Rolling Classical 2012

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.

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-)