wimpel69
11-19-2013, 05:00 PM
Upgraded to FLAC. Link below. This is my own rip.
This 1989 album featured the first-ever complete versions of Virgil Thomson's landmark
1930s documentary feature scores The River and The Plow That Broke the Plains.
The River is a 1938 short documentary film which shows the importance of the Mississippi River
to the United States, and how farming and timber practices had caused topsoil to be swept down the
river and into the Gulf of Mexico, leading to catastrophic floods and impoverishing farmers. It ends by
briefly describing how the Tennessee Valley Authority project was beginning to reverse these problems.
The Plow That Broke the Plains is a 1936 short documentary film which shows what happened
to the Great Plains region of the United States and Canada when uncontrolled agricultural farming led
to the Dust Bowl. It was written and directed by Pare Lorentz. The film was narrated by the American
actor and baritone Thomas Hardie Chalmers. In 1999, The Plow That Broke the Plains was selected for
preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally,
historically, or aesthetically significant".
Lorentz worked on the film with composer Virgil Thomson, who shared Lorentz's enthusiasm for folk
music and incorporated many folk melodies, along with other popular and religious music, into the
soundtrack. Virgil Thomson compiled a concert suite from his original score, which has been
performed and recorded.
Music Composed and Orchestrated by
Virgil Thomson
Played by the
Philharmonia Virtuosi, New York
Conducted by
Richard Kapp
Tracks:
The River
1. The Old South (00:39)
2. Prologue (03:52)
3. - (03:36)
4. Industrial Expansion in the Mississippi Valley (04:27)
5. Soil Erosion and Floods (07:44)
6. Finale (03:33)
The Plow That Broke The Plains
7. Prelude and Fugue (03:33)
8. Grass - Pastorale (01:15)
9. Cattle (02:01)
10. The Homesteader (04:04)
11. War and the Tractor (03:20)
12. Blues (Speculation) (02:35)
13. Drought (00:49)
14. Wind and Dust (02:28)
15. Devastation (04:18)
Total Time: 48'14
"Thomson was an excellent film composer because he had a rare ability to respond to visual
and literary stimuli. His response to Gertrude Stein in the operas Four Saints in Three Acts (1934)
and The Mother of us All (1947) was uncanny. As a composer he was content to create a musical
counterpart of her idiosyncratic style. For much of his life Thomson also composed musical portraits,
working in front of the sitter and responding to what he saw. Again, as a music critic, he had a
special ability to react to the music of other composers. [his ability paid off when he had the chance
to compose for films--and Thomson often made the point that he had used American folk sources
in his film scores some years before Copland made such tactics the basis of his own film scores
and what became the international career of the popular ballets.
The Plow that broke the Plains (1936) was Thomson's first film score: The River came in the
following year and both were directed by Pare Lorentz: the black-and-white images of both are
uncannily memorable with this music. There have been several recordings of the suites taken
from both films, which were not premiered until 1943 but this is the first time that the complete
scores have been performed. Richard Kapp, with the help of David Samuel Barr and the composer,
went to a lot of trouble to get corrected material and has even performed the music with live
narration taken from the film script. As with the ballets of Copland�now done complete in
Slatkin's EMI recordings�this proves worthwhile, although film music is naturally of even lower
density, or it would not work as soundtrack.
The Plow has three numbers not in the suite-"The Homesteader" (track 10); "War and the Tractor"
(track II); and "Wind and Dust" (track 14) as well as a fugue tacked on to the Prelude (track 7).
Familiar tunes, including All People that on Earth do dwell, drift in and out as Thomson helps
himself to anything he likes. There's an anticipation of Copland when the third movement,
"Cattle" (track 9), quotes Old Point which features in the Saturday Night Waltz from Rodeo.
Kapp and the Philharmonia Virtuosi (the CD booklet has Viruosi!) give a vivid impression of
Thomson's Americana�compare their blues (track 12) with the much less idiomatic
performance by the New London Orchestra under Ronald Corp (see below). There are extra
numbers in The River too: tracks 2 and 3.
The two complete film scores make a valuable coupling and bring this strand in Thomson's
applied music, where he was a real pioneer, into circulation in a new way. The orchestra
sounds well and so does the recording."
P.D., Gramophone
Source: Koch Schwann CD, Austria 1989 (This is my own rip!)
Formats: FLAC(RAR), DDD Stereo
File Sizes: 200 MB (incl. artwork & booklet)
Download Link (FLAC) - http://depositfiles.com/files/hu9ph05il
Enjoy! Don't share! Buy the original! And add to my reputation if you download my material:)
This 1989 album featured the first-ever complete versions of Virgil Thomson's landmark
1930s documentary feature scores The River and The Plow That Broke the Plains.
The River is a 1938 short documentary film which shows the importance of the Mississippi River
to the United States, and how farming and timber practices had caused topsoil to be swept down the
river and into the Gulf of Mexico, leading to catastrophic floods and impoverishing farmers. It ends by
briefly describing how the Tennessee Valley Authority project was beginning to reverse these problems.
The Plow That Broke the Plains is a 1936 short documentary film which shows what happened
to the Great Plains region of the United States and Canada when uncontrolled agricultural farming led
to the Dust Bowl. It was written and directed by Pare Lorentz. The film was narrated by the American
actor and baritone Thomas Hardie Chalmers. In 1999, The Plow That Broke the Plains was selected for
preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally,
historically, or aesthetically significant".
Lorentz worked on the film with composer Virgil Thomson, who shared Lorentz's enthusiasm for folk
music and incorporated many folk melodies, along with other popular and religious music, into the
soundtrack. Virgil Thomson compiled a concert suite from his original score, which has been
performed and recorded.
Music Composed and Orchestrated by
Virgil Thomson
Played by the
Philharmonia Virtuosi, New York
Conducted by
Richard Kapp
Tracks:
The River
1. The Old South (00:39)
2. Prologue (03:52)
3. - (03:36)
4. Industrial Expansion in the Mississippi Valley (04:27)
5. Soil Erosion and Floods (07:44)
6. Finale (03:33)
The Plow That Broke The Plains
7. Prelude and Fugue (03:33)
8. Grass - Pastorale (01:15)
9. Cattle (02:01)
10. The Homesteader (04:04)
11. War and the Tractor (03:20)
12. Blues (Speculation) (02:35)
13. Drought (00:49)
14. Wind and Dust (02:28)
15. Devastation (04:18)
Total Time: 48'14
"Thomson was an excellent film composer because he had a rare ability to respond to visual
and literary stimuli. His response to Gertrude Stein in the operas Four Saints in Three Acts (1934)
and The Mother of us All (1947) was uncanny. As a composer he was content to create a musical
counterpart of her idiosyncratic style. For much of his life Thomson also composed musical portraits,
working in front of the sitter and responding to what he saw. Again, as a music critic, he had a
special ability to react to the music of other composers. [his ability paid off when he had the chance
to compose for films--and Thomson often made the point that he had used American folk sources
in his film scores some years before Copland made such tactics the basis of his own film scores
and what became the international career of the popular ballets.
The Plow that broke the Plains (1936) was Thomson's first film score: The River came in the
following year and both were directed by Pare Lorentz: the black-and-white images of both are
uncannily memorable with this music. There have been several recordings of the suites taken
from both films, which were not premiered until 1943 but this is the first time that the complete
scores have been performed. Richard Kapp, with the help of David Samuel Barr and the composer,
went to a lot of trouble to get corrected material and has even performed the music with live
narration taken from the film script. As with the ballets of Copland�now done complete in
Slatkin's EMI recordings�this proves worthwhile, although film music is naturally of even lower
density, or it would not work as soundtrack.
The Plow has three numbers not in the suite-"The Homesteader" (track 10); "War and the Tractor"
(track II); and "Wind and Dust" (track 14) as well as a fugue tacked on to the Prelude (track 7).
Familiar tunes, including All People that on Earth do dwell, drift in and out as Thomson helps
himself to anything he likes. There's an anticipation of Copland when the third movement,
"Cattle" (track 9), quotes Old Point which features in the Saturday Night Waltz from Rodeo.
Kapp and the Philharmonia Virtuosi (the CD booklet has Viruosi!) give a vivid impression of
Thomson's Americana�compare their blues (track 12) with the much less idiomatic
performance by the New London Orchestra under Ronald Corp (see below). There are extra
numbers in The River too: tracks 2 and 3.
The two complete film scores make a valuable coupling and bring this strand in Thomson's
applied music, where he was a real pioneer, into circulation in a new way. The orchestra
sounds well and so does the recording."
P.D., Gramophone
Source: Koch Schwann CD, Austria 1989 (This is my own rip!)
Formats: FLAC(RAR), DDD Stereo
File Sizes: 200 MB (incl. artwork & booklet)
Download Link (FLAC) - http://depositfiles.com/files/hu9ph05il
Enjoy! Don't share! Buy the original! And add to my reputation if you download my material:)