BBC Symphony Orchestra – The Planets by Gustav Holst album art
Contributed by Florian Hardwig
on Jan 1st, 2026. Artwork published in
January 1960
.
This cover is for the 1960 US reissue (EMI-Capitol) of the 1958 UK release (His Master’s Voice) of the BBC Symphony Orchestra’s recording of Gustav Holst’s The Planets, conducted by Malcolm Sargent. The image doesn’t depict any of the featured planets, though. If I’m not mistaken, the shown galaxy isn’t even the Milky Way, but Messier 81, also known as Bode’s Galaxy.
The title has lowercase letters from Hellenic Wide, arranged on a bouncing baseline. While the line at the bottom is set in all-caps Stymie, “HOLST” is in Stymie’s precursor, Litho Antique. The stereo note at the top features Venus Bold Extended.
