What are you listening to now?

[The new erato]

Piano Trio in B major op. 8 (Tamas Vasary, Thomas Brandis, Ottomar Borwitzky)


The piano trio never fails to send shivers on my spine, goosebumps on my skin and tears in my eyes ever since I first heard it, some 15 years ago when my reaction was "This is the most beautiful music in the whole world".

Superb work. Katchen, Suk, Starker is still my og-to Version.

[North Star]

Superb work. Katchen, Suk, Starker is still my og-to Version.

Well, with that lineup, it og to be good.  0:)


Thread duty
Ives
Piano Sonata No. 2, Concord, Mass., 1840–60
Alexei Lubimov
Laurent Verney (viola), Sophie Cherrier (flute)
[asin]B00007KI18[/asin]

[San Antone]

Brahms : The Violin Sonatas
Tetzloff & Vogt

This new release, August 2016, follows a previous live recording with these same two musicians that was released in 2002.  This is by far the better of the two ...  "a breathtaking balance of poise and daring...Tetzlaff and Vogt take obvious pleasure in details without losing sight of the larger picture, whether it's a phrase, a movement or an entire work. Indeed, they sharply delineate the individual character of each sonata."
- Gramophone September 2016

[Florestan]

Superb work. Katchen, Suk, Starker is still my og-to Version.

Excellent choice indeed. The best available in stereo, no doubt.

But... if you can stand the outdated mono sound (1951), the most passionate, red-hot and full-fledged Romantic performance I´ve ever heard is the one in this box:

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

My other heroes are a bit more aged than most of yours  : Oscar Ghiglia, Eliot Fisk, David Russell.
And Filomena Moretti (have you heard of her? I had a soft spot for her when I was younger)

I've heard recordings from all of them except for Oscar Ghiglia....hmm...

One of my favourites from earlier in the 20th century was Alirio Diaz.

[The new erato]

Excellent choice indeed. The best available in stereo, no doubt.

But... if you can stand the outdated mono sound (1951), the most passionate, red-hot and full-fledged Romantic performance I´ve ever heard is the one in this box:

I have that box I believe. Will check and listen (I'recently listened to the Pires/Dumay/whomever version).

[amw]

https://www.youtube.com/v/wbC-G6oAIac

I've basically always been sort of leaning towards Viktoria Mullova as the #1 interpreter of Bartók's 2nd violin concerto. Hearing a live performance that's realistically as good as or better than her studio recording is doing nothing to dissuade me from that view.

[Harry]

A composer worthy to stand next to Joseph Haydn if it comes to String Quartets. A composer that has a lot to say, and does so in an unique musical language. New acquisition, first listen. Hat tip to Neal, who alerted me of them.

http://walboi.blogspot.nl/2016/09/fesca-friedrich-ernst-1789-1826-string_15.html?spref=tw

[Karl Henning]

Piano Trio in B major op. 8 (Tamas Vasary, Thomas Brandis, Ottomar Borwitzky)

The piano trio never fails to send shivers on my spine, goosebumps on my skin and tears in my eyes ever since I first heard it, some 15 years ago when my reaction was "This is the most beautiful music in the whole world". The highlight for me is the scherzo´s trio, where the most passionate yearning and the most intense nostalgia is concentrated in a three-minute waltzy-schmaltzy melody. Pure genius.

Well, you remind me that this is a piece I have never yet heard.

Oh, look!  A Brahms box! . . .

[North Star]

Well, you remind me that this is a piece I have never yet heard.

It's a great piece, Karl. The early opus number is a bit misleading, since Brahms revised the score in 1889. I recall that there are recordings of the original version too, though.

Thread duty
Haydn
Symphony No. 64 in A major 'Tempora mutantur' (c. 1772-8)
The Academy of Ancient Music
Hogwood

Tempora mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis.
Quomodo? Fit semper tempore peior homo.

(The times change, and we change with them.
How? Time passing makes mankind worse.)

[San Antone]

Krzysztof Meyer : String Quartet No. 5

Meyer has written 13 string quartets, and counting.

https://www.youtube.com/v/KYqg9RYrAtI

[Karl Henning]

All right, Karlo!  0:)

A first listen:

Brahms
Pf Trio № 1 in B, Op.8
Kalichstein/Laredo/Robinson

[Mister Sharpe]

Well, you remind me that this is a piece I have never yet heard.

Oh, look!  A Brahms box! . . .

I would wager you've heard it, Karl. Anyone else hear the Ode to Joy variations in it, as I do? Remember, Brahms leaned on it in his first symphony as well.

[Karl Henning]

I would wager you've heard it, Karl. Anyone else hear the Ode to Joy variations in it, as I do? Remember, Brahms leaned on it in his first symphony as well.

There's always the odd chance I have, on classical radio before it became All Gershwin, All the Time (a rhetorical exaggeration, sure . . . .)

But it all sounds quite fresh.  A beauty, of course!

[North Star]

All right, Karlo!  0:)

A first listen:

Brahms
Pf Trio № 1 in B, Op.8
Kalichstein/Laredo/Robinson

Splendid!

Thread duty
First listen
Haydn
Symphony No. 61 in D major (1776)
The Academy of Ancient Music
Hogwood

[Harry]

A musical surprise by the hands of a great pianist. Music not likely to be heard by many who know this composer through his opera compositions. New acquisition, and first listen.

http://walboi.blogspot.nl/2016/09/weber-carl-maria-von-1786-1826-piano.html?spref=tw

[Madiel]

Shostakovich 4th.

[asin]B00CX1Z5ZO[/asin]

Karl, if no-one else, will be pleased to know I'm finding myself far more in tune with this work than I was when I first listened to it back in February. Since then I've heard all of symphonies 5-15 in my chronological traversal of all of Shostakovich's opuses, and I've also recently revisited numbers 1, 5-10 and 15 in a tactically chosen order of my own devising. Listening to number 4 after all of those was part of the tactic!

As much as anything I think the span of the music is a lot less daunting. After becoming used to frequent movements of 20 minutes, and a few that are nearly as long as the outer movements of the 4th, it's easier to handle. Plus the music in the 4th is actually a lot more dynamic than some of the other long movements, so that bit of extra length doesn't feel too onerous.

I know people around here aren't the greatest fans of the reviews of David Hurwitz on Classics Today, but one of the things he praises Petrenko for is a genuine sense of symphonic structure, and from other reviews I think that's what people who like Petrenko like about his Shostakovich.  And as I am the kind of person who is into structure, I like the fact that the 1st movement now sounds to me like one long, movement full of interest, not bits and pieces. The end of it, as so often with Shostakovich endings, is magical.

The 2nd movement comes across as, initially, deliberately at a lower voltage. But every now and then the music rears up with an edge of menace. The percussion at the end sounds an awful lot like the 15th symphony, several decades later.

This low-voltage approach naturally leads into the start of the 3rd movement. The emphasis might be on slow and steady, but I'm finding much of it has a magnetic pull. I think Petrenko's secret is that he keeps everything very crisp - this is certainly apparent once the music speeds up again. Attacks are very precise. I'll admit that towards the end I was beginning to wonder when it would all finish, but it wasn't because the playing was boring. And the closing section, when it arrives, is fantastic.

Yeah, okay, I'm converted. This is a good symphony, I want to keep listening to it, and I'll be more than happy to use this recording to do it.

[Florestan]

A first listen:

Brahms
Pf Trio № 1 in B, Op.8
Kalichstein/Laredo/Robinson

That is the one I first listened to, 15 years ago. I was in The Netherlands back then and bought that box and the ones with Schubert´s piano sonatas and piano music and the other one with the Lieder. I literally devoured them in a matter of weeks and turned into kind of a Brahms and Schubert fanatic for life

I reall envy you! Hearing it for the first time... oh, the bliss, the joy and the happiness! 

[HIPster]

Morning listening:

[asin]B00K1Q3UZ0[/asin]
When Leopold of Anhalt-Cothen died in 1728, his former Kapellmeister had not forgotten the five brilliant years he had spent in the prince's service. He wrote a cantata dedicated to his memory based on the music of two major works of the mid 1720s - the Trauer-Ode and the St. Matthew Passion. Although the score to the Kothener Trauermusik is lost, the wordbook and other sources of information have now made it possible to create a performing edition. In his first recording for harmonia mundi, Raphael Pichon leads the ensemble Pygmalion in a rediscovery of this little-known work.

[North Star]

Shostakovich 4th.

Karl, if no-one else, will be pleased to know I'm finding myself far more in tune with this work than I was when I first listened to it back in February.

...

Yeah, okay, I'm converted. This is a good symphony, I want to keep listening to it, and I'll be more than happy to use this recording to do it.

Excellent!