Past Purchases (CLOSED)

[Harry]

For a few euro's more

[abidoful]

The sound of this recording isn't that great. Not bad either, just little dry and "studio-like". The most outstanding work here is the wonderful Henselt concerto; not too long, very compact, full sound of orchestra and rich and very demanding piano part. Add to this yet considerable melodic appeal- certainly work that deserves to be heard. None other than Schumann was most enthusiastic about Henselt and he had considerable reputation still on the beginning of the 20th century.

The Kalkbrenner and Hummel concertos weren't that great, especially the Kalkbrenner was quite forgettable; craftmanship, some occasional melodic charm but mechanic and sort of "papery". Piano part not so imaginitive-perhaps the whole work was more for Kalkbrenner himself to show off his pianism?

The Hiller piece was more interesting. And the Chopin op.46 was here played very well by the Berlin philharmonic. The orchestration (the work was supposedly a abandoned movement of a third piano concerto converted in to a solo work published in 1841) by Wilkomirski had many values but also during the piano solos was much too thick. I can't understand why in the notes it was called as being"authentic"; I believe Chopin didn't leave any full score orchestral material behind. And to me it definitely had some very "un-chopinesque" touches, such as triangle and-as I said- much too thick orchestration.


I purchased this disc only for the Concert Overture and because I knew that this was a great performance. Highly recommended!


R.Strauss solo piano works- not an "essential part of his output but great fun. And in the hand's of the great Glenn Gould even more so. The sonata op.5 sounds at times juvenile, I guess it reminds little the Grieg sonata and also the Sibelius sonata. It would be nice to combine those three works in a recital! The middle movements were IMO the most charming. Little Schumann here and there and also lots of Mendelssohn, not yet any Wagner influences, nor even Brahms. In the beautiful pieces of op.3 there was even some Beethoven there.


Bruckner solo piano works- no there is something even more interesting than those by Strauss! I must say I really enjoyed this disc enormously! It was played with an old piano from the late/mid 19th century and the sound was just charming. It all lend these works sort of very poignant feel of nostalgia-greetings from "forgotten days". Those 4-hand dances reinforced the Austrian and Viennese side of Bruckner and also took him more closer to Schubert. His actual solo piano work output isn't that large (among them a youthful sonata movement, reminding yet again of Schubert) but listening to two of them, a Fantasia and a very, very beautiful piece called "Erinnerung" one would hope he had written more. They sound very intimate and genuine, especially "Erinnerung" sounded almost something from a slow movement from one of his symphonies. Small little treasures these little works!

[Sergeant Rock]

Interesting--I've got the Brilliant Opera Collection website open now in another tab, trying to download a libretto (it's not cooperating at the moment) and it lists five Strauss operas--Ariadne, Rosenkavalier, Frau ohne Schatten, Elektra and Salome.  But not Friedenstag.

I didn't know it was available until I went looking for Ariadne and noticed it at Amazon DE. There is one copy available at amazon.com

Sarge

[71 dB]

Buxtehude - Six Sonatas BuxWV 266, 267, 269, 271, 272 & 273 - Naxos 8.557250

Local department store: 4,99 €

[Conor71]

Just arrived today :

[karlhenning]

Landed yesterday:

Mompou – Complete Piano Works

Thomas Tallis – Complete Works

[The new erato]

Todays landings:





RAGNAR SODERLIND Sedimenti Musicali

Cello Concerto; Symphony No.4

Oystein Birkeland, cello, The Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra of Moscow Radio, Vladimir Fedoseyev

[The new erato]

And somebody made me do this:

[karlhenning]

Not the debbil! Of those, you need never repent.

[vandermolen]

I managed to track down a CD release of Samuel Barber's First Symphony and Violin Concerto with William Strickland conducting the Japanese Sympony Orchestra. This is how I discovered the Symphony (one of my favourites) on LP from a record library decades ago and it is still my favourite recorded performance - have been looking for it for years.

[Elgarian]

Arrived this morning.

Gosh.

[karlhenning]

DVD, Alan?

[Harry]

And somebody made me do this:

Alas the same somebody made me put it on my list, and they will be ordered soon enough. 

[DavidRoss]

Arrived this morning.

Wow.  Fast.  Please let us know how you like it.

[Elgarian]

DVD, Alan?

No - CD, Karl.

[karlhenning]

Ah.

[karlhenning]

Where'd this tongue-depresser come from?

[Elgarian]

Wow.  Fast.  Please let us know how you like it.

It was amazingly fast, yes. I listened to Gwyneth's last half-hour this afternoon, and thought it was terrific. She's much as I remember her: a very distinctive Brunnhilde, with a certain swooping aspect to her singing (I don't know how else to describe it) that bowled me over 30 years ago. Orchestra pretty exciting, too - possibly a shade ragged just before the strings sweep in with the redemption theme at the end, but I remember thinking that too, back in 1980!

[Mirror Image]

Seeing Karl's post about Roussel reminded me that I was missing the last volume on Naxos, so I bought:

[Coopmv]

Arrived this morning.

Gosh.

I have this set as the original Philips LP release and will probably get the DVD set for Christmas ...