Blind Comparison: R.Strauss - Also sprach Zarathustra

Started by madaboutmahler, June 24, 2012, 11:34:00 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

madaboutmahler

Quote from: Carnivorous Sheep on July 04, 2012, 08:58:08 PM
Hey,

If it's not too late, I would like to play. Is there room in one of the remaining groups?

Of course - good to have you on board! :)
"Music is ... A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy"
— Ludwig van Beethoven

Florestan

Quote from: Brian on June 27, 2012, 01:21:07 PM
But there's really no question the greatest recording ever committed is by the Orebro Community Music School in Sweden:

Contest and blind comparison over. This is the winner by a very wide margin...  ;D
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

J.Z. Herrenberg

I have already listened to the B selection. I think I know which performances I prefer, but I'll listen again a few days from now, just to be sure...
Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything. -- Plato

mjwal

I haven't received any links to excerpts for this - have I missed something?
The Violin's Obstinacy

It needs to return to this one note,
not a tune and not a key
but the sound of self it must depart from,
a journey lengthily to go
in a vein it knows will cripple it.
...
Peter Porter

mc ukrneal

Quote from: mjwal on July 06, 2012, 04:54:04 AM
I haven't received any links to excerpts for this - have I missed something?
Somewhere he wrote he was still working on it. I hope he's not missing school or anything to do this though.
Be kind to your fellow posters!!

madaboutmahler

Don't worry - Neal! :)
Today, I finished putting Group C together, so hopefully that will be sent out tommorow. And hopefully Group A the next day. :)
"Music is ... A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy"
— Ludwig van Beethoven

madaboutmahler

Quote from: J.Z. Herrenberg on July 05, 2012, 01:03:19 PM
I have already listened to the B selection. I think I know which performances I prefer, but I'll listen again a few days from now, just to be sure...

Excited to hear your thoughts, Johan! :)

Ok - Group C has been sent out now. If you have not recieved a link yet, you are in Group A, I hope to be sending that group out tommorow. :)

"Music is ... A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy"
— Ludwig van Beethoven

Florestan

Where are those links? I can't see a single one.  ???
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

madaboutmahler

Quote from: Florestan on July 09, 2012, 06:17:49 AM
Where are those links? I can't see a single one.  ???

Don't worry! The links are sent by personal message. You are in Group A, which I hope to be sending out tonight. Apologies for taking quite a while, have been very busy recently... :)
"Music is ... A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy"
— Ludwig van Beethoven

Karl Henning

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

madaboutmahler

Ok, all groups sent out now.

Florestan - your inbox is full so I couldn't send it to you, will try again tommorow. :)

Shall we use the 18th July as our first voting deadline? As always, this can be extended if necessary.

Happy Voting everyone!
"Music is ... A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy"
— Ludwig van Beethoven

Florestan

Quote from: madaboutmahler on July 09, 2012, 02:44:51 PM
Florestan - your inbox is full so I couldn't send it to you, will try again tommorow. :)

Aha, that was the trick!  :)

Inbox pruned, please try again anytime you wish and thank you!  :-*
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Florestan

Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

madaboutmahler

Quote from: Florestan on July 10, 2012, 05:40:01 AM
Aha, that was the trick!  :)

Inbox pruned, please try again anytime you wish and thank you!  :-*

Ok, will send you the link now! :)

Right - as everyone seems fine with it, the deadline for this part of the comparison is the 18th July.

Also, as Neal spotted, I made a little mistake on the Group C link by accidently leaving the title 'C5' on for the 'C6' excerpts too.... Apologies for that, and thank you to Neal for spotting the mistake. The pair of excerpts for C6 start at 40.00 . :)

Happy Voting everyone!
"Music is ... A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy"
— Ludwig van Beethoven

mjwal

OK. I'll step in here where angels obviously fear to tread. My first impressions. I couldn't really make out how many excerpts there were, 2 or 3 - 4? Funny aural jump-cuts in some cases not evident on others. I have no recording of this at hand and haven't listened to it for a long time.

A1. Beginning distinctly underwhelming after the initial growl, lacking in tension.- the trumpets not at all annunciatory to my ears, the climax leaves me cold, something to do with the phrasing not binding the whole together, though there's plenty boom-boom. The instrumental texture is captured quite well in the following excerpt, but something is missing for me: call it "feeling" or whatever, but I don't have the feeling of suspense and tragic experience I want. There's a lot of effect-making, to be sure, big heroic gestures and sobbing strings, but no real cohesion.

A2. This beginning  impresses me more, more foreboding, followed by trumpets announcing with a paradoxically minatory promise. The climax doesn't lift me out of my seat, however. Also in the following I feel more tension & suspense than in A1., a sense of danger more apparent; the orchestral balance helps. It hangs together well, and there is a more doomladen feeling, a human being on the edge; not just a massive orchestral machine here. Even a dangerous sense of dissipation in the last passage - how will it continue? I like the muted brass in this, not so much the strings, which are, well, stringy.

A3. This sounds almost brusque to me - I can't make out the interpretative stance. In the second (?) passage the strings sound rather Rosenkavalierly, in general the conductor seems to me to be going for early Strauss schmalz plus excitement in a rather perfunctory way. Could be film music, hmm, makes me feel out of sympathy with this work, distinctly unpromising.

A4. Is this a live mono account? The beginning blew me away, seriously thrilling, on the edge (sorry about this mountaineering metaphor, it just seems to recur of its own accord, as it were). Despite the lack of spatial differentiation in the recording the work has tremendous plasticity & existential commitment. I suspect I know who is doing this to my central nervous system. Was he a mountaineer himself? The solo strings intervening in the maelstrom here towards the end of the second excerpt sound fragile and dismayed, almost drowning. This is a great artist at work, inspired.

A5. This is distinctly used LP sound at the start, but it swells up magnificently. Great organ sound. In the depths - what can be awaiting us? The 2nd excerpt finely judged at the start, but it is stereo after all despite the crackle & pop or am I mistaken? Very dramatically conceived, but less emotionally gripping here than A4.

A6. Very, I would say too slow and majestic, the ominous swell well maintained, though the climax doesn't make me leap out of my seat as A4. did. Some brilliant instrumental effects - pizzicati? in the following, yet it is all rather faceless to my ears.

I couldn't - after one hearing - tell whether I was listening to exactly the same music excerpts each time after the introduction. My memory is not as good as it was, and I realise I need the whole integral work to make sense of parts of it. A4. sounded most integrated as a conception and in its execution.
Personal list in order of preference:
1. A4.
2. A5.
3. A2.
4. A6.
5. A1.
6. A3.
The Violin's Obstinacy

It needs to return to this one note,
not a tune and not a key
but the sound of self it must depart from,
a journey lengthily to go
in a vein it knows will cripple it.
...
Peter Porter

mc ukrneal

Group C: Also Sprach Zarathustra

I have not listened to this piece in ages. At one time I had a Great Performances LP (Ormandy I think) that I listened to, but it must be at least 25 years since I have heard that. What's more, I only own one version of it on CD, acquired recently in the DG Strauss Karajan box. I have not listened to it (I will wait until after the blind listening is complete to do so). I haven't seen the movie 2001 for ages either (at least 10-15 years, so that should not be much of an influence either). So I approach this with pretty fresh ears.

A note about the score
Immediately, I am trying to figure out how the opening section should go. There are many differences for such a 'simple' opening (and one so well known), so I decided to seek out the score and try and figure out why some were working better than others and what they should be doing. And I was really surprised. The piece starts with double bass and contrabassoon. This lasts four bars before the trumpets enter in piano, and then the whole orchestra enters with the (dunt dah) soon after. The first group entrance is a sixteenth note in forte (the dunt in dunt dah), followed by a whole note. The whole note is held with a diminuendo and crescendo in that bar back to a forte. Drums then bang away in forte. The trumpets make their second entrance of the motif in mf (mezzo forte) and the third in forte. So the entrances should not sound identical. After the third time, there is some additional playing, and I won't go into detail about it now. But on the last note that is held at the end of this opening section, there is again a diminuendo and crescendo in that last whole note, after which the organ holds longer.  Here is what I observed:

C1: Trumpets do p, mf, and f entrances. Difficult to detect a diminuendo in the last note of the dunt dah (more of a f to p quickly), which is partly why it seems too static. Strikes me as one long crescendo on that last note (no real diminuendo).
C2: Trumpets sound similar in first two (p and mf hard to differentiate). First diminuendo sounds like a diminuendo. Sixteenth note seems just right the first time, with perhaps a slightly longer hold the next two times.  I didn't notice much of a diminuendo on the last note. But this still works well.
C3: Is first note held too long? Trumpets get louder each time. Sixteenth note held longer, with daylight between the dunt and the dah. Good diminuendo in the first, ok in second. Diminuendo on the last note clear as day! Hooray!
C4: Trumpets come in early. Trumpets - hard to differentiate first two entrances, but good forte on third. Diminuendo clear first two times. Sixteenth note is held too long. Diminuendo on last note not clear (I think there is an attempt, but hard to discern).
C5: Forgetting poor unison and sloppy entrances, trumpets enter at p, mf and f. Their sixteenth notes are noticeably shorter (in the dunt dah), which I thought too short, but seem to conform to the score (go figure – I guess I just got so used to longer held notes)! Diminuendo is there but a bit more abrupt in execution.
C6: Trumpets enter progressively louder. The diminuendo is particularly good in second entrance of motif. But the dunt dah sixteenth note sounds way long! What a differentiation compared to the previous! Diminuendo attempted, but all one seems to hear is the organ when they get softer.

So what to do? None of them really do what the score asks for (though some are closer than others). Sometimes when they do, they are ineffective and vice versa. They all play it so differently! The only reason this is easy to compare is that there is relatively little going on. And still, a lot of differences. Score is here for those interested: http://conquest.imslp.info/files/imglnks/usimg/c/ce/IMSLP19119-PMLP12187-Strauss_-_Also_sprach_Zarathustra__orch._score_.pdf

My Rankings

C3 and C2 were clear winners for me, followed by C4 solidly in third place. There is then a huge gulf (blackhole really) between 3rd and 4th. The last three were hard to rank for me as I felt they each had some major issues. I put them as C1, C5 and C6, but I felt all three were quite weak.

C1: Good drums. Decent start, but hold back too much and they play too sloppy (and not always in unision). Second clip has a lot of strength. It seems pretty good, so why am I resisting it? I think there is too little differentiation in loudness and phrasing.  Ranking: 4

C2: Much more internal variation of sound here. The drum sounds a bit dull, but that is in part because the sound here isn't the greatest – sounds congested. Despite that, preferred it to C1. Has all sorts of detail in terms of phrasing and such and good energy.  Second clip has all the same advantages and disadvantages. Would have loved to hear this in better sound. Still, one can hear what the piece is about here. Chromaticism comes out well.  Ranking: 2

C3: Solid beginning, though not as inspiring as C2. But they seem to follow the score in a number of important areas that make this good.  Second clip has nice variation. Here we have some great detail (some of the brass details shine) and the energy is there (but you feel they could give even more, which creates tremendous impact). I liked the second clip best so far of all of them. Ranking: 1

C4: This one starts out with a deeper rumble, but I think the trumpets enter too early. This one is more ominous. Middle of the road in terms of differentiation. Not enough phrasing I think, but a pleasing start if one doesn't mind the entrance problem. Very deep range of sound to the recording. The brass kill it! Second clip has some wonderful moments, but I feel there is a certain sameness to it. The loudness of it gets fatiguing. Ranking 3

C5: Slight break before trumpet entrance and some lack of unison playing (sloppy entrances in places, and places where instruments do not hold notes long enough leaving gaps). In second clip, better playing. Doesn't really move forward like it should.   Ranking: 5

C6: Nice full sounding start. But then when the whole world should be shaking and this one is strangely reserved. The organ seems too heavily weighted here (distorting balance). The second clip has some decent phrasing, but is a bit bland. There are some out of tune moments too (I think it's the oboe).  Ranking:  6
Be kind to your fellow posters!!

madaboutmahler

Thank you both for your votes! Very interesting comments, and thank you to Neal for posting that analysis of the opening. Very useful and fascinating.

Remember, that if you have finished your first group and wish to, and have the time in the next week, you can compare another of the groups (or even all 3)! Just let me know if you want to, and I'll send you the links. :)
"Music is ... A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy"
— Ludwig van Beethoven

TimH

1 = C1: Opening - spacious, great clarity, powerful timpani, monumental organ. Second excerpt - rich, lush strings, poise, thrilling and energetic, dreamy string section, sliding subtle harmonies.

2 = C3: Opening - slightly woolly timpani, but strong brass, ringing triangle and organ with triumphant climax. Second excerpt - warm vivid tone, surging, swirling, powerful, controlled, multilayered.

3 = C4: Opening - very powerful from outset, forward moving, huge timpani and overwhelming climax. Second excerpt - very "in your face", beefy, brash, fast - lacks finesse of C1 and C3 - all at one level of high intensity.

4 = C5: Opening - low impact, seems lightweight, rushing through. Second excerpt - slightly bland, thin, recording lacks detail and presence.

5 = C6 (incorrectly labelled as a second C5 on download, I think): Opening - slow, very controlled crescendo. Second excerpt - very out of tune organ makes a terrible sound, really grating - unforgivable!; in any case, bland, low impact, dragging, wallowing, low detail recording.

6 = C2: Opening - very thin congested sound, background noise and hiss. Second excerpt - sound distortion, strings sliding and swooping all over the place, of historical interest only?

So, in summary, for me not much to choose between C1 and C3, which are miles ahead of the other four.

Looking forward to the next stage!

TheGSMoeller



Got my beer and the score, bring on the comparison!

Brian

Ha! I put on the A group, listened to just about 35 seconds of A1, and thought, "this sounds too familiar..." Direct comparison proves it is indeed one of the three ASZ recordings I own.  ;D

Anyway, I'll naturally try to be as unbiased as possible. Looking forward to this very much!