ABSTRACT
The most valuable source for C19th Romantic performance style, unique in historically informed performance (HIP) studies, is undoubtedly the earliest audio recordings. They may be seen as an HIP Rosetta Stone, transliterating verbal reports and music score signs into genuine, if flawed, music performances. This chapter outlines the three technologies represented, cylinders, phonograph discs, and reproducing piano rolls, discussing their strengths and weaknesses in turn and demonstrating how they may be used together to triangulate late Romantic style. Selected early recordings are then analysed using a specially developed tool which avoids an overly reductionist focus on stylistic elements and numerical data and which gives due place to overall dramatic effect and contemporary reaction. While focused on piano recordings, this chapter also examines early orchestral, strings, chamber, and vocal examples. It concludes that despite technical and artistic limitations, and the probable dimming of the Romanticism they express, these documents remain an invaluable source of an earlier, vitalist Romantic style.
