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

As if you people needed to be told!

I did need to be told! I'll be spinning Sibelius' 4 Legends (the Horst stein recording) and Amorphis' Silent Waters!

Good choices. You can stare at stuff like this at the same time: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/17/Gallen_Kallela_The_Aino_Triptych.jpg

I adore Gallen-Kallela. Someday I'ma make it over there and get me an eyeful of him first-hand.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/28/arts/music/van-cliburn-pianist-dies-at-78.html?src=rechp&_r=0

Anybody see the first part of The Sound and the Fury on BBC Four last night?

― wronger than 100 geir posts (MacDara), Wednesday, 13 February 2013

yeah. this is a three part three hour bbc series on 20th century classical music. if unlike me you're in the UK you can still watch the whole thing online, though ep 1 has only three days left.

the full perfomances on the red button were nice
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p01531w2/The_Sound_and_the_Fury_in_Concert_Cage_Feldman_Reich_Monk_Part_and_Benjamin/

Listening to late Stravinsky. Getting near the end of Stephen Walsh's hefty biography and listening along to the late serial stuff I've not knowingly heard before. Threni (or most of it) is much more engaging than I was anticipating and Movements for Piano and Orchestra sounds just as Webernian as its reputation suggests. I believe I can dig these.

Listening to Crime and Dissonance

believe in the webernianisms

Only thing I believe in these days..

"Il Buio" always sticks with me

Ricreazione Divertia is my favourite atm.

I want to argue that Band of Susans was the best that NY minimalism ever got, by quite a distance (even if Young composed the works he is know for in NY, he is an LA kinda guy).

http://thestar.blogs.com/.a/6a00d8341bf8f353ef0120a8ebc725970b-320pi

so Elgar's first symphony is pretty awesome, huh

Yes it is. The 2nd even better IMO. My faves are the 2nd, the Cello Concerto and the Falstaff symphonic poem.

I only know the Cello Concerto and it is indeed awesome.

Sorta related: I finished reading Britten's Children, about Benjamin Britten's relationships with adolescent boys, and about how he uses children and child singers in his works. Really interesting, and a bit hard to take at points... As a former boy singer myself, I have sung so much of his stuff, which probably increased my interest.

I want to argue that Band of Susans was the best that NY minimalism ever got, by quite a distance (even if Young composed the works he is know for in NY, he is an LA kinda guy).

NOOOO...

But, really, Band of Susans over Steve Reich??

And, come on, that's totally cheating re Young.

Absolutely: there was no way he could ever have found enough La Montes for a band of them.

Ha.

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

Favorite performance of this. Holy shit.

Can't click at work, whose is it?

Hollywood Quartet's.

Oh yeah, cosign on that. Have it on CD.

I want to argue that Band of Susans was the best that NY minimalism ever got, by quite a distance (even if Young composed the works he is know for in NY, he is an LA kinda guy).

NOOOO...

But, really, Band of Susans over Steve Reich??

And, come on, that's totally cheating re Young.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Tuesday, 12 March 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha ok fair enough on Young but Reich and Glass' model of minimalism was to develop their own groups, v post-rock era type stuff...and I think its a bit sluggish. Really you have to tackle this from another angle, as a rock group playing with ampage and volume, using that to develop minimalist songs off that, and it totally works. I love the 2nd CD of Wired for Sound without the vocals (even if those were great if a bit without character, which they acknowledge by compiling a whole CDs worth of instrumentals)

otoh there was a dave q post comparing them to OASIS and actually I can kinda see it just richness of sound-wise. There is a weird correspondance I'd rather leave unexamined bcz I like it so much.

Susan Stenger plays Cage this week

Anyone have a spare ticket? :)

I think Band of Susans was junk tbqh.

By all rights, I should like them: 80s noise/drone guitar rock with a post-minimal pedigree (Chatham proteges no less), pop hooks in the classic Amerindie style. Somehow, nothing seems to come together right on the records, though: The cheesy 80s production with giant gated drums might work if this were spare new wave/postpunk but it seems to work so strongly against what they were going for. The rhythm section is plodding and uninspired, just a constant predictable backbeat. I find Poss's voice completely unappealing. The guitars drone but never quite seem to deliver much in terms of rich textures or innovative sounds. They never seem to really nail a pop hook like REM or Husker Du or, say, the Mary Chain or MBV could. ("Hard Light" comes closest.)

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Wednesday, 12 September 2012 00:18 (6 months ago) Bookmark

The way I read minimalism is as something restrictive albeit slowly unfolding and that's how I'm reading things like 'predictable backbeat'. I play 5/6 songs in a row, they have hooks yet are without much character. Agree Poss' voice is an acquired taste but somehow that works with the icey-dirge they get into a lot of the time

As for sounds and textures: take out new wave/postpunk and it is spare set of variations on a sound palette, going on a song-by-song basis. What do you think they were going for? I find it quite addicitve the louder I'm playing it. They are not as rich as what MBV were doing on Loveless but physically the sound is as attractive. They must've been amazing live.

Du's Recurring Dreams is a late 60s psych re-thread; Guitar Trio is an actual (even if accidental) update of sorts, felt truly of its time and years before the stuff SY were doing on Goodbye 20th Century.

I mean they were odd, heavy concentration of a partic guitar sound above everything else, so the rhythm section is never doing as much work, but how much better is it on some of those MBV/JAMC records?

digging this:

charles villiers stanford

http://open.spotify.com/track/3TY1Z5poA1sv4BmFihWHIU

i've listened to helmet's meantime album way more than any band of susans album i ever owned. and i would like to thank rhys chatham for that album too. that album kinda ruined big black for me. cuz it was like listening to big black but the sound was way big in a metal way and helmet's drummer made me want to write a fan letter to a drummer.

i know i'm always embarrassing him on here, but seeing ilx's own tarfumes the escape goat play drums on guitar trio was one of the highlights of the last, like, five years for me. MASSIVE.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJhR7L2iZrg

Moeran's Rhapsody No. 3 in F-sharp major for piano and orchestra has been a fav recently too, makes every commute an adventure!

http://open.spotify.com/track/50zWyAbkO2CYANakU5fRJW

The single note at the end of the Stanford piece kills me:

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

Wow, you're right about that version of Verklarte Nacht!

I mentioned JAMC and MBV as examples of bands that were more successful at coming up with pop hooks, not great rhythm sections (although I'll rank "You Made Me Realise" over most BoS for rhythm). Reich and Glass actually both did innovative and really engrossing things with rhythm imo. I do rate Guitar Trio but I give Chatham the credit for that one.

Sorry mis-read you.

Oh yeah I give Chatham the credit but I mean the thing about covering a mdoern classical composer was a thing that seemed to be forgotten or not much of a thing, so I given them a bit of credit for closing Worda and the Flesh with that.

I'm hearing enough hooks with Band of Susans, not as many as JAMC and MBV but they are perhaps less interested in that. Thought I'd be bored with their instrumentals but no. Gotta say I only listen to Word and the Flesh and Wired for Sound comp, haven't got round to the others.

i've listened to helmet's meantime album way more than any band of susans album i ever owned.

*listens to a few tracks on youtube* I've heard Limp Bizkit you know ;-)

"In the meantime" (no pun intended) Boulez's structures off this CD on hat art is slaying me.

that album is way better than any nu-metal and doesn't sound anything like limp bizkit and page of helmet was in band of susans and played with branca which is why i brought them up.

I know he was in Band of Susans.

Helmet's sound does seem incorporated to a lot of nu-metal. I mean that's what it was reminding me off which is why I bought Limp Bizkit up even if it was a bit of a low blow.

earlier helmet is less slick but i think meantime is the perfection of something or other. nu-metal obviously inspired by lots of good stuff. and some bad stuff. i mean that helmet album is really the only math rock i need when it comes to the 90's. though i do own two albums by the sea and cake.

OMG NO DON CABALLERO WHAT IS THIS?!

its the only helmet album i feel the need to own. but i love it. in a way that i never loved BOS. and production and vocals on BOS records probably did have something to do with that. songwriting not a strong suit of a lot of post-whatever guitar bands. or good vocals. which i can live with usually. i dunno i'm sure if i went back and listened to band of susans i would find things to like. their records sell for a dollar here and i would pick one up if i saw one. i think i did a year or so ago but i didn't play it.

yeah was never a don cab fan. i liked trans am though. hated the fucking champs. tortoise bored the hell out of me.

but this is the classical thread sorry everyone!

It is! Loving Savall and Hesperion XX's Brandenburgs right now.

Oh sorry - it's Le Concert Des Nations.

Reckon we should bring anything we feel its classical-related to this thread, btw.

Anyone in London going to the London Ear festival next weekend. Cello recital looks good, btw.

Hello, just popped by to say that Boulez's Structures are his most austere and successful work and worth listening to and studying.

I recommend listening to "The Unanswered Question" and following that up with a simultaneous listen of Mozart Clarinet Quartet and Boulez Structure for Piano 1a

Huh, you rate those over Le Marteau? I should listen again.

I recommend listening to "The Unanswered Question" and following that up with a simultaneous listen of Mozart Clarinet Quartet and Boulez Structure for Piano 1a

Ha!