5196105968

Letters

Speaker Distorted

I am pleased to sce in your magazine my com-menis on loudspeakcr design cntitled “Tim Holi—The Search for Questions" |()clober|. but an error apparenily slipped into the eon-densation of the original intemew. I am quoted as saying that “no speaker today has an

efficiency that even approaches 1%.*' which is. of course. not true. Mv original statement was that “most high lidelity speakers available today have an efficiency that does not even ap-proach l%." There arc. of course. exceptions to this. such as some horn-loaded speakers and sonie speciali/ed. non-high-fidelity. high-output P.A. speakers. I trust this will elear up any wrong impression that may have inacker-tently been given.

Tim Holi

Vice President. Engineering Teledvne Acoustic Research

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Norwood. Mass.

Shades of Grey

John Canarinas article “Will the Real Colin Wilson Please Stand Up?" [August] was of morę than passing interest to me. as my name may be one of the fcw nonpseudonyms ap-pearingon Aries’ record jackets. Several years ago I madę contact with this company and. af-ter a brief exchange of correspondence. ended up writing ils jacket notes. I exchanged notes for records and did so on the assumption that Aries' masking of artists and orchestras was akin to RCA‘s practice of not identifying per-formers on the old Camden label. supposedly beeause of recording contract conflicts. (It should be mentioned. however. that not all Aries performances arc misnamed: There is a Boult/Rostropovich release of the Second Cello Concerto of Shostakovich. and the two symphonies of the contemporary Isracli com-poser Yohannes Bochni with the Jerusalem Radio Symphony.) My further assumption was that nobody producing such Top l en Box Office Bolfos as Sir Granville Ban lock s Pagon Symphony and Peter Racine F ricker s Fiflh Symphony could conceivably be doing ii for much. if any. profit.

Apparenily. at least with Brians works. I was mislaken. The interest in Brian hasgrown ra pieli) in the last few years. a fact that delights those of us who have been lamiliar with his

musie for some time. lt obviouslv does not

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delight many of those performers who gave us that musie in the First place to (ind their performances now appearing under false colors. The irony is that the numerous Brian performances on Aries niav have contributed im-

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mensely to raising the public’s awareness of his compositions. For this. as well as for many rare record i ngs in my library. I am gratelul to Aries. For condtictors such as Mr. Canarina and all the olher Colin Wilsons. I am person-ally chagrined to have obliquel\ participated in the usurpalion of their work.

Emil Franzi Tucson. Ariz.

I own a copy of the Aries album of Havergal Brian s (iothic Symphony. I am glad to have it. and I do not have a guilty conscience. It is a musical work ofgreat interest that isotherw isc unavailable as far as I know. Aries is not en-gaged in meretricious pirating. sińce it is not diminishing anyone s income: Aries' source is not a commercial recording. but an otherwise unreleased perfomiance.

If the BBC. presumably the ow ner of the concert tapes Aries has reproduced. is resent-ful of the Aries records. the solution is sini ple: It can make a commercial release of the same performance. With the wider distribunon availablc to a commercial album, and with a superior technical presentation based on first-generation master tapes and good disc mann-fact u ring. the BBC recording could immedi-atelv deflate the market for the Aries version to nolhing. It would also do the musical public a servicc.

Surely there is a market for the longest and most massive symphony cver wrillen. Given the expense. we cannot hope for a studio recording. but a commercial release of a concert performance, either Sir Adrian Boults or Ole Schmidfs. doesn*t seem too much to ask.

Stephen Whitney

Kensington. Calif.

Out of Step?

With regard to Patrick J. Smith*s review of the EMI recording of Poulenc’s compiele songs [May], I am glad he w rotę so well about them (which is important beeause so many people read High Fidfi ity). but he w role less accu-rately about me. and I would like to explain why.

Poulenc w rotę many of his songs for the almost-tenor voice of Picrrc Bcrnac. (Reniem-ber. Be mac sang Pelleas. which lies terribly high for a baritone. whereas I sing Goiaud. w hich is reallv w ritten for a bass-baritone.) So

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when I sing Poulenc songs. I often have to transpose. (By the way. I once received a post-card from Poulenc in which he says **Cheren-fani. transpose z tom ce qne vous voudrez. tnais en lous cas chanie: nui musigue"—“Dear chi Id. transpose anything you want. bul by all means sing my musie.") Fifteen years ago when I re-corded the cycle “Tel jour. telle nuit” for RCA. I did not hesitate to transpose sonie of (Continueci on page 6)

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Coserpty&o George Menda

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