The Los Angeles Philharmonic Association is the focus of a new exhibition at the Hollywood Bowl Museum, “Tapes Rolling: David Swedlow Records the Hollywood Bowl, 1954-1959.”

Launched in conjunction with the June 15 opening of the 2019 summer season and the continuing centennial celebrations of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the exhibit showcases Swedlow’s recordings of the orchestra. It will be on view through the spring of 2020.

Swedlow was a pioneer in the world of acrylics manufacturing, but he was also an early high-fidelity enthusiast who, in the late 1940s and early 1950s, bought and assembled professional audio components. Swedlow customized an Ampex tape recorder for an extraordinary personal project: to capture the Los Angeles Philharmonic performing live. Beginning in July 1954 and continuing for the next six seasons, Swedlow recorded 246 concerts, both at Philharmonic Auditorium and at the Hollywood Bowl, using his experimental three-track machine.

Swedlow’s collaboration with the LA Phil was groundbreaking from a technological standpoint, as his system preceded standard consumer two-track recording, which wasn’t introduced until 1958. This exhibition presents landmark performances that have only been heard, until now, by those who attended the concerts.

Considered by experts and historians the crown jewel of the LA Phil’s archives, the Swedlow collection is a rare document of the orchestra’s activities in the late 1950s. The collection features performances by legendary conductors and soloists such as Bruno Walter, Leontyne Price, Walter Gieseking, Leopold Stokowski, Michael Rabin, Birgit Nilsson, Nina Simone, Pierre Monteux, Thomas Schippers, José Iturbi, Leonard Bernstein, Nat “King” Cole with Nelson Riddle, Robert Merrill, and Elizabeth Schwarzkopf, among others. The concerts led by Dutch conductor Eduard van Beinum, the LA Phil’s music director from 1956 to 1959, are the high point of the collection for connoisseurs.

During the summer season, June through September, the Hollywood Bowl Museum is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. until show time) and Sundays from 4 p.m. until show time. Admission is free all year.

For information and tickets, visit hollywoodbowl.com, call (323)850-2000, or visit the Hollywood Bowl box office.