David Hurwitz

[Mirror Image]

Just watched the Hurwitzer's Music Chat: Really BAD Symphonists (1) Kurt Graunke and then listened to Graunke's Seventh Symphony, the first movement. And god help me, I liked it! Proving what?...that either I have really bad taste or that Hurwitz grossly exaggerates. Still too early to come to a conclusion. I need to listen to more of his music before deciding.

Sarge

I mean the fact that he centered an entire video around someone being a 'bad' symphonist is reason enough to give them a listen. People seem to hang on his every word and take what he says as gospel, which Andre rightfully pointed out. I can imagine the next video will be him on a ledge somewhere holding a list of "the do's and don'ts of classical music listening" where a crowd of people are just looking at him with a glazed, empty look on their face and then he receives thunderous applause when he's done reading the list.

[flyingdutchman]

It got a very positive review from Dentley Hunt at Fanfare ("Santa Fe Listener" to those who remember his Amazon reviews.  He is IMO Fanfare's worst writer.) 

"Without a doubt this performance rises to the top tier of Mahler Sevenths on disc."

I was very impressed with Kirill Petrenko's Suk recordings on CPO.

It's Huntley Dent.

[Madiel]

Hurwitzism has become a cult.

Around here anti-Hurwitzism is well on its way to the same status.

[Roasted Swan]

Around here anti-Hurwitzism is well on its way to the same status.

A cult needs a leader - "anti-Hurwitzism" is simply a shared opinion.

[Madiel]

Lol. Right, so when people share an opinion with Hurwitz it's a "cult", though?

I feel an irregular verb coming on. You mindlessly agree with someone, I independently happen to share an opinion with another person...

[DavidW]

The clip of that 9th symphony posted in another thread made me listen with interest. And yet when you read the YT comments all there is is deference for Hurwitz' taste  and omniscience. Practically everybody write that they certainly won't listen to Graunke... .  Hurwitzism has become a cult.

That is an artifact of the YouTube algorithm.  It is really good at presenting to viewers only what aligns with their interests and opinions.  And then his videos are so long if you're not a fanboy you're not going to watch them (I know I don't).  What is sad is that most of those commenters will not support him by paying the small subscription fee at Classics Today.

[staxomega]

I do apologize if my cheeky post caused any offense or annoyance; I assure you that despite my irreverent tone, it came from a place of concern. I mean, the poor guy can barely open his eyes, and from what I understand ptosis is an easy fix if myogenic/age related.

None of the MDs I work with care about music at all—it's cool to see a practicing doctor who's passionate about classical music.

P.S. Not sure what the last eye finding you're thinking of is with MS; nystagmus, with complaint of diplopia, perhaps?

Woops, sorry just seeing this now. I'm not sure what I was thinking of then, I thought it was something CN III/IV/VI or PPRF related.

I don't know any people that are into classical music, I know several people I worked with or currently working with that are big music fans, usually the music they grew up with; U2, Stones, Beatles, etc. I'm the youngest among my partners so this is all music of another era for me. One of my friends in another field was a huge Phish fan and planned his vacations around seeing as many shows as he could.

That is an artifact of the YouTube algorithm.  It is really good at presenting to viewers only what aligns with their interests and opinions.  And then his videos are so long if you're not a fanboy you're not going to watch them (I know I don't).  What is sad is that most of those commenters will not support him by paying the small subscription fee at Classics Today.

I'm not a fanboy but I listen to them all the way through. One of my car's screaming natural flat-6 plus tire/road noise is too loud to listen to music in  I used to listen to Boston sports radio but you can really only take so much whining from entitled Boston fans despite 20 years of probably the greatest sports success in the entire world.

I might have posted this when his channel first started; for me the main benefit of his channel is learning about new recordings. Most online forums are filled with people discussing the same oldies over and over, it's like people got stuck with their record collection of the 70s and never moved on. GMG is much better in that regard. I like Hurwitz's attitude that classical music didn't die off decades ago. I've never made a blind buy based off what he or most other people have said. I have streamed some of what was new to me and disagreed with him about as much as I've agreed with him, so the usual coin toss of opinion just like other critics or what individuals post.

I ignore the nonsense about things like him writing off Boulez in the most juvenile way, his grudge against certain conductors, distaste of pre-war recordings, etc.

[Karl Henning]

Just watched the Hurwitzer's Music Chat: Really BAD Symphonists (1) Kurt Graunke and then listened to Graunke's Seventh Symphony, the first movement. And god help me, I liked it! Proving what?...that either I have really bad taste or that Hurwitz grossly exaggerates. Still too early to come to a conclusion. I need to listen to more of his music before deciding.

Sarge

Measured, sober cultural reflection doesn't goose the internet traffic!

[Karl Henning]

Around here anti-Hurwitzism is well on its way to the same status.

Sobriety is not a cult. You're welcome.

[Madiel]

Sobriety is not a cult. You're welcome.

Temperance movements and prohibition?

[Todd]

A fun video from Mr Hurwitz: Music Chat: Insane Audiophile Road Shows and Other Tales from the Crypt

[Olias]

Oh yay!  This thread again.    For the record, I am neither pro nor anti Hurwitz.  I watch some of the videos to get ideas and be entertained.  Sometimes I agree with him, sometimes I don't.  His book on Dvorak is a great resource for my studies, and I have discovered a lot of recordings I enjoy thanks to his commentary.  His channel is just another resource that is available.

[vandermolen]

Oh yay!  This thread again.    For the record, I am neither pro nor anti Hurwitz.  I watch some of the videos to get ideas and be entertained.  Sometimes I agree with him, sometimes I don't.  His book on Dvorak is a great resource for my studies, and I have discovered a lot of recordings I enjoy thanks to his commentary.  His channel is just another resource that is available.

This is largely my view as well. I have his rather useful book about Shostakovich.

[Wanderer]

It'd be nicer for everyone if he was kept in this thread and there weren't any spillovers of his videos in other threads. Thank you.

[Olias]

This is largely my view as well. I have his rather useful book about Shostakovich.

Riiiiiiight, I have that book too.  I had forgotten that one was his as well.  The entire series is rather good and my older eyes appreciate the larger font size. 

[Spotted Horses]

Anyone who thinks their opinion of a musical performance is valuable to another person is a fool, Hurwitz included. Unless I know the person well, the most valuable information in any review is the fact that the recording exists.

[Roasted Swan]

Anyone who thinks their opinion of a musical performance is valuable to another person is a fool, Hurwitz included. Unless I know the person well, the most valuable information in any review is the fact that the recording exists.

Over time I find there are certain reviewers who I have found whose 'taste' chimes relatively closely with mine so if they are enthused by a performance/recording or piece I might well check it out in a way I otherwise would not.  If all you need is knowledge of a disc's existance visit company's "new releases" pages!  This presupposes that everyone has the same level of prior knowledge.  The value of Hurwitz is the way in which he can engage and enthuse his regular audience and introduce them to aspects of CM that otherwise they might not encounter.  CM needs ALL the enthusiasm and support it can get and if that includes a liberal dose of Hurwitz's 'character' along the way I think it is a price worth paying.

[Todd]

Anyone who thinks their opinion of a musical performance is valuable to another person is a fool, Hurwitz included.

This is objectively incorrect.  What works for you specifically is basically irrelevant for most other people, if not everyone.  The existence of multiple classical review publications, some of which have been around for decades, obviously refutes your statement. 

[Madiel]

Anyone who thinks their opinion of a musical performance is valuable to another person is a fool, Hurwitz included. Unless I know the person well, the most valuable information in any review is the fact that the recording exists.

What are you doing on the forum, then?

Because a very large percentage of this forum consists of people not just reporting the existence of recordings, but speaking about what they thought of them, including whether they thought it was better or worse than other recordings of the same music.

The fact that people don't describe their posts as "reviews" and don't put them in places where you might be charged money to read doesn't alter this. So why are you here?

I would note that it isn't hard to find examples in your own posts of your opinion of a musical performance.

[Brian]

I believe in the (theoretical/general) value of critics, but then again, this is because my salary depends on maintaining that belief. 

The important thing is to build a long-time sense of trust and understanding of a critic and their point of view. The best critics are able to clue you in right away, or to describe a thing to you such that you'll know whether you'll like it regardless of whether they did. It's something that I try to keep in mind in my own work. "Too spicy" is like "too fast": not helpful to the reader at all, because everyone has different definitions of when food becomes too spicy or a tempo becomes too fast.

This is why I think Roger Ebert remains the ideal of the critic. He loved great film, sure. But he also gave high marks to horror movies if they scared him, and romantic comedies if they made him a little bit weepy. And you can read just one article of his and immediately understand both his frame of reference and whether or not you agree with it.

I have almost no use for critics I don't know familiarly (like other cities' newspapers' writers, or everyone on Yelp) but find it tremendously useful to follow certain knowledgeable, observant, insightful people over the longterm once I have gotten to learn how their views might differ from my own (like Ebert, Pete Wells, Dwight Garner, Helen Rosner, Wesley Morris, Soleil Ho, A.S. Hamrah, Alex Ross, and, yes, David Hurwitz).

Of course, as you can see from the length of that list, I am at the far end of the bell curve from Spotted Horses on this subject, as extreme in one direction as he is in the other. Criticism is a pretty hefty chunk of my reading diet, because in the hands of good critics it can teach you something even when you don't engage with the material being criticized, and when you do (as in, say, Marjorie Garber's essays on Shakespeare), it can teach you a lot. My life pretty much revolves around subject matter with established critical traditions (books, film, music, food).

Incidentally, I just did a search and found that we had this exact discussion in this same thread in 2016. Karl noted his problem with Hurwitz is that the guy is a "blunt instrument" - surely true. DH is at his most interesting when you get him off his pet topics (vibrato, Mahler) and onto something where he is forced to convert his deep knowledge into a new idea (like a recent video where he argued that music cannot express the emotion of hatred, only the thing being hated on).