What are you listening to now?

[aligreto]

Dvorak: Symphony No. 7 [Sejna]....





Wonderful performance; what stands out for me is the portrayal of the writing for the woodwinds.

[aligreto]

I'm not fan of American Minimalism a la Reich, Glass, Riley, Young, etc., but there are a few Adams works I enjoy. Harmonielehre and Harmonium are my favorites. I do enjoy The Chairman Dances from Nixon In China quite a bit (dislike Nixon as a whole). Two other works from Adams I thought were pretty good were The Dharma at Big Sur and Naive & Sentimental Music. I also think Lollapalooza and Grand Pianola Music are great fun. He's a terribly uneven composer though and has composed many works where the cheese factor is quite high.

My collection of John Adams' works is very far from extensive so I am not qualified to discuss the above with you. However, I can strongly recommend his Violin Concerto if you have not heard it. I think that it is a wonderful work. If you have heard it I would be interested to read what you think of it.

[Todd]

Disc 2.

[Mirror Image]

My collection of John Adams' works is very far from extensive so I am not qualified to discuss the above with you. However, I can strongly recommend his Violin Concerto if you have not heard it. I think that it is a wonderful work. If you have heard it I would be interested to read what you think of it.

I'm not a fan of the Violin Concerto unfortunately. I think it's tedious and what truly aggravates me about the work is the violinist never shuts up! I know it's a concerto, but the lack of orchestral involvement is ultimately what turned me off.

[Brian]

Big Karel Sejna party at GMG the past week or so.

[aligreto]

Larsson: Little Serenade....

[aligreto]

I'm not a fan of the Violin Concerto unfortunately. I think it's tedious and what truly aggravates me about the work is the violinist never shuts up! I know it's a concerto, but the lack of orchestral involvement is ultimately what turned me off.

There is no way that I can argue with that 

[aligreto]

Big Karel Sejna party at GMG the past week or so.

I am a mere Sejna newbie but a total convert 

[Spineur]

This should keep Gurn happy,
But my real god here is the Moravian kid that became a knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire

[not edward]

Dvorak: Symphony No. 7 [Sejna]....





Wonderful performance; what stands out for me is the portrayal of the writing for the woodwinds.

The Czech Philharmonic's woodwind section at that time was really something else. And on that note:

[asin]B00000351B[/asin]

[kishnevi]

Czeching in with more Dvorak

Mercury Living Presence 2 box, CD 5

[Harry]

Czeching in with more Dvorak

Mercury Living Presence 2 box, CD 5

Beautiful performance in my opinion!

[Dancing Divertimentian]

That's maybe the second time I heard the piece, and the only recording of it that I have, can't really judge. Her playing in rest of the disc is clear, crisp, precise, minimal pedalling, sharp attack, maybe lacking in last ounce of abandon here and there but generally the kind of playing that I like.

Thank you! Yes, appears worth investigating.

[NikF]

Brahms: Symphony No. 1 in C minor - Boult/London Philharmonic.

[asin]B000026BS8[/asin]

[Kontrapunctus]

No. 3 and 4 today. Authentic and intense!

[Drasko]

The Czech Philharmonic's woodwind section at that time was really something else. And on that note:

On the same note (and particularly trio of the scherzo):

[aligreto]

Bruch: String Quintet....

[aligreto]

[asin]B00000351B[/asin]

A wonderful CD IMHO.

[ritter]

Every once in a while I revisit this:


Yes, the work might be flawed, dramatically awkward, perhaps even musically inconsistent...but is is endlessly fascinating and breathtakingly beautiful. A must for anyone interested in the music of Manuel de Falla. Sadly, recordings of it are not easy to find these days (except for a bootleg of the staged première at La Scala of an "intermediate" version of Ernesto Hallfter's completion, in poor sound and in Italian translation).

I fortunately located the other day a cheap copy of the CD transfer of Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos's pioneering recording from the 70s, with which I got to get to know the work in my teens and that was only briefly available in the market:



It's on its way to Spain from Germany! 

[SimonNZ]

Byrd's Mass for Five Voices - David Hill, cond.