an attempt at a general "What are you currently digging re. classical music" thread

Is Wim Mertens 'Classical'? Recently got his Struggle for Pleasure album and it's very enjoyable. Find myself putting it on again after it finishes and putting it on when I can't think of anything particular to play.

my partner loooooves that album

The only mertens I know is the sdtrk to belly of an architect ...

i love the stuff i have of his on windham hill. whisper me is great. such underheard records. you can buy them on vinyl for nothing. i think of him more in the harold budd type of arena? whatever that is. modern newage ambient classical whatever music.

i would totally buy any of his Les Disques Du Crépuscule releases from the 80's and 90's but physical copies are harder to find. the windham hill pressings are ubiqutous. and they are comps of the les disques material.

Outsider music tonight in London. Tenney, Nancarrow among others.

Won't be there.

Liking Invisibility for Solo cello by Liza Lim quite a bit. I was at that concert, and it felt like I was witnessing the birth of something that would be in the repertoir for a long time to come. First time that has happened.

Really hit me because I had a CD of hers - works from the 90s - that hadn't made much of an impression but it seems like only now she is writing great music. So Wild Winged One for Solo Trumpet has these clownish flurries of humour that get your attention straight away, but there is an argument in which they are subsumed into, grains of which only return now and then. I haven't heard many compositions for solo trumpet, its hard to get away from its legacy in jazz but she certainly manages to give it a distinct character.

I just got back from seeing the Cecilia String Quartet and pianist Georgy Tchaidze at the university. The one contemporary work the quartet played, Another Little Piece of My Heart by Kelly-Marie Murphy, is really really great, despite the dumb title. You can watch one movement here: http://youtu.be/39Fla-lTbNw

They also did Franck's Piano Quintet, which was staggering. And Tchaidze played some Mendelssohn. I admit to taking a nap during Variations serieuses.:P

Variations sneuzes

Wonder what Canadian composers Cecilia will be recording - get onto it Sund4r :)

Yeah, that Franck piece rules.

Yun's Study for Flute is A+++

Liza Lim's Mother Tongue I'm undecided on this - great vocal lines and all but some of the brassy lines don't agree w/me, a bit one-dimensional at times. Will re-listen

how about this! i was just listening to john renbourn's lady and the unicorn and was like WHAT IS THIS SONG because it sounded so familiar
it was lamento di tristano played super duper fast!!

i never look at the song titles on this record but now i know
pleasant surprise, the end

i forgot about my ear-research project i was supposed to do on that ('why does LL like Munrow Lamento di Tristano more than other versions? What makes this Tristano diff than other Tristanos?')

it's ok, you have other things to do -- i'm patient! i think it has something to do with (1) spare instrumentation (2) drone and (3) pace, but beyond that i have no idea.

I've hunted a work for larger ensemble by Newman (The State Paintings with the anti-abstract), he has this...naivety about him, very English experimental school, i.e. post-Obscure records variety, yet what keeps you from dismissing it as solely is that is by how well learnt it is. Lives and revels in that paradox.

Elliott Carter re-discovery gathers pace - rocking away the duo for violin and piano from '75. The violin is incredibly gestural and violent, the piano is a almost ambient observer by comparison. Until it joins in the fun later, that is.

anyone recognize the artist of this painting?

http://static.qobuz.com/images/jaquettes/3760/3760127221029_600.jpg

It's a detail from Johann Friedrich Overbeck's "Maria und Elisabeth mit dem Jesus- und Johannesknaben".
http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/romanticism/Friedrich-Overbeck.html

wow! i was expecting it to be some northern renaissance painter from the 15th/16th century. thanks :D

http://i.imgur.com/N6KXrOA.jpg

probably a fun cd (idk much ornstein apart from "suicide in an airplane"), but ugh that cover

Well people really did call them that tbf

that is solidly in the upper quartile of steffen scheiermacher covers judging by a cursory gis

Re: that "Oboe from Mars" compilation, don't miss Claus-Steffan Mahnkopf's Solitude-Nocturne!

― il caresse sa dingding (Paul in Santa Cruz), Monday, 14 January 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Love this! Def on the comp!

So wanna go to this tonight. *sigh*

http://open.spotify.com/track/7mc9iLnsOGsKyTHs6ICpNT

can anyone id that bach piece?

Happy birthday to Delius!

cool — i will listen to "paris" for the occasion

I always wanna reach for Song of the High Hills or Appalachia

Jon: as a big Sibelius fan, what do you think of Rozhdestvensky?

I have not heard any of Rozhdy's Sibelius cycle. I understand it's kind of a controversial one. Rozhdy is quite versatile in my experience - I have him in Prokofiev, Delius and Vaughan Williams and he's great in all three.

I'm really curious to hear his cycle, which is supposed to be very distinctive indeed - booking it out of the library tomorrow.

a stroll thru some of my classical bins.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQpq4T-cGjM

That made me happy!

If i was there hangin' out right now I would bug you to throw on the Britten - Spring Symphony and then Boulez - Le Marteau! And WTF is the Nude Paper Sermon?!

"http://open.spotify.com/track/7mc9iLnsOGsKyTHs6ICpNT

can anyone id that bach piece?"

I'm having trouble tracking this down. There's a famous Bourree from the Lute Suite in e minor but that's not it. I wouldn't be surprised if this was a transcription/derivation.

Favorite Chopin Etudes? Perahia is my go-to for having the best combination of virtuosity and musicality. I am listening to the Lang Lang set on Spotify and it's surprisingly good for all the shit he gets from connoisseurs. On the positive - the guy can clearly play and it's cool to hear all the notes. However I don't want to hear EVERY note pounded out precisely at the expense of the melody. 25/6 and 25/11 are player-piano robotic in sections.

There has never been a particular one that worked all the way through the whole cycle for me. At various times I've favored Ashkenazy, abbey Simon, and Perahia. The BBC live excerpts by Richter are astonishing. Maybe too astonishing.

schubert d.958 and 959 (kempff)

D958 is my favorite Schubert sonata right now. Andsnes!!!

all three of the last sonatas are otherworldy

I consider D894 to be absolutely amazing too. Man, there's just nothing like late Schubert. I saw the trio D929 performed live last year and was almost indecently intense to experience in public.

"http://open.spotify.com/track/7mc9iLnsOGsKyTHs6ICpNT

can anyone id that bach piece?"

I'm having trouble tracking this down. There's a famous Bourree from the Lute Suite in e minor but that's not it. I wouldn't be surprised if this was a transcription/derivation.

------------------------------------------------------------

Yeah, this is the weird thing, I've got the lute suites book and my sight reading isn't quite what it used to be, but I'm quite sure it's not in there. It doesn't sound like it could be related either.

(If you can play the famous E minor one, play it triplets like a 6/8 feel and listen to what happens to the bass part, it does incredible things, I found a Buckethead video once where he seems to have discovered the same thing)

Just got back from seeing Penny Johnson playing Bach: French Suite #2, Prelude and Fugue in F# from WTC2, Contrapunctus 9 from Art of the Fugue, Partita #4 in D. Sounded great!

Favorite Chopin Etudes?

Pollini or Uchida imo

I saw Angela Hewitt play French Suites 5 & 6, Debussy's Pour le Piano, and Ravel's Tombeau de Couperin. She is not the most virtuosic pianist out there but her control and sensitivity are astonishing.

Warner Music Group announced they are buying the Parlophone Group - including EMI Classics and Virgin Classics. Good news IMO since Warner does not put sonic watermarks on their digital offerings.

got great CDs at the thrift store this morning:

havergal brian - symphony no. 1 "gothic" (marco polo) (slovak philharmonic. which is pretty gothic.)

sensemaya - the unknown silvestre revueltas (1899-1940) (dorian recordings)

schoenberg - verklarte nacht/kammersymphonien (DG) (orpheus chamber orchestra)

korngold - between two worlds (london)

janacek - concertino/violin sonata (london) (musiktage mondsee ensemble)

peter blanchette - style brise - the broken style (angelic alternative) (killer tunes - bach, handel, dowland, etc - for 11-string archguitar)

johann adolf hasse - salve regina (archiv)

Revueltas? Not unknown over here, that guy is super cool

its all stuff that had never been recorded until this cd.

Ooh, interesting. I just did a google search to learn about it. (The 2nd google result for "revueltas" is a recipe for pupusas on the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.)

It also means "scrambled" (re: eggs) iirc!