My wife has had a boxed set of Nat “King” Cole records, as released by the Longines Symphonette Society, ever since she was she was in high school. For What It’s Worth, she bought it directly from the Society, so now I’m giving clues as to her age. Well, our victrola is becoming increasingly difficult to find replacement stylii to, and in any event, she listened to “The Ruby and the Pearl” so often during her adolescence that there’s very little acetate left on the platters. So it is imperative that we find out how to get the compact disc version of this set. But we can’t find the Symphonette Society any more (so we can ask them how we can send for it). The Larchmont (New York) Chamber of Commerce was unhelpful to my search for where this operation picked up and moved to, and they even hinted that the name of the street (Symphonette Square) the society was on had been changed (a driving directions search on Yahoo! MapQuest supports this). Holy Illuminati, Batman! What manner of conspiracy is this? There’s only one thing to do, and that is to turn the case over to Cecil and the SDMBSTAFF. If they can’t get to the bottom of this, no one can.
Oh, and the Teeming Millions are invited to help, too.
Well, the only Longines Symphonette that I have ever heard of is a stupid little radio. Here is a pic. Somehow, there does also seem to be signs of Longines Symphonette Recording Society which seems to a former record label. I find a few links that point mostly to descriptions of used records for sale. But no current activity. So I guess they’re gone. Looking at the titles they used to offer, you must be the only folks who miss them.
It’s bad form to follow up to myself, but I’ve done a little more research. Here we learn:
So these guys were bigger than I thought. And that page in about Beatles records, so I guess I take back my remark about their catalog. You could ask the Longines-Wittnauer Company, but here we learn:
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In September of 1994, Longines and Wittnauer parted company, and Swiss giant SMH, which holds title to Hamilton, Omega and Tissot, among other name brands, acquired the name.
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I guess that radio was just another business for them. But it’s not looking real hopeful for the Longines Symphonette Recording Society. I still think the record label is gone. It’s time you guys switched to cd’s anyway.
That brings back memories! I was browsing topics and was all set to just cruse past yours when a blast from the past brought me to a skidding stop.
I remember them. When I was a kid, their advertisements were all over the place as they sold recordings of music ranging from easy listening to classical. They used to take popular tunes and rework them with an orchestra, – something like what later became elevator music, only better.
Nate King Cole was on their product, along with selected songs from Johnny Cash, Perry Como, Diana Shore, some show tunes and such like that. They were like, to an extent, the popular duo of Ferranti and Teicher, who took rock and roll tunes and set them to piano. They sold a lot of Christmas music from Bing Crosby and other easy listening artists of the time.
Think of them as taking, lets see now, – something from Salt 'n Peppa and setting it to symphony music.
I don’t know what happened to them. Thinking back from when I was a little guy, to now, they seem to have just somehow vanished, lost in the rush, so to speak, like Jimmy Durante, the Muppet Show, and Fraggle Rock along with Christmas Club savings accounts in banks.
I do recall them, though. It has been a long, long time since I even thought of those guys. They also seem to have taken Ferranti and Teicher along with them.
For the record: We’re TRYING to convert to CD’s; that’s why it’s so frustrating that we can’t find the folks who have the power to make the Nat King Cole Golden Treasury “Unforgettable” set available on CD.
Nat Cole’s set was the only one I ever saw commercials for, and I guess I was fortunate.
Have you checked Tower Records online yet? If you do an “artist search”, quite a few multiple-CD collections show up. Here are two 3-CD collections called “Unforgettable”:
I did check Tower’s website. They can’t find any Nat Cole release of “The Ruby and the Pearl”, therefore the set that we’re looking for is not available from Tower. Q.E.D. The set contained 6 LPs with ten songs each.
BTW, my Yahoo! check for “Swiss giant SMH”, using the terms “Hamilton, Omega, and Tissot” suggests that SMH primarily deals in watches.
Ah, yes, teevee memories . . . That old character actor saying, "YOU probably recognize this lovely tune as ‘Stranger in Paradise.’ Well, you pig-ignorant boob, it’s actually the Polovetsian Dance No. Three by Boradin . . "
Page Morton Black for “Chock Full o’ Nuts” (that heavenly coffee!), Ann Blyth for Hostess Cupcakes, Ruuuuula Lenska and her “friends from Europe,” Giselle McKenzie for . . . whatever the hell it was Giselle McKenzie hawked . . .
I know this response comes several years late, however, I just inherited a large collection of rare recordings from my dad. I have, in my posession, the exact Nat King Cole box set that you were looking for several years ago.
You misheard nothing; The Longines Symphonette was also the name of the orchestra that produced pseudo-classical arrangements of popular music for Longines. The 101-strings-type arrangements had little unfilled space.
Interesting how technology changes. Digital music is so pervasive at this point it might well be easier to buy the individual songs you want via itunes and and other sites and simply burn the exact mixes you want.
I have a set of old time radio clip records hosted by Jack Benny from sometime in the mid-late 1960s that had something to do with Longines Symphonette. That the only place I ever saw it, I wasn’t aware it was a thing.
What has been missed in this discussion is that Longines-Wittnauer was a long-time sponsor of a radio program that had what later would be identified as a Boston Pops flavor. Before they bought the record club, they themselves had a significant side business going selling albums of the Longines Symphonette. Often topical, sometimes the works of a single composer.
As I remember (this was in the mid/late 40’s), their arrangements were not highly regarded. I think also that their radio theme song was “On the Trail” from the Grand Canyon Suite by Grofe.
