News:
A biography of Ignaz Friedman by Allan Evans is scheduled for publication in 2008. Publisher and details to follow.
Francis Planté and his Peers (Arbiter 150) & Morini and Firkusny Sonata Recital (Arbiter 151) have received the Diapason d' Or.
Premium CD series: Support Arbiter and receive a newly restored historic recording. Our first offering is the 1936 Beethoven 9th Symphony under Weingartner (Vienna Philharmonic). Contributions are tax-deductible.
Hear the 2nd Movement
Latest Releases:
Arbiter 156
Charles Tournemire: Complete Recordings
Cavaille-Coll organ of Sainte-Clotilde, Paris
Franck: L'Organiste (excerpts); Pastorale; Cantabile; Choral
No. 3 in A minor
Tournemire: L'Orgue Mystique:
Andantino; Paraphrase-Carillon
Five Improvisations:
Petite Rhapsody; Cantilene; Te Deum; Fantasie; Chorale
recorded in 1930 & 1931
Tournemire's revelatory improvisations and interpretations link his master César Franck to Messiaen. A profound and volatile mystic, his avant-garde experimentation emerges from plainchant and modes. These rare discs document the only surviving sounds of the organ Franck played on for thirty-one years before it was rebuilt in 1933.
Hear Charles Tournemire improvise a "Petite Rhapsody" 3:10
Read the liner notes
Arbiter 155 (2 cd set)
Stravinsky: Music for Four Hands
The Nonesuch Recordings
Paul Jacobs & Ursula Oppens, pianists
CD I:
Petrouchka: piano four hands
Three Pieces for String Quartet
Concerto per due pianoforti soli
Sonata for Two Pianos
Five Easy Pieces
Etude for Pianola
total time: 79'14"
CD II
Three Easy Pieces
Zvietochnoy Waltz
Paul Jacobs in concert*:
Stravinsky:
Four Etudes
Jacobs on Stravinsky
Piano Rag Music
Tango
Ragtime
Debussy:
Minstrels; General Lavine
Schönberg: Klavierstücke, Op. 33a/b
Jacobs speaks with Aaron Copland
Copland: Four Piano Blues
Copland: Danzon Cubano for two pianos (Jacobs, Copland pianos)
Jacobs on Bolcom
Bolcom: Ghost Rags
Jacobs on Rzewski
Rzewski: Down By The Riverside
* first publication
total time: 79'44"
Paul Jacobs and Ursula Oppens recorded Stravinsky's piano music for four hands in 1977 and 1981. It receives its first CD release, restored from Nonesuch's masters. In addition are excerpts from a recital of Jazz-influenced works, along with what may be Copland's last public performance as a pianist. Extensive liner notes by Jacobs analyze the music.
hear Jacobs & Oppens play Stravinsky's Andante from Five Easy Pieces (CD I: 13) 1'03"
read the liner
notes
World Arbiter 2008:
Lifting the Veil
The First Bluesmen (1926-1956)
Rev. Gary Davis & Peers
78 rpm discs from the Harry Smith Archive & private recordings
Leadbelly*: Sermon on Pancakes; The Blood's Done Signed Your
Name; Gallows Pole; Leaving Blues*
Rev. Gary Davis*: Come Down to See Me Sometime; Lost John; Soldier's
Drill;
Slow Blues in E; Mountain Jack; I Didn't Want to Join the Band;
Big Bill Broonzy: Starvation Blues
Leola B. Wilson & Blind Blake: Black Biting Bee Blues
Buddy Boy Hawkins: A Rag
William Moore: Raggin' the Blues; Old Country Rock
Gus Cannon & Blind Blake: Poor Boy
Ramblin' Thomas: Poor Boy; Hard Dallas Blues; Back Gnawing Blues;
Sawmill Moan
Charley Patton: Mississippi Bo Weevil Blues; Screamin' and Hollerin'
the Blues
Rube Lacy: Mississippi Jail House Groan; Ham Hound Crave
Edward Thompson: Seven Sisters Blues
total time: 76'38"
* previously unpublished
Liner notes include excerpts from an unknown, unpublished oral histroy of Rev. Gary Davis compiled in 1951.
Hear Leola B. Wilson & Blind Blake in 1926 (Black Biting Bee)
Read the liner notes
Indiana University Press has just published a compilation of writings by pianist Moriz Rosenthal, co-edited by Mark Mitchell, author of a biography of Vladimir de Pachmann, and Allan Evans, Arbiter's director, who produced a CD accompanying the book. The preface is by Charles Rosen. Click here for a larger image.
OUR ORIGINS:
Arbiter of Cultural
Traditions, Inc., a non-profit arts organization, was founded
in 2002 as a means to continue the work of the former Arbiter
Recording Company in order to save performances by musicians both
living and from the past whose work embodies our classical music
at its height. The failure of the record industry to have done
so makes our efforts all the more critical, as the challenges
now faced make what we once took for granted as our cultural heritage
into an endangered tradition. While artists such as Horszowski
and Gieseking
are well-known, the artistry of Ignace
Tiegerman and Michal Hambourg
is at the highest musical level, as the most significant artists
often do not pursue or achieve lucrative musical careers. Therefore
it is important to find the great music-making wherever it survives:
our searching has brought us to such places as the basement shelves
of Gieseking's daughter living in Germany, a hill-town in the
Italian Dolomites (Ignaz Friedman's home) and areas of Cairo where
pupils of Tiegerman still live. Note that all our previous publications
by the Arbiter Recording Company will remain available and publication
will continue undisturbed. Please check our UPCOMING PROJECTS
file for information on new CD projects.
A world music sublabel, World Arbiter, makes available examples of classical and traditional music from other cultures. Today's world music scene is slipping back into the "International" genre it was before such guiding lights like Teresa Sterne of Nonesuch invented the Explorer series, which took serious music from all over the globe with utmost seriousness. We offer vital examples from genuine traditions backed by scholarly analysis that expands interest rather than dulling curiosity: one living master from India's classical tradition, Ashok Pathak, maintains his family's unique tradition, which like many, barely survived the dismantling of the Maharajahs' court patronage.
Please consult our Upcoming Projects page for news and sound samples.
Hear some of our artists in performance:
Ashok Pathak in
a test of Raga Bageshri before the final recording of World Arbiter
2003. (mp3, 9'26" 4.3MB)
Ferruccio Busoni in
1922 performing Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody no.13 with SONIC DEPTH
TECHNOLOGY. (mp3, 6'23", 3.0MB)
Michal Hambourg,
the living link to pianism's Golden Age, in an unpublished performance
of Chopin's Etude in A-flat, Op. 25, no. 1. (mp3, 2'54",
1.3MB)
Aside from our familiar music projects (publishing CDs and maintaining reference material on historic pianists), we are expanding into other fields, which will expand our web site:
MUSIC RESOURCE CENTER: Formerly the Museum of Historic Pianists, our new reference tool will provide extensive essays, bibliographies and download examples of great artists from all disciplines, ranging from instrumental music to World Music genres. Our aim will be to document every significant performer in these idioms and provide information and recordings which can be downloaded. This will be an ongoing project, so please check back often for updated references and added recordings.
MUSIC INTERNS: To better preserve Western music we will be seeking interns to train in restoration technology, pedagogy so that they will continue to educate the public in hearing with a sense of history and understanding the cultural conditions which shaped the interpretive art of past and current masters. Applicants are urged to contact us via email at the address atthe page's end.
JUDAICA: The opening of a wing dedicated to oral history, diaries, photos, and manuscripts. Our first offerings are a A 19th Century Hebrew Harvest Augury from Yemen by James Irsay and photos of Birzh (Birzhai) Lithuania, c. 1937, by Shmuel Evin. We offer excerpts from Evin's diary (1932-38) written in Birzh, documenting the cultural and political changes of a community now extinct.
ITALIAN CULINARIA: Investigation into culinary manuscripts from aristocratic families in Italy's Marche region, dating from the 1600s to the present. Aside from seeking further documents, we will begin making available their recipes on our web site (in Italian and translated into English) with the aim of eventual publication.
Any comments and suggestions should be directed to our email address (info@arbiterrecords.com)
or via mail to:
Arbiter Records, PO Box 541336, Linden Hill Station, NY 11354
USA
Arbiter
Records Catalog
World Arbiter Catalog
Ordering Information
Liner Notes
Music
Resource Center
Upcoming Projects
Judaica
Other Links
All notes and translations © Allan
Evans Site last updated July 2004
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