Henryk Gold

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Henryk Gold (born September 3 or 9, 1899 in Warsaw , according to other sources 1902 , † January 9, 1977 in New York ) was a Polish violinist , orchestra conductor , composer and pioneer of Polish jazz music .

Life

He came from a Jewish family of musicians. His father Michał Gold was a flautist in the Warsaw Opera Orchestra , his mother Helena came from the famous Polish musical family Melodysta. Henryk Gold's older brother Artur Gold was also a violinist, orchestra conductor and composer and was one of the prominent Warsaw musicians of the pre-war period. Henryk Gold first received violin lessons from 1907. The piano was later added as a second instrument . In Russia he studied with Aleksander Glazunow, later at the Warsaw Conservatory with Stanisław Barcewicz . At the age of 17, Gold got his first job as a violinist with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra in 1916 , but gave up this post the following year to join the First World War as a soldier in the Russian Army . He was also a soldier in the Polish-Soviet war . During his time in the military, he also gained experience as a military musician and bandmaster. In the early 1920s he began well, more closely with the dance and light music deal and founded a modern dance orchestra , with whom he from about 1925 briefly for the record company ETFE ( Polska płyta ) and from 1926 determined under contract standing for the company Syrena Record (from 1929 Syrena-Electro) made recordings. Especially during his early years with Syrena, his repertoire consisted mainly of German pop compositions . In 1926 he took the titles The grandma now wears a bob-haired head (Syrena record 17625), What are you doing with your knee, dear Hans (Syrena record 383a) and I saw Miss Helen bathe (Syrena Record 17639). However, he soon expanded the range to include American compositions. His early acoustic recordings were also published as Syrena foreign presses in small editions with a German label as "Henry Gold Künstler-Tanzkapelle" or "Tanzorchester Henry Gold" in Germany, sometimes under anonymous names on Syrena.

By the end of the 1920s, his band was already the most popular dance band in Poland, which was mainly due to the enormous amount of his recordings. Henryk Gold's recording volume at that time was already comparable to that of his German colleagues. B. Dajos Béla , Marek Weber or Paul Godwin . Gold also performed live with his orchestra, including in 1927 in the Hotel Bristol in Warsaw and on January 17, 1928 in the revue Confetti in the Nowe Perskie Oko Theater . In addition, in other Polish revue theaters and on Polish Radio in Warsaw. In addition, Gold also increasingly attracted attention through hit compositions.

In 1931 he left the Syrena record company, where he was replaced as the house conductor by Henryk Wars , and made a handful of recordings for the Polish Odeon and Parlophone branches of the German Lindström concern . At the beginning of 1932 he was signed permanently by the Polish Columbia and stayed with this record company until 1936. During this time, Gold worked primarily with famous Polish actors and singers. His orchestra accompanied u. a. Artists like Eugeniusz Bodo , Hanka Ordonówna , Aleksander Żabczyński , Lucyna Szczepańska , Witold Conti and Kazimierz Krukowski . After the end of the contract with Columbia, he and his orchestra could be heard again on Syrena records, but after 1937 no more records from his orchestra are known.

In 1939 his orchestra took part in the New York World's Fair . At the beginning of the war, Gold was with his orchestra in the Soviet Union, where he joined the army of the Polish general Władysław Anders and finally came to Palestine . There Gold appeared again as a composer, he composed some Hebrew songs. In the early 1950s he made recordings again in Paris, among other things as an accompanist to the Yiddish singer Henri Gerro .

In 1953 Henryk Gold finally emigrated to the USA. There he directed the salon and dance orchestra of the Hotel "Plaza" in New York for 13 years. In addition, he was active again as a radio accompanist and led theater and music hall orchestras. In 1975 he retired.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ cf. Tomasz Lerski: Syrena Record - pierwsza polska wytwórnia fonograficzna. Editions "KARIN" New York / Warsaw 2003, ISBN 83-917189-0-5 .
  2. ^ "Okey" (Columbia DM. 1906), recorded in Warsaw in 1934
  3. ↑ "Trudno" (Columbia DM. 2086), recorded in 1936 in Warsaw
  4. ^ "Piosenka o Nadine" (Columbia DM. 1950), recorded in Warsaw in 1934
  5. ^ "Tic-ti-tic-ta" (Columbia DM. 1919), recorded in Warsaw in 1934
  6. ^ "Rose Marie" (Odeon O. 288162, originally Columbia DM. 1946), recorded in Warsaw in 1934
  7. ↑ cf. Tomasz Lerski: Syrena Record - pierwsza polska wytwórnia fonograficzna. Editions "KARIN" New York / Warsaw 2003, ISBN 83-917189-0-5 .
personal data
SURNAME Gold, Henryk
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Polish violinist, orchestra leader, composer and pioneer of Polish jazz music
DATE OF BIRTH September 3, 1899 or September 9, 1899 or 1902
PLACE OF BIRTH Warsaw
DATE OF DEATH January 9, 1977
Place of death new York