Rolling Classical 2012

[Removed Illegal Link]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVNzemi1Fpk&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL7B6040B2EF41C597

huh, weird

the news link: www.npr.org/blogs/deceptivecadence/2012/01/17/145337601/gustav-leonhardt-dies-at-83

I'm glad you gave Rolling CM 12 a generic title. I worried a little that last year's title gave the impression that it was 20th century or even post-war specific and y'know I love to talk Schumann/Liszt/Bruckner/LvB etc.

On the temp Sandbox thread someone had just splurged on the new Chailly LvB symphonies set. Opinion now that you've had it a while?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVZKnLieIho

Sometimes I wonder why I listen to anything other than Bach.

Bach-related by way of hommage/extrapolation: I finally got the renowned 60s live recording of Busoni's Fantasia Contrappuntistica, in the two-piano version, by the very young Peter Serkin and Richard Goode.

This was this work's last chance with me. I tried hard over the years with a few recordings of the solo piano version and just couldn't wring any juice out of the thing. Immediately on listening to the Serkin/Goode, it's searingly obvious the thing is an irresistible masterpiece. Fucking A! Poor Busoni seems to be even more at the mercy of pianist-drudges than my man Liszt. At least when Debussy is played by a drudge, you can still tell the music is great...

Also, on last year's thread I and then we had enthused about Othmar Schoeck's Notturno chamber song-cycle. Finally got another Schoeck thing: a captured broadcast of a song cycle called Lebendig Begraben (something like Life in the Grave?) which takes place from the point of view of a dead husband lying in his grave observing the doings of the town. Another knockout from Schoeck. He is THE man for post-Das Lied von der Erde voice-and-ensemble magic.

This week I heard Rued Langgaard's Music Of The Spheres for the first time--a new recording is out conducted by Dausgaard--and was bowled over. For evolution-of-music fans this is an astonishing thing for someone to have composed in 1916; Langgaard tossed his lance WAY into the future with this thing. But far more importantly, it just grabs you by the collar and rocks your world. Let me put it this way: the thing is called Music of the Spheres and it earns the title. Have you ever wanted to hear Nielsen take a journey to the center of his mind? Get this. There are cheap downloads at the usual services and DaCapo has good CD distribution.

Finally, I want to reaffirm that Claude Frank is the secret prince of beethoven piano sonatas.

Dang I didn't know Paavo Berglund had died in January. 82 y.o., so good innings much like Charles Mackerras, but I do have to take a moment to salute the guy. His EMI recordings of Sibelius' Kullervo, Pelleas et Melisande suite and 6th Symphony, Vaughan Williams' 4th and 6th Symphonies, and Shostakovich's 11th still vie for best-ever of those works. His whole EMI Sibelius bargain box probably makes the best one-stop intro to my favorite composer. And quite apart from recording activities, his work in (iirc) the early 70s on a new edition of Sibelius' scores paved the way for an international Sibelius renaissance which shows no signs of stopping 40 years later. Vale Paavo.

been listening to shostakovich's string quartets (borodin quartet) lately after years and years of not having heard them. after spending so much time with late beethoven quartets in the intervening time the sh. #15 hardly has any 'modern' sounds to it at all - it sounds almost totally 'late' and simple and unadorned in the same way.

er, i mean, not having heard them in a long time. returning to them.

Hmm I'll listen to #14 and #15 on the train home tonight. I have neglected those two (my go-to cycle right now is the one by Quatuor Danel).

I LOVE late Shostakovich though. So much of it is bitter and sardonic. I think the 14th Symphony might be my favorite of his symphonies.

well, that was just an impression! don't want to over-sell it. but i recall a stringency that i can barely hear now.

even the 'like flies dropping' comment of shostakovich's doesn't totally make sense to me. maybe he over-rated the potential boringness? or maybe decades of 'boring' music since then have made #15 sound like it's doing something different.

I was very sad to find out today that Tony Duggan, an amateur yet very influential Gustav Mahler scholar whose huge survey of Mahler CDs began to appear online in the late 90s, died in late February at age 58. I never exchanged emails with Mr. Duggan, but the personality that comes across so well in his Mahler writing made me think of him as a friend. His Mahler project remains essential reading today for anyone who wants to start coming to grips with this intimidating yet singularly satisfying body of life-music. The latter 90s were, in my memory, a wonderful time to be online as a novice classical music listener, exactly because of generous, quixotic projects like Tony’s. Though my own tastes often differ from his strongly-held and clearly-voiced positions, I’ve learned a tremendous amount from his survey. In fact, I only googled Duggan’s name today because yesterday I listened for the first time to his favorite recording of Mahler’s 3rd—and now it’s my favorite recording of Mahler’s 3rd. I was hoping he had some new writing online. RIP.

http://www.musicweb-international.com/Mahler/index.html

http://ticketing.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/festivals-series/impossible-brilliance-the-music-of-conlon-nancarrow

Nancarrow fest anyone? Been to many concerts but I am really not sure how this is going to pan out.

Unique, once in a lifetime showing tho' - definetely worth 2-3 concerts.

I had also read Mr Duggan's words many times over. RIP sir!

Of course I wait to mention this until it's probably no longer on the racks anymore... but the issue of BBC Music with the Debussy cover is very much worth buying for its cover disc, the best and most coherent recording yet of the music for The Martyrdom Of Saint Sebastian, the bizarre multi-media kinky-christ 'happening' put together by the decadent Gabriel D'Annunzio, for which Debussy composed his own fully-transmogrified take on the Parsifal vibe.

"Let he who loves me best shoot first!"

le martyre is one of my alltime faves

http://i.imgur.com/a15jz.jpg

excellent lp

Nakh, here is where I reveal that the copy of BBC Mag i bought had doubles of the cover disc included for some reason. If you haven't/don't get a copy let me know and I can send you my extra one. It's a stunner.

Have not heard that LP, Nakh - love all of those pieces. Don't think I've ever heard an orchestral version of Verklarte that I liked more than the chamber arrangement, though!

I've been getting into Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition" lately. Packs a lot into 30 minutes.

^^^if you ain't heard the solo piano original, get hold of it post-haste!

xpost Yes on Verklarte Nacht the shimmery bits toward the end are so much more palpable in the chamber version.

JELZ of your Nancarrow festival, that is *so cool*.

xp o. nate check out the original two pianos version for interest. Ravel's orchestration is real cool, landmark even, but it over-emphasizes the stylistic disparities between each movement. As a piano piece I think it's untouchable.

I have four recordings of "Concord Sonata" (John Kirkpatrick, Aloys Kontarsky, Gilbert Kalish, Manfred Reinelt) and I'm listening to them all today to decide if anybody did better than Kirkpatrick (so far no but I still have Kalish to go)

I really like the different colors that Ravel gets out of the orchestra, but it would be interesting to compare the piano version. I'll look for it. Thanks.

I'm listening to them all today to decide if anybody did better than Kirkpatrick (so far no but I still have Kalish to go)

the objective answer to this is no, no one did it better than Kirkpatrick

Owen have you heard the newish Jeremy Denk one? I have an mp3 of him playing it live a few years ago and it's quite good...

re: Pictures, O Nate, everyone everywhere will tell you to go to Richter live in Sofia for this, and they're right, but be ready for dire sound quality.

jon you are a mensch, but i should be able to get a copy of that via internets assuming it doesnt get an official release

it's seemingly a live recording from wales from a concert which got 4/5 from thegraun

re verklärte, i prefer the string orch arrangement because i really like that heavy lugubrious austrogerman heaviness in the early movements
(levine's siegfried idyll is pellucid and supple tho)

tonight I start learning movements 4 & 5 from Bach cantata 32

eek

DJP I thought you were a baritone? @ Jon: I'll check it out! I lucked out, I live next to a classical vinyl store and got three copies of Concord in one pull (all the non-Kirkpatrick ones, I had to eBay the Kirkpatrick).

v psyched to get to see some Saariaho performed next month for the first time(her Bergman tribute, Lanterna Magica)! The rest of that evening's program, well... I am totally up for Shostakovich's 6th but I have a feeling Franz Welser-Most is a conductor who is best pitted against bristlingly difficult post-wwii fare and might not bring the goods in dsch. And Brahms 2nd piano concerto would excite me too except yefim bronfman, meh.

Also next month Crumb's two orchestral colossi Starchild and Echoes Of Time And The River in one night! He's been performed a LOT in nyc the last several years which is great for me cause I love him. The downside: Leon Botstein conducts...

Fuuuuck I wish I could be in NYC for that.

[selfish] I'm flying to London today to oversee rehearsals for my violin concerto. It's my first one. I'm so, so excited. [/]

the fact that the stereo Kirkpatrick is still not available on CD is a painful act of negiligence on Columbia's part.

Last year I got a copy of the original mono Kirkpatrick, but it's so scratchy I almost couldn't listen. I am saving the transfer & cleanup for a rainy day.

I saw Henry Brant's orchestration of the Concord Symphony at SF Symphony with Tilson Thomas on Wednesday night. It's easier than ever to follow certain melodies when you break them across instrumental groups. But at times it becomes almost too transparent, some of those lines are supposed to be inextricable instead of underlined, and the slow, increasingly quiet spiral of the last movement comes across differently when it's 60-80 people following a very tightly wound score. It's far more of a Brant piece than an Ives one; still had a wonderful time but I've been mainlining my favorite recordings of it in the week since.

The pre-concert talk was in fact two actors recreating John Kirkpatrick's initial encounter with Ives, rehearsing the Concord for him in Ives' attic; played up to the hilt, with all the dialogue sourced directly from Cowell's book and Ives' Memos. But the guy playing Kirkpatrick could play pretty well, and the music made it all work; hundreds of people were there by the end of it and you can tell when the Davies crowd likes something; they are completely silent during the music

xpost congrats on violin concerto mr. owen

i was reading botstein's essay in 'franz liszt & his world' which was slightly tendentious and dull, rest of book skimmed but seems rich

congrats ówen!

Really looking forward to hearing your violin concerto on Friday.

I have to admit that over the last couple of years I've found contemporary classical music so much more rewarding to listen to than the other stuff I used to listen to. However, there's so much to explore and so little time!

owen that's fantastic! Which one of London's bazillion 1st class orchs are you working with?

DJP I thought you were a baritone?

I am. 4 & 5 are S/B duets with enough Es in the B part to make a bass angry.

ps re: the violin concerto: baller

Ha, thanks DJP. It's Britten Sinfonia, Pekka Kuusisto is playing it. Thanks for well-wishes!

Can anybody recommend me a Wyschnegradsky?

I still haven't cracked the Concord Sonata — I always fall asleep after the first movement.

I'm listening to Berlioz's Requiem (Inbal, RSO Frankfurt) again.

Going to see Giuseppe Ettorre play Bottessini with a chamber orchestra in a couple hours. New territory for me.

Schubert Sonata D958, Leif Ove Andsnes. This is finally the rendition of this sonata I've been looking for. With the instincts of a snake charmer Andsnes nails the balance between mysterious distance and sudden assertion and achieves terribilitas. The finale's death-dance some serious head-nod shit.

Which reminds me, we were discussing Mussorgsky's solo piano Pictures yesterday; if you have an aversion to 1950s bootleg sound quality, Andsnes is a good hi-fi alternative to Richter (very different interpretation of course).

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g48080-d1026626-Reviews-Ravel_Hotel-Long_Island_City_New_York.html

and http://www.tresbienshop.com/brand/dries-van-noten/ravel-coat-navy

More my scene.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ravel_Morrison#Personal_life

I've been getting into Arbiter Classical reissues lately - they just have great taste, and seem to do really nice remastering (assuming there's some kind of remastering going on), plus I love the covers (other than the annoying elephant logo):

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41HPNNJ2CTL._SL500_AA300_.jpg
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61yGtkemVXL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

That Paul Jacobs album is INCREDIBLE. I wish there was more of him on record.

Yeah, it's so fucking good! And I had never heard of him before I discovered it.

You should check out the iren marik stuff - I think you will like her if you like Jacobs.

Get yourself Jacobs' Debussy recordings without the slightest delay! Esp the Preludes. He is the king of dry-point Debussy playing (Bavouzet is the king of wet-brush Debussy playing). His Schoenberg disc is wonderful too.

Other recommended Arbiters:

Arbiter 116: Tiegerman: The Lost Legend of Cairo

Arbiter 139: Hindemith as Interpreter · The Amar-Hindemith Quartet

Arbiter 157: Scriabin chez Scriabin

Just noticed that both Decca and EMI have released Delius boxes. Any opinions on either?

EMI offers the wider selection of repertoire but the Decca is largely composed of Mackerras' recordings which are uniformly excellent and superbly recorded. There isn't really any top-tier Delius missing from the Decca set IMO (except the tone poem Eventyr), making it a better introduction to my man. But if you're already obsessed with Delius the EMI is a real feast of rarer stuff. I know I want to get it at some point even though I already have the Beecham and Barbirolli material.

BTW, the Danish conductor Bo Holten has now released three geographically-themed Delius discs ('Danish Masterworks', "Norwegian Masterworks" and the new "English Masterworks") which are all fantastic; he may some to supplant Mackerras as the Delius master of the digital era. The Norwegian one is especially killer: Eventyr and Song Of The High Hills on one disc!

Get yourself Jacobs' Debussy recordings without the slightest delay! Esp the Preludes. He is the king of dry-point Debussy playing (Bavouzet is the king of wet-brush Debussy playing). His Schoenberg disc is wonderful too.

― Axolotl with an Atlatl (Jon Lewis), Thursday, March 15, 2012 12:17 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

That sounds good! I am finding myself increasingly drawn to dry-brush pianists in general, and the concept of dry-brush Debussy is interesting.

dry-point rather

Part of it, of course, is how he's recorded-- that wonderful Connoiseur Society E. Alan Silver type sound where the attack of each note is like a sweet 'ping'. See most everything recorded by Ivan Moravec before the digital era.

Thanks again - sounds like Mackerras is my man!

A further word-- I don't know if you like your Delius on the lively end (a la mono-era Beecham) or on the languorous wallowy end (a la Barbirolli)-- I prefer the former, and that's what Mackerras brings (but unhurried and with plenty of rubato).

Persephone. The one big Stravinsky piece that just fell through the cracks of popularity somehow. But so great. Elliott Carter called it 'the humanist Rite of Spring'. Elliott Carter OTM. It's got so much charm. Maybe it never caught on because it has a narrator.

All-time I don't think there have been more than 5 or 6 commercial recordings of it. My favorite isn't even one of them-- it's a radio broadcast from the BBC I downloaded off a new group, Andrew Davis conducting. Right now I'm listening to the work's second recording-- Andre Cluytens conducting, mono, a vinyl rip off a dude's blog a couple of years ago.

so beautiful:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9DJpaxT7wg

Battalia à 10 D-dur, C.61 (1673)
01:43 - 2. Allegro: "Die liederliche Gesellschaft von allerey Humor"

Biber's Battalia (1673) is a rare precedent, with its quodlibet of eight different folksongs in five different keys, representing the songs of the soldiers encamped before the battle.

Wow! A precedent for Ives, yeah? I've been seeing references to this piece for years but never heard it til now (though I have listened to the Rosary Sonatas).

The more I listen to Biber, the more I flip out, this guy was centuries ahead. the alternative tuning work in the Rosary Sonata, the extended technique to emulate Bird & Frog songs in 'Sonata Representiva', and... now this completely bonkers Ives moment

and of course when he plays it straight, which is most of the time, it is just transcendental, been listening to 'Rosary Sonatas' a lot this last year

& posting this to watch it from home later

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcW3rL_pV-g&feature=player_embedded

Tony Conrad is a huge Biber enthusiast.

Now THAT is interesting...

that is wonderful, ty milt

i know only hb's violin work

http://i.imgur.com/Mw3jT.png

Justin Heinrich Ignatz von Bieber

Ahhhhh

Interview grabs from the internets:

Further research into the baroque violin repertoire led him to the “Mystery Sonatas” of Heinrich Biber, whose bold scordatura tunings had a marked effect on the young man: “I perceived Biber’s music as having been constructed according to timbre, not melody.... Biber had completely reformulated the basis for music composition, around timbre.”

...

A chance discovery of Heinrich Ignaz Franz Bibers’s “Mystery Sonatas” with their inventive constructions around timbre as opposed to melody had a transformative effect. “For the first time, my violin sounded truly wonderful. It rang, and sang, and spoke in a rich soulful voice – the timbre of the instrument… My body merged with the body of the violin; our resonances melted together in rich dark colors, harsh bright headlights. Slower; slower.”

for the sandbox execrable classical cd covers thread:

http://i.imgur.com/DFzZV.jpg

>Heinrich Ignaz Franz Bibers’s “Mystery Sonatas”

it's just one of those pieces. the Violin Sonatas are just as incredible. and I went on a Biber buying spree after finding 'Battalia' upthread and the one I've been playing the most is Musica Antiqua Köln / Reinhard Goebel's performance of 'Harmonia Artificiosa': http://www.amazon.com/Biber-Heinrich-Ignaz-Franz-von/dp/B0001DQTL0

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-B4ztwwZc83U/TfjrUKua7jI/AAAAAAAAB5E/sZL8SILCoPU/s1600/Front%2528110%2529.jpg
Floors me every single time.

How is Trois poèmes de Stéphane Mallarmé even possible. Fuck.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0w-adjLQ-w

Vivier is one of my all-time favourites!

Listening to Shostakovich's Preludes and Fugues these days. Can't get over those.

I always feel bad about not posting to this thread more. It gets hard to do when classical music is, like, what I do at work, you know?

I definitely feel less like talking about classical music online when I'm selling subscriptions. :\

As well as the Delius anniversary sets mentioned above, this year also sees the release of four Debussy boxes. Can anyone offer an appraisal of one or more of them?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Debussy-Collection-Various/dp/B006VKKAXU

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Debussy-Edition-Various-Artists/dp/B00742LLKU

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Debussy-Piano-Edition-Various-Artists/dp/B00751JXQ4

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Debussy-Complete-Piano-Signature-Edition/dp/B0079J283C

The Decca piano set is comprised of previously released Thibaudet recordings IIUC. Would be tempted, given the rosaries and star accolades, etc. were it not for the fact that I've been tracking down Paul Jacobs' recordings on the back of this thread...

Don't bother with the Sony IMO. The only first rate performances in there are the Boulez Pelleas + orchestral works.

The DG/Universal Debussy Edition surprised me, but then I remembered DG now folds in the Decca and Philips catalogs as well, and this box includes things from some independent French labels too. A lot of great recordings and very intelligently anthologized. This is the best of these 4 sets IMO.

The mostly Thibaudet piano box-- for great modern Debussy playing I would urge you toward the Bavouzet discs on Chandos. There were five of them. If they haven't boxed them yet I'm sure they will. Thibaudet is really good too, but not on Bavouzet's level.

Leave that Gieseking set til later. In the Preludes, the sound quality almost kills some of the most inspired piano playing ever. I hate you Walter Legge for engineering WG in a cardboard box. EMI keeps remastering these but they'll never sound alive. Seek the Gieseking volume in the Great Pianists Of The 2oth Century series-- one disc has his 1930s Debussy recordings and they sound much better than EMI's 1950s ones.

Sund4r what is your day job is it's ok to ask?

Thanks again - might wait a while before wading in... Maybe listen to a few of the performances in the DG box first while continuing my Jacobs odyssey.

Jon: lecturer in music theory and music history. Teaching 20th c music analysis right now so if I'm online, it's usually because I'm taking a break from Debussy or Bartok or Schoenberg etc (or from trying to write music to get a composition job).

I realize every job is a grind, but damn that is v cool to me.

And your own instrument is gtr iirc?

Yes, but I'm a composition/theory specialist, not a professional virtuoso classical performer.

Thanks for the Kancheli reminder, Turangalila.

<3

yeah I need to finally listen to him

I'm afraid of heart attack inducing dynamics tho, like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okD2VSTEWyM

Warning, do not listen to this in the dark.

Btw, if you're not aware of it, the CBC now has an online music service including 10 different classical stations:
http://music.cbc.ca/

(Hopefully, this will survive the budget cuts.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdGDlMeNyoQ

http://i43.tinypic.com/33xyn1u.jpg

^^^great album. One of the very few listenable vinyl-to-CD transfers I ever achieved, when I was trying to do such things, was that LP.

It's a great recording - wonder why there has been no whiff of a CD reissue. No idea what the market for Ives stuff is like...

Now listening to Tallis Anthems. Hearing the fragment used by V. Williams in his 'Fantasia...' for the first time is a real trip.

Big vinyl pull today:

"Music for three pianos in sixths of tones", a collection of piano stuff by Ivan Wyschnegradsky and Bruce Mather. Brilliant gestures hidden in otherwise tedious stuff.

A DG Ligeti compilation: 2nd string quartet (LaSalle), Lux Aeterna, Volumina. Got it for Etude Nr. 1 "Harmonies" for solo organ, really something:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3gVRPmx9cI

David Oistrakh playing Khachaturian, for a dinner tonight

Bernstein/NYPhil playing Elliot Carter Concerto for Orchestra and William Schuman In Praise of Shahn-- so cool, that Schuman:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxXnaRFivhE

Bernstein doing Les Noces and Mass, bleah, but I don't have the Mass on vinyl and his version is OK.

Lorand Fenyves and Anton Kuerti playing Bartok, Sonata #1 and 2nd Rhapsody.

Three Ives LPs:

http://www.nonesuch.com/files/imagecache/section-albums-coverart/albums/coverart/degaetani-kalish-ives-songs.jpg

http://991.com/newGallery/Charles-Ives-Symphony-No-1-483950.jpg

http://ring.cdandlp.com/pgraux/photo_grande/113989522.jpg

And fuck it I got this too:

http://i.imgur.com/cFfc5.jpg

Happy record store day

Nice haul!

I was looking for Messaien but was screwed before I got to "M".

Lately been enjoying these:
Andras Schiff - Bach: Two and Three Part Inventions
Alban Berg Quartett - Haydn: String Quartets Op. 76: No. 2-4

>It's a great recording - wonder why there has been no whiff of a CD reissue. No idea what the market for Ives stuff is like...

Columbia's keeping the spate of centennial Ives recordings off the market -- it's some kind of real crime. The John Kirkpatrick Concord, the Gregg Smith 'Music For Chorus' record, those are both top 10 maybe top 5 Ives records

Man, that is no fun for anyone. =(

HIYA

does anyone have any current classical guitar/spanish guitar recommendations? it's for my mother so nothing too avant garde, she has fairly traditional tastes

a little leftfield but only a little, but you might look into Ralph Towner albums - he's a guitarist from a 70s band called Oregon, remarkable technique, and his solo stuff is incredibly good unaccompanied guitar compositions, and they're beautifully recorded (they're on ECM). His albums Time Line and Ana are both in this style:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gb3d9j5Tex4

another one just because I love this guy's music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hegtu7bSLZE

that is quite gorgeous

has anyone heard of this one? http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=526115

stumbled upon it via reviews etc - know nothing more but i thnk the piece is more in line with her tastes + i think a chinese performer will go down well with her

I've really enjoyed what I've heard of Radio 3's Skalkottas programmes (Composer of the Week). I'd urge anyone who has access to iplayer to listen to those. He's someone to listen to more, clearly.

lex, I don't know that performer but EMI's a solid label for classical & the Concierto de Aranjuez is a completely solid piece in the classical guitar repertoire, I would go for it

You might also look for a 2-guitar version of Albeniz's Iberia solo piano cycle. I'm pretty sure it's been arranged for guitar duo a couple of times. Sund4r to thread...

i like skalkottas and radio 3 should be commended for not just doing delius or handel or whatever for the millionth time

donald mcleod sez nobody he talked to while preparing for the programmes even recognised skalkottas' name

kinda wonder what bawheids are walking around the radio 3 offices

http://www.otherminds.org/shop/Rugglesdisc.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/may/10/debussy-martyre-saint-sebastien-review/print

ha so we were discussing le martyre, and now there's a recording with....isabelle huppert

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7182/6939551135_01552d5157.jpg

http://www.kingsplace.co.uk/whats-on-book-tickets/music/apartment-house-facing-beauty

http://www.kingsplace.co.uk/whats-on-book-tickets/music/mark-knoop-artificial-environments

Couple of recitals that are worth going to.

http://c3.cduniverse.ws/MuzeAudioArt/Large/11/1098211.jpg

This is killing me right now.

Weird, wrong image - it's this one
http://c3.cduniverse.ws/MuzeAudioArt/Large/88/1142288.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj_dPwmfpAI

intrigued by the guarineri

really into bussotti's bergkristall atm

from 2011, Novak's 24 Preludes & Fugues is pretty remarkable imo

Whoa, never heard of that composer.

Ooh that sounds fascinating.

On a similar scale of contempo piano massiveness, does anyone know James Dillon's 'Book of Elements'?

I don't but it's on Naxos Online. Would it come across well enough on built-in PC speakers at the reception desk of an office?

Sounding good so far.

I don't know it yet! Been considering buying it for quite awhile, based on reviews in Fanfare.

man oh man this Novak, Book Two, Prelude 10, "Elijah" - it makes me wish I could write music like this - it's atypical of the cycle, more melodic, lyrical in an almost traditional way but still very open - so so good

gonna get that Dillon from eMusic

cool man, report back!

(do you get hooked up w/free eMu creds for writing columns? If so, jealous!)

trying to remember the name of a composer whose name i have forgotten

in my mind he is filed with antheil.....sort of an eccentric american modernist with an emphasis on piano who lived for a long time iirc

Leo Ornstein?

yes! thank you

i am currently digging the hell out of roussel's 3rd symphony

Born ca. December 2, 1893
Kremenchuk, Poltava, Russian Empire
Died February 24, 2002 (age 108)
Green Bay, Wisconsin, United States

that's ornstein

roussel doesn't seem too familiar to me.....i don't think i know french interwar modernism well

king of french interwar modernism for me is Koechlin, seek anything he wrote for orchestra.

Roussel went through some quite distinct phases iirc. I only own a disc from his early impressionist-exotica phase (the Spider's Feast and the Padmavati suite) as I have a deep weakness for that particular strain of CM...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCdeaAiuCrk

he was of an older generation, so any contemporary influences were filtered through whatever language he had developed to that point, but it has a surprising fierceness and an admirable structural reflexiveness.

xp

and koechlin is indeed brilliant

I wrote a paper that discussed Ornstein once. There was this quote from, if I remember correctly, a concert notice from really early, maybe the 1910s:

"I do bewail the murderous means with which Leo Ornstein patrolled the piano. He stormed its keys, scooping chunks and slag and spouting scoria like a vicious volcano. Heavens!"

yeah koechlin i know (via present company)

i hope that writer never got to hear ustvolskaya

i still love alkan alkan alkan

Enjoyed the Roussel.

<3 this, reissued as "Istikhbars & Improvisations" this year.

http://weirdorecords.com/zen/images/13600.jpg

Mustapha Skandrani - "Musique Classique Algérienne - Stikhbar" [Pathé Marconi, 1965]
Really amazing music from Algerian pianist Mustapha Skandrani – music that effortlessly links up European traditions and North African roots – in a blend that's completely sublime, and unlike anything else we can think of! At many points, Skandrani plays with a complex, virtuostic quality that's right up there with Glenn Gould – but the overall setting is a lot freer, too – with these long, drawn-out tunes that are half improvisations – piano lines stretching forth, based on Algerian vocal modes (even though the set is just piano) – in ways that almost illustrate the same sort of African influence that Randy Weston explored with his 60s piano – yet expressed here by Mustapha in a completely different way! Titles include "Mode Araq", "Mode Raml Maya", "Mode Moual", "Mode Zidane", and "Mode Sika" – plus a number of untitled improvisations.

It's almost like a noodlier, sped-up Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou. I want more.

Cage night at the Proms was v enjoyable

Looking fwd to this:

http://www.cafeoto.co.uk/langham-research-centre-john-cage-tape-electronics.shtm

Don't know about this but is happening in the same week:

http://www.cafeoto.co.uk/john-cage-indeterminacy-stewart-lee-tania-chen-steve-beresford.shtm

Talking of centenaries has anyone caught any performances of Pierrot Lunaire?

Been listening to that Mustapha Skandrani reissue quite a bit

really curious to hear that Novak now—two of my favorite things are cycles of 24 preludes+fugues, and weirdo avant-garde experimentation with traditional forms (a one-voice fugue??? preposterous!!!)

a one-voice fugue??? preposterous!!!

I kind of did a double-take at that too.

some of bach's solo works (for cello, violin) have one-voiced fugues don't they?

I've N=never heard of one but perhaps it may be possible; you can find all sorts of things in his fugues. Do you know of an example? I've always understood fugues to be polyphonic by definition: you need at least a subject and answer, surely? There's a two-voice fugue in WTC, Bk 1 (Em, #10) and even that's pretty wild.

"I've never..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6BjTN25VbE&feature=related

?

??? The answer clearly enters in a second voice around 0:07.

You can see it on the score here: http://imslp.org/wiki/Violin_Sonata_No.3_in_C_major,_BWV_1005_(Bach,_Johann_Sebastian)#Scores

Johann Sebastian’s fugues for unaccompanied violin from the Sonatas, BWV 1001, 1003,

and 1005, play a central role in the violin repertoire. Bach’s conceptualization of the fugues for

solo violin, an instrument that would appear to preclude this sort of contrapuntal writing, is

unique in the Baroque repertoire. This paper identifies precedents to Bach’s creation of fugues

for solo violin. While Bach’s unprecedented and unmatched skill in the fugal genre provided for

the creation of the violin fugues, he drew ideas from existing compositions and techniques.

Specifically, he adopts the formal adaptation of the sonata da chiesa to the solo violin sonata

which occurred in the Italian school of violin playing, notably Arcangelo Corelli. Furthermore,

he builds upon early experimentation with the unaccompanied violin sonata and the development

of virtuoso techniques within the German school of virtuoso violin playing of the late

seventeenth century. Bach’s fugues for solo violin, therefore, represent a synthesis of the Italian

and German traditions of violin playing.

right....multiple voices on an instrument that is conventionally univocal

nb i don't have any theory knowledge

The violin is not a monophonic instrument. Check the score I linked: a second voice enters in m. 4 and a THIRD voice enters in m. 10.

2xpost

no.....but i don't think anybody wrote for the violin like this prior to him? biber maybe?

maybe Corelli

Baltzar, Biber, Walther, and Westhoff are listed as German antecedents here: http://drum.lib.umd.edu/bitstream/1903/2912/1/umi-umd-2703.pdf

Talking of centenaries has anyone caught any performances of Pierrot Lunaire?

I've missed one that I know of in NYC, probably more I didn't notice. I should really keep a sharper eye out; this is a bucket-list piece for me to see in performance

I guess that a fugue could be of ideas and/or rhythms and need not be polyphonic? Or you could just play a single voice of a fugue and it'd be beautiful and the polyphony would be implied?

Anyway there's some/lots of polyphonic music for violin/cello pre-Bach but those solo sonatas/suites were revolutionary insofar as they extended 'violinistic technique'. (Also, those violin fugues are uh 'bad pieces' as far as I'm concerned, save the g-minor, they're the hardest to learn and the hardest to sell)

I've just never known of another single-voice fugue so I'm interested to see what this guy did with this idea. It's likely that it's along the lines of what you suggest.

who have you been trying to sell them too ówen?

too

Me personally? Nobody, those fugues are good for nothing but auditions. You can't play them at weddings or funerals. They're not flashy enough for a recital or beautiful enough for church service.

The high-water mark in Bach solo violin polyphonic writing is imho the Adagio from Sonata 3 (C major), pretty much the most beautiful thing ever written, Youtube it, I'll listen to Hahn, Ehnes and John Holloway playing it back-to-back-to-back

Fuck it this is so beautiful I'm gonna post it on the drone thread

lack of flashiness no bad thing

xpost of course I don't have any of those three -- I have Kremer II, St. John, J. Fischer, and Grumiaux

milstein for all that

kremer ii i have heard, perlman

zehetmair is v dry if u go in for it

I kiss Gidon for his Ysaye forever but his Bach makes me want to [do something negative]. Milstein and Grimeaux are good.

People are all *roll eyes* when people say Hahn anything but her robot technique works excellent for me on Bach and if she ever records the complete sonatas/suites I'll buy ten copies.

Seriously: seek out John Holloway for his Baroque performances, he gets a little shaky on some of the toughies but his tone and intonation are just heartwrenching

Holloway is on iTunes, get a sample over there

I have zero Holloway recordings somehow! I remember his Biber Rosary Sonatas got rave reviews back in the day.

I have nothing against Hahn. She somehow came up with a new recording of the Sibelius concerto that felt fresh to me after all the ones I've had and loved. The Schoenberg on the same disc was also awesome.

^ don't tell a Finn that

Rachel Podger's Bach recordings (with historical instrument) are very good

The high-water mark in Bach solo violin polyphonic writing is imho the Adagio from Sonata 3 (C major), pretty much the most beautiful thing ever written, Youtube it, I'll listen to Hahn, Ehnes and John Holloway playing it back-to-back-to-back

Listened to Hahn's recording twice yesterday.

...thoughts?

Oh, it was very nice, sorry. Really good piece. I haven't listened to other recordings of it enough to make comparisons about the performance.

I guess that wasn't the most informative post, ha. Just chiming in that I was listening to your recommendation, I guess.

Many "Romantic" violinists/cellists make a go at enhancing the drama of Bach Adagios, but I prefer a performance that aims for tranquility, just letting the voicing spin out in the most natural way. Still haven't found a 100% great performance of the Ciaconne but I guess that'll never happen and maybe shouldn't

milsteinnnn

OK

not by those criteria, but by mine

'the most natural way'...i don't know enough about violins and violinism to say, but this is just the _absolute_, and he was 82 years old too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l75X-SDKq1Y

Listened to '68 and already, it's not for me. There's enormous amount of open-E on that first page and I like it when the performer integrates its tone instead of having it ring out like baby in the next room.

'86 is so far kind of awesome, holy shit? 82 years old? I like this performance better

Oh my god I'm gonna cry his wrist is so stiffened and still it's so beautiful

http://www.emiclassicsus.com/latest_news/fifty-shades-of-grey-the-classical-album/

*blows head off*

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/aug/15/feldman-crippled-symmetry-review

http://i.imgur.com/d3Q7j.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXshbVJL2gc

holy shit

NYer profile of Christian Tetzlaff piqued my interest and I've been working through some of his recordings on Spotify. His Bach Sonatas & Partitas are pretty much revelatory, which is classical-douchebag-speak for awesome.

Also liked his Brahms violin concerto very much

He really has his own sound, as advertised.

hes good in the bartok unaccompanied violin sonata

^yes, I v much recommend his Bartok disc with Leif Ove Andsnes. Been meaning to get his Hanssler rerecording of the Bach cycle for years. Also recommended: recent Szymanowski disc with him and Boulez.

NYer article was nice.

the other day i blagged a ticket to this excellent concert

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/aug/26/prom-56-bbcso-knussen/print

and after the end of 'le martyre', plummy voiced woman in the next box exclaimed 'thank GOD, that was almost as bad as mahler'

so many layers of idiocy

Mehler.

smdh

So what are your favorite piano quintets? Recommend some, plz.

‘With Moses und Aron, I have tried to destroy Stravinsky’s quote
saying that music was powerless to express the most abstract, the
most ordinary, the most concrete things.’ (Jean-Marie Straub)

(Note: Schoenberg's title may have omitted an "A" in Aaron's name because the composer was severely superstitious triskaidekaphobe.[3] "Moses und Aaron" would have caused the title to have a total of 13 letters.)

been meaning to see those straub/huillet filmed operas -- they did one of vom heute auf morgen that looks good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5hztoVTHac

send me into space with this forever in my ears please

I love that guy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jCkdWTyDbY

on a renaissance kick atm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVeaAhYluOc

sigh

prokofiev's romeo and juliet — omg so good

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljOMXgfflRI

Been listening to some Hindemith chamber music, and lots of Couperin lately.

Found this fun footage of the man himself conducting in 1963:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sp84Ar3eyP8

tend to like hindemith pre-wwii the most — the kammermusik pieces especially.

listening to this, which i suspect i will not tire of anytime soon:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41tn6NY-GcL._SS500_.jpg

The Bach transcriptions on that Kurtag disc are completely breathtaking. Wish they had recorded more of them on that disc. (K has done more than those few).

I've got tickets to Arvo Pärt's Passio next thursday with Ars Nova and Theatre of Voices in Copenhagen. Looking forward to it.

http://www.wigmore-hall.org.uk/whats-on/productions/exaudi-james-weeks-director-30413

shd be good if you like that sort of thing..

Check the last paragraph: http://spectrumculture.com/2012/10/morton-feldman-crippled-symmetry-at-june-in-buffalo.html/

god bruckner's choral music is so great

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6fAT3iGRWc

Spent the weekend working through EMI's "Great Cathedral Organs" 13-CD set with my dad. It was amazing!

Great: Mendelssohn organ sonatas! Holy crap, I had no idea! None of the performances from this CD set are on Youtube (Philip Marshall plays #5 which was my favourite). Here's somebody else instead, this is nice enough

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdy17WD-2Zk

Good: Dad loves Cesar Franck and there are several pieces of his on the collection. Franck's harmonic sensibilities rarely work for me. There was a good Elgar sonata played by a guy named Sumsion ("Well, he ~knew~ Elgar, don't you know," says dad.)

I was less impressed by Ives and Reger. The Bach stuff I've heard a million times and it was good. A great collection, it was all recorded in the 70s and they sound hairy and brilliant and bright.

Organ repertoire is a huge, inglorious hole in my otherwise fairly wide-ranging classical knowledge. The specific INSTRUMENT matters so much... it's hard to process!

Oof Nicolas Kynaston on Westminster is a great recital. Two good Franck pieces, an awesome piece by Vierne and Messaien "Combat de la Mort et de la Vie" which ruuuules, I'm gonna do something about this and DM you about that

My father informs me that both the Franck pieces (Choral in a minor, Pastorale in E) are "really, the best things Franck ever wrote" and that the Vierne piece (Carillon de Westminster) is fairly overplayed in his opinion but, yes, beautiful.

Google informs me of an interesting account of Vierne's, ah, show-stopping death: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christopher-houlihan/louis-vierne-concert-organist-tribute_b_1559222.html

have you heard jehan alain? his father studied with vierne, and he himself studied with dupré and dukas. his music sounds like proto-messiaen

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQiS_iA6UuE

o yeah, his sister is marie-claire alain (still alive!)

clouds, Jon, DM sent

Thank you v much Mr. flamgoontincl!

yes!

(anybody else is welcome if you message me; it is a delicious organ recital)

one problem with organ music, which usually isn't an issue with other genres of cm is how it seems that so many ppl can never get over the "spooky haunted house" or, more understandably, the "churchy" connotation it has, instead of just hearing it as pure, varied (in a circumscribed way, ofc) music. even ppl who normally have good taste can't seem to get over it. bugs me to no end.

like how can you hear something as sublimely beautiful as bach's "ich ruf zu dir, herr jesu christ" and feel nothing more than "this sounds like a funeral." chalk it up to ignorance i suppose.

That's just an extension of ppls inability to listen to stravinsky/bartok without thinking ~horror movie~ or lieder without thinking 'nooo opera stay away'

can anyone recommend the go-to recordings of the prokofiev symphonies?

1 - Too many choices
2 - The one on Chandos or the Gergiev
3 - Abbado on London/Decca or Gergiev
4 - Kuchar on Naxos
5 - I like Ormandy/Sony for this one but many many choices
6 - Mravinsky on Praga (probably reiss on other labels)
7 - Smetacek on Praga

there is no wholly awesome one-stop box set.

incidentally listening to kuchar's 3 and 7 while typing that post

Love #3 sooooo much, 2 and 3 both hella underrated aggro-modernism.

The Leinsdorf recordings are supposed to be v good as well, but I don't have those.

can anyone recommend a recording of bartok's 'bluebeard's castle'? i'd quite like one that includes the libretto....

Hmmm. The only one of the 3 I own which came with libretto was the Haitink/EMI. But it's not my favorite (though not bad).

thank you!

The justly lauded Kertesz/London one has had a ton of different reissues-- see which one has a libretto and get that,is my advice.

liking this

http://www.pacificaquartet.com/recordings.php?albumName=shostakovich%201,2,3,4

also this ed. of sonatas and interludes by cage

http://www.dustedmagazine.com/reviews/7442

apparently there's another out this year too..

Franck's harmonic sensibilities rarely work for me.

Hmmm. Do you like any of the late chamber pieces? Franck is one my favorite composers - would recommend the String Quartet in D and the Quintet in F minor.

the constant roving chromaticism can make his music seem restless but that doesn't preclude my enjoyment

can anyone recommend a recording of bartok's 'bluebeard's castle'? i'd quite like one that includes the libretto....

Get a dvd! Easier to watch than read.. I recommend this one
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bluebeards-Castle-London-Philharmonic-Orchestra/dp/B0011WMWWU/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1351561144&sr=1-1

i got the kertesz/london recording of "bluebeard's castle" (with libretto), as recommended by jon; it's amazing. the first time i've enjoyed opera. hoping it's maybe a gateway...

can anyone recommend a good recording of Delius' powerful joyous climactic choral stuff which I have seen a couple of times on TV programmes but never taken down the name of the pieces ?
All I can find on spotify is more pastoral ( cartoon deer prancing through woods with bluebirds, that kinda thing)
hopefully someone who knows something can advise.

requiem, a mass of life, sea-drift, songs of sunset (look for the vernon handley recordings)

ace, thank you so much. I'll do some youtube digging and then look for the recording you recommend.

It's hard to know what you heard; Delius deployed chorus in a variety of ways. Was it chorus unaccompanied or orchestra with chorus? Here are some stabs in the dark:

Appalachia - This is a long orchestral work in variation form which brings in the chorus for a big finale ("Honey I am goin' down the river in the mornin'/Hey-oh hey-oh down the mighty river..."). It's based on a spiritual tune from the american south. I recommend Mackerras or Barbirolli for this.

Song Of The High Hills - Probably the most sublime, mysterious & evanescent thing Delius ever did. The apex of his pantheist mode. Mostly orchestral; the chorus is used as a wordless element of the instrumental fabric a la Debussy's Nocturnes. Recommend Mackerras, Fenby or Bo Holten for this.

A Mass Of Life - This is much more choral-centered in the oratorio style. Big and lumbering, with text drawn from Nietzsche's Zarathustra, it was supposed to be a kind of atheist's mass. I've never clicked with this piece. People usually recommend Hickox for it.

Songs of Sunset/Songs of Farewell - These are structured like songs but the chorus carries a lot of the weight. Extremely chromatic, to a fault if you ask me, but they include some heart-piercing moments. Hickox with Bryn Terfel and Sally Burgess is a good choice for these.

Sea Drift - Included on the same Hickox disc with the previous item, this is a fantastic setting of a Whitman poem about sad seagulls for solo voice plus chorus and orchestra. Definitely deserves its status as a greatest hit.

Also, to roll with Delius at all you're gonna have to come to grips with the pastoralist thing. Replace the cartoon deer and bluebirds with the real thing and get inside their skins; this kind of aural nature poetry was not a quaint picture postcard thing for Delius but a subject of the deepest intensity.

(By the way C I think you mean Hickox not Handley? Handley did his share of Delius but not much of the choral stuff iirc?)

ha yes, you're right. was mixing up my chandos regulars.

and your post is wonderfully informative. will have to do some delving.

my love for the Arbiter label is strong - every time I put on something from them, it's the right thing, hiss and all.

Webern, Beethoven, Kurtag

Cesar Franck continues to frustrate and confound us

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOtejkH8jjw

The last 1:30 of the last movement of Shostakovich's last symphony: one of my favorite passages of music ever.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/culture/2012/11/ten-notable-classical-music-recordings-of-2012.html

there is some shitty programme about westminster abbey on tv and all the choirboys are auditioning for the soloist in allegri's miserere and oh god this kid's voice just cuts out for the high c

same programme had zadok the priest all over it and now i can't stop playing zadok the gd priest so i downloaded a couple of oratorios but none of them remotely approximate that awed stately plaintively phasing intro or or the sudden choral exultation (the second half of zadok is no good)

will try to find that

Recs for watching Don Giovanni on Netflix DVD or streaming?

Just got a CD of Philip Glass music - "Metamorphosis" and some selections from Glassworks and the score to The Hours performed on harp by Lavinia Meijer. Pretty nice. Here's a bit of it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_54NQciqofU

To bring this thread (almost) full cycle - this is out a week today: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sibelius-Complete-Symphonies-Tapiola-Finlandia/dp/B0091JQH2Q/

Oh that's great! Cheap too! Shame they are not including Kullervo but that Bournemouth recording has already been available for a while.

The Berglund/Bournemouth team is almost always worth hearing. Their Shostakovich 10 and 11, Vaughan Williams 4 and 6, and sibelius Kullervo are all close to top choices IMO. So I'll want to hear these Sib symphonies.

Is there a new thread? (long time reader, first time poster)

the 'an attempt at a...' thread is v active right now and for the last couple weeks!

Rued Langgaard's Music Of The Spheres for the first time--a new recording is out conducted by Dausgaard--and was bowled over

from the bowls of ILM, I resurrect this thread to say this is indeed an amazing piece. Watched a youtube of Per Norgard saying he'd slipped this score to Ligeti in 1968, without L's knowledge of Langgaard's music, and Ligeti immediately confessed to a sudden realization of seemingly having been "influenced" by it. Tone clusters, weird, repetitive motifs, harmony that goes even further than Debussy in its total disregard for typical tension/release. The only thing that really gives it away as being a kind of Romantic tone poem is Strauss-y/Wagnerian orchestration. (It also reminds me a bit of Sibelius' later stuff which might support further Norgard connections)

Is it OK if I c&p this to the thread I just started: Rolling Classical (Late 2015-)