Vaughan Williams's Veranda

[Roasted Swan]

Colleague sent me this:
https://www.planethugill.com/2022/06/midori.html

Always pleased to hear of more violinists exploring RVW's fiddle music away from "just" The Lark Ascending.  I've mentioned this disc before but it remains stubbornly little known....



Occasionally Mordkovitch can be a little too forceful for my taste but she is excellent in the Sonata which is a very fine work.  I prefer the 6 Studies in English Folksong in the clarinet version as the lack of vibrato on that instrument somehow makes the folksongs "purer" and less affected.  This old version on Chandos of those by Janet Hilton is just gorgeous....



the same performance appears in this Chandos twofer which brings together various disparate older Chandos recordings and makes for a very interesting mixed programme.....

[Mirror Image]

Yes, that is exactly the same as my collection excluding my old LP set (which I bought in 1972 - I had a Saturday job in a record shop and saved up for the LP set and utilised my staff discount  )

In my case it's called OCDCDCD (obsessive compulsive CD collecting disorder). As John says there is no logical reason for it. I think that I no longer have the blue box set as I sold it some years ago. Great news about the Japanese set John 

I can only imagine how thrilled and enraptured as a youngster you were with this Boult set, Jeffrey. Honestly, I don't remember my first reactions to RVW. They were positive of course, but I don't actually think I understood the music too well. I got into RVW when I was still new to classical music and trying to understand it. I must've listened to Boult's set 4-5 times in row.

[Mirror Image]

Always pleased to hear of more violinists exploring RVW's fiddle music away from "just" The Lark Ascending.  I've mentioned this disc before but it remains stubbornly little known....



Occasionally Mordkovitch can be a little too forceful for my taste but she is excellent in the Sonata which is a very fine work.  I prefer the 6 Studies in English Folksong in the clarinet version as the lack of vibrato on that instrument somehow makes the folksongs "purer" and less affected.  This old version on Chandos of those by Janet Hilton is just gorgeous....



the same performance appears in this Chandos twofer which brings together various disparate older Chandos recordings and makes for a very interesting mixed programme.....

I imagine Mordkovitch being quite good in the Violin Sonata No. 2. This is one of RVW's more gnarlier pieces and I love it to bits. I own that Chandos 2-CD set somewhere and I remember it having a rather odd mix of works.

[Mirror Image]

I might rewatch this documentary tonight:



I recall our Jeffrey isn't too fond of this documentary, but I happen to prefer it to the Tony Palmer film, O Thou Transcendent, which I wrote a scathing review of on Amazon many years ago.

[Roasted Swan]

I imagine Mordkovitch being quite good in the Violin Sonata No. 2. This is one of RVW's more gnarlier pieces and I love it to bits. I own that Chandos 2-CD set somewhere and I remember it having a rather odd mix of works.

There is only 1 Violin sonata which is simply "Violin Sonata in A minor" - the String Quartet No.2 is in the same key........

[Mirror Image]

There is only 1 Violin sonata which is simply "Violin Sonata in A minor" - the String Quartet No.2 is in the same key........

Ah, you're quite right. I might've been confusing the SQs.

[Roasted Swan]

I might rewatch this documentary tonight:



I recall our Jeffrey isn't too fond of this documentary, but I happen to prefer it to the Tony Palmer film, O Thou Transcendent, which I wrote a scathing review of on Amazon many years ago.

I didn't like it either - for me it tried too hard to "sensationalise" the fact that RVW was a man who had relationships with women.........  whatever next!

[Mirror Image]

I didn't like it either - for me it tried too hard to "sensationalise" the fact that RVW was a man who had relationships with women.........  whatever next!

Yes, I didn't like this particular angle of the documentary either, which may be why I haven't rewatched it. I'd love a documentary on the composer that actually told the composer's story without trying to exaggerate a story or make a  particular talking point. One of the problems I have with the Palmer film is the sloppiness of it all and how there wasn't some kind of narrative told in a coherent way. I also didn't like the images of dead children and stacks of dead bodies being thrown about. For me, this had no place in a film about a composer. We know RVW was in the trenches of WWI. I just found it distasteful.

[vandermolen]

I didn't like it either - for me it tried too hard to "sensationalise" the fact that RVW was a man who had relationships with women.........  whatever next!

V much agree - the other one was ruined for me by the absurd juxtaposition of extracts from the Ninth Symphony with images of famine in Biafra. In some respects the forgotten and surprisingly conventional Ken Russell film about Vaughan Williams was best of all.

[Mirror Image]

V much agree - the other one was ruined for me by the absurd juxtaposition of extracts from the Ninth Symphony with images of famine in Biafra. In some respects the forgotten and surprisingly conventional Ken Russell film about Vaughan Williams was best of all.

I've seen that Ken Russell film via YouTube...well, I didn't watch all of it, because I thought it wasn't too well thought-out. I'm definitely waiting on a documentary that follows the composer's life chronologically in a coherent way with the absence of grotesque imagery, tangents that have nothing to do with the composer's own life or music and haphazard, erratic editing.

[vandermolen]

I've seen that Ken Russell film via YouTube...well, I didn't watch all of it, because I thought it wasn't too well thought-out. I'm definitely waiting on a documentary that follows the composer's life chronologically in a coherent way with the absence of grotesque imagery, tangents that have nothing to do with the composer's own life or music and haphazard, erratic editing.

The one I most enjoyed was the recent one (over here) about the friendship between VW and Holst. A good example of 'less is more' I think.

[Mirror Image]

The one I most enjoyed was the recent one (over here) about the friendship between VW and Holst. A good example of 'less is more' I think.

Very nice.

[Roasted Swan]

The one I most enjoyed was the recent one (over here) about the friendship between VW and Holst. A good example of 'less is more' I think.

That was the "Heirs & Rebels" documentary wasn't it?  Which is also the title of the book of letters between the 2 composers



which I strongly recommend to anyone interested.  The title itself is such a perfect distillation of the 2 composer's creative approach - heirs to a 19th Century legacy and Germanic influences while also rebelling against the same via folksong/Elizabethan music/Indian culture etc etc......

[Irons]

That was the "Heirs & Rebels" documentary wasn't it?  Which is also the title of the book of letters between the 2 composers



which I strongly recommend to anyone interested.  The title itself is such a perfect distillation of the 2 composer's creative approach - heirs to a 19th Century legacy and Germanic influences while also rebelling against the same via folksong/Elizabethan music/Indian culture etc etc......

Don't think so. Not a hard edged factual documentary but a fascinating view of the two composers friendship by Amanda Vickery and Tom Service.
At least that is what I think Jeffrey is alluding too.

  https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bshhss

[Karl Henning]

Don't think so. Not a hard edged factual documentary but a fascinating view of the two composers friendship by Amanda Vickery and Tom Service.
At least that is what I think Jeffrey is alluding too.

  https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bshhss

Thanks! Enjoyed this v. much. (Had to adopt a UK VPN)

[vandermolen]

Don't think so. Not a hard edged factual documentary but a fascinating view of the two composers friendship by Amanda Vickery and Tom Service.
At least that is what I think Jeffrey is alluding too.

  https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bshhss

Yes, Lol is right.

[vandermolen]

Thanks! Enjoyed this v. much. (Had to adopt a UK VPN)

I'm glad that you enjoyed it Karl.
I liked the scenes relating to Holst's teaching post at St Paul's Girls School in Hammersmith (hence the 'St Paul's Suite' and 'Hammersmith'). What wasn't mentioned was that VW sometimes stood in for Holst if Holst was ill (his health was quite fragile).

[Karl Henning]

I'm glad that you enjoyed it Karl.
I liked the scenes relating to Holst's teaching post at St Paul's Girls School in Hammersmith (hence the 'St Paul's Suite' and 'Hammersmith'). What wasn't mentioned was that VW sometimes stood in for Holst if Holst was ill (his health was quite fragile).

That's why GMG is an important supplement.    One of my key takeaways was that I need to give Egdon Heath some proper attention.

[Irons]

That's why GMG is an important supplement.    One of my key takeaways was that I need to give Egdon Heath some proper attention.

I would be most interested in your views of a piece that tends to fly under the radar.

[Mirror Image]

That's why GMG is an important supplement.    One of my key takeaways was that I need to give Egdon Heath some proper attention.

Egdon Heath is a masterpiece, Karl. I read that this is one of Holst's personal favorite pieces of his own.