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Grand Hotel
Mazurka de Concert (Ovide Musin) [3:13]
By the Sleepy Lagoon (Eric Coates) [3:20]
Melodies of Britain (Trad. Arr. Jack Byfield) [9:03]
If My Songs Were Only Winged (Hahn) [3:30]
Parlez moi d'amour (Lenoir) [3:16]
Fascination (Marchetti) [3:26]
Dear Miss Phoebe - Selection (Parr-Davies) [6:50]
The Laughing Violin (Kai Mortensen) [2:01]
Jealous Lover (Charles Williams) [3:25]
Because You're Mine - Selection (Various) [9:31]
Gipsy Carnival (Yascha Krein) [3:21]
Dream Serenade (Wüsthoff) [3:15]
Pizzicato from Sylvia (Delibes arr. Fred Cramer) [2:46]
Waltzing Thru' Filmland (Various) [9:16]
Meditation from Thais (Jules Massenet) [3:11]
Air on the G String (J.S.Bach) [3:27]
To a Wild Rose (Edward MacDowell) [2:18]
Tom Jenkins (violin), with Reginald Kilbey (cello) and Jack Byfield (piano), directing the BBC Grand Hotel Orchestra
rec. 1951 and 1952, live (Bach and MacDowell)
DINMORE DRD 056 [76:29]
 
It’s always a pleasure to come across recordings made by Tom Jenkins, one of Britain’s great Grand Hotel ‘Kings’. He took over the Grand Hotel mantle at the BBC from the mortally ill Albert Sandler in 1948 and Jenkins kept the position until 1954, though he returned to the corporation with his own ensemble soon thereafter. He was soon to share Sandler’s melancholy fate. Jenkins died in 1957 at the age of 47, hardly much older than Sandler himself.
 
Jenkins had studied with Carl Flesch and had a secure classical grounding. Recordings preserved on a Symposium disc, in its Great Violinists series, reveal quite how excellent was his technique. The studio recordings in this Dinmore disc were made in 1951 when he was securely installed as the country’s leading violinist supremo of the Light Music genre. I hadn’t come across this disc before, though it was re-mastered, and presumably made available, as long ago as 2002. Still, it’s excellent to make its acquaintance now.
 
The programme is a typical one, spiced by some interesting novelties. Arrangers such as Fred Cramer and the pianist in Jenkins’s orchestra, Jack Byfield, were on hand to craft melodies and medleys and to steer the tunes in the most appropriate direction, all the while graced by the warm tone and facile technique of the leader, probably sporting his 1667 Strad for the purpose.
 
It’s good to start with Ovide Musin’s Mazurka de Concert which reflects Jenkins’s classical strengths in his use of rubati and pizzicati. Languorous warmth floods Eric Coates’s By the Sleepy Lagoon and it’s entertaining to hear how Byfield stitched together a predictable series of tunes for Melodies of Britain, amongst which are Danny Boy, Cherry Ripe, Loch Lomond, All Through The Night, John Peel and Drink To Me Only. How successfully to convey in the lighter mode something like Hahn’s If My Songs Were Only Winged can be best gauged by listening to this excellent performance. Marchetti’s Fascination was by then a popular evergreen but it’s played with convincing and communicative geniality. To distil some humour, Kai Mortensen’s The Laughing Violin does precisely that in Jenkins’ hands.
 
Charles Williams, himself a fiddler, conductor and composer of huge distinction in the Light Music genre, contributes Jealous Lover, an ingratiating piece that offers little concertante moments for the hard-working band members; apart from Jenkins we hear from the other members of his trio in this disc, namely Byfield and cellist Reginald Kilbey, later well-known as a conductor. The selection from Because You’re Mine distils the essence of the style in nine minutes of cantabile richness and dancing verve: namely variety, instrumental finesse and a terpsichorean elegance.
 
There are two bonus tracks from 1952. Jenkins plays the Air on the G String in a closely cut side beset by audience coughs. There are a few minor acetate thumps toward the end of the record. MacDowell’s To a Wild Rose is accompanied by noisy paper rustling but is finely played. These two allow us access to Jenkins playing live, without a safety net, as is the case with that Symposium disc [1269] which is almost wholly classical. Dinmore’s transfer clearly comes from a commercial copy as there a few little scratches here and there. It’s good to welcome Jenkins back to the fold.
 
Jonathan Woolf
 




It’s good to welcome Jenkins back to the fold.

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