Six or so favourite works written in the 1950s

Started by vandermolen, May 03, 2015, 01:44:46 AM

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vandermolen

May 03, 2015, 01:44:46 AM
Vaughan Williams: Symphony 9
Lo Presti: The Masks
Menotti: Apocalypse
Honegger: Symphony 5
Shostakovich: Symphony 10
Rubbra: Symphony 7
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

EigenUser

#1
May 03, 2015, 02:35:29 AM
Possibly my least favorite decade of the 20th century. Off of the top of my head:
Messiaen Oiseaux Exotiques
Tippett  Piano Concerto
Beethoven's Op. 133 -- A fugue so bad that even Beethoven himself called it "Grosse".

Sergeant Rock

#2
May 03, 2015, 03:28:48 AM Last Edit: May 03, 2015, 03:30:22 AM by Sergeant Rock
Favorites include a bunch of Sevenths

Havergal Brian Symphony No.9 A minor
John Cage Concerto for Prepared Piano and Orchestra
Roy Harris Symphony No.7
Daniel Jones Symphony No.4 "In Memory of Dylan Thomas"
George Lloyd Symphony No.7
Ralph Vaughan Williams Symphony No.8 D minor
Sergei Prokofiev Symphony No.7 C sharp minor
Erich Korngold Symphony in F sharp major
Igor Stravinsky Agon
William Schuman New England Triptych
Leonard Bernstein West Side Story


Sarge
the phone rings and somebody says,
"hey, they made a movie about
Mahler, you ought to go see it.
he was as f*cked-up as you are."
                               --Charles Bukowski, "Mahler"

San Antone

#3
May 03, 2015, 04:15:02 AM
Quote from: Sergeant Rock on May 03, 2015, 03:28:48 AM
Igor Stravinsky Agon
Leonard Bernstein West Side Story

Two great choices

chadfeldheimer

#4
May 03, 2015, 05:04:14 AM
Here are my "or so favourite works written in the 1950s". Surely forgot some.

Nono - Il Canto Sospeso
Hartmann - Concerto Funebre (revisited 1959)
Stockhausen - Gesang der Jünglinge
Boulez - Pli Selon Pli
Ligeti - Apparitions
Stravinsky - Agon
Shostakovich - 10th Symphony
Xenakis - Metamorphoses
B.A. Zimmmermann - Nobody knows the Trouble I see
Messiaen - Chronochromie (started 1959)
Varese - Deserts
Penderecki - Anaklasis (started 1959)

North Star

#5
May 03, 2015, 05:21:06 AM
A few others haven't mentioned:

Shostakovich Cello Concerto No. 1
Stravinsky - In Memoriam Dylan Thomas, Choral-Variationen über das Weihnachtslied "Vom Himmel hoch da komm’ ich her", Canticum Sacrum
Britten - The Turn of the Screw, Nocturne
Martinů - Mikeš z hor, Nonet no. 2
Dutilleux – Symphony No. 2 (Le Double)
"Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it." - Confucius

My photographs on Flickr

vandermolen

#6
May 03, 2015, 09:56:30 AM
Quote from: Sergeant Rock on May 03, 2015, 03:28:48 AM
Favorites include a bunch of Sevenths

Havergal Brian Symphony No.9 A minor
John Cage Concerto for Prepared Piano and Orchestra
Roy Harris Symphony No.7
Daniel Jones Symphony No.4 "In Memory of Dylan Thomas"
George Lloyd Symphony No.7
Ralph Vaughan Williams Symphony No.8 D minor
Sergei Prokofiev Symphony No.7 C sharp minor
Erich Korngold Symphony in F sharp major
Igor Stravinsky Agon
William Schuman New England Triptych
Leonard Bernstein West Side Story


Sarge

This could more or less be a list from me. You are quite an Anglophile. Great choices. I don't know the Cage.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Sergeant Rock

#7
May 03, 2015, 10:55:59 AM
Quote from: vandermolen on May 03, 2015, 09:56:30 AM
You are quite an Anglophile.

Early in my life, two things did it: Bernstein lecturing on the Vaughan Williams Fourth in a Young People's Concert; and my first classical record purchase (Elgar Enigma/RVW 8, Barbirolli). Well, that and reading about the Charge of the Light Brigade  8)

Sarge
the phone rings and somebody says,
"hey, they made a movie about
Mahler, you ought to go see it.
he was as f*cked-up as you are."
                               --Charles Bukowski, "Mahler"

Cato

#8
May 03, 2015, 10:58:48 AM
Sorry, 6, unless you are Patrick McGoohan, 8)  just does not make it!   8)

Elmer Bernstein: Score for The Magnificent Seven

Hartmann: Symphonies V-VII

Herrmann: Scores for On Dangerous Ground, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Vertigo, North by Northwest

Hindemith: Symphony Die Harmonie der Welt

Honegger: Symphony V

Martinu: Piano Concertos IV-V, Symphony VI

Moross: Score for The  Big Country

Penderecki: Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima

Rozsa: Score for Ben-Hur

Stravinsky: Threni

Tcherepnin: Symphonies III-IV

Tiomkin: Score for High Noon

Toch: Symphonies I-III
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

Sergeant Rock

#9
May 03, 2015, 11:02:32 AM
Quote from: Cato on May 03, 2015, 10:58:48 AM
Sorry, 6, unless you are Patrick McGoohan, 8)  just does not make it!   8)

Elmer Bernstein: Score for The Magnificent Seven

Hartmann: Symphonies V-VII

Herrmann: Scores for On Dangerous Ground, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Vertigo, North by Northwest

Hindemith: Symphony Die Harmonie der Welt

Honegger: Symphony V

Martinu: Piano Concertos IV-V, Symphony VI

Moross: Score for The  Big Country

Penderecki: Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima

Rozsa: Score for Ben-Hur

Stravinsky: Threni

Tcherepnin: Symphonies III-IV

Tiomkin: Score for High Noon

Toch: Symphonies I-III

I was tempted to include some film scores too (as I think they should be included in "classical" music). Nice to see some favorites here.

Sarge
the phone rings and somebody says,
"hey, they made a movie about
Mahler, you ought to go see it.
he was as f*cked-up as you are."
                               --Charles Bukowski, "Mahler"

EigenUser

#10
May 03, 2015, 11:13:40 AM
Whoops, forgot Agon! Definitely. If we count film scores (why not?), then add some stuff by Herrmann.
Beethoven's Op. 133 -- A fugue so bad that even Beethoven himself called it "Grosse".

vandermolen

#11
May 03, 2015, 01:19:29 PM
Quote from: Sergeant Rock on May 03, 2015, 10:55:59 AM
Early in my life, two things did it: Bernstein lecturing on the Vaughan Williams Fourth in a Young People's Concert; and my first classical record purchase (Elgar Enigma/RVW 8, Barbirolli). Well, that and reading about the Charge of the Light Brigade  8)

Sarge

V interesting. Thanks Sarge.  :)

I am paradoxically very drawn to American composers. Hearing my older brother's Everest LP of Copland's Third Symphony with the LSO and Bernstein's CBS LP of Bernstein's 'Jeremiah' Symphony coupled with Roy Harris's Third Symphony did it for me.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

vandermolen

#12
May 03, 2015, 01:20:19 PM
Must agree with Leo over Ben-Hur and the Tcherepnin symphonies.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

vandermolen

#13
May 16, 2015, 02:59:37 AM Last Edit: May 16, 2015, 03:05:23 AM by vandermolen
I should definitely have included Jean-Michel Damase's 'Symphonie'(1952) - a wonderfully inspiriting and enjoyable work:
[asin]B00M2D7MY0[/asin]
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Dax

#14
May 16, 2015, 07:11:34 AM
Cage - String Quartet in Four Parts
Barraqué = Piano Sonata
Brant - Signs and Alarms
Aarre Merikanto - Genesis
Cowell - Ongaku
Tom Dissevelt/Kid Baltan (=Dick Raiijmakers) - Song of the Second Moon
John White - 2nd Piano Sonata

vandermolen

#15
May 16, 2015, 08:03:53 AM
Quote from: Dax on May 16, 2015, 07:11:34 AM
Cage - String Quartet in Four Parts
Barraqué = Piano Sonata
Brant - Signs and Alarms
Aarre Merikanto - Genesis
Cowell - Ongaku
Tom Dissevelt/Kid Baltan (=Dick Raiijmakers) - Song of the Second Moon
John White - 2nd Piano Sonata

Interesting choices - thank you. I also admire Cowell and Merikanto but don't know the works that you have listed.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

Dax

#16
May 16, 2015, 09:39:31 AM
Quote from: vandermolen on May 16, 2015, 08:03:53 AM
Interesting choices - thank you. I also admire Cowell and Merikanto but don't know the works that you have listed.

Here's the Cowell

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tR4o1qfvDPs

and a live performance of the Merikanto

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQR3apygfzg

Strangely both open with para-quotes, at least to my ears: Varese's Integrales (Cowell) and Szymanowski's Stabat Mater . . .

vandermolen

#17
May 16, 2015, 09:48:53 AM Last Edit: May 16, 2015, 10:29:14 AM by vandermolen
Quote from: Dax on May 16, 2015, 09:39:31 AM
Here's the Cowell

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tR4o1qfvDPs

and a live performance of the Merikanto

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQR3apygfzg

Strangely both open with para-quotes, at least to my ears: Varese's Integrales (Cowell) and Szymanowski's Stabat Mater . . .

V kind of you. Am sure I will enjoy listening to them.  :)

In return here is a bit of the PC No.2 by Damase although not completed until 1962.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rbYAgEzT2Tw

Also could have included Freitas-Branco: Symphony 4 (1952) which is a great work.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

vandermolen

#18
May 21, 2015, 12:19:47 AM
Should never have left this out.

Kabelac 'Mystery of Time' (1953-57) one of my greatest discoveries through this forum. In my opinion it is one of the great orchestral masterpieces of the Twentieth Century. There are echoes of Honegger and Shostakovich I think but Kabelac has his own unique style.

Written in a powerful, tonal, uncompromising idiom but also profoundly moving, especially as the momentum begins to diminish shortly before the end:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5kxcD0mU9jo

"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

jochanaan

#19
May 21, 2015, 08:43:45 AM
Many of my favorites from then have already been mentioned, but I hasten to add:

Poulenc: Dialogues of the Carmelites
Stockhausen: Gesang der Juenglinge
Varese: Poeme Electronique

Imagination + discipline = creativity
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