I lived and worked at Grand Canyon National Park (south rim) for 6 years. At least once a year during the spring I would sit on the canyon rim and listen to this piece as the sun came up. Bucket list item... complete.
36 years ago I started a solo hike down the Bright Angel Trail at 4:45am and was able to witness the sunrise by myself from within the canyon. A remarkable once in a lifetime experience!
Yes, I have been there once. The trip of a lifetime! The Grand Canyon is a sight everyone should see once before they die. It’s the most gorgeous thing I have ever seen. The first time I ever saw blue and purple shadows! ❤
I was a freshman in high school in 1955. I registered late and was given a list of electives, all were filled except for "Men's Glee Club". I had no idea what a Glee Club was, but I knew what "glee" meant. I thought it was a party class, so I signed up. I was horrified, along with a few other guys, to discover it was a class on music and singing. I practically hid in the shadows when I left class the first day so nobody would see me leaving the "girlie class". The teacher was a man named Norman Reidel and he knew the mind of young guys. The music he played was Irish and American folk songs of the wars and winning the west, like "The Streets of Loredo". He also played classical music that I remember to this day. The Grand Canyon Suite was particularly imprinted on my mind as he described a vision of the Grand Canyon as the sun came up and the mules walking the trail. I visited the Grand Canyon decades later and . . . there it was. The Grand Canyon Suite! Thank you Mr. Reidel. You opened eyes that never closed over the decades.
Beauty "was" everywhere? ... did it change in Cities? I would love to visit after several years Seattle, San Francisco and Vancouver/Canada, my favourite cities at the West-Coast. But I've seen terrible Photos in WEB. Greetings from Germany ... .
At 73 one of my fondest memories of my youth was the day my father brought home Ormandy conducting the music of Grofe's The Grand Canyon Suite. And still today when I hear this music being played,I think so fondly of that earlier day oin my life.
First heard this in music class in grade school. Fell in love with it enough to ask for it for my birthday. It was the very first album I ever owned. At 64 I still have it.
I listened to this when I was 10 in 1972. My Dad had several albums including Telstar, but I chose this one and fell in love with it. Now I know why. The musicianship is superb. The Horns are perfect and I really love the violin solo with the over the top high note. A parody in parts. Comical.
At 77 yrs with a master's degree in music and 43 yrs of teaching behind me, this is still one of my favorites. I still have this exact vinyl album and enjoy it greatly.
OUTSTANDING. I am sitting here crying like a baby, it is so wonderful. I have always loved this tone poem, and Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra do a superb job. I lived in Arizona and this music brings back wonderful memories of it.
The first time I saw the Grand Canyon I had a recording of The Grand Canyon Suite on the car's tape player. As we drove into the parking lot at the South Rim I did not look at the Canyon. Instead I had my friend lead me with my eyes shut to the wall at the rim. When I was situated at the wall she told me to open my eyes. I could not believe what I was looking at. Such beauty, such grandeur. Never before had I seen such a sight. When I was able to turn away we then brought the car as close to the wall as possible, turned on the tape and listened to the complete Suite while drinking in the unbelievable creation before us. I know I cried.
I used to live there. You're not the only one to pair the two, and your friend gave you a wonderful introduction to the Canyon. Words... are inadequate to describe it. Literally larger than your mind can take in. Humbling place, actually...
What a lovely story, Dominic. I've been around and down it a few times, and it never ceases to thrill. And the changing light and the angles you can view the Canyon from, the make it look so different! One of the most interesting views was an airliner flight from Minneapolis to Palm Springs. We went right over it and you could look straight down. Towering. There's so much to see in that area--Meteor Crater, the Painted Desert, the Petrified Forest, and further east Monument Valley. But the Grand Canyon is still #1.
Amazing, isn't it? And you would think the technological advances would have brought just the opposite. I remember being in the middle of a big ensemble performing this when I played bassoon in high school. Never so live, or so alive!
Now Gene and the gang have gone and made me cry on Super Bowl Sunday!! Yippee!! They do such a superlative job… I’m going to go down to work at the Grand Canyon this summer (2024) and Mr. Frerde Grofe sets the tone of the Grand Canyon soooooo perfectly!! Cheers!! (I know it will be a life-changing experience!!)
i KNEW THIS SUITE WHEN I WAS 15 YEARS OLD (NOW I AM 59). IT WAS RECORDED 2 YEARS BEFORE MY BORN. SINCE THE FIRST DAY I CRY WITH ALL MY FEELINGS WHEN LISTEN THE FLUTE OF THE SUNRISE, OR THE MELODY OF ON THE TRAIL OR THE TERRIBLE STORM OF CLOUDBURST. AND ONE MONTH AGO I COULD MAKE REALITY MY DREAM OF KNOW THE GRAND CANYON. FROM ARGENTINA, MY MOST ABSOLUTLY ADMIRATION TO FERDINAND VON GROFÉ AND ALL HIS CREATION.
This is the recording I heard as a child. That photo of the Grand Canyon haunts me to this day. Like a painting. That and the opening movement, "Sunrise," are enough to bring me to tears. This is a peerless recording of Grofe's masterpiece.
This was one of my Go To albums when I a teenager. I just marveled at the way Ferde Grofé captured every part of the day in that mighty canyon. "On The Trail" was my favorite section. It's so nice to have the opportunity hear it in its entirety.
This is even MORE beautiful now, 60 years after first hearing this magic!! tears......and more tears 🌹 Been in and at the bottom of Grand Canyon many times. Grofe did WELL to capture it’s own heaven 🌟
I did too - honestly I think it contributed to my creativity and my imagination. As others have posted, I would and could, listen to this endlessly. It took me away, out of a city in Southern California, to somewhere else, the wilderness, the desert, the wide open spaces. A masterpiece....
You wouldn't think such very young children would understand it and see and hear what the composer was saying, but they can and so did I, just slightly older than you were. And it's a time capsule for me, too, I badly need.
My folks bought this album when it came out in 1957 and I still have it. In my mind I could always picture the Grand Canyon and every scene depicted in the score. This composition is truly a language that paints a vivid picture.
Like so many others, I came here to say this was the record my parents had when I was little (this was the 70s). I listened to it often. Revisiting now after many years. Putting it on my “Alzheimer’s Happy Music” playlist for that day when I could really use a jolt of good feelings and memory.
First listened to this in 1972 when I was 10 in Woodland hills on my Dad new stereophonic turntable. I could choose between this, Sinatra, or Telstar. Now Im playing it on my Horn and loving that I was introduced to music.
Un des tout premiers disques que j'ai acheté moi-même. J'avais 15-16 ans. Je l'ai fait jouer un nombre de fois incalculable! Je l'ai encore. C'est avec cette version donc que j'ai connu cette merveilleuse musique. Je la réécoute avec grand plaisir aujourd'hui. :-)
When I was only about 8-10 years old my father built his own hi-fi system (no stereo yet) with a Heath kit and bought records of all kinds of music - this same recording was one of them. Even as just a little shaver, I couldn't believe how Grofe could paint pictures with music, listened to it over over. Glad to hear Ormandy & the Philly orchestra once more.
Thanks for uploading this masterpiece! I'd forgotten how great these old Columbia Masterworks sounded. But I'll never forget Ormandy and the Philly! This was where I learned to appreciate graphic music as a teenager.
The absolute greatest performance of this wonderful suite. Ormandy felt it in his bones and loved the essence of it. It is like no other performance ever recorded.
The Toscanini with the NBC Symphony was up there with this one. I loved this as a small child, it paints a picture I could clearly see, even when about 7 or 8. For years you couldn't find recordings of Ferde Grofe anywhere, except in 2nd hand music shops or specialists ones. Friends living nearby in the 1950s, had a super Hi Fidelity setup and they would play this music loudly to demonstrate the quality. I was enthralled. Here it is again, for me and thank you so much marchan1374, it takes me back to that time, musically and nostalgically.
I remember playing this over and over again when I was 11 or 12--not long after this was released. I was transfixed by the beauty of the sound and my imagination of the sight that the music elicited. My father told me that it was not well received in Europe when it was first played. I could not imagine why anyone would not absolutely be carried away by the music as I was.
+Cathy Kelley, LOVE your comment. I did this, too. I'd turn it up, lay on the floor, close my eyes, and let the music "take me there." I absolutely LOVED this whole suite. I also loved the Mississippi Suite, too, but not as much as the GCS. Not long after Dad introduced me to this, we actually got to see the real Grand Canyon (in 1960). Only spent 1 nite there, but ... also got to see the GC and Monument Valley within the same 2 days. This was so awe-inspiring for a 9-10 yr. old kid (at that time). This music has definitely brought back to mind a happier, more simple time.
I did that too - actually with all my LPs. I used to save my money until I had enough to buy another classical album at the music store. My mother would beat the crap out of me for going "all the way down there" to buy a classical LP but I didn't care - I'd have my music. And I still have all my albums to this day. So mom, you nasty woman - I win!
Me too. My first real introduction to a classical sound and I was 10. Now Ive played it live in concert several times as a Hornist. It always emotes the fondest memories for me especially this rendition.
Beautiful music of Ferde Grofé. I visited the Grand Canyon several times and I love the Canyon - hiked down to the Colorado-River at Bright-Angel-Trail and back at South- Kaibab-Trail. And I love this great music. Greetings from Germany. 😀
........there is no getting around it. The greatest of "European" music, is the most fabulous "stuff" ever dreamed up. And Germany takes the summit. But........no music is unworthy of the pleasure and insight of listening, and dreaming. Like this charming American work. Now, if you dare.......listen to the Love-Death, the finale to the Eroica, the Afternoon of a Faun, the sunrise from Also Sprach.............such impossible splendours ! Beyond words..............beyond Music..........beyond Life. Music is not to be graded & compared, anymore than our children.........it's all there to partake. Jim
This brings back so many wonderful memories. This piece is just simply inspired. I would think Ferde's mother would have been most proud. I hope she was able to hear her son's music.
I've never heard this before, but it reminds me a bit of Ralph Vaughan Williams. What he did for the English countryside, this does for the American countryside.
thank you for posting this! To my mind, it is the best interpretation of Grofe. Perhaps my mind is colored by this recording being the first I heard of Grofe as a child, but every other recording I have heard has left me disappointed in one aspect or another. I have the recording (as pictured) and treasure it. Sadly, hearing the music through the hiss, clicks, and pops of an absolutely worn out LP is difficult, but I still treasure it. Finding this recording today was like being reunited with a long-lost friend.
Una pieza musical profundamente descriptiva de este portentoso Gran Cañón, relieve de la poderosa naturaleza, la música capta esa vida supuestamente inmóvil de este colosal relieve de la grandiosa naturaleza, gracias por este regalo.
Maybe someone can relate. My parents had this LP in 63. It had fantasia of greenslaves on one side and grand canyon suite on the other. Vaughn Williams was the conducxtor of Philadelphia orchestra. From the first time I heard (both sides) I was addicted to it. I must have played 'both sides' a million times. The LP was eventually totally worn out through my mis handling. I now play it here on you tube with my computer that has a nice sound system... Like other people here, my kids and wife think (know) I'm crazy... Seems like amny others here have had the same early exposure to this music. Has anyone heard fantasia on Greensleaves?
Thanks for posting---a great recording. Great solos by all the principal players and a wonderful tutti sound! It is interesting to note that this is one of the few recordings of Mel Broiles, for many years the great principal trumpeter of the Metropolitan Opera orchestra, playing principal trumpet with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He was there for just one season, 1957-58, just when this recording was made!
@@michaelmcguffey8409 Thanks for the info! However, being familiar with Krauss' sound having attended many @Philorch concerts plus owning many recordings when he was principal, it seems that the trumpet sound in "The Grand Canyon Suite" is definitely NOT Krauss! So it's difficult to believe that the great playing heard here is not Mel Broiles! Maybe Broiles got fired right after this recording? And, if it's not Broiles or Krauss, who else might it be?
Thank you for posting and favorable comments. My father recorded this album. He was in charge of remote operations for Columbia from 1956-71 He also went down the canyon, on the mules with a portable tape recorder for the Johnny Cash album.I know he is listening along with Miestros Ormandy, Szell and Bernstein.
When we moved from Iowa to Arizona in the late fifties, GCS was mandatory listening for school kids. Our school participated in "Music Memory", an annual event to encourage children to listen carefully to classical music. Grofe was on the list along with Bizet, Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, etc. I've always thought that Grofé was more a jazzman. If the music teacher had known this was "jazzy", she would have rolled over in her corset.
Rolling inside your corset would be worth seeing. Seriously. A wise choice for kids to be introduced to serious music. He faded from fashion for decades and was rediscovered, like so much more recent comps. People are marvelling at what they have found, which was lost. He deserves his place along with all the others who, in their time/s were also considered vulgar, etc.etc.
The record and jacket shown have the ML number designation which was for monophonic. The version heard here is definitely in stereo and would have had the MS designation for its number. The first wide spread distribution for stereo LP's began in 1957.
I got this when I was about 12/13 after seeing Disney's short film that fitted the music to images of The Grand Canyon. I wore the record (got it from the Columbia Record Club) out playing while looking at pictures of the Canyon on my ViewMaster projector. Still have the album but its great to hear it without all the hiss and static.
I love this piece since I first heard it in Art class back in first or second grade. I have enjoyed viewing this from start to finish for several years. This year they have inserted irritating ads between each movement. Very annoying. I’d rather be forced to listen to all them ads upfront or the end as opposed to ruining the beauty of the work.
The best version of this work ever recorded. Ormandy understood Grofe, and this piece. He brought it to life like no one ever has. Technically, you could run this through a noise filter to remove the 'hiss' but then you would lose the 'breadth' of sound. That must have been a difficult decision to make, but you made the right one! Thank you!
They worry about hiss and the scratching that age and use creates, but I don't know why. To be completely hissless you need to be at the concert hall, etc., and hear something 'live'. Unless it distorts the sound, does it really matter?
Best version, best recording of this piece. Ormandy had a real feel for this while others did not. THANKS for posting this. Finding this by Ormandy at online stores is difficult to do.
In 1957 i was 13 years old and visiting my aunt and uncle in buffalo ny. We would watch old western movies every weekday evening featuring Tom mix and hop- along Cassidy etc. On WBEN - TV and the theme of this program was this very piece of music featuring the, "on the trail section". Its still one of my favourite orchestral pieces.
@@j.ag.3537 Toscanini's reading is the BEST by far. Lengo67 is way off the mark. Ormandy's reading is marked with inaccurate balances, wrong notes and wrong tempi.
Conservo un "microsurco" de los años sesenta y con apenas 15 años descubrí la grandiosidad de la suite del gran cañón. Esta versión de Eugène Ormandy al frente de la orquesta de Filadelfia me suena a música celestial.
Like so many others, this was in the long extinct vinyl collection of my youth. Perhaps that's why I consider it the best recording. I've heard many, many others but for me none can match this one by Ormandy & TPO.
Just listened to Bernstein's version of this. There's no comparison; Ormandy brings out the magnificence of the music and the Grand Canyon. Bernstein sounds like he's on qualudes.
This is the recording I knew on my dad's hi-fi in the late 1950's. Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra had such a golden sound. By the way, has anyone ever compared this piece to the much earlier tone poem by Borodin "In the Steppes of Central Asia".? They share many features: the high harmonic chords in the strings in the introduction, the walking hoofbeats, the basic shape of the first main theme. Perhaps this is well known but I've never heard anyone else make the observation.
This is a very good piece by Grofe, who was an the extremely prolific composer. It was by far his best known work, but he wrote a lot more. Besides Ormandy and the Phila. Orch., it was also recorded by Toscanini and the NBC Symphony. They played it at Carnegie Hall with the composer present. Also recorded by Bernstein and the NY Phil. and Grofe himself with the Rochester Phil., as well as Antal Dorati, Erich Kunzel, Howard Hanson, Morton Gould, Gerard Schwartz and several others. See the list of pieces by Grofe here: th-cam.com/video/Xe7wC-HG6RQ/w-d-xo.html
Michael Schneider, I can't reply to your question and you'll probably never see this but I have this LP and side 2 is the Sunset and Cloudburst movements. This was the first version I heard when I was child and still my favorite, although the Bernstein version is also quite good.
I wish the youth of today were exposed to this music. I grew up with it playing on my Hi Fi and my young sons were exposed to it but maybe not impressed. I had this on Vinyl in 1958 but sadly my record collection is now gone. My grandchildren get annoyed with me when I play music at performance volume and rush to turn the volume down. They are so used to hearing their music on a phone or other modern devise they have no understanding of real orchestra sound.
That's sad. Have you considered a good set of studio headphones? Preferably closed not over the ear nor ear buds. Sennheiser, Sony and Bose makes some good headphones Good luck consider studio quality headphones.
Reading the Book JACKIE… I read she had this preformed at the White House. So I wanted to hear it… crazy how I can feel or put myself there and visualize the time. Ahe qas re-decorating the White House of course. This beautiful piece must have inspired her!
A nice version. This is a piece of music that needs a very good balance between all players and sections, which probably is the reason many a recording sounds somewhat rough around the edges. The opening part (Sunrise) in this version is for instance more disciplined and less "all over the place" then Bernstein's rendition. Pity for that miss in the trumpets at it's very end though. Sounds like someone went for the final outburst a few measures to soon (4:57 min). :-)
Yes, before the age of digital recording minor errors, such as noted, were often kept "in" as opposed to going the expense of rerecording. Nowadays, an audible error can be easily "fixed" in the recording booth!
Here's a question for all of you who were amazed that this was still out there.he album had the Grand Canyon suite,but what was the other side.God if you know please tell me,it's driving me crazy. All I can remember was that the music while not a copying effort,but it was of the same power up and calms.
I hope you enjoyed the suite,I hadn't heard it in years so when I saw the original sleeve for the album,I thought if anyone would remember it would be those who liked this particular recording.
I lived and worked at Grand Canyon National Park (south rim) for 6 years. At least once a year during the spring I would sit on the canyon rim and listen to this piece as the sun came up. Bucket list item... complete.
Wonderful.
Checkmark for Ferde.
36 years ago I started a solo hike down the Bright Angel Trail at 4:45am and was able to witness the sunrise by myself from within the canyon. A remarkable once in a lifetime experience!
Good bye
Yes, I have been there once. The trip of a lifetime! The Grand Canyon is a sight everyone should see once before they die. It’s the most gorgeous thing I have ever seen. The first time I ever saw blue and purple shadows! ❤
I was a freshman in high school in 1955. I registered late and was given a list of electives, all were filled except for "Men's Glee Club". I had no idea what a Glee Club was, but I knew what "glee" meant. I thought it was a party class, so I signed up. I was horrified, along with a few other guys, to discover it was a class on music and singing. I practically hid in the shadows when I left class the first day so nobody would see me leaving the "girlie class". The teacher was a man named Norman Reidel and he knew the mind of young guys. The music he played was Irish and American folk songs of the wars and winning the west, like "The Streets of Loredo". He also played classical music that I remember to this day. The Grand Canyon Suite was particularly imprinted on my mind as he described a vision of the Grand Canyon as the sun came up and the mules walking the trail. I visited the Grand Canyon decades later and . . . there it was. The Grand Canyon Suite! Thank you Mr. Reidel. You opened eyes that never closed over the decades.
America the way it was when i was young and fearless
Beauty was everywhere
Beauty "was" everywhere? ... did it change in Cities?
I would love to visit after several years Seattle, San Francisco and Vancouver/Canada, my favourite cities at the West-Coast. But I've seen terrible Photos in WEB.
Greetings from Germany ...
.
This brings peace to my soul.
At 73 one of my fondest memories of my youth was the day my father brought home Ormandy conducting the music of Grofe's The Grand Canyon Suite. And still today when I hear this music being played,I think so fondly of that earlier day oin my life.
First heard this in music class in grade school. Fell in love with it enough to ask for it for my birthday. It was the very first album I ever owned. At 64 I still have it.
@@judithholt3118 good morning judith the gran cannion colorado mara villoso !!! The suitte ... thenkiu !! Bay !!!
I listened to this when I was 10 in 1972. My Dad had several albums including Telstar, but I chose this one and fell in love with it. Now I know why. The musicianship is superb. The Horns are perfect and I really love the violin solo with the over the top high note. A parody in parts. Comical.
Beyond wonderful❤
At 77 yrs with a master's degree in music and 43 yrs of teaching behind me, this is still one of my favorites. I still have this exact vinyl album and enjoy it greatly.
OUTSTANDING. I am sitting here crying like a baby, it is so wonderful. I have always loved this tone poem, and Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra do a superb job. I lived in Arizona and this music brings back wonderful memories of it.
The first time I saw the Grand Canyon I had a recording of The Grand Canyon Suite on the car's tape player. As we drove into the parking lot at the South Rim I did not look at the Canyon. Instead I had my friend lead me with my eyes shut to the wall at the rim. When I was situated at the wall she told me to open my eyes. I could not believe what I was looking at. Such beauty, such grandeur. Never before had I seen such a sight. When I was able to turn away we then brought the car as close to the wall as possible, turned on the tape and listened to the complete Suite while drinking in the unbelievable creation before us. I know I cried.
Lucky you! Google Earth for me.
I used to live there. You're not the only one to pair the two, and your friend gave you a wonderful introduction to the Canyon. Words... are inadequate to describe it. Literally larger than your mind can take in. Humbling place, actually...
What a lovely story, Dominic. I've been around and down it a few times, and it never ceases to thrill. And the changing light and the angles you can view the Canyon from, the make it look so different! One of the most interesting views was an airliner flight from Minneapolis to Palm Springs. We went right over it and you could look straight down. Towering. There's so much to see in that area--Meteor Crater, the Painted Desert, the Petrified Forest, and further east Monument Valley. But the Grand Canyon is still #1.
I didn't know how rich my childhood was until I grew old.
Amazing, isn't it? And you would think the technological advances would have brought just the opposite. I remember being in the middle of a big ensemble performing this when I played bassoon in high school. Never so live, or so alive!
Now Gene and the gang have gone and made me cry on Super Bowl Sunday!! Yippee!! They do such a superlative job… I’m going to go down to work at the Grand Canyon this summer (2024) and Mr. Frerde Grofe sets the tone of the Grand Canyon soooooo perfectly!! Cheers!! (I know it will be a life-changing experience!!)
Sitting in my back yard in North Texas on a hot summer's eve listening to the Grand Canyon Suite. Love this music.
i KNEW THIS SUITE WHEN I WAS 15 YEARS OLD (NOW I AM 59). IT WAS RECORDED 2 YEARS BEFORE MY BORN. SINCE THE FIRST DAY I CRY WITH ALL MY FEELINGS WHEN LISTEN THE FLUTE OF THE SUNRISE, OR THE MELODY OF ON THE TRAIL OR THE TERRIBLE STORM OF CLOUDBURST. AND ONE MONTH AGO I COULD MAKE REALITY MY DREAM OF KNOW THE GRAND CANYON. FROM ARGENTINA, MY MOST ABSOLUTLY ADMIRATION TO FERDINAND VON GROFÉ AND ALL HIS CREATION.
My Father was a music teacher. I grew up listening to Grand Canyon Suite also. A treasure.
Thanks for your words. It's really a treasure!!!
And what yo Say of The beautiful and sweet melody of "SUNSET"!!!
Thank you Leyland Kirby for introducing me to this splendid piece.
My husband and I visited the Grand Canyon in the 90's. It took our breath away due to the spectacular color ranges.
Goddamn, the Philadelphia Orchestra, particularly in music like this, was spectacular.
Known for their great string section especially.
Un gran regalo para la Vista y el oido😊
This is the recording I heard as a child. That photo of the Grand Canyon haunts me to this day. Like a painting. That and the opening movement, "Sunrise," are enough to bring me to tears. This is a peerless recording of Grofe's masterpiece.
My mother loves On the Trail(stepped of horses or donkies) very beautiful thank you 17 Dec 2019
I haven't listened to this since I was a teen on my record player! Oh, thank you! I am no longer a teen, but still loved the donkeys and the storm!
I love this work and am, certainly, partial to the Philadelphia Orchestra, which I consider a "National Treasure"!
Sunrise - 0:00
Painted Desert - 5:10
On the Trail - 10:34
Sunset - 17:50
Cloudburst - 22:14
I had old Toscanini's recording of this with the NBC Orch. Arturo was normally a no-nonsense guy, but I guess he thought this piece was okay.
Nobody is gonna mention Everywhere at the end of time
@@The_forgotten_two810shut up
This was one of my Go To albums when I a teenager. I just marveled at the way Ferde Grofé captured every part of the day in that mighty canyon. "On The Trail" was my favorite section. It's so nice to have the opportunity hear it in its entirety.
same
This is even MORE beautiful now, 60 years after first hearing this magic!!
tears......and more tears 🌹
Been in and at the bottom of Grand Canyon many times.
Grofe did WELL to capture it’s own heaven 🌟
One of my favourite classical works
Went to sleep every night to this when i was 5 or 6 yrs old,..its like a time capsule for me nearly 50 years later.....thanks so much !
I did too - honestly I think it contributed to my creativity and my imagination. As others have posted, I would and could, listen to this endlessly. It took me away, out of a city in Southern California, to somewhere else, the wilderness, the desert, the wide open spaces. A masterpiece....
You wouldn't think such very young children would understand it and see and hear what the composer was saying, but they can and so did I, just slightly older than you were. And it's a time capsule for me, too, I badly need.
YES! Me too. Just found this- almost in tears(joy!)
My folks bought this album when it came out in 1957 and I still have it. In my mind I could always picture the Grand Canyon and every scene depicted in the score. This composition is truly a language that paints a vivid picture.
Like so many others, I came here to say this was the record my parents had when I was little (this was the 70s). I listened to it often. Revisiting now after many years. Putting it on my “Alzheimer’s Happy Music” playlist for that day when I could really use a jolt of good feelings and memory.
a few of these songs are actually used in an album about alzheimer’s
@@asskicka71 Which one? The one with the burros on the trail, probs...
@@nygtheater The Caretaker - Everywhere at the End of Time. Specifically, tracks C4, D1, and D5
I have this exact album cover.... and remember playing it on my parents hi-fi record player.
This is one of the great pieces of the last century. Lovely.
First listened to this in 1972 when I was 10 in Woodland hills on my Dad new stereophonic turntable. I could choose between this, Sinatra, or Telstar. Now Im playing it on my Horn and loving that I was introduced to music.
Christmas Story introduced this to me. Thanks for that.
Oh no, a C+?!
I still have this vinyl record - grew up on it! Thanks for posting!
I do too,and it is this version. I will always love it.
Un des tout premiers disques que j'ai acheté moi-même. J'avais 15-16 ans. Je l'ai fait jouer un nombre de fois incalculable! Je l'ai encore. C'est avec cette version donc que j'ai connu cette merveilleuse musique. Je la réécoute avec grand plaisir aujourd'hui. :-)
Bienvenu à Ormandy et le Philly
Maravilhoso !!!!!! ...inspiração p montagem contemporânea de dança ....
When I was only about 8-10 years old my father built his own hi-fi system (no stereo yet) with a Heath kit and bought records of all kinds of music - this same recording was one of them. Even as just a little shaver, I couldn't believe how Grofe could paint pictures with music, listened to it over over. Glad to hear Ormandy & the Philly orchestra once more.
this is fantastic
Oh my it’s so beautiful thank you
First listened this suite in about 1987 or 1988 when I was in high school in Beijing. It was played in local radio
Thanks for uploading this masterpiece! I'd forgotten how great these old Columbia Masterworks sounded. But I'll never forget Ormandy and the Philly! This was where I learned to appreciate graphic music as a teenager.
It transports me back to 1960 when I was a freshman student at Boston College. Beautiful.
The absolute greatest performance of this wonderful suite. Ormandy felt it in his bones and loved the essence of it. It is like no other performance ever recorded.
The Toscanini with the NBC Symphony was up there with this one. I loved this as a small child, it paints a picture I could clearly see, even when about 7 or 8. For years you couldn't find recordings of Ferde Grofe anywhere, except in 2nd hand music shops or specialists ones. Friends living nearby in the 1950s, had a super Hi Fidelity setup and they would play this music loudly to demonstrate the quality. I was enthralled. Here it is again, for me and thank you so much marchan1374, it takes me back to that time, musically and nostalgically.
I remember playing this over and over again when I was 11 or 12--not long after this was released. I was transfixed by the beauty of the sound and my imagination of the sight that the music elicited. My father told me that it was not well received in Europe when it was first played. I could not imagine why anyone would not absolutely be carried away by the music as I was.
+Cathy Kelley, LOVE your comment. I did this, too. I'd turn it up, lay on the floor, close my eyes, and let the music "take me there." I absolutely LOVED this whole suite. I also loved the Mississippi Suite, too, but not as much as the GCS. Not long after Dad introduced me to this, we actually got to see the real Grand Canyon (in 1960). Only spent 1 nite there, but ... also got to see the GC and Monument Valley within the same 2 days. This was so awe-inspiring for a 9-10 yr. old kid (at that time). This music has definitely brought back to mind a happier, more simple time.
Stravinsky's Rite of Spring was also "not well received in Europe when it was first played" so it's in good company.
Maybe Europeans didn't like it because they weren't blessed with the experience of the Grand Canyon so they couldn't relate with the symbolism.
I did that too - actually with all my LPs. I used to save my money until I had enough to buy another classical album at the music store. My mother would beat the crap out of me for going "all the way down there" to buy a classical LP but I didn't care - I'd have my music. And I still have all my albums to this day. So mom, you nasty woman - I win!
Me too. My first real introduction to a classical sound and I was 10. Now Ive played it live in concert several times as a Hornist. It always emotes the fondest memories for me especially this rendition.
Very beautiful ! 👍🌝
Beautiful music of Ferde Grofé.
I visited the Grand Canyon several times and I love the Canyon - hiked down to the Colorado-River at Bright-Angel-Trail and back at South- Kaibab-Trail. And I love this great music.
Greetings from Germany. 😀
This is the recording I grew up with, I think. The best performance of "Sunrise" -- well, all of it, for me, but particularly the first movement.
Awesome amazing Trumpets ♪
I keep the Toscanini version because of its historical interest, but this is the best interpretation ever, that I've discovered. So, I have both.
I played this CD in my car as I was approaching and driving into Big Bend National Park in Texas. It was amazing.
THIS is REALLY a MASTER WORK by Ferde Grofe with The Philadelphia -SOUNDING by The Genius Eugene Ormandy!
my sister and i had a record club as young girls and she ordered this! i just loved the music and so glad to find it here today. Ormandy is the best!
Absolutely glorious!
........there is no getting around it. The greatest of "European" music, is the most fabulous "stuff"
ever dreamed up. And Germany takes the summit. But........no music is unworthy of the pleasure and insight
of listening, and dreaming. Like this charming American work. Now, if you dare.......listen to the Love-Death,
the finale to the Eroica, the Afternoon of a Faun, the sunrise from Also Sprach.............such impossible splendours !
Beyond words..............beyond Music..........beyond Life.
Music is not to be graded & compared, anymore than our children.........it's all there to partake. Jim
Great performance.
This brings back so many wonderful memories. This piece is just simply inspired. I would think Ferde's mother would have been most proud. I hope she was able to hear her son's music.
Braviiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii The Philadelphia Orchestra with Eugene Ormandy, conductor. Teleported me music by Ferde Grofé in the Grand Canyon. ~
I've never heard this before, but it reminds me a bit of Ralph Vaughan Williams. What he did for the English countryside, this does for the American countryside.
thank you for posting this! To my mind, it is the best interpretation of Grofe. Perhaps my mind is colored by this recording being the first I heard of Grofe as a child, but every other recording I have heard has left me disappointed in one aspect or another. I have the recording (as pictured) and treasure it. Sadly, hearing the music through the hiss, clicks, and pops of an absolutely worn out LP is difficult, but I still treasure it. Finding this recording today was like being reunited with a long-lost friend.
The Great American Tone Poem! 🇺🇸🏜️
Learning the violin cadenza from "on the trail" It is beautiful, but absolutely crazy.
THANK YOU. This is the recording that my mother had and we listed to it so much when I was little. Nice to be able to hear it again.
*Ferde Grofé (1892-1972)*
*Grand Canyon Suite (1929-31)*
00:01 *I. Sunrise* 🌞
05:14 *II. The Painted Desert* 🏜️
10:36 *III. On the Trail* 🌵🐴
_Andante Moderato (Violin Solo)_
12:01 _A Tempo [D] (the donkey & cowboy_
_themes)_
16:02 _celeste solo and conclusion_
17:57 *IV. Sunset* 🌅
22:20 *V. Cloudburst* ⛈️
*The Philadelphia Orchestra*
*Eugene Ormandy, conductor*
_Columbia Masterworks Stereo Recording, 1957_
Una pieza musical profundamente descriptiva de este portentoso Gran Cañón, relieve de la poderosa naturaleza, la música capta esa vida supuestamente inmóvil de este colosal relieve de la grandiosa naturaleza, gracias por este regalo.
My childhood in vinyl.
Great performance of some beautiful music!
Maybe someone can relate. My parents had this LP in 63. It had fantasia of greenslaves on one side and grand canyon suite on the other. Vaughn Williams was the conducxtor of Philadelphia orchestra. From the first time I heard (both sides) I was addicted to it. I must have played 'both sides' a million times. The LP was eventually totally worn out through my mis handling. I now play it here on you tube with my computer that has a nice sound system... Like other people here, my kids and wife think (know) I'm crazy... Seems like amny others here have had the same early exposure to this music. Has anyone heard fantasia on Greensleaves?
Yes! Meee tooo!
Hermoso. Me recuerda a mi papá que en paz descanse.
Thanks for posting---a great recording. Great solos by all the principal players and a wonderful tutti sound! It is interesting to note that this is one of the few recordings of Mel Broiles, for many years the great principal trumpeter of the Metropolitan Opera orchestra, playing principal trumpet with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He was there for just one season, 1957-58, just when this recording was made!
Broiles was fired in the middle of the season. Sam Krauss was 1st Trumpet
@@michaelmcguffey8409 Thanks for the info! However, being familiar with Krauss' sound having attended many @Philorch concerts plus owning many recordings when he was principal, it seems that the trumpet sound in "The Grand Canyon Suite" is definitely NOT Krauss!
So it's difficult to believe that the great playing heard here is not Mel Broiles!
Maybe Broiles got fired right after this recording?
And, if it's not Broiles or Krauss, who else might it be?
Thank you for posting and favorable comments. My father recorded this album. He was in charge of remote operations for Columbia from 1956-71 He also went down the canyon, on the mules with a portable tape recorder for the Johnny Cash album.I know he is listening along with Miestros Ormandy, Szell and Bernstein.
When we moved from Iowa to Arizona in the late fifties, GCS was mandatory listening for school kids. Our school participated in "Music Memory", an annual event to encourage children to listen carefully to classical music. Grofe was on the list along with Bizet, Mussorgsky, Tchaikovsky, etc. I've always thought that Grofé was more a jazzman. If the music teacher had known this was "jazzy", she would have rolled over in her corset.
Rolling inside your corset would be worth seeing. Seriously. A wise choice for kids to be introduced to serious music. He faded from fashion for decades and was rediscovered, like so much more recent comps. People are marvelling at what they have found, which was lost. He deserves his place along with all the others who, in their time/s were also considered vulgar, etc.etc.
This is the version I grew up with--same album cover and all!
Que versión impecable. Gracias por subirla
Comfort of this music is beyond description
The record and jacket shown have the ML number designation which was for monophonic. The version heard here is definitely in stereo and would have had the MS designation for its number. The first wide spread distribution for stereo LP's began in 1957.
I got this when I was about 12/13 after seeing Disney's short film that fitted the music to images of The Grand Canyon. I wore the record (got it from the Columbia Record Club) out playing while looking at pictures of the Canyon on my ViewMaster projector. Still have the album but its great to hear it without all the hiss and static.
Great memories!
Me Too !
I love this piece since I first heard it in Art class back in first or second grade. I have enjoyed viewing this from start to finish for several years. This year they have inserted irritating ads between each movement. Very annoying. I’d rather be forced to listen to all them ads upfront or the end as opposed to ruining the beauty of the work.
The best version of this work ever recorded. Ormandy understood Grofe, and this piece. He brought it to life like no one ever has. Technically, you could run this through a noise filter to remove the 'hiss' but then you would lose the 'breadth' of sound. That must have been a difficult decision to make, but you made the right one! Thank you!
They worry about hiss and the scratching that age and use creates, but I don't know why. To be completely hissless you need to be at the concert hall, etc., and hear something 'live'. Unless it distorts the sound, does it really matter?
Best version, best recording of this piece. Ormandy had a real feel for this while others did not.
THANKS for posting this. Finding this by Ormandy at online stores is difficult to do.
What about the toscanini's reading?
In 1957 i was 13 years old and visiting my aunt and uncle in buffalo ny. We would watch old western movies every weekday evening featuring Tom mix and hop- along Cassidy etc. On WBEN - TV and the theme of this program was this very piece of music featuring the, "on the trail section". Its still one of my favourite orchestral pieces.
For the age of the recording I am amazed at the quality of the sound.
@@j.ag.3537 Toscanini's reading is the BEST by far. Lengo67 is way off the mark. Ormandy's reading is marked with inaccurate balances, wrong notes and wrong tempi.
@@j.ag.3537 Toscanini's reading is the best ever. The composer certainly thought so.
Conservo un "microsurco" de los años sesenta y con apenas 15 años descubrí la grandiosidad de la suite del gran cañón. Esta versión de Eugène Ormandy al frente de la orquesta de Filadelfia me suena a música celestial.
Like so many others, this was in the long extinct vinyl collection of my youth. Perhaps that's why I consider it the best recording. I've heard many, many others but for me none can match this one by Ormandy & TPO.
WOW!
Just listened to Bernstein's version of this. There's no comparison; Ormandy brings out the magnificence of the music and the Grand Canyon. Bernstein sounds like he's on qualudes.
Grew up with this recording!Unsurpassed!
This is the recording I knew on my dad's hi-fi in the late 1950's. Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra had such a golden sound. By the way, has anyone ever compared this piece to the much earlier tone poem by Borodin "In the Steppes of Central Asia".? They share many features: the high harmonic chords in the strings in the introduction, the walking hoofbeats, the basic shape of the first main theme. Perhaps this is well known but I've never heard anyone else make the observation.
He oído varias versiones y ésta es la que más me gusta.
Bonita musica
This was one of my first introductions to classical music, my Dad used to play this same recording
me too
Es una de les realitzacions més acurades i nitides de la gran instrumentació de la Suite
I *do* like his addition of a thunder sheet near the end of the thunderstorm, an instrument not included in the original score.
When I was six years old in 1959 I'd drag my friends into my bedroom and try to make them listen to the Grand Canyon Suite.
Fere Groff also wrote one called the Death Valley Suite.
This is a very good piece by Grofe, who was an the extremely prolific composer. It was by far his best known work, but he wrote a lot more. Besides Ormandy and the Phila. Orch., it was also recorded by Toscanini and the NBC Symphony. They played it at Carnegie Hall with the composer present. Also recorded by Bernstein and the NY Phil. and Grofe himself with the Rochester Phil., as well as Antal Dorati, Erich Kunzel, Howard Hanson, Morton Gould, Gerard Schwartz and several others. See the list of pieces by Grofe here: th-cam.com/video/Xe7wC-HG6RQ/w-d-xo.html
I had an LP of this, paired with the Mississippi Suite. Grofe was an arranger for Paul Whitman.
Michael Schneider, I can't reply to your question and you'll probably never see this but I have this LP and side 2 is the Sunset and Cloudburst movements. This was the first version I heard when I was child and still my favorite, although the Bernstein version is also quite good.
I wish the youth of today were exposed to this music. I grew up with it playing on my Hi Fi and my young sons were exposed to it but maybe not impressed. I had this on Vinyl in 1958 but sadly my record collection is now gone. My grandchildren get annoyed with me when I play music at performance volume and rush to turn the volume down. They are so used to hearing their music on a phone or other modern devise they have no understanding of real orchestra sound.
Me too
Lock the kid's phones in a box when they're there, strap them to chairs and force them to listen ala Clockwork Orange.
That's sad. Have you considered a good set of studio headphones? Preferably closed not over the ear nor ear buds. Sennheiser, Sony and Bose makes some good headphones
Good luck consider studio quality headphones.
Si ..La original Eugene Ormandy
Reading the Book JACKIE… I read she had this preformed at the White House. So I wanted to hear it… crazy how I can feel or put myself there and visualize the time. Ahe qas re-decorating the White House of course. This beautiful piece must have inspired her!
JACKIE Public, Private Secret book
A masterpiece of American classical music. Used by Walt Disney in hishis Grand Canyon documentary,
A nice version. This is a piece of music that needs a very good balance between all players and sections, which probably
is the reason many a recording sounds somewhat rough around the edges. The opening part (Sunrise) in this version is for instance more disciplined and less "all over the place" then Bernstein's rendition. Pity for that miss in the trumpets at it's very end though. Sounds like someone went for the final outburst a few measures to soon (4:57 min). :-)
LOL and I thought I was the only one who caught that! Ormandy knew how to keep them in line, that's for sure.
Yes, before the age of digital recording minor errors, such as noted, were often kept "in" as opposed to going the expense of rerecording. Nowadays, an audible error can be easily "fixed" in the recording booth!
The last movement always sounds to me like Richard Strauss in Arizona.
Here's a question for all of you who were amazed that this was still out there.he album had the Grand Canyon suite,but what was the other side.God if you know please tell me,it's driving me crazy. All I can remember was that the music while not a copying effort,but it was of the same power up and calms.
I hope you enjoyed the suite,I hadn't heard it in years so when I saw the original sleeve for the album,I thought if anyone would remember it would be those who liked this particular recording.
Side two contained, 1 Sunset 2 Cloudburst.