Andre Kostelanetz (russian: Абрам Наумович Костелянец; December 22, 1901 – January 13, 1980) was a Russian-born American popular orchestral music conductor and arranger who was one of the major exponents of popular orchestra music.

Biography

Abram Naumovich Kostelyanetz was born in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

, Russia to a prominent Jewish family. He was a cousin of physicist

Lew Kowarski Lew Kowarski (10 February 1907, Saint Petersburg – 30 July 1979, Geneva) was a naturalized French physicist. He was a lesser-known but important contributor to nuclear science. Early life Lew Kowarski was born in Saint Petersburg to Nicholas K ...

. His father, Nachman Yokhelevich (Naum Ignatyevich) Kostelyanetz, was active on the St. Petersburg stock exchange; his maternal grandfather, Aizik Yevelevich Dymshitz, was a wealthy merchant and industrialist, engaged in timber production. He began playing the piano at four and a half years old. He studied composition and orchestration at the Petrograd Conservatory of Music. When he was 19, the Grand Petrograd Opera Company held a competition to select a chorusmaster and assistant conductor, in which he was selected despite being the youngest applicant. Kostelanetz continued there until leaving Russia in March 1922 after the

Russian Revolution The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social revolution that took place in the former Russian Empire which began during the First World War. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and adopt a socialist form of government ...

, when he stayed in Paris for a time before moving on to the United States. He arrived in the United States that year, and in the 1920s, conducted concerts for radio. In the 1930s, he began his own weekly show on CBS, ''Andre Kostelanetz Presents''. Kostelanetz was known for arranging and recording light

classical music Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical music, as the term "classical music" al ...

pieces for mass audiences, as well as orchestral versions of songs and Broadway show tunes. He made numerous recordings over the course of his career, which had sales of over 50 million. For many years, he conducted the

New York Philharmonic The New York Philharmonic, officially the Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York, Inc., globally known as New York Philharmonic Orchestra (NYPO) or New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra, is a symphony orchestra based in New York City. It is ...

in pops concerts and recordings, in which they were billed as Andre Kostelanetz and His Orchestra. Kostelanetz may be best known to modern audiences for a series of

easy listening Easy listening (including mood music) is a popular music genre and radio format that was most popular during the 1950s to 1970s. It is related to middle-of-the-road (MOR) music and encompasses instrumental recordings of standards, hit songs, ...

instrumental albums on

Columbia Records Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese conglomerate Sony. It was founded on January 15, 1889, evolving from the A ...

from the 1940s until 1980. Kostelanetz actually started making this music before there was a

genre Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other f ...

called "easy listening". He continued until after some of his contemporaries, including Mantovani, had stopped recording. Outside the United States, one of his best known works was an orchestral arrangement of the tune "With a Song in my Heart", which was the signature tune of a long-running BBC radio program, at first called ''Forces Favourites'', then '' Family Favourites'', and finally ''Two Way Family Favourites''. He commissioned many works, including

Aaron Copland Aaron Copland (, ; November 14, 1900December 2, 1990) was an American composer, composition teacher, writer, and later a conductor of his own and other American music. Copland was referred to by his peers and critics as "the Dean of American Com ...

's '' Lincoln Portrait'',

Jerome Kern Jerome David Kern (January 27, 1885 – November 11, 1945) was an American composer of musical theatre and popular music. One of the most important American theatre composers of the early 20th century, he wrote more than 700 songs, used in ove ...

's ''Portrait of

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has pr ...

'', William Schuman's '' New England Triptych'', Paul Creston's ''Frontiers'',

Ferde Grofé Ferdinand Rudolph von Grofé, known as Ferde Grofé (March 27, 1892 April 3, 1972) (pronounced FUR-dee GROW-fay) was an American composer, arranger, pianist and instrumentalist. He is best known for his 1931 five-movement tone poem, '' Grand Ca ...

's ''Hudson River Suite'',

Virgil Thomson Virgil Thomson (November 25, 1896 – September 30, 1989) was an American composer and critic. He was instrumental in the development of the "American Sound" in classical music. He has been described as a modernist, a neoromantic, a neoclass ...

's musical portraits of

Fiorello La Guardia Fiorello Henry LaGuardia (; born Fiorello Enrico LaGuardia, ; December 11, 1882September 20, 1947) was an American attorney and politician who represented New York in the House of Representatives and served as the 99th Mayor of New York City fr ...

and

Dorothy Thompson Dorothy Celene Thompson (July 9, 1893 – January 30, 1961) was an American journalist and radio broadcaster. She was the first American journalist to be expelled from Nazi Germany in 1934 and was one of the few women news commentators on radio ...

Alan Hovhaness Alan Hovhaness (; March 8, 1911 – June 21, 2000) was an American- Armenian composer. He was one of the most prolific 20th-century composers, with his official catalog comprising 67 numbered symphonies (surviving manuscripts indicate over 70) a ...

's ''Floating World'', and Ezra Laderman's ''Magic Prison''.

William Walton Sir William Turner Walton (29 March 19028 March 1983) was an English composer. During a sixty-year career, he wrote music in several classical genres and styles, from film scores to opera. His best-known works include ''Façade'', the cantat ...

dedicated his '' Capriccio burlesco'' to Kostelanetz, who conducted the first performance and made the first recording, both with the New York Philharmonic. His last concert was ''A Night in Old Vienna'' with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra at that city's War Memorial Opera House on December 31, 1979.

Personal life

His first wife was actress/singer Sarah Loy; they were married from 1923 to 1937, when the marriage was dissolved. He was then married to soprano

Lily Pons Alice Joséphine Pons (April 12, 1898 – February 13, 1976), known professionally as Lily Pons, was a French-American operatic soprano and actress who had an active career from the late 1920s through the early 1970s. As an opera singer, she s ...

from 1938 to 1958, when they divorced. They owned a home in

Palm Springs, California Palm Springs (Cahuilla: ''Séc-he'') is a desert resort city in Riverside County, California, United States, within the Colorado Desert's Coachella Valley. The city covers approximately , making it the largest city in Riverside County by lan ...

which was built in 1955. In 1960 he married Sara Gene Orcutt; the marriage lasted several years. All three unions were childless. His brother,

Boris Kostelanetz Boris Kostelanetz (16 June 1911 – 31 January 2006) was a leading tax lawyer. Childhood Boris Kostelanetz born in St. Petersburg, Russia on June 16, 1911, to a wealthy Jewish family. Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, Boris and his fami ...

(1911–2006), was a prominent tax defense lawyer.

Death

After the December 31, 1979 concert with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Kostelanetz left for a vacation in Haiti. While in Haiti, Kostelanetz contracted

pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severit ...

and died on January 13, 1980, aged 78.

Discography (partial)

Many of the early LP releases were actually re-releases of albums released earlier on 78 rpm records. Musical Comedy Favorites, for example, was released as Volume 1 (album M-430) in late 1940 for songs 1 through 8, and Volume 2 (M-502) in 1941 for the remaining 8 songs on the second side of the LP. Four of Kostelanetz's albums made the Billboard Hot 200, no match for his Columbia easy listening rivals

Ray Conniff Joseph Raymond Conniff (November 6, 1916 – October 12, 2002) was an American bandleader and arranger best known for his Ray Conniff Singers during the 1960s. Biography Conniff was born November 6, 1916 in Attleboro, Massachusetts, United St ...

and Percy Faith but typical of many of popular instrumental easy listening artists of the day whose audience did not buy their albums immediately upon release but bought them over the years. * ''Andre Kostelanetz & His Orchestra: "Carmen"'' LP #693cl735 Columbia 1950 U.S.A. * ''Music of Sigmund Romberg'',1946, Columbia Masterworks MM635 * ''The Music of Victor Herbert'', Columbia Masterworks M-415 * ''Tchaikovsky: Nutcracker Suite'', Op. 71a'', 1956, Columbia Long Playing CL 730 * ''Music of Irving Berlin'', 1950, Columbia Masterworks MM/ML-4314 * ''The Music of Stephen Foster'', 1941, 3 LP Set, Columbia Masterworks M-442 78's * ''Mississippi Suite'', 1947, Columbia Masterworks MX-284 12" album * ''The Music of Chopin'', 1949, Columbia Masterworks MM-840 * ''Waltzes of Johann Strauss'', 1948, Columbia Masterworks ML-2011 10" album * ''Music of Cole Porter'', 1948, Columbia Masterworks ML-2014 * ''Music of George Gershwin'', 1948, Columbia Masterworks 2026 * ''Mississippi Suite'', 1948, Columbia Masterworks ML-2046 10" album * ''Invitation to the Waltz'', 1948, Columbia Masterworks ML-2069 10" album * ''Swan Lake'', Columbia Masterworks ML-4308 1950 * ''An American in Paris'', Columbia Masterworks ML-4455 1951 * ''Black Magic'', 1955, Columbia CL 712 * ''Grofé: Grand Canyon Suite'', 1955, Columbia CL 716 * ''Prokofiev, Peter and the Wolf & Saint-Seans, Carnival of the Animals,'' 1955, Columbia CL 720 * ''Music of Vincent Youmans'', 1955, Columbia CL 734 * ''Verdi: Aida'', 1955, Columbia CL 755 * '' Bravo!'', 1955, Columbia CL 758 * ''Vienna Nights'', 1955, Columbia CL 769 * ''Music of Fritz Kreisler, Music of Sigmund Romberg'', 1955, Columbia CL 771 * ''You and the Night and the Music'', 1955, Columbia CL 772 * ''Musical Comedy Favorites'', 1955, Columbia CL 775 * ''Music of Jerome Kern'', 1955, Columbia CL 776 * ''The Lure of the Tropics'', 1955, Columbia CL 780 * ''Stardust'', 1955, Columbia CL 781 * ''Kostelanetz Conducts...'', 1955, Columbia CL 786 * ''An American In Paris/Rhapsody In Blue'', 1955, Columbia CL 795 * ''La Boheme for Orchestra'', 1955, Columbia CL 797 * ''Clair de Lune and Popular Favorites'', 1955, Columbia CL 798 * ''La Traviata'', 1955 Columbia CL 799 * ''The Sleeping Beauty'', 1956, Columbia CL 804 * ''Strauss Waltzes'', 1956, Columbia CL 805 * ''Calendar Girl'', 1956, Columbia CL 811 * ''Bolero!'', 1956, Columbia CL 833 * ''The Very Thought of You'', 1956, Columbia CL 843 * ''Music of Chopin'', 1956, Columbia CL 862 * ''Cafe Continental'', 1956, Columbia CL 863 * ''Beautiful Dreamer: Music of Stephen Foster'', 1956, Columbia CL 864 * ''Broadway Spectacular'', 1956, Columbia CL 865 * ''Madame Butterfly'', 1956, Columbia CL 869 * ''Tender Is the Night'', 1956, Columbia CL 886 * ''The Lure of Spain'', 1957, Columbia CL 943 * ''Rigoletto'', 1957, Columbia CL 970 * ''The Romantic Music of Rachmaninoff'', 1957, Columbia CL 1001 * ''The Lure of France'', 1958, Columbia CL 1054/CS 8111 * ''The Columbia Album of Richard Rodgers, Vol. 1'', 1958, Columbia CL 1068 * ''The Columbia Album of Richard Rodgers, Vol. 2'', 1958, Columbia CL 1069 * ''Blues Opera'', 1958, Columbia CL 1099 * ''Encore!'', 1958, Columbia CL 1135/CS 8008 * ''Theatre Party'', 1958, Columbia CL 1199/CS 8026 * ''The Romantic Music of Tchaikovsky, Vol. 1'', 1958, Columbia CL 1208 * ''The Romantic Music of Tchaikovsky, Vol. 2'', 1958, Columbia CL 1209 * ''Romantic Arias for Orchestra'', 1959, Columbia CL 1263 * ''Flower Drum Song'', 1959, Columbia CL 1280/CS 8095 * ''Great Waltzes'', 1959, Columbia CL 1321 * ''The Lure of Paradise'', 1959, Columbia CL 1335/CS 8144 * ''Strauss Waltzes'', 1959, Columbia CL 1354/CS 8162 * ''Gypsy Passion'', 1960, Columbia CL 1431/CS 8228 * ''Joy to the World'', 1960, Columbia CL 1528/CS 8328 * ''The Unsinkable Molly Brown'', 1960, Columbia CL 1576/CS 8376 * ''Kostelanetz Favorites'' Columbia ML 4065 * ''The Nutcracker Suite'', 1961, Columbia Masterworks 6264 * ''The New Wonderland of Sound'', 1961, Columbia CL 1657/CS 8457 * ''Star Spangled Marches'', 1962, Columbia CL 1718/CS 8518 * ''Broadway's Greatest Hits'', 1962, Columbia CL 1827/CS 8627 * ''Fire and Jealousy'', Columbia CL 1898/CS 8698 * ''Music from "Mr. President"'', 1962, Columbia CL 1921/CS 8721 * ''World Favorite Romantic Concertos for Piano & Orchestra'', 1963, Columbia Masterworks ML 5876/MS 6476 * ''Wonderland of Sound'', 1963, Columbia-CL-1938 * ''Wonderland of Golden Hits'', 1963, Columbia CL 2039/CS 8839 * ''Wonderland of Christmas'', 1963, Columbia CL 2068/CS 8868 * ''Kostelanetz in Wonderland: Golden Encores'', 1963, Columbia CL 2078/CS 8878 * ''New York Wonderland'', 1964, Columbia CL 2138/CS 8938 - #68 Billboard Albums * ''I Wish You Love'', 1964, Columbia CL 2185/CS 8985 * ''New Orleans Wonderland'', 1964, Columbia CL 2250/CS 9050 * ''The Romantic Strings of Andre Kostelanetz'', 1965, Columbia Masterworks ML 6119/MS 6711 * ''Wishing You a Merry Christmas'', 1965, Columbia Masterworks ML 6179/MS 6779 * ''Romantic Waltzes by Tchaikovsky'', 1965, Columbia Masterworks MS 6824 * ''Warsaw Concerto'', 1966, Columbia Masterworks ML 6226/MS 6826 (reissue of 1963 ML 5876/MS 6476) * ''Today's Golden Hits'', 1966, Columbia CS 9334 * ''The Shadow of Your Smile'', 1966, Columbia CS 13285 * ''Season's Greetings from Barbra Streisand and Friends,''1967, Columbia Special Products, CSS 1075 * ''Exotic Nights'', 1967, Columbia CS 9381 * ''The Kostelanetz Sound of Today'', 1967, Columbia CS 9409 * ''Today's Greatest Movie Hits'', 1967, Columbia CS 9556 * ''Scarborough Fair'', 1968, Columbia CS 9623 * ''For the Young at Heart'', 1968, Columbia CS 9691 * ''Sounds of Love'', 1968, Columbia - #194 Billboard Albums * ''Traces'', 1969, Columbia CS 9823 - #200 Billboard Albums * ''Andre Kostelanetz Conducts Puccini's "La Boheme" for Orchestra'', 1969, Columbia Masterworks MS 7219 * ''Greatest Hits of the '60s'', 1970, Columbia CS 9973 * ''I'll Never Fall in Love Again'', 1970, Columbia CS 9998 * ''Everything Is Beautiful'', 1970, Columbia 30037 * ''Sunset'', 1970, Columbia Masterworks 30075 * ''And God Created Great Whales'' (Hovhaness), 1971, Columbia 30390 * ''Love Story'', 1971, Columbia 30501 - #183 Billboard Albums * ''For All We Know'', 1971, Columbia 30672 * ''Plays Chicago'', 1971, Columbia 31002 * ''Plays Cole Porter'', 1972, Columbia 31491 * ''Love Theme from "The Godfather"'', 1972, Harmony 31500 * ''Last Tango in Paris'', 1973, Columbia 32187 * ''Moon River'', 1973, Columbia 32243 * ''Plays Great Hits of Today'', 1973, Columbia 32415 * ''The Way We Were'', 1974, Columbia 32578 * ''Plays Michel Legrand's Greatest Hits'', 1974, Columbia 32580 * ''Plays Music of Villa-Lobos'', 1974, Columbia 32821 * ''Plays Gershwin'', 1974, Columbia 32825 * ''Musical Reflections of Broadway and Hollywood'', 1974, Columbia 33061 * ''Plays "Murder on the Orient Express" and Other Great Themes'', 1975, Columbia 33437 * ''Never Can Say Goodbye'', 1975, Columbia 33550 * ''I'm Easy'', 1976, Columbia 34157 * ''Dance With Me'', 1976, Columbia 34352 * ''Plays Broadway's Greatest Hits'', 1977, Columbia 34864 * ''You Light Up My Life'', 1978, Columbia 35328 * ''Theme from "Superman"'', 1979, Columbia 35781 * ''Various Themes'', 1980, Columbia 36382 * The Complete Christmas Album, 2018 - #20 Billboard Classical Albums

References

Bibliography

* * *

External links

*
Andre Kostelanetz Collection, 1922-1984
and the onlin
Andre Kostelanetz Collection
at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The libra ...

Andre Kostelanetz Recordings Collection
at the

University of Maryland Libraries The University of Maryland Libraries is the largest university library in the Washington, D.C. - Baltimore area. The university's library system includes eight libraries: six are located on the College Park campus, while the Severn Library, an o ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kostelanetz, Andre 1901 births 1980 deaths 20th-century American conductors (music) 20th-century American male musicians American classical pianists Male classical pianists American male conductors (music) American music arrangers American people of Russian-Jewish descent American radio personalities Classical musicians from California Columbia Records artists Deaths from pneumonia in Haiti Easy listening musicians Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States Jewish American classical musicians Musicians from Palm Springs, California Musicians from Saint Petersburg Russian Jews 20th-century American Jews