I'm glad we have a Diamond thread.
My introduction to him was on the Australian Classic FM, a truly dreadful music radio station dedicated to everything mediocre and substandard in classical music (in correspondence with me they told me that the music of Robert Simpson would have 'no appeal' to their listeners and they would never play it). However, on this one occasion they served up a treat: I was waiting for someone at a train station late at night, their train was late and went out to the car and flicked on the radio and they were playing the last movement of the SQ 3, couldn't believe it, just such wonderful, eloquent, sad but noble music. I think Classic FM were having an aberration at the time.
Marvelous composer, one of the great things about him is that he is very consistent, so, although his music gets darker and more dissonant over time, it's always recognisably Diamond straightaway. I love the symphonies (I know 3, 4, 5 and 10) and it's a crying shame we don't have a complete cycle. We do have the complete string quartets from Albany and I've got the first two volumes so far (2, 3, 8, 9, 10 and the Concerto for SQ), love them.
Just a couple of questions:
1. I know that DD was gay, and yet all the information about the String Quartet No.3 was that the slow movement was written in memory of a woman that DD lived with in Paris who suicided. What's the story, was she just a friend? Or was he bisexual? I don't care what his sexuality was, just want to know the story.
2. I downloaded the radio broadcast of the premier of the Symphony 10 from 1988 from Unsung Composers downloads, (love the way the organ becomes more and more prominent in the scherzo and the through the finale). Anyway, some other information tells me DD revised the symphony in 2000, does anyone know if these changes were major?
