Uploaded May 2018 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
The Slumber Boat
Alice C. D. Riley (author)
Jessie L. Gaynor (composer)
Josef Pasternack (conductor)
Recorded: January 10, 1918 (take 5) Camden, New Jersey
Hey Balu
Robert Schumann (composer)
Robert Burns (author)
Josef Pasternack (conductor)
Recorded: January 10, 1918 (take 5) Camden, New Jersey
Discography of American Historical Recordings:
https://adp.library.ucsb.edu
The following is from the 2015 Holdridge Record Auction Catalog, Musical Courier, University of Michigan, and Ancestry.com:
LAURA COMSTOCK LITTLEFIELD (soprano): 1882, Malden, MA - 1941, Durham, NC (en route to Florida). A graduate of Radcliffe College in 1904, among the artists likely to be completely forgotten today had she not recorded, Mrs. Littlefield was a gifted concert soprano heard in the Boston area in the ‘teens to the mid- ‘20s of the last century. She had been a soloist with the Boston Symphony, the Händel and Haydn Society, the Cecilia Society of Boston and with various festivals in New England. In addition she frequently gave recitals, one in Aeolian Hall in New York, 1925, eliciting extraordinary praise from critic W. J. Henderson. In the November 9, 1922 edition of Musical Courier (page 33), the magazine announces her return to the United States from Europe, where she had studied with Jean De Reszke, Mrs. Littlefield describing the noted tenor as "an inspiration from the moment you enter the door until you leave." From 1930 - 1934 Mrs. Littlefield was assistant Professor of Music at the University of Michigan.
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The Slumber Boat
Alice C. D. Riley (author)
Jessie L. Gaynor (composer)
Josef Pasternack (conductor)
Recorded: January 10, 1918 (take 5) Camden, New Jersey
Hey Balu
Robert Schumann (composer)
Robert Burns (author)
Josef Pasternack (conductor)
Recorded: January 10, 1918 (take 5) Camden, New Jersey
Discography of American Historical Recordings:
https://adp.library.ucsb.edu
The following is from the 2015 Holdridge Record Auction Catalog, Musical Courier, University of Michigan, and Ancestry.com:
LAURA COMSTOCK LITTLEFIELD (soprano): 1882, Malden, MA - 1941, Durham, NC (en route to Florida). A graduate of Radcliffe College in 1904, among the artists likely to be completely forgotten today had she not recorded, Mrs. Littlefield was a gifted concert soprano heard in the Boston area in the ‘teens to the mid- ‘20s of the last century. She had been a soloist with the Boston Symphony, the Händel and Haydn Society, the Cecilia Society of Boston and with various festivals in New England. In addition she frequently gave recitals, one in Aeolian Hall in New York, 1925, eliciting extraordinary praise from critic W. J. Henderson. In the November 9, 1922 edition of Musical Courier (page 33), the magazine announces her return to the United States from Europe, where she had studied with Jean De Reszke, Mrs. Littlefield describing the noted tenor as "an inspiration from the moment you enter the door until you leave." From 1930 - 1934 Mrs. Littlefield was assistant Professor of Music at the University of Michigan.
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![Tenor Ben DAVIES: A Spring Night; I Attempt From Loves Sickness To Fly (1924)
Tenor Ben Davies (1858-1943)
A Spring Night (Schumann) I Attempt From Loves Sickness To Fly from The Indian Queen (Purcell, Arr. W. H. Cummings)
Recorded: 1924
The Gramophone advertisement is from The Observer (London, Greater London, England), Sunday, January 6, 1924 (page 7)
Ben Davies (6 January 1858 – 28 March 1943): Welsh tenor singer who appeared with the Carl Rosa Opera Company, in operetta and light opera, and on the concert and oratorio platform. He was spoken of as a successor of Edward Lloyd as a leading British tenor and retained something of his style and repertoire in concert performance. The earliest recordings by Davies are Pathé brown wax cylinders from the mid-1890s. Davies had an early start among British singers in making gramophone records, beginning in 1901. Joe Batten noted: Sir Landon Ronald persuaded [him] to make his first records. He had laughed at the idea of singing into a tin trumpet, but when the test record of Henry Bishops My Pretty Jane was played back to him, he was inexpressibly delighted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Davies_(tenor)
******************************************* Tenor Ben DAVIES: A Spring Night; I Attempt From Loves Sickness To Fly (1924)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/RLnrK4v2lQ4/mqdefault.jpg)






