Frederick William Gaisberg (1 January 1873 – 2 September 1951) was an American-born musician, recording engineer and one of the earliest classical music producers for the
gramophoneThe record player, phonograph or gramophone was the most common device for playing recorded sound from the late 1870s until the late 1980s.- Terminology :...
. He himself did not use the term 'producer' and was not an impresario like his protégé
Walter LeggeWalter Legge was an influential British classical record producer, most notably for EMI....
of
EMIThe EMI Group is a British music company. It is the fourth-largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the "big four" record companies. EMI Group also has a major publishing arm- EMI Music Publishing- based in New York City...
or an innovator like
John CulshawJohn Royds Culshaw was a pioneering English classical record producer for Decca Records.Along with Fred Gaisberg and Walter Legge, he was one of the most influential producers of classical recordings...
of
DeccaDecca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; later the link with the British company was broken for several decades...
. Gaisberg's genius was in talent spotting and persuading performers to make recordings for the newly-invented gramophone.
Gaisberg began working in the recording industry in America as a young man, becoming a pioneer of early recording, and also worked as piano accompanist.
Frederick William Gaisberg (1 January 1873 – 2 September 1951) was an American-born musician, recording engineer and one of the earliest classical music producers for the
gramophoneThe record player, phonograph or gramophone was the most common device for playing recorded sound from the late 1870s until the late 1980s.- Terminology :...
. He himself did not use the term 'producer' and was not an impresario like his protégé
Walter LeggeWalter Legge was an influential British classical record producer, most notably for EMI....
of
EMIThe EMI Group is a British music company. It is the fourth-largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the "big four" record companies. EMI Group also has a major publishing arm- EMI Music Publishing- based in New York City...
or an innovator like
John CulshawJohn Royds Culshaw was a pioneering English classical record producer for Decca Records.Along with Fred Gaisberg and Walter Legge, he was one of the most influential producers of classical recordings...
of
DeccaDecca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; later the link with the British company was broken for several decades...
. Gaisberg's genius was in talent spotting and persuading performers to make recordings for the newly-invented gramophone.
Gaisberg began working in the recording industry in America as a young man, becoming a pioneer of early recording, and also worked as piano accompanist. In 1898, he join the
Gramophone CompanyThe Gramophone Company, based in the United Kingdom, was one of the early recording companies, and was the parent organization for the famous "His Master's Voice" label...
in England as its first recording engineer. In 1902, he recorded music sung by the
tenorThe tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
Enrico CarusoEnrico Caruso was an Italian tenor who sang to acclaim at the major opera houses of Europe and North and South America...
for Victor, and the recordings became a sensation. By 1921, Gaisberg was artistic director of
HMVHis Master's Voice is a famous trademark in the music business, and for many years was the name of a large record label. The name was coined in 1899 as the title of a painting of the dog Nipper listening to a wind-up gramophone...
's international artistes department. After 1925, he concentrated on artist management. In 1939, he retired from his position but continued as a consultant in the industry through the 1940s.
Early years
Gaisberg was born in Washington, DC. His father, Wilhelm, was the son of German immigrants. Gaisberg was educated in Washington and was a chorister at St. John's Episcopal Church.
A musically talented youngster, he encountered the fledgling recording technology in the early 1890s and got a job working for the 'Graphophone' [
sic] company in America. Sound quality and short playing time, however, meant that recordings were more an amusing novelty than a serious means of reproducing music. In this decade the first of the recording industry's format wars was taking place, with the original cylinder recordings gradually being ousted by the superior and more convenient flat disc. Gaisberg played an important part in this, helping to establish 78 revolutions per minute as the standard playing speed and shellac as the standard material for making discs.
The Gramophone Company and HMV
In 1898 the
Gramophone CompanyThe Gramophone Company, based in the United Kingdom, was one of the early recording companies, and was the parent organization for the famous "His Master's Voice" label...
was formed in London. Gaisberg, by then working as piano accompanist and recording supervisor for
Emile BerlinerEmile Berliner was a German-born American inventor, best known for developing the disc record gramophone...
, left New York for London to join the Gramophone Company as its first recording engineer. He landed in
LiverpoolLiverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
with recording outfit, a $25 bicycle and introductions and instructions from Berliner. Among his first recordings in London were several sung by Syria Lamonte, an Australian singer working at Rules Restaurant in
Maiden LaneMaiden Lane may refer to:* Maiden Lane , a street in Manhattan* Maiden Lane , a street in San Francisco* Any of three holding companies created as part of the global financial crisis of 2008–2009** Maiden Lane LLC...
.
Gaisberg was the first person to record the
tenorThe tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
Enrico CarusoEnrico Caruso was an Italian tenor who sang to acclaim at the major opera houses of Europe and North and South America...
, in
MilanMilan in Italy, is the capital of the region of Lombardia and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while the urban area is the fifth largest in the E.U. with an estimated population of 4.3 million...
on April 11, 1902. The voice recorded well even on the primitive equipment of the time, and the entire enterprise paid off financially as well as artistically. Caruso's recordings were released in 1903 on the premium-price Victor 'Red Seal' label, the first recordings to feature Nipper, the 'His Master's Voice' dog, listening to the acoustic horn of a gramophone. Caruso's Victor recordings sold prodigiously and turned him into an international star. Caruso himself said, 'My Victor records will be my biography'. Gaisberg's subsequent signings for the label included Fyodor Chaliapin,
Beniamino GigliBeniamino Gigli, was an Italian opera singer. The most famous tenor of his generation, he was renowned internationally for the great beauty of his voice and the soundness of his vocal technique. Critics sometimes took him to task, however, for what was perceived to be the over-emotionalism of his...
,
Nellie MelbaDame Nellie Melba GBE , born Helen Porter Mitchell, was an Australian opera soprano. She became one of the most famous singers of the late Victorian Era and the early 20th century due to the purity of her lyrical voice and the brilliance of her technique. Melba was the first Australian to achieve...
,
John McCormackJohn Count McCormack , was a world-famous Irish tenor and recording artist, celebrated for his performances of the operatic and popular song repertoires, and renowned for his diction and breath control...
and
Fritz KreislerFritz Kreisler was an Austrian-born violinist and composer. One of the most famous violinists of his day, he was known for his sweet tone and expressive phrasing. Like many great violinists of his generation, he produced a characteristic sound which was immediately recognizable as his own...
. Gaisberg was the only record producer to record a
castratoA castrato is a man with a singing voice equivalent to that of a soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto voice produced either by castration of the singer before puberty or one who, because of an endocrinological condition, never reaches sexual maturity.Castration before puberty prevents a boy's...
singer, and he was the first to produce recordings in India and Japan. He produced India's first gramophone recordings with
Gauhar JaanGauhar Jaan was an Indian singer and dancer or a tawaif from Calcutta. She was one of the first performers to record music on 78 rpm records in India .-Early life and background:...
singing a khayal recorded on 2 November 1902 in a makeshift studio in two rooms of a hotel in Calcutta. In Japan, he recorded more than 270 titles in one month of 1903.
Unlike his successors Legge and Culshaw, Gaisberg did not generally regard it as part of his function to influence the way performers performed. He found the best artists he could, signed them up and faithfully captured their performance on disc in the best possible sound. He told a colleague that he saw his task simply as one of making as many sound photographs or gramophone disc sides as possible during each recording session.
Later years
In 1921 Gaisberg became HMV's artistic director in the newly formed international artistes department. After the introduction of electrical recording in 1925, he delegated the role of producer and concentrated on artist and repertoire management. He remained artistic director after the HMV and Columbia merged in 1931 as Electric and Musical Industries (EMI). The recordings made under his supervision include Elgar's series of records of his symphonies, concertos and other major works. With
Bernard ShawBernard Shaw may refer to:* George Bernard Shaw, Irish playwright* Bernard Shaw , English footballer of the 1960-70s* Bernard Shaw , English footballer of the 1890s...
, the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation, usually referred to by its abbreviation as the "BBC", is the longest established and largest broadcaster in the world...
and others Gaisberg was partly responsible for persuading Elgar to write a third symphony, though in the end the composer died leaving the sketches incomplete. (They were successfully "elaborated" into symphonic shape by the composer
Anthony PayneAnthony Payne is an English composer, most famous for the work published as Edward Elgar: The Sketches for Symphony No. 3 Elaborated by Anthony Payne....
four decades later.)
Gaisberg refused offers of a directorship of HMV, preferring to remain a link between the artists and the company. At the age of sixty-six, in 1939, Gaisberg retired; he remained a consultant to EMI and continued to have an important influence on the recording industry. In the late 1940s he argued in favour of long-play and stereophonic recording, both of which were introduced after his death.
A banquet was given at the
Savoy HotelThe Savoy Hotel is a five-star hotel located on the Strand, in the City of Westminster in central London that opened on 6 August 1889. The hotel, called "London's most famous hotel", remains one of London's most prestigious and opulent hotels, with 263 rooms and panoramic views of the River Thames...
to mark his retirement. It was attended by musicians as diverse as
Sir Thomas BeechamSir Thomas Beecham, 2nd Baronet, CH was a British conductor and impresario. From the early twentieth century until his death, Beecham was a major influence on the musical life of Britain and, according to Neville Cardus, was the first British conductor to have a regular international career.From...
,
Gracie FieldsDame Gracie Fields, DBE , born Grace Stansfield, was an English-born, later Italian-based actress, singer and comedienne widely hailed as one of the greatest stars of both cinema and music hall.-Early life:...
,
Richard TauberRichard Tauber was an Austrian tenor acclaimed as one of the greatest singers of the 20th century. Some critics commented that "his heart felt every word he sang".-Early life:...
and
Arthur RubinsteinArthur Rubinstein KBE was a Polish-born American pianist. He received international acclaim for his performances of the music of a variety of composers, and is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the twentieth century.-Early life:Arthur Rubinstein was born on January 28, 1887, the...
.
Gaisberg retained his American citizenship to the end, and was a life-long bachelor. He died at his home in Hampstead in 1951 at age 78 and was buried in
Hampstead CemeteryHampstead Cemetery is a historic cemetery in West Hampstead, London, located at the upper extremity of the NW6 district. Despite the name, the cemetery is three-quarters of a mile from Hampstead Village, and bears a different postcode...
in
West HampsteadWest Hampstead is an area in northwestern Greater London, England, situated between Childs Hill to the north, Frognal, Hampstead to the north-east, Swiss Cottage to the east, Kilburn to the south-west, and South Hampstead to the south. Until the late 19th century, the locale was a small village...
.