I was reminded by someone that the American premiere of the Richard Strauss's Oboe Concerto featured Mitch Miller.

It is highly unlikely that Miller would have played the US premiere,though he was certainly a virtuoso on the instrument. Here is some background info:

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes....e-his-oboe-concerto/

I don't know how many people on this site follow jazz but, if you do, Mitch Miller WAS the oboist on one of the legendary jazz recordings of all time, "Bird With Strings," featuring alto saxophonist Charlie Parker (aka "Bird"), with an all-star rhythm section --
Buddy Rich, drums; Ray Brown, bass -- and a string orchestra accompaniment. Pure genius!

I may have made a mistake about Mitch Miller in my last response, for which I apologize. My research is a bit hazy.

Hey Xylo Guy,

Indeed Mitch did play the US premiere of the Strauss Concerto. An IDRS member yesterday posted this:

Reprinted from Gramophone, December, 2003, p. 26 (Letters to the editor) and April 2004 (p. 22)

"Strauss's Oboist"

After the war, de Lancie became Associate First Oboist of the Philadelphia Orchestra. Strauss instructed his publisher to give de Lancie the rights for the American premiere, but the honor was denied him when the Philadelphia's celebrated principal oboist, Marcel Tabuteau, threw a fit at the thought of being upstaged. Instead of giving the rights to Tabuteau, De Lancie conferred them on a friend of his in the CBS Symphony - the young oboist Mitchell Miller, later famous as the host of an American pops TV show, "Sing along with Mitch."

This is an excellent video with Mitch Miller's son, Michael. It is web only, and it talks about his love of the oboe, Pablo Casals and Bach.

A friend from the NC Symphony sent it to me.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/#38528904

I believe that the performance of Mitch Miller playing the Strauss also included Julius Baker playing the US premiere of the Ibert Concerto. Regardless if they were US premieres or not, there was a concert with both of those concerti played by Miller & Baker. They met during Julius Bakers freshman year at Eastman (as Curtis was closed due to the depression) and they remained life long friends.