Kids arent interested in the foundation, they want it big, loud and challenging!
April 12th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
Patrick,
What an intriguing idea!
An intern for KUSC a few years ago was completely new to classical music, so I lent him a pile from my personal collection: Mozart piano concertos, Bach suites, Beethoven symphonies, etc. and also Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. The one he liked best by far, and wanted to talk about? The Rite of Spring.
(I never did get that record back!)
My first ever record purchase was Mahler. You really may be onto something here……..
January 30th, 2010 at 8:15 pm
I have just started to listen to KUSC, and it all started with Mozarts ‘ JUPITER,’ where the end was enough to give BAUCH, ” A HEADACHE,” or at least that’s what the was said during the intro….
Today I enjoyed the German Tennor Kaughman, who sang the ” Miller’s Daughter ! ”
I hope to hear ‘ Vaughner,’ you know the one the ‘ AIR CAV,’ played for that village when they were going surfing in the movie ‘ Apocolypstick Now ! ” I mean ‘ Apocolypes Now,’ as a follower on Twitter is ‘ Apocolypstick,’ my mistake !
Speaking about the mayor of LA, I would like to thank him for kicking all those several generations of pimps and hookers out of the Fairfax District as I think they all came to Riverside, as we have been plagued the same Long Beach was where her old Long Beach Drive In used to be as well !
I am a student at the Univiersity of Horse Manure, on SPOOF, and as a Sophmore my school motto is ” Take this job and SHOVEL IT,” and for the City of Long Beach ” Your Coffee Tastes Better if you don’t Draw your Water Down Stream from the LATRINES ( LA RIVER ) ! “
January 30th, 2010 at 8:28 pm
PS… I would like to Concur with the German gal who said on KUSC, during an interview that it was better and harder to do comedy than the drama that’s been going around these day’s, and for her if she is listening ” Ich Liba Diche,” Cologne !
PSS…. ” A man is no sailor if cannot take a Joke , ” Henry Richard Dana Jr., ” Two Years Before The Mast ! ” ” I polished the brass so well that now I’m the ruler of the Queens Navy,” as well !
My question is “If a man is no sailor if he can’t take a JOKE,” then what is a woman if she cannot say the same ” A WOMAN ? ”
PS…. I would like to end with a message to Herr Eichman’s, ‘ Music Haus,” in Bad Hersfeld, Germany, ” Herr Eichman, the H’o'fner Western Guitar you sold me in 1976, was the best guitar I ever had !
January 30th, 2010 at 8:30 pm
David S. say’s : ” I’m tired ! ” Sounds like Madeline Kann, from the movie ‘ Blazing Saddles ! ‘
January 30th, 2010 at 8:37 pm
Gail E. say’s : ” The Rite of Spring ? ” You heard of ” Springtime for Hitler and Germany,” another Mel Brooks movie block buster. Well here in Riverside, I sing ” Springtime for Hemet, and Riverside, as a joke when the only gals who know me let slip when they have a fight with their husbands or Spouses, be they male - female, or both like the current marriages between the sexes, and thats why I think only Heteral Sexuals, should be the only ones to get legally married as why should they get get to miserable like the rest of US straight’s when after all they are happier being ” GAY ! “
January 30th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
Well goodnight KUSC, and I would like to say I enjoy the intellectual joy of music with you as much as Mel Gibson, should of done like Red Skelton when he got stopped for DUI, with ” FOUR ON THE FLOOR, and a FITFH UNDER THE SEAT ! ” At Least COSTELO said to ABBOT when a cop said ” Why for Two Cent’s I’ld PUNCH YOU IN the NOSE,” and Abbot asked ” What happend then,” and Costello replied ” HE RAN UP ABOUT EIGHT BUCKS ! ” ” Keep the SMOG, and THROW AWAY LA ( JACK BENNY ) ! “