What are you listening 2 now?

[steve ridgway]

Maderna - Concerto For Oboe And Chamber Ensemble No. 1.

[Florestan]

You know I've always liked that divertimento, and I don't care that it is early Mozart.  It is just a fantastic piece!

Much of Mozart's early music is way better than other people's mature works. The guy was the greatest, most versatile genius in the history of Western music period.

[steve ridgway]

Scelsi - Hymnos (For Organ & 2 Orchestras).

[DavidW]

I wasn't impressed with Herreweghe so we go again!

[Brahmsian]

You know I've always liked that divertimento, and I don't care that it is early Mozart.  It is just a fantastic piece!

Working from home these days, I don't wear socks either. 

[Iota]

You know I've always liked that divertimento, and I don't care that it is early Mozart.  It is just a fantastic piece!

Wholeheartedly agree! An utterly irresistible piece, in the best performance I know.

Maderna - Concerto For Oboe And Chamber Ensemble No. 1.

There's fantastic music in all three of those Maderna oboe concertos. It's been a long time, a revisit is due!



Here:



Stravinsky: Threni


All the current GMG Stravinsky chatter prompted me to put on this fantastic recording of Threni, a piece that would unquestionably poll in my Strav top 10.

[SonicMan46]

Quantz, Johann (1697-1773) - Flute Concertos w/ the performers shown on the cover art - all playing period flutes after Quantz - thought I'd go from the Sonatas to the Concertos (300 or so written [Source], and as expected no repeats!  ).  Quantz was a German composer employed by Frederick the Great; and was also a flute maker, teacher, and author of a treatise on flute playing. Mary Oleskiewicz wrote her liner notes w/ an impressive bio HERE, for those interested; also, reviews attached.  Dave

   

[SimonNZ]

[Carlo Gesualdo]

Well perhaps Johannes Tinctoris for theoric & music achievement closer to contemporary such as Johannes Ockeghem, but Ockeghem and Dufay over shadowing is works in notoriety very Close than Johannes Ockeghem in skill and some similar method of sequencing than one I can think of, bravo! (my testify statement), flavoring different, this is theory in practice a math exercise of genie, the recipe so riveting to one chair, also one could or coul'd like I.e composer another come to mind, one of the greater Franco-flemish godz of 15th century  the sound of Johannes Regis or Johaness Prioris  two others John of 15th century, mix there  sound but Ockeghem has a blue print well explain in musicology course to me perhaps?


Listening and enjoying fully this release: Johannes Tinctoris on NON-SUCH record N.Y,  nyc US, based label that is ... tapis rouge please! Instrumental and vocal ensemble - Under the direction of Roger Blanchart



Well this is interesting hey, is in it, see old school ''sexy analogue'' precision, the black gold & sweet petrol, a thick Med near mint, as most them vinyl worthy of 60''-70'', take care of them polished, them, clean them, routine. Music lover do this, clean often there gear  and LP's CD physical media.

Never mind this debatable argument of rambling about analogue and whatever...

The work is MIssa Trium Vocum.

goodnight folks, to be continue in a following episode... 

[André]

Disc 2

- Violin concerto
- Kontraste. Two Pieces for Solo Violin
- Gasa, for violin and piano

Disc 1 was centered on the cello, disc 1 features the violin.

The concerto is a large work (40 minutes) in 3 movements that can also be played separately. It was composed in 1981 and precedes the first symphony. It's fair to say that this is as close to western classical music as Yun was willing to go. It still bears strong oriental features, but its classical design ensures a certain degree of familiarity. The unfamiliarity will quickly be apparent by the way the solo violin line evolves: « In Yun's main tone technique, the central, or main tones merely form stations in a developmental process, whereby a tone enters with an accent or a melodic upswing and is kept alive by oscillations, vibrati and glissandi and the nuanced use of tone color and volume ». A totally 'vertical', sound-oriented way of conceiving the melodic line, then. The musical development appears almost aleatory, subject to the way sounds evolve - almost like smoke signals or smoke rings caught in the wind. Quite demanding not on account of the sounds produced (very listenable) but because of its seemingly haphazard schemes within the traditional concerto structure.

Kontraste (1987) pits two totally different pieces against one another. Duration: 10+8 minutes. With Yun complementarity (the yin and the yang, the feminine and the masculine) is the essence of a musical work's existence. He conceives music with this foremost on his mind. In total departure to this philosophy, he composed a work in which « the two pieces are oppositional, with multiple contrasts to and within each other ». It's a fascinating exercise in musical personality, probably the most exploratory work of Yun's I've heard so far.

The korean term Gasa refers to a kind of declamatory poetry. It's an earlier work (1963) that predates his kidnapping and imprisonment by the korean military dictature. By the early 60s Yun had abandoned the strictures of serialism while keeping some of its features. I was reminded of Schoenberg's Phantasy opus 47 in places, but in a 'deconstructed' way, as if Yun was picking pieces here and there, trying this or that, like a child exploring and inventing a fantasy world. Lasting just short of 15 minutes, it's quite a beautiful piece.

[Symphonic Addict]

Hermann Goetz's Symphony is the work of a composer whose tool box is every bit as complete as more well known German masters.  Oddly, there are passages therein that sound much like Richard Strauss, born 24 years after him.  Alternatively rousing and meditative, it enjoyed the praise of one George Bernard Shaw who thought it surpassed Mendelssohn's, Schumann's and Brahms'!  What's for sure is that we lost a most promising composer in him to TB at the age of 36. Would sure like to hear more of his work.

An overstatement of sorts, isn't it? Anyway, one work I love by this composer is his Piano Quartet in E major. The meaning of loveliness. The melodies and development are so attractive. It must be counted among the best examples in the genre in the first half of XIX century.

Moreover, the two piano concertos sound to me like a cross between Beethoven and Liszt. The combination is really appealing.

[Symphonic Addict]

Just found this on YouTube. The symphonic poem Emek by Marc Lavry (1937). Seriously attractive music, like a sort of biblical score in a style Respighi meets Bloch (and maybe Braga Santos too!) with touches of film music in the mix.

https://www.youtube.com/v/lSW4zeg7PN0

[Karl Henning]

Listened to this disc twice this evening, my ear finding that it tastes so good:

Prokofiev
Romeo & Juliet, Op. 64 (excerpts from Suites 1 & 2
Cleveland
Levi

Pf Cto 3 in C, Op.26
Kimura Parker, pf
Royal Phil
Previn

[Mirror Image]

Stravinsky: Threni


All the current GMG Stravinsky chatter prompted me to put on this fantastic recording of Threni, a piece that would unquestionably poll in my Strav top 10.

An outstanding work as is the Requiem Canticles.

[Mirror Image]

NP: Berg Der Wein (Otter/Abbado)

[Mirror Image]

NP: Berio Ekphrasis (Eötvös)

[Mirror Image]

NP: Copland 12 Poems of Emily Dickinson (Addison/Copland)

[Symphonic Addict]

String Quartet No. 10 by Pehr Henrik Nordgren. Quite impressive. A very mood-changing work. It intersperses passages of bitterness with pure bliss and profoundity. Somehow this composer reminds me of Schnittke, just that Nordgren is more lyrical to my ears.

[Symphonic Addict]

More string quartets. I saw this box on the Purchases Today thread that contains those works, so I thought it would be interesting to find out what to find here.

His only two inputs in the genre, these "incomplete" string quartets, despite being juvenilia, are not mediocre at all. Quite the opposite. I didn't expect such accomplishment.

The 2nd movement from No. 2 Andante molto sostenuto is not anything that goes unnoticed. Absolutely striking, intense reaching moments of drama. The absolute highlight.

[Que]

Morning listening another setting of Lamentations:



This time by Constanzo Festa (1485 - 1545), who was the first major native Italian polyphonist after the domination of composers from the Netherlands in Italy and combined both styles. Despite the fact that a substantial amount of his music is preserved, recordings seem very thin on the ground. Paul van Nevel did a disc of choral music, included in the "Secret Labyrinth" box, and an instrumental one. Festa is said to be the beacon for his successors, notably Palestrina.

This is the only complete recording of the Lamentations, and despite some minor reservations I think we are lucky to have it.
The 11 male members of the French ensemble Scandicus give a dedicated, small and intimate  performance. The sound the ensemble is on the smoother and mellow side. It could more edgy, but it is beautifully done - intimate and touching. The music itself is pretty, though perhaps not breathtaking. Scandicus keep these predominantly homophonic works sufficiently transparent.Though this would be a perfect piece for Cinquecento to record!

My copy has no liner notes... but since the label is now defunct, there is nowhere to send my complaint ..