Pieces that have blown you away recently

[Pohjolas Daughter]

"Die Soldaten" - in Hamburg - just stunning (shocking, moving, dazzling...wonderful).

https://fxroth.com/zimmermann-die-soldaten-on-tour-hamburg-and-paris/

"In »Die Soldaten«, Bernd-Alois Zimmermann processes his personal experiences during the  Second World War and the threats posed to the world by a potential nuclear disaster. His dazzling sound language is clearly inspired by the lucid colours of impressionism, and he created a dystopia that remains timeless and consequential. Despite its vehemence, the opera is an intimate play between human beings, a parable about love and its dark sister, violence, and about the abysses of brutality and self-destruction."

Die Soldaten / play

Will have to check that one out!

So envious! But delighted that it's available online, and I will be checking it out soon.

I was lucky to see the Ruhrtriennale production in New York, with the audience in seats that moved (!). The whole thing was incredible.

-Bruce

Moving seats!  How did they do that?  And was it a very big venue?

PD

[Cato]

Concerning Bernd Alois Zimmermann, I used his Latin cantata Omnia Tempus Habent in my 8th Grade Latin II course.

The kids were always rather confuddled by the style, but were usually accepting of it, with some of them becoming enthusiastic and wanting to hear other things by Zimmermann.

In fact, two of my former students, when they were Sophomores in high school, made a special visit to me to ask: "What was that music that we heard with that text from the Old Testament?"  😇

[Karl Henning]

After many years of trying to "get" Brahms, one of his pieces finally clicked for me. Symphony No. 3 is pure structural brilliance.

It is, indeed!

[Cato]

In case you missed it elsewhere, allow me to add this symphony by Mathilde Kralik von Meyrswalden:

The symphony was begun in 1904 and completed (or revised?  I have seen both words) in 1942: the opening Rhapsody had me hooked!


The Adagio was not particularly slow, but again kept my interest throughout.


The Scherzo, although it is marked Sehr rasch, did not seem particularly fast, but has a balletic feel to it at times, puckish at others.


The Finale has the rhapsodic nature of the first movement and features an organ and a soprano.


No text for the Hymn at the end!  I will try to find it!


For those who know German:

https://kralikklassik.de/mathilde-kralik-media/?fbclid=IwAR2N18bqtTWMWvP8w-EUHEKdOpjjW6j5YrSKehaUNFnIuUuwAEXdlxLMcD4

[Florestan]

Mathilde Kralik von Meyrswalden

Say that fast, if you can!

[Cato]

Say that fast, if you can!

Aye!  'Tis a mouthful!   

[brewski]

Moving seats!  How did they do that?  And was it a very big venue?

PD

The venue was the enormous, block-long Park Avenue Armory in New York, which in the last 10-15 years or so has been the site of many extravagantly staged events, purely because of the size of the space. (It's the size of an airplane hangar.)

With the main stage maybe 20 feet wide, running the length of the space, they built the seats on risers above it, moving on railroad tracks. The entire block of seats could move back and forth (slowly, deliberately) along the length of the stage. Here is a video from the New York Times (surprisingly, a little fuzzy) that shows it better.

-Bruce

[Pohjolas Daughter]

The venue was the enormous, block-long Park Avenue Armory in New York, which in the last 10-15 years or so has been the site of many extravagantly staged events, purely because of the size of the space. (It's the size of an airplane hangar.)

With the main stage maybe 20 feet wide, running the length of the space, they built the seats on risers above it, moving on railroad tracks. The entire block of seats could move back and forth (slowly, deliberately) along the length of the stage. Here is a video from the New York Times (surprisingly, a little fuzzy) that shows it better.

-Bruce

Thanks!

PD

[Mapman]

Brahms: 3 Intermezzi, Op. 117

The first one is absolutely gorgeous. It feels familiar, but according to my records I haven't listened to it anytime recently.

[vandermolen]

Thomas de Hartmann:
Symphonie-Poeme No.1 (1934)
A great epic of 65 minutes:

[relm1]

Thomas de Hartmann:
Symphonie-Poeme No.1 (1934)

Sounds intriguing.  Will add to listening list.

[vandermolen]

Sounds intriguing.  Will add to listening list.

I expect that you will enjoy it.

[Mapman]

Dvořák: Piano Quintet #2, Op. 81

I somehow had not heard this before today. It's great! The first movement has Dvořák's typical wonderful melodies, and the second movement is quite melancholy.

[Symphonic Addict]

Lately I've been very impressed by these pieces:


Heinz Holliger: String Quartet No. 1 (1973)

The renowned oboist is also a conductor and composer. This is the first work ever I hear by him, and holy mackerel... if you're seeking really apt music for Halloween (forget about Saint-Saëns' Danse macabre or Mussorgsky's A Night on the Bald Mountain), this quartet fits the bill big time I think. In some passages the music sounds so incredibly discordant and, let's say, hectic, that sounds like if a pig is being butchered. I'm not the biggest fan of contemporary music, but I confess that works with dissonances and effects like this quartet do draw my attention. The Berner Streichquartett had to have the workout of their lives [performers] because this work sounds fiendishly difficult to play.




Peter Sculthorpe: Lament, for cello and strings

Yet another work that has some significant dissonances and for a composition by this Australian composer it turned out a little surprising to me. There's a genuine feeling of sorrow in this work, just as a haunting and bitter atmosphere that grips you. Quite moving.

[Florestan]

In some passages the music sounds so incredibly discordant and, let's say, hectic, that sounds like if a pig is being butchered.

How anyone can enjoy, let alone be blown away by, such "music" has been, is and will forever be beyond me. And that Holliger of all people, who is intimately familiar with lots of saner and calmer music, should write it is a greater still mystery... 

(Sorry, couldn't resist.)

[LKB]

How anyone can enjoy, let alone be blown away by, such "music" has been, is and will forever be beyond me. And that Holliger of all people, who is intimately familiar with lots of saner and calmer music, should write it is a greater still mystery... 

(Sorry, couldn't resist.)

Music should not always be " sane ", or calm. Mahler, Shostakovich, Beethoven, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, and Tchaikovsky knew that very well.

If you don't care for his composing, that's fine - some of it doesn't appeal to me either. And I'm sure others here aren't fans of his music, any more than you are. But unless you're a musician of equal stature and importance, venturing judgements regarding his composing seems unadvisable to me.

[Florestan]

unless you're a musician of equal stature and importance, venturing judgements regarding his composing seems unadvisable to me.

In other words, one is ill-advised to voice criticism of Rachmaninoff's music unless one has graduated from the Moscow Conservatory with the Great Gold Medal and is an internationally acclaimed pianist. @ritter , please take note!

With all due respect, the notion is absurd, its logical implication being that we should shut down GMG and do away with musical criticism altogether. And why limit it to music only? Let's extend it to all arts. One should not voice criticism of, say, Hermann Hesse unless one has won a Nobel Prize in literature oneself. One should not criticize, say, Rafael's paintings unless one is an iconic Renaissance painter oneself. Finally, one should not dislike, say, the sculptures of Brâncuși unless one has bequeathed one's own workshop to the French state.

The reality is of course very different. One needs neither special qualifications to form one's own opinions on the music they hear (or the books they read, the paintings and sculptures they see) nor anybody else's permission to express them.

[Herman]

Peter Lieberson, Neruda Songs, the five orchestral songs he wrote in 2005 for his wife, the noted mezzo-soprano Lorraine Hunt Lieberson  -  shortly before she died.

I have been listening to the recording by LHL with the Boston Symphony and a performance by Kelly O'Connor in a woefully underattended concert in the Amsterdm Concertgebouw. O'Connor is more altoish, but she has sung this work many times.

[ritter]

In other words, one is ill-advised to voice criticism of Rachmaninoff's music unless one has graduated from the Moscow Conservatory with the Great Gold Medal and is an internationally acclaimed pianist. @ritter , please take note!

I didn't criticise good old Sergei Vasilyevich's music, I simply said I wouldn't buy any CDs of it. @Florestan , please take note! 

[Mapman]

Today I was very impressed by Ravel's Sonatine. The first two movements have a wonderful atmosphere.