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A Lifetime of Record Collectingby Charles Fry I came to a love of vocal music, ultimately opera, as a very young boy. Back in the late 1940s and early 1950s there wasn't much in the way of what we now enjoy as nightly "television." In its stead there was the good old reliable radio. Does anyone remember radio? That is television minus the picture. We had a wonderful old RCA consul radio, the pride of my father, which in addition to picking up local broadcasts, also had a broad band to pick up short wave radio waves. After dinner we would move into the living room of our home and turn on the radio for the evening. To have had it on earlier would have spoiled its magic effect as an after dinner entertainment. There were lots of comedy shows and what we would now call "sit coms." But at the age of around 8 or 9, I loved the variety shows. Shows like the Major Bowes Amateur Hour which eventually introduced a young soprano who went on to be known as Maria Callas, along with another soprano who pretended to be the little Whippore Will that sang "Rinso White, Rinso White, Happy Little Birdie Song" (a lady known as Beverly "Bubbles" Sills). In my case, as intersting as the soprano voices were, I was infatuated by the tenors and, especially, the baritones who sang on those programs. One night there was a baritone by the name of Robert Merrill, who sang the Largo al factotum from "Il Barbiere di Siviglia" and I was lost. I absolutely was blown away by that aria and the voice that sang it. I was. perhaps, 8. A few years later, when I had earned a few dollars from mowing neighbors lawns, I went to a record store and found a 78 RPM recording of "Largo al factotum" by Robert Merrill. I acquired it, for the huge sum of $1.25 and took it home to play it on my family record player. I nearly wore out the record and my parents' patience. I still, by the way, have the record. I was hooked. Thanks to the suggestion of a fifth grade teacher, who was an opera lover, I had the courage to turn on the Saturday Metropolitan Opera Radio Broadcast and found a performance of Madama Butterfly with Licia Albanese and James Melton. When it was over I was humilitated to be seen by my family as my face was wet with tears. Needless to say, I thought the Navay Lt. Pinkerton was among the world's lowest people. But the music and the death of poor Butterfly remained with me for years to come (still, in fact, is the case). As a young lad of nine it would not have occurred to me that all these years later, I am now in my 60s, I would find myself with a collection of somewhere beyond 1,000 operas and twice that many vocal recitals and video tapes, not to mention laser discs and now DVDs. How does one become a "record collector?" I am not certain I can answer that question. I only know that the art form that reached out and grabbed me as a youngster, was extremely powerful. And here in the States, I am sorry to say that fewer and fewer schools are incorporating music appreciation programs into their curriculum. Had it not been for the invention of the radio and a teacher with a love for good music, I can't imagine what my life today would be like. There is not a grey day that passes in my life that cannot be brightened by the right recording by the right singer. Only I can know what that magic combination is, because I have to go into my own collection to find the right piece or pieces. I feel so sorry for some of our youngsters who may never know the joy of great singing and spirit moving music because there is an absence of exposure to music of any kind. Show tunes, lieder, opera, pop songs (those with lyrics and music that connect) are out there, but there seems to be no systematic methodology for introducing our youth to them. That is the bad news. The good news is, there is still a wealth of wonderful
music available on record that we may never have had the opportunity to
hear. Thanks to folks like George Symons and his Mainly Opera site, many
who have never had the chance to be exposed to great musical experiences
can now sample and become lovers of some of the greatest music history
has known. Chuck Fry |
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