Ritual Dance of the Young Zappa

Andre, , ,

CAL 110 (sleeve front)

At a young age, Zappa bought a copy of The Rite of Spring and loved every note:

The second 33 1/3-RPM record I bought was by Stravinsky. I found a budget-line recording (on Camden) of The Rite of Spring by something called ‘The World-Wide Symphony Orchestra.’ (Sounds pretty official, eh?) The cover was a green-and-black abstract whatchamacallit, and it had a magenta paper label with black lettering. I loved Stravinsky almost as much as Varèse.[1]

Much of my research relies primary sources. Lyrics, liner notes, bootlegs, interviews, and The Real Frank Zappa Book (FZ’s autobiography) make up the bulk of these sources. Along these lines, Avo Raup’s fantastic website Zappa Books–with its search-able database of interviews and zine articles–and Román García Albertos’ IINK (Information Is Not Knowledge)–a huge, cross-referenced database of lyrics and other album information–have been a tremendously helpful resources. But occasionally, I need to get right to the source. Such was the case with finding Zappa’s copy of Stavinsky’s The Rite of Spring.

In my current chapter (which examines cases of musical borrowings from Stravinsky in Zappa’s music), I make the argument that much of Zappa’s understanding of Stravinsky is influenced by the mythology surrounding the older composer. I wondered if there might be any juicy details on the liner notes that would provide some insight regarding the idiosyncrasies with which Zappa viewed Stravinsky. Armed with Zappa’s description I set out to find a copy of the same record…

As it turns out, Camden was a budget label for RCA Victor records, first introduced in 1955 (right about when Zappa would have been buying the record). Some quick Googling revealed that the Camden catalog did include a recording of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring! (I express surprise here due to prior aggravations brought on by tracing comments from The Real Frank Zappa Book…) CAL 110 features World Wide Symphony Orchestra performing The Rite!

341995093_7aa83c50f9The RCA Building in Camden, NJ
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ebot/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Further research revealed some interesting facts about the record. The World Wide Symphony Orchestra, it seems, was a pseudonym for the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra. This particular record (CAL 110) was actually dubbed from 78 rpm discs of another recording by the SFSO conducted by Pierre Monteux. (Monteux, like the SFSO, isn’t mentioned anywhere on the record. Presumably, the motivation here was to re-release a back catalog of 78 rpm records in a more commercially-viable format using pseudonyms to avoid conflicting with sales of newer recordings of the same artists. It was, as Frank would say, strictly commercial.)

3359562292_d1a7096d70The Théâtre des Champs-Élysées
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kerolic/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Monteux, as any responsible Stravinsky scholar will jump to tell you, premiered The Rite at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris in 1915 1913 (noted, of course, for the riot it incited). Zappa doesn’t seem to have been aware that his record featured such a prestigious conductor.

And–lucky me–a quick WorldCat search found a copy of the record at UC Santa Cruz! (Which means I could request it and get my grubby hands on it right quick.) This turned out to be a little more difficult that expected (frustrations with an inefficient interlibrary loan system), but the record arrived yesterday! Green-and-black abstract whatchamacallit and all!

Unfortunately, being the budget label that it was, Camden seems to have cut costs by not including liner notes. Oh well… The adventure wasn’t a total bust. I got to listen to the record and pretend to be a young Zappa listening to “The Augers” for the first time.

I snuck off to a remote corner of the library and took a few pictures of the record as well. You can see where some helpful librarian has scratched out “World Wide” and entered the correct performer data. (I would have ripped the vinyl to mp3s, but it was “in library use only.”) Here are some scans of the sleeve and label. Enjoy!

CAL 110 (sleeve front)CAL 110 (sleeve back)

CAL 110 (side A)CAL 110 (side B)

The first record Zappa bought, by the way, was The Complete Works of Edgard Varèse, Vol. I (EMS 401). And if Zappa played the Stravinsky as much as he played the Varèse, this disc got a lot of attention. (By one account, Zappa claimed to have listened to The Rite of Spring more than “any man in the world”![2])

References:
[1] Frank Zappa and Peter Occhiogrosso, The Real Frank Zappa Book (New York: Poseidon Press, 1989), 34.
[2] Rip Rense, “A Unique Musical Force or Blasphemous Freak: Which Is Frank Zappa?,” The Valley News (June 27, 1976).
Ritual Dance of the Young Zappa

47,791 thoughts on “Ritual Dance of the Young Zappa”

  2. nike air max 95 2011

    Hello there, just became alert to your blog through Google, and found that it is really informative. I am gonna watch out for brussels. I’ll appreciate if you continue this in future. Numerous people will be benefited from your writing. Cheers!

  5. nike air force numero 34

    Someone necessarily lend a hand to make critically articles I might state. This is the very first time I frequented your website page and up to now? I amazed with the analysis you made to make this actual publish extraordinary. Fantastic job!

  7. (GF105) Nike Roshe Run Sport Red Cool Grey Sail Deals

    Oh my goodness! Awesome article dude! Thank you so much, However I am encountering difficulties with your RSS. I don’t understand the reason why I can’t join it. Is there anybody having the same RSS issues? Anyone that knows the solution can you kind…

  8. gafas ray ban wayfarer zonnebril

    I seriously love your website.. Great colors & theme. Did you create this amazing site yourself? Please reply back as I’m wanting to create my own personal blog and would love to know where you got this from or just what the theme is called. Many than…

  13. ray ban 3025 aviator 002/3f

    Thanks for some other excellent post. Where else may just anybody get that kind of information in such a perfect way of writing? I have a presentation next week, and I am on the look for such info.

  14. ray ban rb 4140 keyhole wayfarer sunglasses

    of course like your website however you need to test the spelling on several of your posts. Several of them are rife with spelling problems and I to find it very troublesome to inform the truth nevertheless I will definitely come again again.

  17. oakley romeo 1

    First off I want to say great blog! I had a quick question in which I’d like to ask if you don’t mind. I was curious to find out how you center yourself and clear your thoughts prior to writing. I’ve had a tough time clearing my thoughts in getting…

  30. vans era 59 azul comprar

    I’ve learn several just right stuff here. Certainly price bookmarking for revisiting. I wonder how so much effort you set to create this sort of magnificent informative web site.

  31. oakley yellow sunglasses

    It’s a shame you don’t have a donate button! I’d most certainly donate to this brilliant blog! I suppose for now i’ll settle for bookmarking and adding your RSS feed to my Google account. I look forward to new updates and will talk about this site…

  49. oakley radarlock fire iridium polarized

    Nice post. I was checking constantly this blog and I am impressed! Extremely helpful information specifically the last part 🙂 I care for such information a lot. I was looking for this particular info for a very long time. Thank you and best of luck.

Comments are closed.