Rolling Classical 2012

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