Rolling Classical 2020

Prepared guitar piece worth price of admission.

Nice! I'm a sucker for Beckett-themed contemporary classical but Dwyer does it better than most. It also helps make up for my utter ignorance of the Irish scene.

I haven’t heard it yet but this may be of interest to you, Sund4r (and others, of course):

https://thibaultcauvin.lnk.to/BrouwerEM

Cool, I don't know Cauvin's playing that well. I will try to look into it.

I'm into Dan Michaelson's new one, Colourfield

https://dan.michaelsonscores.com/album/colourfield

That was nice.

RIP Julian Bream; there's no classical guitarist I've listened to more: https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-53777949

RIP

I began to explore the classical guitar repertoire through his recordings, which were never anything less than remarkable, and Nocturnal is among my very favourite recitals for any instrument. He will be greatly missed.

Do you know his 20th Century Guitar albums? The original LP is really the definitive but the two CDs are also good. I'm listening to the first rn.

Just listened to the new Roomful of Teeth recording of Michael Harrison's Just Constellations while doing dishes: https://roomfulofteeth.bandcamp.com/album/just-constellations

It's all drone-based choral music in just intonation. Wasn't totally sure what I thought yet but it was pleasant.

it's okay but it's the OTHER roomful of teeth that got me today. "Are We Death" is likely to be one of the best singles of the year for me.

https://roomfulofteeth.bandcamp.com/album/the-ascendant

That made a stronger first impression.

Devónte Tine's take on Langston Hughes "The Black Clown" was probably the best thing I heard live last year; this is very much worth your time
http://lincolncenter.org/lincoln-center-at-home/show/harlem-week-the-black-clown-by-langston-hughes-661

(tho tbh, that's not the best clip out of context. Tines conversation merits the click though and the impression i get is that this is going to be a series, so probably worth tracking)

https://open.spotify.com/album/79x1fDyq0qs8OS75QfEoYC

the beautiful Yair Elazar Glotman soundtrack from Last and First Men is a big element of what makes the movie so apocalyptic and affecting for me.

probably bad form of me not to mention that the late Jóhann Jóhannsson wrote this soundtrack but died before it was recorded. Was just wiki-ing it and read he was in a late 80's vaguely shoegazey band (daisy hill puppy farm) that got played on Peel that I have a vague memory of hearing a version of Heart Of Glass from when I was 15.

Steve Cowan's (now McGill instructor) livestream solo guitar concert from tonight was archived here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/732611411?fbclid=IwAR3JaLC7rh4Sa8ZuUfN-hjsUAbjAOUc92Zad6i2gju6o5Uws4rnkrtf0BzI

This was the programme:

Silvius Leopold Weiss (1687-1750)
Sonata V in G Major (excerpts)
Thomas Adès (b. 1971)
Interlude from "The Exterminating Angel"
Federico Mompou (1893-1987)
Suite Compostelana (excerpts)
Manuel M. Ponce (1882-1948)
24 Preludios (excerpts)
Frank Martin (1890-1974)
Quatre pièces brèves
Steve Cowan (b. ???)
Suite Laconique

The Adès piece (around 24m in) is v cool and aggressive. I didn't know it before. I own a couple of recordings of the Martin, ofc, but he performed it well, with a lot of intensity. Weiss piece is lovely too. There was an encore with Sor's fourth lesson from Vingt-quatre leçons progressives - an easy piece, to be sure, but done really nicely and a light way to end things.

Cool, thanks for the heads up. I'm a big fan of the Martin and curious about the rest so I'll check it out.

I'm listening to Joanna MacGregor 2016 recording of Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano on NML. On Sonata no.5. These are interesting. She takes the sonatas at appreciably faster tempi than in other recordings or performances I've heard, giving them something more of an energetic, rollicking feel, as opposed to the atmospheric, contemplative character I'm used to.

holy crap! just heard some stunning piece from Nikolai Kapustin's etudes on the radio that just blew my socks off, now I know what I want in my shopping basket next.

I didn't know those but I just watched a video of Yeol Eum Don playing 6-8 and, yeah, wow.

Kapustin is fun, yeah. The composer is a highly capable interpreter of his own works, but Marc-André Hamelin absolutely nails them.

alas I noticed he passed away a couple of months back when I looked up the name.

On the dronier and more microtonal end of the spectrum, I'm enjoying Bára Gísladóttir's HĪBER, 50 minutes of winter-inspired pieces for solo double bass against a discreet backdrop of found soundscapes. It really does make me feel like I'm hibernating, as intended.

Wow, that's great, thanks for that Pom. It's super glacial (which is duh because winter inspired) and yeah, could've fooled me if this was in a drone thread. First I've heard of her, if you've got more recommendations I'd like to hear it!

Glad you liked it, LBI! It was my introduction to her music as well, and I'm definitely going to check out her other stuff, most of which is thankfully on Apple Music/Spotify.

https://chrisicasiano.bandcamp.com/album/provinces

Filipino-American percussionist and composer Christopher Icasiano presents his debut solo work Provinces, two suites that explore the complexity of cultural identity and community as a second generation immigrant in Seattle. Composed predominantly on the drum set, Provinces’ virtuosic rhythmic patterns evoke melodies over long cyclical phrases, while a lush color palette provided by keyboards and percussion fill out the soundscape.

this has grown on me, god knows if it belongs here but I didn't know where else to park it!

What are the best Xenakis bangers?

― rob, mardi 22 septembre 2020 15:35 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

...
Jonchaies absolutely bangs.

― sock solipsist (pomenitul), mardi 22 septembre 2020 15:35 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Try Pithoprakta.

― The nexus of the crisis and the origin of storms (Sund4r), mardi 22 septembre 2020 15:36 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Looks like we’ll need a poll

― rob, mardi 22 septembre 2020 15:37 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

I'm down.

― sock solipsist (pomenitul), mardi 22 septembre 2020 15:37 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Although it started as a joke, a Xenakis ballot poll actually sounds like it might be a good idea. What kind of interest would there be? We only got around 18 ballots when we did a poll for all notated music since 1890 some years ago so it might be slim.

I'd be interested! (Though I go AWOL a lot and miss stuff. Not least that notated music poll, despite submitting nominations! o_0 )

I would watch! I’m not versed broadly enough in X to vote. I will say that Persephassa live in Central Park was one of the peak live music experiences of my life.

Alternatively, we could do a dedicated chronological listening thread, Shakey-style.

Oh, that sounds fun.

And it doesn't have to be Xenakis (although I, for one, would be into it). We can nominate a few composers, then poll them to secure a consensus.

i'd be into a dedicated xenakis thread — perhaps as a precursor to a ballot poll ?

Excellent idea! Any other prospective participants?

Ha, thought so.

In other news, John Luther Adams's Lines Made by Walking and untouched, played by the ever-reliable JACK Quartet, both sound like unabashed Pärt riffs, and I'm totally cool with that.

Oh I'd be up for it!

Well, ok, untouched less so due to the microtonal inflections, but still.

xp excellent, so I guess that makes… six of us?

Iannis Xenasix, Metastasix, The Dämmerschein Six. The possibilities are endless!

John Luther Adams/JACK Quartet and three compositions inspired by slowly trudging across vast landscapes. I'm up for some of that!

Speaking of JLA and vast landscapes, Become River, Become Ocean and Become Desert have just been re-released as a trilogy.

For some reason, I just don't find myself going back to his works very much, although I own four of his albums and listened to all of them in the years of release. Not sure what it is.

I think of him as an ambient composer.

I'd be up for whatever kind of dedicated listening thread, Xenakis or et al., you all devise (I'm certainly not knowledgeable enough to participate in a poll though) provided it doesn't start until next week.

On that note, in the free time I'm about to finally have, I was idly thinking about listening through pom's classical polls: each top 3 or something...I haven't thought about the logistics at all, just been wanting to do a more dedicated listen to classical than I ever have. This project might be slightly more likely to actually happen if someone joins me—I could start a thread if anyone thinks they'd be into commenting/playing along/making fun of my taste?

Rolling classical threads don't see much action anyway, so feel free to keep us posted here, if you prefer.

Starting with the top 3 results of each decade poll up until, say, 1940, is not a bad way to do it – thanks for the vote of confidence! I wouldn't approach it too systematically, though, so if I were you I'd give myself some wiggle room to periodically put those polls on the back-burner and just keep exploring whichever composer and/or compositional genre you jive with the most along the way.

I have no musical training to speak of and can't tell an A apart from a C, so I just got into classical because I liked what I heard (Shostakovich's 8th String Quartet was the catalyst). There's some theoretical stuff I amateurishly picked up along the way just by listening (and reading, although that doesn't extend to actual sheet music), but simply paying attention and being moved by certain pieces is what did it for me – as with all other types of music, really, although classical does perhaps require you to focus a bit more before it opens up, which is part of what I like about it tbh, especially now that I'm finding it increasingly more difficult not to be scatterbrained as digital electronics, with their infinite potential for multi-tasking (aka distraction), encroach on my listening habits to an unsettling degree.

Thanks for the encouragement, pom! Excited for this, it's really going to improve my pretentious, ivory-tower-dwelling elitist snob game :)

I've just started listening and since the first piece is a total obscurity called Beethoven's 'Pastoral' (two thumbs up), I have a question: do any of you have a go-to source/guide for deciding which recording to listen to?

I'm currently listening to Karl Böhm and the Wiener Philharmoniker as it was the first one that came up when I searched. I don't have any complaints...it might be a little soft? It's called Pastoral though so that seems appropriate. [ok, I just got to the storm section...never mind, this is properly dynamic]

I know "Pastoral" fairly well actually, though not to the level of having any kind of perspective on the interpretative work Böhm might be doing. But an anxiety I always have with big canon classical is that I'm not listening to the "best" recording--I know the answer is probably: just listen to it and if you like it try some others, but I'm wondering if there's a relatively trustworthy guide I'm not aware of. Even just searching for this music on streaming services is a nightmare--instant nostalgia for the CD racks at my public library growing up (which I largely ignored on my way to the sci-fi section lol).

Other than a recording guide, I'd be curious if anyone has any book recommendations? Not quite sure what I have in mind, but, for example, I have an unread copy of Alex Ross's The Rest Is Noise that I plan to at least dip into when I get to the 20th c.

Also, thank you to the poll voters, "Pastoral" was a rather pleasant way to start the project and my morning.

Sadly neither The Penguin guides nor the gramophone guides are still printed they have their limitations of course (bias towards British performers) but used ones could help you start exploring. With Spotify it’s so easy to compare performances and see which one moves you the most. Then you can go down the rabbit hole of “traditional” vs. “historically informed performance”, etc. Bohm would represent the former, for example. Huge orchestra, 20th century instruments.

Right now for Beethoven I’m enjoying Frans Brüggen and the Orchestra of the 18th Century for a “ historically informed” approach. It’s quite delightful!

an anxiety I always have with big canon classical is that I'm not listening to the "best" recording

I can certainly relate to this. Starting out, there were certain canonical works I couldn't get into at all until I found the right recording, so the stakes are high and therefore stressful! Honestly, I'd say it's a process of trial and error: if you feel like Böhm's take on the Pastoral is too leisurely (and it really is), you can check out a swifter, more youthful version such as Claudio Abbado's live recording with the Berlin Philharmonic (that's probably my go-to Beethoven Symphonies cycle btw, although it tells an ineluctably partial tale and could never suffice on its own). But yeah, I'd say it helps to read online reviews and get a sense of which interpretation best matches your view of the work and/or the composer's aesthetic, and that takes time. But it's also a lot of fun, and the realization that you only disliked/failed to get important composition x because subpar recording(s) y or z had misled you is one of my favourite things about exploring classical music. You'll also start to get a better feel for who your favourite performers are, and they can usually guide you through other composers' oeuvres as well.

As for The Rest Is Noise, I think it's a good read, but its narrative is extremely US-centric, which may or may not appeal to you. I personally found that aspect of it quite insufferable, especially when he suggests that while fascism may have threatened to destroy European music, the US heroically swooped in to save the day, expanding the modernist idiom beyond what was previously thought possible (which is true), as though aesthetic breakthroughs had just ceased in the so-called Old World (which is bullshit). If you look past that borderline jingoistic reading of history, however, and supplement it with, say, Paul Griffiths's Modern Music and After for the postwar period, it's definitely worth your while because it does help make up for the unsurprisingly Eurocentric approaches that thrive on the other side of the pond (I mind those way less, but that's my own personal bias showing).

Oh, and I almost forgot about the guides. I just just saw that the latest entry in The Guardian's 'Know the Score' series was added this morning – on Schubert, incidentally – and it occurs to me that it's not a bad place to start, even though I don't really care for Andrew Clements's list of great Beethoven performers. Not that it matters in the end – you're bound to feel differently from both me and Clements after listening to different recordings, and that's precisely the beauty of it:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/series/know-the-score

xp to B,M: Brüggen is good! I really enjoy his Mozart too, and I usually don't like Mozart all that much.

Haha, the Griffiths was the textbook when I took late 20th c music history in undergrad (not sure why tbh since the prof was far from being a Boulez-obsessed Europhile) - Ross's take is almost a breath of fresh air in comparison, but yeah, the two have opposite biases. I find the Griffiths a little dry and rarefied, though - I wouldn't even assign it to undergrad music students myself.

What I did assign is Joseph Auner and Walter Frisch - Music in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries, which involves a little more notation and technical musical info than Ross but certainly no more than Griffiths. I think it's very good, thorough, and up-to-date; American but not as slanted in its coverage as Ross; touches on the relationships between these movements and popular styles as well.