The Classical Chat Thread

[jlaurson]

Results of the 2015 Chopin Competition are In, Ey!

http://ionarts.blogspot.com/2015/10/the-results-of-2015-chopin-competition.html

[jlaurson]

Fresh from Forbes:



OCT 23, 2015
New Principal Conductor For The Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestra

...Fischer is a fairly big name for an orchestra with so little name recognition, although the
orchestra has a proud tradition. It's just that one has to go back a while... namely to 1833,
when Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy led them for three seasons. Before him, Louis Spohr
and Ferdinand Ries had subbed; after him came Ferdinand Hiller (1847–1850) and then of
course Robert Schumann (1850–1854) who led them incompetently but with enthusiasm.
Big-ish names graced the orchestra again in the mid-20th century when Jean Martinon
(1960–1965) and Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos (1966–1971) led the band in back-to-back,
one-term stints.

Picking a new music director for orchestras at this level of fame-purgatory is tricky; old
but famous hands who phone it in don't do the trick but unknown young music directors
can backfire if they don't turn out to be the next miracle man....

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jenslaurson/2015/10/23/new-principal-conductor-for-the-dusseldorf-symphony-orchestra/

[Maestro267]

Each of the past three centuries has had a great and substantial set of variations for solo piano added to the repertoire. Bach started it in the 18th century with the Goldberg Variations, followed by Beethoven's Diabelli Variations in the 19th century and Frederic Rzewski's variations on The People United Will Never Be Defeated in the 20th. Will a composer in this 21st century write an equally-substantial set of variations for solo piano to add to these great works?

[North Star]

Each of the past three centuries has had a great and substantial set of variations for solo piano added to the repertoire. Bach started it in the 18th century with the Goldberg Variations, followed by Beethoven's Diabelli Variations in the 19th century and Frederic Rzewski's variations on The People United Will Never Be Defeated in the 20th. Will a composer in this 21st century write an equally-substantial set of variations for solo piano to add to these great works?

(The Bach is obviously written for a double manual harpsichord and not a piano)
There are also Rakhmaninov's Corelli Variations and Variations on a Theme of Chopin, the Brahms sets, and Stevenson's Passacaglia on DSCH!!

[Karl Henning]

Will a composer in this 21st century write an equally-substantial set of variations for solo piano to add to these great works?

Sure.

[Maestro267]

(The Bach is obviously written for a double manual harpsichord and not a piano)
There are also Rakhmaninov's Corelli Variations and Variations on a Theme of Chopin, the Brahms sets, and Stevenson's Passacaglia on DSCH!!

Yes, but of those, only the DSCH is of a similar length to the ones I mentioned. I'm after sets that last for around an hour or longer.

This begs another question...how come there are no sets of variations of this length written for orchestra? The longest set I know of is the 30-minute Enigma Variations. And I'm not talking about transcriptions of piano variations for orchestra.

[Jo498]

Keyboard variations had been an established form already in the 16th century (or probably earlier). Bach's Goldberg variations put the earlier ones in the shade but there are actually some impressive earlier sets, e.g. one by Buxtehude in G major which is very probably one of the inspirations for the Goldbergs (lasts about 25 min or so). Orchestral variations were only a thing from the late romantic period on and in the 20th century.

And it's also not easy to write enough interesting variations for an hour... The Goldbergs were probably not intended to be performed in one run (and Busoni made a heavily cut edition for ca. 1900 audiences). So patience for such works is not to be taken for granted.
I don't know why orchestral variations never became such a big thing or why they usually run "only" about 20-25 minutes or so.

[Florestan]

Sure.

Off to work, then, Karl! 

[amw]

Yes, but of those, only the DSCH is of a similar length to the ones I mentioned. I'm after sets that last for around an hour or longer.

This begs another question...how come there are no sets of variations of this length written for orchestra? The longest set I know of is the 30-minute Enigma Variations. And I'm not talking about transcriptions of piano variations for orchestra.

The longest I know of is Sorabji's variations on the 'Dies Irae' plainchant which last about seven hours, including a 90-minute passacaglia and a fugue of equal length. And there's another set of Symphonic Variations for piano and orchestra apparently of about equal length. But, well, Sorabji.

For non-piano variation sets, there is Robert Simpson's 9th String Quartet, consisting of 32 (I think) palindromic variations and a fugue on a theme by Haydn (the minuet of the Symphony No. 47). Lasts about an hour if I recall correctly. No idea why there are no orchestral ones, I suppose because long orchestral pieces tend to be symphonic cycles because composers want to exploit all the possible colours and invent material suited to them, whereas long piano pieces are more suited to variation form because the sonority of the instrument isn't as well suited to constantly introducing and differentiating new material.

[Karl Henning]

For non-piano variation sets, there is Robert Simpson's 9th String Quartet, consisting of 32 (I think) palindromic variations and a fugue on a theme by Haydn (the minuet of the Symphony No. 47). Lasts about an hour if I recall correctly.

Thanks for reminding me of this . . . and I know a friend from whom I can borrow it . . . .

[jlaurson]

Fresh from Forbes:



NOV 8, 2015
Bang-Bang: The European Union Youth Orchestra's
Summer Shenanigans

...Amongst our weaponry are such diverse elements as surprise...

A good youth orchestra has at its disposal a terrific weapon of surprise, namely
that it somehow lulls you into sus-pecting less than you would from a big name
professional orchestra... and then delivers more...

Angela Gheorgiu, one of the most difficult and by all accounts least pleasant
people to work with in the music world (thrice winner of the Kathleen Battle medal
for excellence in the Art of being a Diva), wouldn't have a career if her voice were
even just a shade less glorious. In her repertoire – dramatic Italian opera foremost
– she can conjure beauty and power that can evoke an imaginary Golden Age of
opera. There was nothing to quibble with the two arias for which she came and
after which she went... assuming one doesn't mind overlooking...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jenslaurson/2015/11/08/bang-bang-the-european-union-youth-orchestras-summer-shenanigans/

[jlaurson]

Fresh from Forbes:



NOV 10, 2015
The 'Other' Petrenko To Stay At The Oslo Philharmonic Until 2020

...In appointing Vasily Petrenko, the orchestra made the right step towards youth and risk.
Apart from an early blooper when, right around the time of his inaugural concert, Petrenko
made a potentially sexist comment regarding the efficiency of women-conductors (something
that doesn't fly in aggressively gender-progressive Norway), this seems to have paid off
nicely. The orchestra is busy recording and reviews of its concerts are full of praise. Tours
and gigs abroad (the Edinburgh Festival, the BBC Proms et al.) help greatly. Gramophone
Magazine quotes Petrenko as saying: "After two seasons with me at the reins, I think we
have freshened up the orchestra and introduced some great music that hasn't been heard
in Oslo for many years." That sounds about right...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jenslaurson/2015/11/10/the-other-petrenko-to-stay-in-oslo-until-2020/

[Wanderer]

Aunt Sally Disappointed With Contemporary Classical Piece

[North Star]

Aunt Sally Disappointed With Contemporary Classical Piece

Brilliant!

[Florestan]

Brilliant!

+1! The best concert review I´ve ever read, period. 

[Karl Henning]

Aunt Sally Disappointed With Contemporary Classical Piece

I laughed. I cried.  I voiced a non-tonal hexachord.

[jlaurson]

Fresh from Forbes:



NOV 25, 2015
The Real Top 10 Bach Recordings

Bach, the Grand Master

There is something about the music of Johann Sebastian Bach that puts it in a category of its own.
Bach is the P.G. Wodehouse and the Shakespeare of the musical score rolled into one. He is the
only composer on whom I cannot overdose, and while his music seemed dated to his own, slightly
embarrassed sons, it strikes us as perfectly timeless now. His works pillars of mankind's culture,
and his music constitute the first tracks etched onto the golden record Voyager record that sails
toward hypothetical distant galactic civilizations. I should think that potential aliens might rather
get too sanguine an impression of us* ... but there we go: Bach is the bee's knees, and anyone
who knows Bach but doesn't love his music is going to be suspect to me, lest I learn a exculpatory
reason for their lamentable deficiency.

The Gramophone Bias

Gramophone Magazine is the only English language magazine that combines serious CD-reviewing
with the glossy, popular magazine approach. I used to read it religiously and got many of my first
hints, tastes, and opinions from its pages. BBC Music Magazine gets close; Classic FM Magazine
lasted nearly twenty years but wasn't taken seriously by the cogniscenti. No-nonsense, no-picture
publications like the American Record Guide or Fanfare Magazine (both American), which exude the
charm of telephone books, are total geek literature, arcane, loved by the few dedicated readers, and
more or less published out of the basements of their respective, dedicated publishers... private
ventures and labors of love that, like the lamented International Record Review, won't likely survive
their founders.

In my time as a clerk at Tower Records, we would sometimes make fun of Gramophone Magazine's
rather obvious pro-English biases. "Proximity bias" or "mere exposure effect" might be the appropriate
euphemism for them being unabashed homers. And indeed, when they published a "10 Best Bach
Recordings" list published early last year, they topped it in such a ridiculous way that it needed soft
rebutting which I hope to provide hereby...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jenslaurson/2015/11/25/the-real-top-10-bach-recordings/

[Jo498]

I have not heard the Guttenberg (and probably will not get it) but I also remember that passage "Wahrlich, wahrlich, dieser ist Gottes Sohn gewesen" from the first time I ever heard the piece on the radio (one of the Richter recordings, I think) and I found that most subsequent interpretations I have heard take it to quickly. Richter's broad tempo might not be historically correct but in most other readings this moment passes far too quickly.

[jochanaan]

I laughed. I cried.  I voiced a non-tonal hexachord.

[jlaurson]

Fresh from ionarts:



NOV 28, 2015
The Hobbit Returns: Thomas Fey & the Heidelberg
Symphony will finish their Haydn Cycle

It has just been informally announced that Hänssler CLASSIC, which was recently,
partially merged with PROFIL Hänssler (see "Merger Reunites Classical Music Labels
Of Father And Son" on Forbes.com), will continue the wildly imaginative, musically
successful Haydn Symphony cycle that Thomas Fey and the Heidelberger Sinfoniker
had been working on for the last few years. Yay!

Fey (*1960), who has attained the lovingly-meant nickname "The Hobbit" in an
internet forum that teems with appréciateurs for that particular cycle, founded the
orchestra in 1993 and has its roots in an early music ensemble that Fey founded as
a student, several years earlier. Fey, who had studied under Nikolaus Harnoncourt,
is greatly influenced by, but not beholden to, the historically informed performance
ideology or movement. (The orchestra calls itself "historically oriented".)

When their Haydn recording project began shortly after the orchestra assembled, in
1999...

http://ionarts.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-hobbit-returns-thomas-fey.html