New Releases

Started by Brian, March 12, 2009, 12:26:29 PM

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Madiel

#12440
Quote from: amw on October 17, 2021, 04:23:32 AM
...

If a performer isn't interested in playing the music in a way closer to the composer's intentions, and doesn't wish to bring any new and individual interpretation to the music, what is the point? Are young pianists (e.g. Cho, Grosvenor, Moog) recording Chopin and Liszt and Rachmaninov because they have something new and original to say, or just to prove that they can do it in order to satisfy the critics and build their careers, so that they can move on to whatever they're more interested in? (Ok, there are other possible reasons as well, but less defensible ones.)

Playing close to the composer's intentions and having something new and original to say are almost mutually exclusive concepts.

EDIT: Personally I'd go with the composer's intentions, if one is invoking the composer's name to sell a performance. It was in fact only yesterday I was thinking about that very issue, and musing how the whole quest for 'originality' is code for saying that if everyone else has been hitting a target, it's somehow more interesting to miss it.
I am now working on a discography of the works of Vagn Holmboe. Please visit and also contribute!

Todd

Quote from: jlopes on October 17, 2021, 03:54:31 AM



The clearly conscious lighting makes me wonder why the ensemble, photographer, and marketing folks made such a crappy choice.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

MusicTurner

Quote from: OrchestralNut on October 17, 2021, 04:45:07 AM
A peculiar comment.

The poster was obviously provoked by an entry.

The new erato

Quote from: Florestan on October 17, 2021, 03:35:37 AM
And yet concerts today are usually much shorter (and less varied) than the early 19th century ones.

The way we look at concerts is essentially the Late Romantic one. Its basic features, from programming to etiquette, have been established since before 1900.
For the authentic experience, we shold drink, smoke, talk and go to the loo while the music is playing. ;)

Florestan

Quote from: amw on October 17, 2021, 04:23:32 AM
Early 19th century audiences were also not expected to sit in reverential silence and half darkness for five hours to listen to music. Concerts were social events, to see and be seen, converse with peers, occasionally listen to the music if the piece was sufficiently short or interesting, and request encores or ad hoc programme changes whenever one got bored.

Yes and precisely my point. It would be very interesting a thought experiment: how many of us (I mean, active GMGers) would agree to experience such a concert. For one, count me in.

QuoteYes, but well after the time of Schubert and Schumann; the modern concert did begin to crystallise in the 1840s (while not displacing earlier concertgoing modalities) but had only taken more or less its present-day form by the 1870s-1880s.

Again: yes and precisely my point.

QuoteIf a performer isn't interested in playing the music in a way closer to the composer's intentions

Imnsho, this is the greatest canard in the whole history of music. Not only are the composer's intentions completely unknowable to anyone else than the composer himself, but oftenly they are not knowable even to the composer herself --- witness (among scores of other direct or indirect testimonies) Rachmaninoff's and Prokofiev's recoded significant departures from their own scores.

Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Florestan

Quote from: The new erato on October 17, 2021, 05:56:52 AM
For the authentic experience, we shold drink, smoke, talk and go to the loo while the music is playing. ;)

Yes and count me in for that!

Actually, imnsho, their experience of music back then was much more serious and engaged than ours.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Florestan

Quote from: amw on October 17, 2021, 04:23:32 AM
The discussion here is clearly about ways of performing the standard repertoire, with me and Que agreeing that it is largely a waste of time to continue to play it on modern instruments in the manner established by the famous "old school" pianists of the 20th century.

Yes, and with you and Que disagreeing with the vast majority of pianists, critics and layman music lovers alike.

QuoteAre young pianists (e.g. Cho, Grosvenor, Moog) recording Chopin and Liszt and Rachmaninov because they have something new and original to say, or just to prove that they can do it in order to satisfy the critics and build their careers, so that they can move on to whatever they're more interested in?

Why don't you just forget about Cho, Grsovenor and Moog to concentrate on buliding your own career? I'm very curious about (1) whose music would ypu choose for your very first recording and (2) not so much about how you'd be able to asses their intentions as about how anyone else other than you would be able to agree about it,

Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

The new erato

Quote from: Florestan on October 17, 2021, 06:09:42 AM
Yes and count me in for that!

Actually, imnsho, their experience of music back then was much more serious and engaged than ours.
Of course, since it wsn't available at the push of a button.

Brian

Quote from: Todd on October 17, 2021, 05:28:01 AM

The clearly conscious lighting makes me wonder why the ensemble, photographer, and marketing folks made such a crappy choice.
I'm also curious about the photographer who convinced the Swedish Chamber Orchestra to carry their instruments across a river.

Florestan

Quote from: The new erato on October 17, 2021, 06:20:14 AM
Of course, since it wsn't available at the push of a button.

Yes! Back then, the first time one ever heard anything, be it a symphony, a sonata or a chamber music work, chances were great that it was also the last time in their whole life. That's why for me reading professional or dilettante reviews of dozens of A/B comparisons is certainly entertaining and illuminating but ultimately pointless.



Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Todd

Quote from: Florestan on October 17, 2021, 06:02:30 AMhow many of us (I mean, active GMGers) would agree to experience such a concert. For one, count me in.

Me too.


Quote from: amw on October 17, 2021, 04:23:32 AMAre young pianists (e.g. Cho, Grosvenor, Moog) recording Chopin and Liszt and Rachmaninov because they have something new and original to say

Yes.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Brian

#12451
Quote from: amw on October 17, 2021, 04:23:32 AM
If a performer isn't interested in playing the music in a way closer to the composer's intentions, and doesn't wish to bring any new and individual interpretation to the music, what is the point? Are young pianists (e.g. Cho, Grosvenor, Moog) recording Chopin and Liszt and Rachmaninov because they have something new and original to say, or just to prove that they can do it in order to satisfy the critics and build their careers, so that they can move on to whatever they're more interested in? (Ok, there are other possible reasons as well, but less defensible ones.)
This is a really stimulating discussion (at least to me; Florestan clearly thinks it's crazy). I think the young pianists' intentions vary, of course; Cho recently gave an interview where he explained that he was asked to record Chopin and put it off a few years because he didn't especially want to. I guess it varies by record label, too, right? Some are more artist-led or artist-tolerant and others are all about the money. I think there's also a "groupthink" mentality where young artists see what repertoire is "trending" and herd towards it. Very Serious Music is generally "trending" right now, except for the odd virtuoso showpiece that you can use at competitions, like Agosti's transcription of The Firebird or Carl Vine's piano sonata or Medtner if the pianist is Russian and had teachers who revered Medtner.

The problem is that if you are playing on modern instruments in the modern style, having something new and original to say is really splitting hairs. Like that this one section should be different, or that the rhythm of this one mazurka should be sprung like so, or that the chord at the end of this piece should be held extra long. It's become super duper common to hear a new pianist in mainstream repertoire and hear all of their talent, technical skill, years of training, etc., but super duper rare to immediately hear a unique personality. Actually Moog does come to mind. Or Tianwa Yang on violin.

Quote from: Madiel on October 17, 2021, 05:14:46 AM
the whole quest for 'originality' is [maybe] code for saying that if everyone else has been hitting a target, it's somehow more interesting to miss it.
This is an amazingly great comment which is open to a wide variety of interpretations, and I'm quoting it so everyone has to read it twice.

Quote from: Florestan on October 17, 2021, 06:19:29 AM
Why don't you just forget about Cho, Grsovenor and Moog to concentrate on buliding your own career? I'm very curious about (1) whose music would ypu choose for your very first recording and (2) not so much about how you'd be able to asses their intentions as about how anyone else other than you would be able to agree about it,
FYI, it may be a language barrier thing, but the question here does come off a bit hostile. It reads like you are defending those artists by going on the attack.

(FWIW, I did once sketch out what I'd want to do if I were a pianist and if I got to the level of a recording career. My debut album would include two rarities I really love a lot and suffer from a lack of recording choices - A. Tcherepnin's Etudes Op 18 and excerpted preludes from Kabelac Op 30 - along with two mainstream works where I have really unusual/bizarre ideas for how they should be played, and which no existing recording gets the way that the works go in my head - Chopin's Barcarolle and Schumann's Fantasie. I'd hope to be recognized for personality both on the choices of rarities and the clearly well outside mainstream interpretive choices in the famous stuff.)

Florestan

Quote from: Que on October 17, 2021, 05:07:28 AM
artists make their own artistic choices, but they might try something else - like putting their money where their mouth is8)

Okay, let's consider these:



Would you be so kind as to enlighten me about how and why they were not putting their money where their mouth is? TIA.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Brian

Actually Lisiecki's Nocturnes are a really good example of somebody successfully being different from the rest, I just think that, ironically for being so different, it's really boring  ;D ;D ;D

Florestan

Quote from: Brian on October 17, 2021, 06:44:36 AM
This is a really stimulating discussion (at least to me; Florestan clearly thinks it's crazy).

Why should Florestan, who according to you clearly knows the distinction between crazy and normal, let itself involved in such a discussion? He must be crazy himself ;D --- unless this were a really stimulating discussion for himself as well....


Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Florestan

Quote from: Brian on October 17, 2021, 06:48:51 AM
Actually Lisiecki's Nocturnes are a really good example of somebody successfully being different from the rest, I just think that, ironically for being so different, it's really boring  ;D ;D ;D

Boring for who?
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Brian

Quote from: Florestan on October 17, 2021, 06:54:24 AM
Boring for who?
Hint: look at the phrase "I think it is"

Todd

Quote from: Florestan on October 17, 2021, 06:45:35 AMwhy they were not putting their money where their mouth is?


The idiom was misused.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Florestan

Quote from: Brian on October 17, 2021, 06:44:36 AM
FYI, it may be a language barrier thing, but the question here does come off a bit hostile. It reads like you are defending those artists by going on the attack.

Well, I am defending those artists, possibly a bit hostile.

It's not that much a language barrier thing, but a cultural barrier thing. I mean, we Romanians have a proverb: whomever cant reach the grapes, claims they are sour. Like, amw (a confessedly unprofessional pianist) complaining about this or that professional pianist being dead wrong on their interpretation of Chopin's music. No offense meant but I'd take, say, the first name coming to my kind, Maria Joao Pires's Nocturnes over amw's any day or midnight.


Quote(FWIW, I did once sketch out what I'd want to do if I were a pianist and if I got to the level of a recording career. My debut album would include two rarities I really love a lot and suffer from a lack of recording choices - A. Tcherepnin's Etudes Op 18 and excerpted preludes from Kabelac Op 30 - along with two mainstream works where I have really unusual/bizarre ideas for how they should be played, and which no existing recording gets the way that the works go in my head - Chopin's Barcarolle and Schumann's Fantasie. I'd hope to be recognized for personality both on the choices of rarities and the clearly well outside mainstream interpretive choices in the famous stuff.)

Splendid! I for one would get your debut recording instantly --- if only because any new recording featuring Chopin or Schumann is of interest to me.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

premont

Quote from: MusicTurner on October 17, 2021, 05:36:27 AM
The poster was obviously provoked by an entry.

I didn't intend to be provocative, but just wondered about the purpose of using a piano, which is a hundred years old. One doesn't get closer to the baroque sound world for that reason.

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