The Romantics in Period Performances

[king ubu]

Thanks guys! Obviously I wasn't aware that H's Dvorák wasn't his usual po-faced self 

I'm not too big on him in general, so I've never checked him out beyond baroque/classical so far. But I've got some Gardiner line-up (that's actual HIP, I assume, with his revolutionary romantics).

As for ECO, I've enjoyed plenty of their work here and there (Perahia playing Mozart comes to mind first).

But back to Dvorák: does anyone here know any of the piano discs, Michiels or Kvapil? And does Kvapil use a modern instrument on the Supraphon box set?

[PerfectWagnerite]

Thanks guys! Obviously I wasn't aware that H's Dvorák wasn't his usual po-faced self 

I'm not too big on him in general, so I've never checked him out beyond baroque/classical so far. But I've got some Gardiner line-up (that's actual HIP, I assume, with his revolutionary romantics).

As for ECO, I've enjoyed plenty of their work here and there (Perahia playing Mozart comes to mind first).

Again, the ECO (English Chamber Orchestra) is a modern instrument ensemble. The ensemble size is approximately what it was during Mozart's time but they use modern instruments and their performance practices aren't really in any way HIP. You can hear that clearly in the Perahia/Mozart set: wonderful, spontaneous, beautifully played recordings that strike an ideal balance between soloists and orchestra but is not HIP in any way.

The ORR used by Gardiner is a period instrument ensemble. Some of the other big ones are Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Orchestra of the 18th Century, The London Classical Players, and the Hanover Band.

[Brian]

But back to Dvorák: does anyone here know any of the piano discs, Michiels or Kvapil? And does Kvapil use a modern instrument on the Supraphon box set?

I think Kvapil uses a modern piano in the box set. I like the recital CD where he plays on a piano from Dvorak's time!

[king ubu]

I think Kvapil uses a modern piano in the box set. I like the recital CD where he plays on a piano from Dvorak's time!

One of the two I depitcted above? Both state on the cover that they were recorded on Dvorák's own Bösendorfer.

[brokebassoon]

Browsing the Anima Eterna/Immerseel discography (http://animaeterna.be/discografie/?lang=en) is interesting - a lot of late 19C works covered. They tackle, amongst others, Tchaikovsky's 4th symphony; the Symphonie Fantastique (a quick google comes up with fairly negative reactions to this one); Carmina Burana (!); an album of Rimsky-Korsakov (Sheherazade) and Borodin - this one particularly interests me; an album of Ravel; Pictures at an Exhibition; a Poulenc CD; and one of Debussy. There's also a HIP Johann Strauss album! Does anyone have any of these and can offer opinions? On paper it sounds like plenty of interesting stuff.

By the way, I love Gardiner's Planets.

I think I have all of these in one format or another. My personal favorites are the Tchaikovsky disc (nothing revolutionary, just very good), Carmina Burana, Scheherazade, and Debussy. Their Liszt album and a live disc with An American in Paris (if you can find it) are also excellent. There are much better options for Symphonie Fantastique (Gardiner, Les Siècles). Some scrappy oboe d'amore playing as well as dubious choice of bassoon ruined the Ravel disc for me. Pictures and Poulenc are pretty good. The Strauss disc is quite good, but I just can't get that excited about the Waltz King...

If you'd like to hear Planets on period instruments, the New Queens Hall Orchestra recorded it to great effect before disbanding.

[Peter Power Pop]

I think I have all of these in one format or another. My personal favorites are the Tchaikovsky disc (nothing revolutionary, just very good), Carmina Burana, Scheherazade, and Debussy. Their Liszt album and a live disc with An American in Paris (if you can find it) are also excellent. There are much better options for Symphonie Fantastique (Gardiner, Les Siècles). Some scrappy oboe d'amore playing as well as dubious choice of bassoon ruined the Ravel disc for me. Pictures and Poulenc are pretty good. The Strauss disc is quite good, but I just can't get that excited about the Waltz King...

If you'd like to hear Planets on period instruments, the New Queens Hall Orchestra recorded it to great effect before disbanding.

[Warning: Self-Promotion Alert] You can hear the New Queens Hall Orchestra Planets here:

https://petersplanets.wordpress.com/2015/01/01/goodman-1996/

You can easily ignore the text on that page.

[Peter Power Pop]

Browsing the Anima Eterna/Immerseel discography (http://animaeterna.be/discografie/?lang=en) is interesting -  ... [snip] ... They tackle, amongst others ... [snip] ... Debussy. ... [snip, snip, snip]

[snip overload]

I'm currently listening to a lot of Debussy (for a possible blog comparing recordings of La Mer), and I'm loving Immerseel's La Mer. It's by far my favourite HIP La Mer. Actually, it's one of my favourite La Mers period. (Pun definitely intended.)

You can hear the Immerseel disc on Spotify.



Incidentally, there's another HIP Debussy album that I know of. It's with Les Siècles, conducted by François-Xavier Roth.

You can hear the Roth disc on Spotify.



The Roth La Mer is well played and recorded, but it's not doing much for me emotionally. The Immerseel, on the other hand, is full of life. It sounds like a living, breathing thing. And I love it.

[milk]

Looks like Penelope Crawford released a Beethoven and a Schumann CD this year. Any thoughts anyone?

[(poco) Sforzando]

Not in the case of Harnoncourt's Dvorak, although it is the case sometimes. For example, Charles Mackerras often got HIP-ish results with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, and Roger Norrington tried to do HIP performance with the SWR Orchestra of Stuttgart.

Harnoncourt's Dvorak DOES have standouts in my opinion - The Golden Spinning-Wheel, and the Piano Concerto with Pierre-Laurent Aimard.

The Golden Spinning-Wheel is the piece whose story Old Nick elucidated in stupefying detail before performing it with the VPO in Berlin. Otherwise what I remember most about that unfortunate concert was a heavy-handed Moldau that sounded like the river had become as polluted with sludge as the Hudson.

[Mandryka]

Looks like Penelope Crawford released a Beethoven and a Schumann CD this year. Any thoughts anyone?

I haven't been able to find the Schumann (is it a chamber CD? ) but I listened to one track of the Beethoven, the first movement of op 101. What I thought was this: it was the most "middle period" op 101/i that I can remember hearing.  And the least spiritual, the least etherial, the least nimble, the least sweet, the least luminescent, the least poetic, the least brooding, the least joyful.

Here's a good op 101 from Martha Argerich

https://www.youtube.com/v/I-Fp0SEHhLU

[Brian]

Looks like the Schumann is brand-new.



By the way, to provide a counterpoint (Mandryka and I usually have opposing opinions of keyboard performances, for whatever reason), Todd and I very much enjoyed Crawford's new Beethoven album. Here's Todd's review and here's an interview I did with her about her performing approach, if you haven't seen that.

[Mandryka]

Here's Todd's review

What's interesting about that is that T heard  it (101/i) as a late period performance, while I didn't. I heard  the mood as sweaty passionate striving heroism like you hear quite often in performances of the Hammer i or the Appassionata.

[Wakefield]

Looks like the Schumann is brand-new.



By the way, to provide a counterpoint (Mandryka and I usually have opposing opinions of keyboard performances, for whatever reason), Todd and I very much enjoyed Crawford's new Beethoven album. Here's Todd's review and here's an interview I did with her about her performing approach, if you haven't seen that.

This Schumann looks as a must-have!

I also noticed a new disk with Schubert's songs, but the soprano's voice doesn't sound very attractive. 

[kishnevi]

I haven't been able to find the Schumann (is it a chamber CD? ) but I listened to one track of the Beethoven, the first movement of op 101. What I thought was this: it was the most "middle period" op 101/i that I can remember hearing.  And the least spiritual, the least etherial, the least nimble, the least sweet, the least luminescent, the least poetic, the least brooding, the least joyful.

Here's a good op 101 from Martha Argerich

https://www.youtube.com/v/I-Fp0SEHhLU

That is about how I felt about Crawford's 101110.  Although I think I reduced it to "rather boring".  I found nothing of what Brian found.   ETA...misremembered which CD of Crawford's I have.

BTW, this post from New Releases should also go here....
http://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php/topic,11592.msg908923.html#msg908923

[Mandryka]

That is about how I felt about Crawford's 101110.  Although I think I reduced it to "rather boring".  I found nothing of what Brian found.   ETA...misremembered which CD of Crawford's I have.

BTW, this post from New Releases should also go here....
http://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php/topic,11592.msg908923.html#msg908923

I thought the op 110 was glib in the outer movements, boots on the piano in the second.

[Wakefield]

I haven't been able to find the Schumann (is it a chamber CD? ) but I listened to one track of the Beethoven, the first movement of op 101. What I thought was this: it was the most "middle period" op 101/i that I can remember hearing.  And the least spiritual, the least etherial, the least nimble, the least sweet, the least luminescent, the least poetic, the least brooding, the least joyful.

Here's a good op 101 from Martha Argerich

https://www.youtube.com/v/I-Fp0SEHhLU

Ideas are born sweet and get older fierce. I don't exactly recall who said this (or something like this), but I remembered it when I did read your message.

Probably, Crawford's interpretation should be understood as an attempt of pre-Romantic performance. Beethoven before Schubert, Liszt, Wagner and Mahler; nimble, lighter, lesser tortuous and with a bigger sense of personal freedom. In addition, I think Crawford listens in the right way to the voice, technical features and spirit of the instrument that she plays, an instrument even slightly posterior to Beethoven's age (and more robust?). But, obviously, a century of Romantic interpretive tradition isn't easy of forgetting.

In summary, I agree with Brian, probably even more than himself. 

[Mandryka]

Yep Gordo, it was those sorts of thoughts which made me try to avoid saying whether or not I thought what Crawford does is good, right, enjoyable. In 101.

Having said that, if you're right and the Crawford project is about deromanticisation (like Gulda's project I suppose), it would be interesting to read what she says about this, how she arrives at her decisions. I've never seen anything to suggest that the Crawford way is a serious historical reconstruction of some pre romantic style.

In 110, that's later, I'm less open to what Crawford does. Beethoven was, when he wrote 110,  caught up in religious ideas of a mystical variety. I think. In the case of 110, I think that Lubimov is the superior musician.

[Wakefield]

She writes her essays in music. 

Well, as far as I know, she is quite involved with other musicians akin to the HIP movement, and removing the Romantic "patina" from interpretations of pre-Romantic repertoire it's a sort of "first principle" for this movement.

[Brian]

I've never seen anything to suggest that the Crawford way is a serious historical reconstruction of some pre romantic style.

"With regard to stylistic playing, I think players of the modern piano are heavily influenced by the 19th-century traditions that have been handed down from their teachers. The language of 18th- and early 19th-century music has its roots in the Baroque period, and legato, long-line phrasing is ineffective in conveying the expressive elements in the music of Mozart, for example.

"Because the instruments are so different in their physical and tonal characteristics, a player (again a player who is really listening to what he's doing) will find that the two instruments lead one in quite different directions. Tempi may be different, the dynamic range is of course different, and perhaps most important, the seemingly sparse notation of Mozart's music, for example, is actually very complete. Modern editions usually contain long phrase markings that have nothing to do with the spoken articulation that makes Mozart's music come alive. The player must read and understand the original notation in order to make stylistic sense of this music. And it's much easier to do this on an early piano than it is on a Steinway."

- Ms. Crawford, in an interview

[Mandryka]

"With regard to stylistic playing, I think players of the modern piano are heavily influenced by the 19th-century traditions that have been handed down from their teachers. The language of 18th- and early 19th-century music has its roots in the Baroque period, and legato, long-line phrasing is ineffective in conveying the expressive elements in the music of Mozart, for example.

"Because the instruments are so different in their physical and tonal characteristics, a player (again a player who is really listening to what he's doing) will find that the two instruments lead one in quite different directions. Tempi may be different, the dynamic range is of course different, and perhaps most important, the seemingly sparse notation of Mozart's music, for example, is actually very complete. Modern editions usually contain long phrase markings that have nothing to do with the spoken articulation that makes Mozart's music come alive. The player must read and understand the original notation in order to make stylistic sense of this music. And it's much easier to do this on an early piano than it is on a Steinway."

- Ms. Crawford, in an interview

Yes I'd seen those but kind of passed over them because they're about Mozart. The idea of speech like articulation, short cells, as far as I know it comes from a rhetorical understanding of some pieces of baroque music. A structure which follows a certain pattern of argument which the ancient Greeks codified.  I had no idea that the same sort of thinking was there in Mozart, I wish she's cite a source for that. She owes it to us to explain why "long-line phrasing is ineffective in conveying the expressive elements in the music."

I wish I'd never got into a discussion with Gordo about romanticism in Beethoven, I just don't understand it well enough to comment with any confidence.  As far as Penelope Crawford goes, she plays op 101/i pretty expressively, and the piano is colourful.