By asking Laszlo Halasz to join Remington Records as Recording Director, in 1952, after Edward Kilenyi had left for Florida, Don Gabor brought the classical catalog to a higher level. Gabor always had excellent contacts with artists of ethnic popular music, and with local jazz musicians. Through conductor Laszlo Halasz, Gabor had access to many more artists and musicians, orchestras of quality, and conductors. One of the conductors was the eminent Thor Johnson in Cincinnati.

 

In 1947 Thor Johnson had become music director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, a quality ensemble, disciplined in the classical repertory and also in the music of modern composers. Thanks to the new conductor, the orchestra's signature was becoming more modern than it had been before under Fritz Reiner and Eugene Goossens. Now under Thor Johnson the Cincinnati Symphony not only performed existing compositions of many a modern American composer, but Thor Johnson did commission many works himself to be premiered by the orchestra. The current website of the orchestra states that during his 11 years in Cincinnati, Johnson conducted the premieres of 120 American and European works, half of which were commissioned by him!

The liner notes of Remington R-199-168 with Antonin Dvorak's Symphony No. 4 (No. 8) from 1953 read:

Thor Johnson of course did inherit from his predecessors a well trained ensemble, but by the very nature of his character, he continued to improve and perfect the playing of the orchestra. He was a good organizer and leader, two assets which a conductor needs. Practically every recording of the orchestra under his baton is the sonic realization of a precise concept. It is probably this strictness and seriousness which Sergei Koussevitzky did like less if compared to the more playful, "musical" attitude of a Leonard Bernstein; Thor Johnson was picked on by Koussevitzky during a course in 1940. True, in Johnson's performances beauty for the sake of beauty is in conflict with the organization of the execution of the music. In his music making beauty stands for construction, for architecture and dynamics. Nevertheless a great intuitive feeling can be noticed at times.
All these qualities made him not only a good classical conductor but rather the man to perform often complicated modern scores as his discography shows.

Picture edited by R.A.B., taken from the cover of Remington R-199-168.

Thor Martin Johnson was born in Wisconsin Rapids (Wisconsin) on June 10th, 1913 in a religious family. His father, Herbert Bernharth Johnson, was of Norwegian descent. He was minister of the Moravian church which originated in that part of Europe what is the Czech republic today. His mother, Anna Josephine Reussnig, was born in a family of German immigrants. When Thor was seven years old his parents took him to a concert of violinist Efraim Zimbalist. This left a great impression on the kid as the day after the concert he was imitating the violinist and taking his bow before an imaginary audience. By the time he was 13 he conducted a choral group and a few years later small ensembles when studying at the University of North Carolina (UNC) and later at the Universitty of Michigan.

In June 1936 he traveled to Europe to attend courses at the Mozarteum in Salzburg and later in Vienna given by Bruno Walter, and courses by Nikolai Malko (Prague), Bernhard Paumgartner (Salzburg), and Felix Weingartner (Vienna). Thor decided to study for a longer period with Malko and spent several months studying in Prague, early in 1937.

All these famous names were investing in the younger generation by giving instruction for hours at length. Also significant was attending performances by Arturo Toscanini, Volkmar Andreae, and Max Reinhardt. He met Eugene Ormandy during the Salzburg Mozarteum Festival, and Max Reinhard in person. Ormandy was conductor of the Minneapolis Symphony at the time. When following courses in Leipzig with Herman Abendroth, 23 year old Thor also met with Richard Strauss. In Budapest he met the great Béla Bartók. When Thor visited the Ferenc Liszt Conservatory he was introduced to the head of the academy, Ernö Dohnányi, who asked him about the reception of his compositions in the USA.
The many teachings he received from these great names in music, before the Second World War broke out, must have impressed the young student. Traveling to Europe, in fact to the region where his religious beliefs found their origin, is of significance too.

In a letter to his parents Johnson described the prewar situation in Austria:

And another witness, Kitty Werthmann, an Austrian World War II survivor, explained that there was 30 percent unemployment, 25 percent inflation, 25 percent interest on loans. There were winers in the streets and housing blocks had been burned down obviously by lack of funds to repair or to rebuild. All because of the reparations payments Austria had to make after loosing World War I.

Johnson returned home to conduct the North Carolina Symphony Orchestra. He went to Chicago to teach at the University of Michgan and led a variety of orchestras and bands, a.o. TheWorld Youth Orchestra. In 1940 he took up the post of conductor of the Grand Rapids Symphony, but after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, he (like so many other musicians) left the orchestra and enlisted in the US army in 1942 where he became a band leader and performed with pianist Eugene List and Australian composer/pianist Percy Grainger. They also had enlisted.

On leave one day he visited Eugene Ormandy, now conductor of the Philadelphia Orchestra. Arturo Toscanini was not well to conduct a planned concert and Ormandy proposed that Thor Johnson would conduct the program which listed Symphony No. 5 of Jean Sibelius, and Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto Op. 23 which he performed with pianist Eugene List. As army band leader he was eventually sent to Great Britain. There he had the opportunity to meet with important people from the music scene there.

When after World War Two things were gradually getting back to normal, Thor Johnson was offered the post of music director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra which he accepted in 1947, a post which he held for more than ten years, until 1958.
From 1967 until his death in 1975 he was music director of the Nashville Symphony Orchestra.
Johnson was a man of discipline and he also was a man of faith. He founded the Peninsula Music Festival and led the Moravian Music Festivals. He did so for the first time in 1950 and for the last time in the summer of 1974, the season prior to his death.

When he became music director of the Cincinnati Symphony, he was announced as "the youngest native born American to lead a major American orchestra". This fact may have incited English Decca through their American branch, London Records, to make recordings with this relative young conductor and the orchestra of Cincinnati which had of course a great reputation. This resulted in the recordings of five works with which his discography begins.

London LL 405/Decca LXT 2604 - Johann Christian Bach: Sinfonia, coupled with Franz Schubert's Third Symphony (1951). Schubert's 3rd was later also available on a 10" Decca LW5328.

London LL 406/Decca LXT 2630 - Alfven: Midsommervaka, coupled with Sigurd Jorsalvar by Edward Grieg (1951). Sigurd Jorsalfar was reissued on a 10" Decca LW 5124 in 1954.

London 5355/Decca LXT 2605 - Berlioz: Nuits d'été, with Suzanne Danco (released in the nineteen nineties on CD together with recordings by Ernest Ansermet entitled "French Vocal Music").

The recording project was probably not what the sales department had in mind and by the time conductor Laszlo Halasz had joined Remington Records as Recording Director, Johnson and his orchestra were free to record for Don Gabor. The knowledge Laszlo Halasz had not only about music but about the American and European music scenes was a great asset for the Remington label and by the cooperation with the ACA, American Composers Association, Remington Records could gain in importance. In this context the choice for Thor Johnson and his orchestra was a logical consequence. Both Halasz, Gabor and Johnson may have conferred and made suggestions for the repertory to be recorded.

Thor Johnson's Remington recordings (1953-1954):

R-199-168 - Antonin Dvorak: Symphony No. 4 (8) in G Major Op. 88.

Click here for a Sound Clip of the Second Movement of Dvorak's 4th (8th) Symphony conducted by Thor Johnson recorded with the Cincinnati Symphony in 1953.

R-199-173 - Ulysses Kay: Concerto for Orchestra. Norman Lockwood: Concerto for Organ and Brasses; Quiet Design.
Marilyn Mason (Organ), brass ensemble, Thor Johnson conducting. Recorded in St. Paul's Chapel, Columbia University.

Photograph by Frank Donato.

Alfred Frankenstein reviewed this Remington release in High Fidelity, July, 1954:

Ulysses Kay's Concerto for Orchestra is a robuts, vivid, intensely polyphonic composition that fills one's ear, entraps one's mind, and lifts one's spirits in a fashion not unlike that of Hindemith, with whom this composer has studied. Norman Lockwood's Concerto for Organ and Brasses is a bold, monumental baroque inspired work written in honor of the celebrated organist, E. Power Biggs, and well worthy of the purpose for which it was created.The Lockwood side is filled with a Quiet Design for organ solo composed expressly with the concerto on this record. The Kay performance is excellent and the Lockwood performance is superb; both recordings are first rate, with sonorous organ and clangerous brasses. - Alfred Frankenstein, High Fidelity, July, 1954.

R-199-182 - Sergei Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 2 with pianist Jorge Bolet (reissued in 1974 in simulated stereo on Turnabout TV-S 34543).

R-199-184 - George Gershwin: Concerto in F with pianist Alec Templeton.
Johnson's leading the orchestra in Gershwin's Concerto in F played by pianist Alec Templeton has style and the structure is well balanced, this certainly also being the result of the chemistry between Templeton and Johnson.

That things could be different is illustrated by the performances of Oscar Levant with Thor Johnson given in Chicago Orchestra Hall in the 1952-53 season. Tchaikovsky's First and Gershwin's Concerto in F were on the program. There was no rehearsal time and Oscar Levant complained that Johnson's tempi were too fast. At the end of the Tchaikovsky, irritated Levant dragged Johnson with such a firm hand to the grand piano in front of the stage that Thor Johnson almost fell face flat on the stage.
Afterwards critic Irvin Sablosky reported in the Chicago Times that the Cincinnati Orchestra "is not a good orchestra. Thor Johnson is not a very good conductor." Another critic wrote that Johnson did not have the feeling for Gershwin's music. It must be said however that R-199-184 with the recording of Gershwin's Concerto in F clearly demonstrates the opposite.
The ill behavior of Oscar Levant resulted in a letter from the Union to Columbia Records who managed Levant, to forbid Oscar Levant to perform again with whatever orchestra, because Levant did not honor contracts.

R-199-185 - Robert Ward: Third Symphony; Leon Stein: Three Hassidic Dances.
The record was reviewed in High Fidelity Magazine, August 1955 edition, by Alfred Frankenstein.

It is also interesting to read what Warren DeMotte wrote about Ward's Symphony.

R-199-187 - Peter Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 2.
It is true that Thor Johnson had his own style. In a review from 1955 the recording of Tchaikovsky's Second Symphony was compared to the performance by Sir Thomas Beecham released on Columbia (USA and Great Britain), and on Philips A 01130 L (Europe). However the reviewer preferred the pace of Johnson rather than the slow tempi of Beecham. Only in the Andantino Johnson's concept did not work too well.
Another trait of Thor Johnson - so the reviewer noted - was that he could make climaxes and tutti sound rather loud. Nevertheless the technical quality of the Remington recording was judged the equal of the Columbia/Philips Minigroove with Beecham in those early mono days.

R-199-188 - Henry Brant: Concerto for Alto Saxophone. Sigurd Rascher, saxophone (coupled with Glanville-Hicks: Gymnopedies 1, 2 and 3; Rudhyar: Sinfonietta; performed by the RIAS Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jonel Perlea).

The recordings of works by Ward, Stein, Brant (and of course those of Glanville-Hicks and Rudhyar led by Jonel Perlea) were all done in cooperation with the American Composer's Alliance (ACA). It is not sure who came up with the idea to make recordings of modern music, Halasz, Gabor or Johnson, but in view of Johnson's interest it is suspected that he proposed to record from the vast reservoir of compositions of modern American composers.
The cooperation with the ACA resulted in a few more records in the Remington catalog of modern American music, performed by other artists, like the Musirama edition of Ulysses Kay's Concerto for orchestra and Concerto for Organ and Brass, Lockwood's Quiet design (organ solo), cello music of Harrison Kerr, and violin music of Otto Luening.

In this context of making recordings in cooperation with ACA there was a unique recording made in Berlin of String Quartet No. 1 composed by John W. Freeman (reviewer of Opera News and author of many liner notes). It was performed by the Koeckert Quartet (Rudolf Koeckert, Willi Büchner, Oskar Riedl and Josef Merz). The Koeckert Quartet recorded for Deutsche Grammophon and the name Koeckert was therefor not mentioned in the original documents from 1954. So the name of violinist Klaus Schlupp was borrowed for the occasion. However Freeman's Quartet was never issued on a Remington disc. The tape was found and selected by Tom Null and issued on Varèse-Sarabande VC 81046.

Unfortunately the cooperation between Remington and ACA (and Thor Johnson for that matter) was not continued. When Remington Records ceased to exist, Composers Recordings Inc. from New York continued making recordings of modern American music. One of the releases was CRI 122 with works performed at the Peninsula Music Festival in Fish Creek, Wisconsin, in 1957, with music of four composers:

* Hungarian Set for Strings and Celeste by Irvin Fischer who had studied with Zoltan Kodaly in Budapest in 1936.
* Concerto for Trumpet and Strings, Op. 8 by Robert Nagel.
* Landscapes by Chou Wen-Chung who initially studied to be an engineer but later studied composition and devoted himself completely to music.
* Concerto for Flute, Clarinet, Bassoon, String Quartet and String Orchestra by John Lessard who, like Hine Arthur Brown and many other Americans studied at one time with Nadia Boulanger in Paris.

Members of the Helsinki University Chorus in front of Cincinnati's Music Hall in November 1953, while taking a break during the rehearsals of the recording of works by Jean Sibelius.
Image courtesy The Helsinki University Chorus - Ylioppilaskunnan Laulajat - edited by R.A.B.

R-199-191 - Jean Sibelius: The Origin of Fire with the Helsinki University Chorus and soloist Sulus Saarits, baritone, and Pohjola’s Daughter, Op. 49 (coupled with Glazunov's Violin Concerto, played by André Gabriel (Roman Totenberg) with the RIAS Symphony Orchestra conducted by Georg Ludwig Jochum).
The Sibelius recordings were issued for the first time in stereo by Tom Null on Varèse-Sarabande VC 81941. See The Remington Series.

Conductor Thor Johnson and baritone Sulus Saarits.
Image courtesy The Helsinki University Chorus - Ylioppilaskunnan Laulajat - edited by R.A.B.

"The Origin of Fire" was in good hands with Thor Johnson leading the musicians of Cincinnati and the Helsinki University Chorus. Thor Johnson was a great admirer of the music of Jean Sibelius. When two years earlier, in 1951, a festival was scheduled in Helsinki devoted entirely to the music of Sibelius, Thor Johnson flew to Finland to attend the seven concerts. But Jean Sibelius himself was not present, this to the disappointment of Johnson. Luckily he met Mrs. Eva Palleheimo, oldest daughter of Sibelius, and met with Sibelius. He was also introduced to Mrs. Jussi Jalas, youngest sister of Eva Palleheimo and wife of conductor Jussi Jalas (who also recorded for Remington conducting the RIAS Symphony). In a telephone conversation with their father the daughters arranged that Thor Johnson would join them and their children to visit Jean Sibelius to say goodbye for the summer. That was one of Johnson's most cherished encounters.

Johnson commissioned many compositions. For example: Lord of the Ascendant (Ellis B. Kohs; 1955). Henry Cowell wrote Variations for Orchestra for Thor Johnson and his orchestra (1956, revised in 1959). Johnson commissioned and first performed T.J. Anderson's Chamber Symphony with the Nashville Chamber Orchestra (1969). Ulysses Simpson Kay wrote the overture "Of New Horizons", commissioned already in 1944 by Thor Johnson.
Johnson himself arranged Georg Frederick Handel's Music for the Royal Firework.
He gave the first performance of William Schuman's Credendum-Article of Faith (1955) and with the Cincinnati Symphony in 1951 the American premiere of Schoenberg's Gurrelieder, not sung in English as Schoenberg had asked, but in the original German text.

When rehearsing with cellist Zara Nelzova in November 1974, all of a sudden Thor Johnson had difficulty turning the pages. On December 8, 1974, a brain tumor was diagnosed which was operated upon on December 24. But Thor Johnson never regained strength and mental alertness. On January 16, 1975, he passed away. On the same evening it was Thomas Schippers who conducted in memory of Thor Johnson a Bruckner Mass which Johnson himself had planned and prepared with the orchestra.

Page written by Rudolf A. Bruil and first published in March 2004. (c) Rudolf A. Bruil

Data about Thor Johnson's studies in Europe, the period prior to his appointment in Cincinnati, the Oscar Levant incident, and his visit to Finland can be found in "Thor Johnson - American Conductor" written by Louis Nicholas, published in 1982 by The Music Festival Committee of the Peninsula Arts Association, Ephraim, Wisconsin.

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