Mozart in Period Performances (HIP)

Started by Bunny, April 12, 2007, 10:40:31 AM

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Que

#120
Quote from: opus67 on April 20, 2008, 10:06:41 AM
Are there any good HIP on disc of the Sinfonia Concertante, K.364?

This Kuijken recording with La Petite Bande on Japanese Denon is still on my shoppinglist, so can't comment yet. Available separately or in the complete set.

 


The historically informed Kremer/Kashkasian/Harnoncourt is excellent - second M's recommendation.

Q

hautbois

Quote from: Que on April 20, 2008, 10:55:56 PM
This Kuijken recording with La Petite bande on Japanese Denon is still on my shoppinglist, so can't comment yet. Available seperately or in the complete set.

 


The historically informed Kremer/Kashkasian/Harnoncourt is excellent - second M's recommendation.

Q


Julia Fischer's recent recording is BEAUTIFUL, great orchestral playing with fine detail that makes it sound like the way it should be. Highly recommended.

Howard

Don

Quote from: fl.traverso on April 20, 2008, 12:35:07 PM
Monica Huggett / Pavlo Benznosiuk / Portland Baroque Orchestra (Virgin)

I've got this one, and it is exceptional - fantastic dialogue.




Que

Quote from: hautbois on April 21, 2008, 06:01:35 AM
Julia Fischer's recent recording is BEAUTIFUL, great orchestral playing with fine detail that makes it sound like the way it should be. Highly recommended.

A little additional information for opus67: that rec. is not HIP.

Q

Opus106

Thanks, guys. :) I'll certainly add your recommendations to my wishlist. As of now, I'm hoping to get a non-HIP recording - the Oistrakhs and the BPO - just because it's paired with the Brahms VC, a work from the set extremely popular VCs yet to be part of my collection.

Regards,
Navneeth

hautbois

Quote from: Que on April 21, 2008, 07:25:01 AM
A little additional information for opus67: that rec. is not HIP.

Q

Thanks for complimenting my post! It was so HIP in sound and style that i have almost forgotten that it is played on modern instruments! The other thing which is interesting on Fischer's recording is that it includes the largely under-rated Concertone K.190 for 2 violins and oboe obbligato.

Howard

Opus106

#126


Good performances?

IIRC, it contains a couple of string quintets, the oboe quartet, the 'Haydn' quartets, and a few non-Haydn ones, as well.
Regards,
Navneeth

FideLeo

#127
Quote from: opus67 on June 25, 2008, 12:04:53 AM


Good performances?

IIRC, it contains a couple of string quintets, the oboe quartet, the 'Haydn' quartets, and a few non-Haydn ones, as well.

The most striking performance in the set for me is the K. 563 trio, which is still not outstanding given the competition available in HIP alone.  Get it if the price is very low (which it is) but don't assume that this is HIP Mozart at its best, etc.  :)
HIP for all and all for HIP! Harpsichord for Bach, fortepiano for Beethoven and pianoforte for Brahms!

Opus106

Quote from: traverso on June 25, 2008, 12:15:40 AM
The most striking performance in the set for me is the K. 563 trio, which is still not outstanding given the competition available in HIP alone.  Get it if the price is very low (which it is) but don't assume that this is HIP Mozart at its best, etc.  :)
Ah, okay. Thanks. :) For some reason, the shop I usually buy from are low on HIP. But recently I saw this box and Kuijken's Bach (sonatas and partitas), so there is some hope.

Regards,
Navneeth

FideLeo

Quote from: opus67 on April 20, 2008, 10:06:41 AM
Are there any good HIP on disc of the Sinfonia Concertante, K.364?



This is definitely a very good performance (improves with each listening) and the fantastic sound
and in-concert atmosphere are also pluses imo.  

HIP for all and all for HIP! Harpsichord for Bach, fortepiano for Beethoven and pianoforte for Brahms!

FideLeo

Quote from: opus67 on June 25, 2008, 12:35:47 AM
Ah, okay. Thanks. :) For some reason, the shop I usually buy from are low on HIP. But recently I saw this box and Kuijken's Bach (sonatas and partitas), so there is some hope.

Most of the music shops we have here in Taiwan are also not very HIP in their classical music stock lists - specialists and label distributors are the places to go for niche market products.   :)
HIP for all and all for HIP! Harpsichord for Bach, fortepiano for Beethoven and pianoforte for Brahms!

Que

Many thanks to traverso for his comments.  :)

Q



Quote from: traverso on July 22, 2008, 06:40:20 AM
It's all (very) good -- if the sound isn't demonstration class.  Playing is very articulate and lively and tempi are brisker than most performances to date, period or not, that I have heard.  I have not heard Carmignola's previous Mozart (like you I was put off by its bad press), but I can't fault his interpretations on this set.  The orchestra is quite small (comparable to the one used in Biondi's recording on Virgin, which is somewhat better recorded) and there is a sense of chamber music playing, where close interaction is evident most of the time between the soloist and the orchestra.  Abbado applies some dynamic touches here and there, generally to good thrilling and dramatic effects. (But the basic tempi were suggested by Carmignola himself, as the booklet essay indicates.)  I think the use of period instruments is an important part of what I like so much about his recording (a particular mix of textures, timbres, articulations etc.) so until I hear otherwise, I won't be tempted to try its sister album of symphonies which is performed on modern instruments.

FideLeo

#132
Quote from: Que on July 22, 2008, 12:32:19 PM
Many thanks to traverso for his comments.  :)

Q




Thanks, Q, for restoring the post where it should have gone in the first place. 
HIP for all and all for HIP! Harpsichord for Bach, fortepiano for Beethoven and pianoforte for Brahms!

M forever

#133
Quote from: traverso on July 22, 2008, 06:40:20 AM
I think the use of period instruments is an important part of what I like so much about his recording (a particular mix of textures, timbres, articulations etc.) so until I hear otherwise, I won't be tempted to try its sister album of symphonies which is performed on modern instruments.

It is played on period instruments, and it is so bad that I regret Abbado had to do that. I have actually lost part of the great respect I have always had for him through listening to that. Abbado really has never been into period performance, and he still isn't, these performances of the symphonies have nothing to do with HIP (even though the orchestra may scratch through the notes on "period" instruments). The performance practice at work here is not "historically informed", it is just a small set of mannerisms applied over and over and a few sensitive "Claudio" touches. There used to be a conductor named "Abbado" who was an independent and very intelligent musical thinker who was great at developing interpretive concepts even for very complex music out of its lyrical potential, and he managed to clarify and bring to life even very complicated scores. A logical development for him therefore was to emphasize his lyrical approach even more when he became principal conductor in Berlin, and he managed to "remix" the sound of the orchestra and "rediscover" a lot of the traditional repertoire, as well as discover modern and neglected traditional music. However, at the same time it became more and more apparent that Abbado increasingly relied on a quasi-improvisatory approach in which his clearly reflected musicianship started to disappear noticeably. He just did too much, had to tackle everything, apparently didn't take the time anymore to study and really get deep inside the music he conducted. "Abbado" was slowly replaced by "Claudio" as he was called in Berlin then. "Claudio" was that incredibly sensitive guy who stood in front of the BP in rehearsals and concerts, waved his arms around, poked in the air and made sublime faces, basically let the orchestra play through the music while he waited for inspiration which he sometimes applied to the process with trembling hands. Later, "Abbado" came back for some extremely good concerts (including some of the ones he did in Lucerne) which once again had that unique balance of intellectual clarity and high lyrical refinement.
But these Mozart symphonies are "Claudio" at his worst, dabbling conceptlessly in the field of "HIP". Why? Why?? Why???

M forever

Quote from: traverso on July 22, 2008, 07:35:56 PM
Go ask Abbado... He may know something that you don't :D

Abbado knows a lot of stuff I don't know, but unfortunately, not about period performance. As these recordings demonstrate. He did some really good and interesting "conventional" Mozart in Berlin (in the earlier "Abbado" phase) and I think there are recordings of some of the symphonies on Sony. But why he had to "claudio" around in the field of period performance I really don't understand. Well, if you are as succesful in general as he is, your ass gets kissed by lots of people all the time, and if he somehow gets the idea (or some agent suggest to him) that he should dabble in period performance, nobody will tell him that that might not be a good idea. But then I also thought this might be quite interesting (otherwise I wouldn't have listened to it, obviously), but I was very unpleasantly surprised by this "Claudio" experience.

FideLeo

Quote from: M forever on July 23, 2008, 08:36:56 AM
Abbado knows a lot of stuff I don't know, but unfortunately, not about period performance.

Is there substance in this assertion?  ??? ::)

HIP for all and all for HIP! Harpsichord for Bach, fortepiano for Beethoven and pianoforte for Brahms!

scarpia

Quote from: traverso on July 23, 2008, 03:23:12 PM

Is there substance in this assertion?  ??? ::)

Nothing to substantiate the assertion that he knows a lot of stuff, as far as I am aware.
:-\

FideLeo

#137
Quote from: scarpia on July 23, 2008, 03:27:20 PM
Nothing to substantiate the assertion that he knows a lot of stuff, as far as I am aware.
:-\


Stuff.  Not "period performance" (in comparison to what Abbado knows, especially). 
HIP for all and all for HIP! Harpsichord for Bach, fortepiano for Beethoven and pianoforte for Brahms!

M forever

Quote from: traverso on July 23, 2008, 03:23:12 PM
Is there substance in this assertion?  ??? ::)

Yes. The above discussed recordings of Mozart symphonies.

PerfectWagnerite

But you have to admit it is pretty strange that Abbado waited till he is 70 to get into the swing of the HIP thing. Usually HIP guys strike pretty early. Abbado, regardless of what you think of his conducting, seem pretty old-school and doesn't seem like the kind of guy who would want to get into the while HIP thing.