David Hurwitz

[Josquin des Prez]

Mediterranean people (French, Italian, Spanish) generally dismiss him.

You got my number there. 

[Josquin des Prez]

Don't particularly care for his chamber music such as the string quartets, Songs without Words, etc., but I do like the Octet.

I don't particularly care for his string quartets either, but you should give his piano trios a shot. They seem to be a little more memorable.

[Lilas Pastia]

You got my number there. 

Well, I'm in there too (in a sense). But note I used the qualifyer "generally"

[Bunny]

If I had to count all the times the hurwitzer has pissed me off, I'd run out of numbers.  However, he has also amused me -- especially with all his back tracking and side stepping around Joyce Hatto.  He's good for a laugh with my breakfast, but I don't take his bad reviews as seriously as he would like them taken.  I check out as many opinions as I can, and he's just one of many.  He is fun when he really is insulting; it's hard not to laugh at him when he gets so righteously incensed.  Classical music's very own hanging judge, hanging out there in the breeze he generates with all of his hot air.

[Dancing Divertimentian]

He gets people to talking about him, that's for sure...

[stingo]

He gets people to talking about him, that's for sure...

Kind of like Paris Hilton...

[jochanaan]

...Classical music's very own hanging judge, hanging out there in the breeze he generates with all of his hot air.

LOL I love that image! But I have better things to do than read reviews.  Usually the music itself is far more interesting.

[PerfectWagnerite]

Kind of like Paris Hilton...

i think she's hot

[david johnson]

i think she's hot

...and i think she should be spanked!  i volunteer...hehehehhe

dj

[Saul]

In a review of Stanford's symphonies on Naxos, he called Mendelssohn and Bruch "gutless wimps" whose music has a "near total lack of passion" and little emotional depth. Where does this horrid man get this garbage? Mendelssohn and Bruch, lacking passion or emotion? The overplayed and overexposed Bruch VC1 is, if nothing else in the world, a dictionary definition of passion - and to say of Mendelssohn - and - and - and - danger danger - overheating -

I'm going to stop talking now because if I do I will rant and be incoherent and it will be ugly. Suffice to say:



Actually let's find a larger one:



Or:

Dont pay attention to him.

He is a gutless Schmuck!

[Gabriel]

Well, the most interesting discussion here is about Mendelssohn, not Hurwitz.

I appreciate highly Mendelssohn's music. His character and background are evident in it; you cannot expect hom to write the music of a Schumann or a Chopin. But it would be enough to listen to his Paulus to notice that we are dealing with a great composer, and most of his chamber music is extraordinary.

I leave further comments on Mendelssohn for a thread on his music. He deserves a lot more than to be an appendix of a Hurwitz discussion.

[quintett op.57]

I accept one criticizes a composer.

But almost every piece of music I know deserves a respectful listening.
Scornful comments as you can often read (including in this forum) are just proofs of ignorance.
Even people having listened to classical for decades are capable to write such things. Subjectivity has no limits.

Lately I read such scornful sentences toward Vivaldi, Scarlatti, Paganini, Schubert, Shostakovich, Haydn and now Bruch and Mendelssohn.

Preposterous!

[Josquin des Prez]

Yeah, i even remember somebody scornfully belittling the music of Bach. What is the world coming to? 

[Gabriel]

Relativism, unfortunately.

[mahlertitan]

you must mean this article:
"Music such as this--well crafted, tuneful, and beautifully scored--probably deserves more attention than it gets. The problem with these symphonies is their near total lack of passion, an accusation often leveled at Victorian English music, and with some justification. But this isn't entirely fair; the "gutless wimp" school of Romantic music originated in Germany with Mendelssohn, and infected scads of later German composers, including Reinecke, Bruch, Rheinberger, and countless others. The problem for England was that for several decades until Elgar came along this style had no serious competition from anyone other than Arthur Sullivan working with W.S. Gilbert. Germany at least had Wagner, Liszt, and in terms of emotional depth, Brahms.

And so we come to these charming works, composed between 1888 and 1911 but sounding as if they could have been written in 1858. Neither taxes the listener, and neither outstays its welcome (though at 42 minutes the Fourth Symphony comes closer than the pithy and crisp Seventh).

This disc is the first in a projected Stanford series, and the performances are certainly every bit as fine as Handley's on Chandos; indeed, the Bournemouth Symphony is marginally the finer orchestra (Handley has Ulster), and the sonics are as fresh and pure as Stanford's scoring is lucid. I know the first paragraph of this review may sound harsh, but there's no point in gilding the lily. As long as you don't expect anything dramatic or strikingly original, there's plenty to enjoy here. [5/29/2007]

--David Hurwitz"

funny thing, he still gave it a 9 + 9.

[sound67]

The ratings are for performance and sound, not for composition (i.e. unless Hurwitz deals with serial music, which he clearly loathes).

[quintett op.57]

Yeah, i even remember somebody scornfully belittling the music of Bach. What is the world coming to? 

Josh? He just wanted to provoke, in my opinion.

[Opus106]

I go to amazon.com to check out the details of a performance of Brahms' 'Double' concerto that I'm listening to, and I come across this...

everyone involved seems to have given a lot of thought and care putting across a very warm, personable interpretation of Brahms's greatest concerto.

Link

He didn't piss me off, but I'm more like . He may like the 'Double' concerto very much, but saying it's Brahms' greatest is taking it a bit too far, IMHO.

[Iago]

Brian,

       You said, "David Hurwitz just PISSED ME OFF:

Well, that must be better than being PISSED ON.

[Don]

He didn't piss me off, but I'm more like . He may like the 'Double' concerto very much, but saying it's Brahms' greatest is taking it a bit too far, IMHO.

He's entitled to his opinion, and you sure can't prove him wrong.  Personally, I like both of them equally.