Today I had the pleasure of attending a Philadelphia Orchestra concert. I haven’t done that in years.  My  mom and I were guests of an old, old, friend who is married to the guest conductor in town for two weekends of concerts. It was a pleasure to sit in the Verizon Concert Hall at the Kimmel Center and enjoy the Philadelphia Orchestra and its classic “Philadelphia Sound.”  It got me thinking. First of all, it reminded me how much I like orchestral music and missed attending concerts.  I must give the New World Symphony in Miami Beach its due, for their affordable concerts and outdoor wallcasts made the orchestra very accessible and easy to engage with. But back to Philadelphia… I started to wonder, just what is the “Philadelphia Sound?”

I asked Barbara, our host, if she could hear the difference among orchestras.  I referenced the famed Philadelphia Sound – and she said she definitely could hear the differences.  I asked because I think I can hear the lush sound of the orchestra, but am not sure I could differentiate the Philly orchestra from anywhere else.  But Barbara assured me that there is indeed a difference.  So what is it? 

With but a little research I came up with two components.  First, somewhere between conductors Leopold Stokowski and Eugene Ormandy a huge emphasis was put on the string section -- From size alone to emphasis on free bowing and a loose and informal but passionate approach to the music.  Then there’s the notion that it was the lack of good acoustics in the famed Academy of Music, the original home of the orchestra, that encouraged orchestra members to dig into their instruments in order to produce a sound that would reach the audience members.  Whatever brought it about, the rich, often described as voluptuous sound of the Philadelphia Orchestra is more than pleasing to these ears.

Once I stopped focusing on the sound and just let it wash over me, I started looking more closely at the musicians themselves.  They were seated in a way I have never seen before.  If you’re looking at the orchestra, first violins were on the left, then cellos, then violas and finally the second violins were on the far right.  Huh.  Did the conductor do that or is that how the orchestra sits now.  The conductor.  It seems that this is how orchestras used to sit in the 19^th century.  Which brings us back to Stokowski.  It seems that he might have been one of the first, in Philadelphia anyway, to change the seating for the more conventional arrangement we are more used to today.  He preferred it for his recordings of which he was a pioneer.  Cool.  Very cool.

The Orchestra's first recordings were made in Camden, New Jersey, in 1917, when Leopold Stokowski conducted performances of two of Brahms's Hungarian Dances for the Victor Talking Machine Company. The historic first electrical recordings were also made in Camden, in April 1925, beginning with Saint-Saëns' Danse Macabre. Then, in 1926, Victor began recording the Orchestra in the Academy of Music. Stokowski led them in experimental long-playing, high-fidelity, and even stereophonic sessions in the early 1930s for RCA Victor and Bell Laboratories. They recorded the soundtrack for Walt Disney's Fantasia in multi-track stereophonic sound in 1939-40.

My dad had a recording, a 78 rpm, I think, on which you could hear Stokowski singing along while he conducted. I wonder what happened to that record?

I credit my parents for my love of classical music, or at least my exposure to it.  I was lucky enough to grow up during the Ormandy years.  During high school, we were offered free tickets to the Friday afternoon concerts.  We climbed to the very top of the Academy, four floors up to the amphitheatre. There we were witness, mostly unbeknownst to us, to some of the best musicians and music ever to grace the orchestral stage.  Today reminded me of all of that and more.  So thank you Barbara and Gloria.  Thank you mom and dad and Girls’ High.  Thank you Philadelphia Orchestra and your signature Philadelphia Sound.  It’s one more reason to be happy to be back in Philadelphia.