ABOUT TITANIC
TITANIC RECORDS, founded
in 1973 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, was one of the pioneers in the recording
of "Early Music" on period instruments. During the LP era, Titanic
released nearly a hundred recordings, including performances by such world-famous
artists as Mieczyslaw Horszowski, John Gibbons, Joel Cohen, and Malcom
Bilson. Now a division of Sirius Music, Inc., based in New York City,
Titanic is expanding its CD catalog to include music of all periods, while
maintaining its commitment to Early Music and periodically reissuing titles
from the LP list.
The images used on the Titanic website are of
the Tabor Grand Opera House, built in 1881
in Denver, Colorado, near the end of the gold and silver mining
booms in the Rocky Mountain West, by the rags-to-riches-to-rags "Silver
King," Horace Austin Warner Tabor. They appear on the Titanic site courtesy
of the Colorado Historical Society.
The Tabor saga was immortalized in Douglas
Moore's and John Latouche's American opera
classic The Ballad of Baby Doe, which premiered at the Central City Opera
House in 1956 and in New York City two years
later. Beverly Sills, Walter Cassel, and Frances Bible (with the New
York City Opera Orchestra and Chorus, Emerson
Buckley conducting) made a legendary
recording of the work in 1959 on Deutsche Grammophon, which reissued
it in 1999. Another excellent recording of the opera appeared in 1997
on the Newport Classics label with the Cast & Orchestra of Central City
Opera, John Moriarty conductor -- the first
all-digital release, produced by John
Ostendorf.
The best full-length account of the life
and legend of the Tabors is Horace
Tabor (University Press
of Colorado, 1989) by Professor Duane
A. Smith of Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. A less scholarly,
but equally readable, book focusing on Elizabeth McCourt Tabor
("Baby Doe") is The Legend
of Baby Doe by John Burke (pseudonym
of Richard O'Connor), published by the University of Nebraska Press
in 1974, with an introduction added in 1989 by Professor Smith. Recently
published is Professor Smith's study of the opera and its production history,
entitled The Ballad of Baby Doe, co-authored by conductor John
Moriarty and published by the University Press of Colorado.
Opening night at the Tabor Grand Opera House
in 1881 featured Maritana
(1845), a three-act opera by the Irish-born composer William
Vincent Wallace (1812-1865). The opera enjoyed considerable popularity
in the 1840's and a revival in 1880 in Her Majesty's Theatre. Perhaps
it was the London revival that called the opera to the attention of the Tabor
booking managers. Maritana was released in its entirety on the Marco Polo
label in 1996. The Tabor Grand remained
a monument to art and the pioneering spirit of the Old West until it
fell to the wrecking ball in 1965 to make way for the Denver branch of the
Federal Reserve Bank.
The Following images (all courtesy of the
Colorado Historical Society), used as
background visuals on other pages of our website, are reproduced unaltered
below:
Click on the thumbnails to
view the larger images, then use the
"Back" button on your browser to return to this page..
1. Interior of the Tabor Grand
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2. Tabor Grand Opera House curtain
with prophetic quote from Charles Kingsley
("So fleet the works of man,
back to the earth again.
Ancient
and holy things fade like a dream.")
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3. Lithograph of original house plan
for the Tabor Grand
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4. Audience at 1,000th-night
performance in the Tabor Grand
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5. Drawing of Tabor Grand Opera House
as it appeared in the 1880's
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