Budget recordings of Alfred Scholz

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There is a subset of "classical" releases which are credited to performers who have never been seen or heard in a live performance. Many of these performers are pseudonyms. Why would a release be published under a pseudonym? It could be because the performer has a restrictive contract with a different record label. It could be because the performance has been "borrowed" from its owner. Or perhaps the pseudonym is considered more marketable - for example the well-known pianist M. Bergerich. In the case of an ensemble, it could be a "scratch" ensemble brought togther just for the recording, and which does not have a name.

The most prolific producer of such budget recordings was Alfred Scholz. Scholz sometimes used his own name, sometimes made-up names, and sometimes the names of real people were given credit for performances which were not theirs.

It is not correct to assume any correspondence between the real and fictitious performers - names were mixed and matched liberally. Scholz sold the same recordings to different labels as different artists, and there are examples in MBz of the same performance being credited in two or more distinct ways.

The recordings are usually found on labels including Point and PILZ (as Vienna Masters).

For example, Fake conductors and the Symphonie Fantastique describes how someone collected 170 differently credited recordings of the work, but on studying them found he only had 162 distinct performances.

The following lists are of artists known to be used by Scholz:

Real artists, names used (possibly) fraudulently

  • Hans Swarovsky. Scholz's conducting professor, a real person with some genuine performances of his own on record, his name was also used by Scholz on recordings which he did not conduct.
  • Hans Zanotelli. Another real person whose name was used.
  • Hanspeter Gmür
  • Bystrík Režucha. Conductor of the Slovak Philharmonic (Bratislava)

Conductors

Some of these are possibly real. More research is needed.

Ensembles

Soloists

  • M. Bergerich (piano). Apparently drawing on the name recognition of Martha Argerich
  • Dieter Goldmann (piano). I can't find any biographical information about him, and he is a frequent performer on Scholz's recordings.
  • Mario-Ratko Delorko (piano). Ratko Delorko is a real pianist, but I can’t find any reliable source for him having an omitted “Mario-” in his first name. This artist should probably be split (or the genuine Ratko Delorko should be added)
  • Michael Rosengarten (piano)
  • Maria Novak (piano)

Question

What is the best way to record these performances in the database? In particular, where a single performance, with identical acoustic fingerprint, is credited to two or more sets of performers, how should they be credited?

See the Talk page.

References