What are you listening 2 now?

[Traverso]

Arnold

CD 2

[Harry]

Worse than the Dutoit/Amoyal/Philharmonia Orchestra Violin Concerto?

Yes!

[Harry]

Most conductors in this work supposedly reach for depths of despair and end up reaching for varying degrees of angst-kitsch (probably what the cat responded to;), instead. Currentzis, on the other hand, is the rare performance that manages to show psychological insight and sincere emotion behind all the work's histrionics; true sentiment without sentimentality. I found the first movement's climaxes, in particular, profoundly devastating.

For what I know for a fact is, that either you like it or you hate it, there is no middle ground with this recording. For me it is psychological chaos with destructive elements. Sincere emotion? For the life of me, I protest, what you hear is Currentzis larger than life ego, and his extremist tendency to defy all notions of the music intentions. Tchaikovsky was a man of sentiment, big gestures, that was his nature, the composers true sentiment.  This recording is rough, with little or no nuance, absurd tempi's, climaxes that have no place in the score, freedoms he allows himself to butter up his over the top interpretation.
Nah this is not the music as Tchaikovsky intended.

[Florestan]

Yes!

Good God!

[Karl Henning]

Sonatas 64-66

Soler wrote some 120 sonatas foe harpsichord. Most are short one movement works, with a slightly longer duration than Scarlatti's - say, around 5 minutes.  nos 60-68 and 91-99 are multi-movement works. Some are short (13-14 minutes) but some last well over half an hour. Nos 64-66 are in three movements (some have two, some four). Soler was a contemporary of Haydn's. It would be easy to think that both composers were kindred spirits.

Cool.  I have certainly enjoyed the Soler on the Alicia de Larrocha discs I've got.

[Karl Henning]

My favorite bits are the first 60 seconds and the last 60 seconds. (The ending is simply genius.) I don't remember much of anything between!

My favorite Langgaard is the late symphony slow movement "unnoticed morning stars." It will be near the end of your journey. 

That is exquisite, Brian.

[Karl Henning]

Schoenberg: Variations for Orchestra - Rosbaud with the Südwestfunk-Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden

https://www.youtube.com/v/cEoBvHSxoWM

Alerted to this performance by this brief appreciation of Rosbaud:

https://www.youtube.com/v/-P0MBH1h4MA

Very nice!

[JBS]

The local Barnes and Noble has started carrying the BBC Music Magazine again so I picked  up the September 2020 [Vol 28 no 12] issue featuring Bartok. [The pre-Covid timelag was the same, always a month behind.]

So now an hour's worth of Bartok
Two pictures Op 10 Sz 46 BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Gergely Madaras
String Quartet 5  Sz 102 Calidore Quartet
Out of Doors Sz 81 Alexander Gadjiev piano

[Karl Henning]

Chas Rosen playing Debussy
Jas Levine leading the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra in the Prelude to Parsifal

[Todd]

[vandermolen]

Schoenberg: Variations for Orchestra - Rosbaud with the Südwestfunk-Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden

https://www.youtube.com/v/cEoBvHSxoWM

Alerted to this performance by this brief appreciation of Rosbaud:

https://www.youtube.com/v/-P0MBH1h4MA

I enjoyed the Rob Cowan video, although I'm sorry that he did not discuss Rosbaud's Sibelius recordings. My first youthful encounter with Hans Rosbaud was when I picked up his LP of Bruckner's 7th Symphony on the Turnabout label.

[Symphonic Addict]

Panufnik: Symphony no. 3 Sinfonia sacra



Panufnik is one of those composers I tend to overlook for whatever reason, and it was good to acquaint myself with what is probably his best-known work. By turns grippingly dramatic and soulfully lyrical, this work makes a powerful impression. I was perhaps reminded of Holmboe but with an Eastern European rather than Nordic accent.


Auric: Phèdre



This is certainly not what I was expecting at all! I was expecting something light, tuneful, witty, elegant; you know, the kind of stuff members of Les Six typically write? Well, this ballet is far from it! Raucous, noisy, dissonant, and eventually cataclysmic, at times it makes Le sacre sound like Poulenc by comparison! I can't say I loved it, but it certainly was an exciting listening experience!


Mozart: Symphony no. 29



The outer movements of this symphony are sheer joy and delightful invention. However, at over 10 minutes long I thought the slow movement was quite a bit too long for its material.


Zemlinsky: Psalms 13 and 23



The late Psalm 23 is a deeply impressive work - opening darkly and inexorably building to a thrilling, radiant conclusion. Psalm 13 is a calmer work, less impressive than 23 but not without some wonderful moments.


Mahler: Piano Quartet in A minor



I had forgotten just how good this all-too-brief early work is. Beginning rather unassumingly, it rises to climaxes of surging passion. As others have remarked, it's a real shame that Mahler didn't write more chamber music.

Good selection! Zemlinsky's choral music is underrated. Fortunately it's been recorded with great performances as the one you posted. Some Auric's ballets I've discovered are delightful, but that Phèdre could be of my liking as well.

[Symphonic Addict]

Cello Sonata No. 1

I only knew the No. 2 but not this one, and how great it is. An intense, expressive, eloquent work. The slow movement conveys a quite effective feeling of grief. This composer wrote some heartfelt music I find so moving.

[Karl Henning]

Jean-Guihen Queyras playing the Bach Cello Suites

[André]

I've been alternately impressed and dismayed by Currentzis. Like you say, there is no middle ground.

[André]

My first ever listening to anything by Boris Tchaikovsky. I have 2 other discs waiting for me in the 'arrivals' pile. I chose this one because it seemed to feature 'easy' works.

Works for strings only are usually called serenade, sinfonietta or something implying smallness of scale, although it doesn't preclude them from displaying vigor. Tchaikovsky's Sonfonietta (1953) is indeed eminently approachable - a gently tuneful, amiable work.

The 1967 Chamber Symphony is also small in scale (6 movements lasting 20 minutes), but that is deceptive. The composer's ambitiousness shows in the fact that each movement is highly different from the others, implying a largeness of conception by portraying different forms, moods and even instrumentation (like a harpsichord popping up in some of the movements). Despite its compactness then, it leaves a big impression. The main theme of the final movement is simply unforgettable - a real ear worm.

Another 6-movement work follows (not advertised on the cover), the Six Etudes for Strings and Organ from 1976. I love this particular instrumental combination. It allows for concertante effects, a sort of musical Q&A play. The sound world is rather somber and mysterious, the composer's musical language having by then absorbed some of the influence of Britten as well as serial techniques he had dabbled with some years before.

The disc ends with a very short work that the composer left unfinished at the time of his death in 1996: a Prelude titled 'The Bells', orchestrated by one Pyotr Klimov. A very recommendable disc.

[Symphonic Addict]

A good introduction to the composer, André. The Chamber Symphony is a striking work. I suspect you would love his 3rd Symphony, which Jeffrey rates highly too.

[Symphonic Addict]

Handel: Organ Concerto in A major, Op. 7 No. 2
Vivaldi: Violin Concerto in C major, Op. 7 No. 2



The only purpose of this music is to give pleasure. Despite Vivaldi wrote the same concerto "500 times", I find huge pleasure on them.

[Brian]

Most conductors in this work supposedly reach for depths of despair and end up reaching for varying degrees of angst-kitsch (probably what the cat responded to;), instead. Currentzis, on the other hand, is the rare performance that manages to show psychological insight and sincere emotion behind all the work's histrionics; true sentiment without sentimentality. I found the first movement's climaxes, in particular, profoundly devastating.

Personally I find the string section's articulation and phrasing in the big first movement "meltdown" at the end of the development section to be some of the most astonishing and perfect playing I've ever heard from an orchestra.

Florestan and Harry - Have you heard the Kopatchinskaja and Currentzis Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto? That performance is insaaaane....in a bad way, an incredible realization of the original nasty Hanslick review claiming that the violin part scratched and clawed with hideous ugliness 

[SimonNZ]