Pieces that have blown you away recently

Symphonic Addict · December 10, 2025, 04:24:06 PM

This disc devoted to Salmanov should be here as well. One of the best CDs from this record label I've stumbled upon in recent years.

It doesn't cease to impress me how many riveting works are out there waiting to be discovered. The sense of surprise and expectation it elicits on me keeps me investigating with real interest.

relm1 · December 11, 2025, 05:11:53 AM

Quote from: Symphonic Addict on December 10, 2025, 04:24:06 PMThis disc devoted to Salmanov should be here as well. One of the best CDs from this record label I've stumbled upon in recent years.

It doesn't cease to impress me how many riveting works are out there waiting to be discovered. The sense of surprise and expectation it elicits on me keeps me investigating with real interest.

I enjoyed it. I then started listening to his symphonies and enjoyed those too! The sound wasn't so great, live recordings. It would be nice to get a newer set.

Symphonic Addict · December 11, 2025, 05:05:22 PM

Quote from: relm1 on December 11, 2025, 05:11:53 AMI enjoyed it. I then started listening to his symphonies and enjoyed those too! The sound wasn't so great, live recordings. It would be nice to get a newer set.

It would be a refreshing project, certainly; also, none of his concertos has been recorded AFAIK.

Symphonic Addict · December 17, 2025, 05:14:39 PM

Pergament: String Quartet No. 1 (from 1920)

This is quite extraordinary music, so different from anything else I know. What it displays for the most part is a relentless feeling of tension that, personally, I find enormously compelling. Once in a while some passages offer some relief and heartfelt lyricism, but it is not what predominates, I must say. This is not a work for everyone's tastes, but for me it's simply irresistible. I mean, those irregular gestures, unpredictable writing and suggestive harmonies are something else! I'm a sucker for works like this riveting quartet that don't sound like any other composer, and the performance seems to do total justice to this intrincate score. Pergament wrote three further quartets. If they share a similar level of inspiration like this masterful piece, labels shouldn't hesitate to materialize them on exemplary recordings.

Menotti: Piano Concerto in F major (from 1945)

Now something completely different. If the Pergament was intended like the spicy food, the Menotti came like a most welcome and delicious dessert. An infectious, sparkling piece permeated with elements of jazz that is fun to the core, albeit not devoid of certain intimacy and mystery, chiefly in the intriguing 2nd movement. The vitality and the dazzling use of the orchestra in the outer movements delight galore. A really great American piano concerto in my view, practically unknown nowadays, almost on par with that of Gershwin, whom Menotti certainly gave a run for his money. The piano part is played by none other than Earl Wild.

relm1 · December 28, 2025, 05:30:21 AM

Yesterday I listened to Sallinen's opera, Kullervo, for the first time and absolutely loved it! Very dramatic, lyrical, colorful and imaginative. I don't fully understand the story, but the opera made me want to explore it further. What I understand is it is part of the Finnish national epic, mythical, and tragic and all of this came through in this work. Some of it reminded me of Gliere's Symphony No. 3 "Ilya Muromets".

Symphonic Addict · December 28, 2025, 04:56:32 PM

Quote from: relm1 on December 28, 2025, 05:30:21 AM

Yesterday I listened to Sallinen's opera, Kullervo, for the first time and absolutely loved it! Very dramatic, lyrical, colorful and imaginative. I don't fully understand the story, but the opera made me want to explore it further. What I understand is it is part of the Finnish national epic, mythical, and tragic and all of this came through in this work. Some of it reminded me of Gliere's Symphony No. 3 "Ilya Muromets".

Never heard of this opera by him before and now my curiosity was piqued.

arpeggio · December 28, 2025, 09:43:16 PM

He composed some great opera. I have the following in my library:

The King Goes Forth to France
Kullervo
and my favorite, Palatsi.

Philo · December 29, 2025, 01:38:33 PM

Mahler Symphony 2 - the Finale - Dudamel with the Youth at Proms:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKdn49T9I40

I cannot tell you how many times I have watched this finale, and, quite literally, every time it leaves me weeping. It can be the finale all on it own, the finale followed by the finale, and iteration. Easily, for me, the most amazing piece of music I have ever come across - I can think of nothing that causes me to feel like this.

DavidUK · December 31, 2025, 12:24:53 PM

Vasks 2nd symphony and Slonimsky's 4th symphony.

Philo · January 01, 2026, 09:40:41 PM

Been working on a Scarlatti School project with ChatGPT - looking at composers who are similar (Cramer, for example) and pianists who may be representative (Gould, for example), and they suggested early Gulda, specifically Beethoven's Op. 2 from 1954, and, BING! Lighting strike moment! ChatGPT called it de-harmonization, and I call it crisp articulation - what an amazing recording:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3w5BQHbSZs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3uOs184jQ0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTI1xqNCqdM

Philo · January 06, 2026, 02:27:13 PM

Every time I rehear Bruckner's Symphony No. 9 - I am blown away; I have yet to hear a bad recording of it, but today, I was blow away by Yannick leading the WP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcCamtD5ufs

What a brass section!

A lot of conducting nuances as well.