Adagio for Strings. First performance by Toscanini - Record SIGNED AND INSCRIBED TO THE DEDICATEE OF THE PIANO CONCERTO

Rare privately issued gramophone recording of the world premiere broadcast by Arturo Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra of the orchestral version of Samuel Barber's Adagio for strings (May 11th, 1938), this being Barber's personal copy, identified in Barber's hand on one side "ADAGIO FOR STRINGS / First performance by Toscanini" and inscribed on the verso "to my dear Manfred in remembrance of Capricorn--Oct '58, Sam."


From the collection of Manfred Ibel, "a young German art student and amateur flute player to whom Barber dedicated the piano concerto. Because from the early 1950s Menotti was drawn more and more into the public arena and the demands of his and Barber’s professional lives limited their time together, Barber welcomed having an available companion with whom he could travel and talk about music and literature. What seemed to draw him to the charismatic Ibel was their 'mutual affinity for the spirit of German Romanticism and culture.' During the summer of 1959 they shared a house on Martha’s Vineyard, and it was at this time Barber wrote the song for flute and piano, Elegy, that in 1962 he orchestrated for the second movement of his piano concerto." (Barbara Heyman, notes for the "Barber & Britten, Music + Festival" October, 2013, University of Arizona)


One of the most recognizable pieces of American concert music, the Adagio for Strings is Barber's most well known work. His arrangement for string orchestra from the second movement of his String Quartet, Op. 11 was completed in 1936, the same year as the Quartet, and was performed for the first time in 1938, in a radio broadcast from a New York studio attended by an invited audience, conducted by Arturo Toscanini, who also took the piece on tour to Europe and South America. Its reception was generally positive, with Alexander J. Morin writing that Adagio for Strings is "full of pathos and cathartic passion" and that it "rarely leaves a dry eye." (11238)

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Signed Document/Item

Classical Music

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