De-lurking at last!

Started by classicalgeek, March 20, 2012, 02:46:26 PM

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classicalgeek

Hello all!

I've been lurking on this forum for a while, and finally registered a few weeks ago.  Now I'm officially de-lurking and introducing myself.

My name is James, and I live outside of Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. with my wife, daughter, and son.  I'm a software test engineer by day, but classical music has long been my life's passion.  I first fell in love with it at age 9 when I was forced to take piano lessons by my mother. She had told me I could quit after six weeks if I didn't like it - I was sure I wouldn't (like it, that is), but after three lessons or so, I knew I'd found something special.  I scraped together $3 and bought a cassette tape of 'Schubert's Greatest Hits', and I'm still hooked going on age 37!  I was also a composer, and studied composition and theory in college, but I decided not to keep it up as a career. 

I've always been a keen collector of recordings, though – first cassette tapes, then CDs starting when I was 14.  I even bought and sold CDs on eBay for several years as a side business.  My wife grew tired of the accumulation of hundreds of CDs in our smallish house, so we struck a bargain that I would curtail my CD purchasing in exchange for downloading to my heart's content.  I think if I lived alone, I'd have recordings from floor to ceiling in every room  ;D.  I'm no audiophile, so the sound quality tradeoff is no big deal for me.  Not to mention, a 3TB external hard drive holds the equivalent of thousands of CDs while taking up less shelf space than a Brilliant Classics Bach Edition!  So in the last five years or so my digital music collection has taken off.

I do almost all of my listening on a five-year-old, 80 GB iPod Classic; my files are MP3s, generally between 192 and 320 kbps.  At work, I spend eight to ten hours a day at a computer, so I can listen largely uninterrupted for long stretches.  I manually tag all my music using my own system; I keep a master list in an Excel spreadsheet and use iTunes (which I don't love, but it works) to manage my digital music library.  I don't usually listen to complete CDs or collections in the conventional sense – instead, I create a playlist for each day and include a wide variety of works on it, which is why I'm "Currently listening to: Everything from Palestrina to Stockhausen..."!

My very favorite composer is Mahler – attending a live performance of the Eighth Symphony is my top 'Bucket List' item – but there are hundreds whose music I enjoy greatly, from Renaissance to avant-garde, from the well-known to the obscure.

I'm happy to have found the GMG forum – I've lurked on several other classical music discussion forums for a number of years.  I like that here contributors are obviously passionate about classical music, and posts tend to stay civil and on-topic!

Sorry to be so long-winded – I look forward to digging into the forum even more, and hopefully contributing as well!

-James
So much great music, so little time...

Original compositions and orchestrations: https://www.youtube.com/@jmbrannigan

TheGSMoeller

Greetings, and welcome!  :)


And great avatar, Beaker is a Muppet of few words.

Scion7

Sometimes "lurkers" are Terminators - somebody have the dawgs sniff 'im !!
When, a few months before his death, Rachmaninov lamented that he no longer had the "strength and fire" to compose, friends reminded him of the Symphonic Dances, so charged with fire and strength. "Yes," he admitted. "I don't know how that happened. That was probably my last flicker."

classicalgeek

So much great music, so little time...

Original compositions and orchestrations: https://www.youtube.com/@jmbrannigan

Ataraxia


Gurn Blanston

Well, you will certainly find some kindred spirits here; it takes all sorts, and we have 'em! Welcome, and feel free to share your accumulated knowledge. :)

8)
Visit my Haydn blog: HaydnSeek

Haydn: that genius of vulgar music who induces an inordinate thirst for beer - Mily Balakirev (1860)

ibanezmonster

Quote from: classicalgeek on March 20, 2012, 02:46:26 PM
My very favorite composer is Mahler – attending a live performance of the Eighth Symphony is my top 'Bucket List' item – but there are hundreds whose music I enjoy greatly, from Renaissance to avant-garde, from the well-known to the obscure.
*summoning Daniel*
I hope you like Mah...
oh, wait.
8)


Anyways, for a while this forum seems to have been thin on members who have Mahler as their favorite composer... it seems to come in cycles. We could use another Mahlerite, especially since that last favorite composer poll very much underrepresented Mahler, just because of the time it was held. It's nice to see maybe we could rebuild a new Mahler gang here, as a few years ago we kind of had one , but they stopped posting over time.

But yeah.... good to have you here.  8)

Conor71

Welcome - this is a great forum, enjoy! :)

Hollywood

Howdy there classicalgeek. Greetings from Schubert's Vienna. Welcome to the forum. 

"There are far worse things awaiting man than death."

A Hollywood born SoCal gal living in Beethoven's Heiligenstadt (Vienna, Austria).

Wanderer


coffee

Liberty for the wolf is death for the lamb.

mc ukrneal

Welcome and enjoy! Love the beaker avatar. Not sure if you aware of it, but there is a clip that marries Beaker and Beethoven here:
http://www.youtube.com/v/xpcUxwpOQ_A.
Makes me laugh every time
Be kind to your fellow posters!!

Karl Henning

Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on March 20, 2012, 06:05:07 PM
Well, you will certainly find some kindred spirits here; it takes all sorts, and we have 'em!

Aye, what Gurn said. Welcome!
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Lisztianwagner

Welcome on the forum, I hope you'll have a nice time here :)
Glad to know you love Mahler's music, he's one of my absolute favourite composers as well. Do you also like Wagner?

Ilaria
"Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire." - Gustav Mahler

Karl Henning

Did Daniel tell you, he hopes you like Mahler? . . .
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

chasmaniac

Welcome! And for my part, I hope Daniel is happy that you like Mahler.
If I have exhausted the justifications, I have reached bedrock and my spade is turned. Then I am inclined to say: "This is simply what I do."  --Wittgenstein, PI §217

bhodges

Hi James, and welcome! Another Mahler fan here...

--Bruce

classicalgeek

Thanks for the warm welcome, everyone.  I like this place already!  :)

Quote from: mc ukrneal on March 21, 2012, 01:31:29 AM
Welcome and enjoy! Love the beaker avatar. Not sure if you aware of it, but there is a clip that marries Beaker and Beethoven here:

I'm definitely familiar with that one - it's brilliant!  Most impressive is the fact that Beaker gets two different pitches out of the same kettledrum :D.  I even received this ornament as a gift last holiday season:
[asin]B0055PERZ4[/asin]
Also great is the Muppets' rendition of 'Stars and Stripes Forever': http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDA9NbPAK8o

Quote from: Lisztianwagner on March 21, 2012, 06:26:09 AM
Welcome on the forum, I hope you'll have a nice time here :)
Glad to know you love Mahler's music, he's one of my absolute favourite composers as well. Do you also like Wagner?
Ilaria
Glad to find so many Mahler lovers here - his music speaks to me like few others do.  The Second Symphony would have to be my favorite - the first time I heard it, at a Boston Symphony concert in 1989 (I was 14), with Ozawa conducting - it left me speechless and in tears.  And it still has that effect!  But of course, I love all the symphonies and song cycles...

As far as Wagner goes - I don't listen to a lot of opera, mainly because I do most of my listening at work, or while doing chores or exercising at home.  I find opera requires more undivided attention to follow what's going on, and I don't get a lot of opportunities to sit down with a score or libretto and listen for the sake of listening, unfortunately.  But I do greatly enjoy his music - I hear the overtures and orchestral excerpts regularly (the Tannhäuser overture always brightens my day!), and I have many recordings of the operas, waiting for that moment when I *do* finally get that elusive chance to just sit and listen :D

Thanks again!
So much great music, so little time...

Original compositions and orchestrations: https://www.youtube.com/@jmbrannigan

mc ukrneal

Quote from: classicalgeek on March 21, 2012, 09:30:11 AM
Thanks for the warm welcome, everyone.  I like this place already!  :)

I'm definitely familiar with that one - it's brilliant!  Most impressive is the fact that Beaker gets two different pitches out of the same kettledrum :D.  I even received this ornament as a gift last holiday season:

Hah! That's either totally brilliant or totally whacko. I love it! There are a lot of funny details in the video - the drum pitches you mentioned, the mixing of the top and middle Beaker when the middle top Beaker runs away, the way the top left Beaker vibrates to the drum, etc. But the ornament - that goes to a whole 'nother level! :)
Be kind to your fellow posters!!

North Star

Welcome to the forum, James!
Our resident Mahler fan will most likely get along with you.
"Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it." - Confucius

My photographs on Flickr