What are you listening 2 now?

[Maestro267]

C. Matthews: Broken Symmetry
London Sinfonietta/Knussen

Schnittke: Nagasaki
Rupert (mezzo-soprano), Cape Town Opera Voice of the Nation
Cape PO/Hughes

[Karl Henning]

Hi Karl,
The first movement never changed in any version. The most significant change is just before the Epilogue of the last movement. In 1936 VW cut out about two minutes of IMO intensely moving and poetic music, which I think was a great shame. After all it survived all his previous cuts to the symphony. Whatever the symphony gained in tightened structure it lost in poetry. He was rather in thrall to Sibelius at the time and this, I suspect, influenced him. Bax was disappointed by the cut of a rather discordant section in an earlier movement and Bernard Herrmann also remonstrated the composer not to cut that section of the last movement.

TD
Last night listened to this CD right through with much pleasure:

Thanks!

[Karl Henning]

RVW
Symphony # 9
LSO
Thomson

[Marc]

Bach, Ich hatte viel Bekümmernis BWV 21, on headphones, whilst working.
The Suzuki band.
Great music. The instrumental introduction and first chorus are just... (sigh).

[Harry]

antonio Vivaldi.
6 Sonatas for Cello and BC.

Anner Bijlsma, Cello.
Hidemi Suzuki, Cello.
Jacques Ogg, Harpsichord.

As far as authentic performances go, it is very good. Maybe a bit bloodless, and not really engaging. Detail is well served, but after awhile you miss the bubbly nature of Vivaldi. Instead you get quite academic performances, of which emotion is drained.
Not really a recording I want to return to. Sound is excellent though.

[Mirror Image]

Falla
Cuatro piezas españolas
Perianes

[Harry]

Jan Dismas Zelenka.
Missa dei Filii.
Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, Jean Lamon.
Kammerchor Stuttgart, Frieder Bernius.
Nancy Argenta, Soprano.
Michael Chance, Counter.
Christoph Pregardien, Tenor.
Gordon Jones, Bass.

I am a bit weary of the sound the Stuttgart singers are producing. A bit too loud with little or no nuance. Must say though, that I am not overly fond of German choirs. The soloists in their respective parts are wonderful, no problems there. Just a pity that the choir do most of the singing.
Instrumental accompaniment is well done, as is the recording.

[Traverso]

Buxtehude

Beautiful recordings,my favorite 

CD1

[Mirror Image]

SQ No. 4 -

[Irons]

Irons,

I had a strange experience the other day.  I went to play a DVD (movie) in my Panasonic DVD/CD/Hybrid-SACD player which I consider to be of pretty decent quality.  The DVD was borrowed from the library....cleaned it off first before inserting.  It kept skipping forward after I hit play and wouldn't stop even when I pushed (repeatedly) on the stop button!  I had to hit the open/close button to stop it!  Looking at it closely, I could see that it had a number of scratches on it.  I thought "What the heck", I'll try playing it on my old MacBook Pro.  It played and fine!  Ended up hooking my computer speakers to it and watched it there.  Was quite surprised that my computer would be better at auto-correcting/reading it than my DVD player.  Moral of this story:  give it a try elsewhere before you chuck it out.   

Must try Rawsthorne and Lambert!  Will see what I can get my hands on to sample.

Best,

PD

Interesting. As you know collecting vinyl is hit and miss - I reject as many as I keep. This attitude has passed onto other formats although I must admit there are less variables with CD. Not a common occurrence but a few CDs, including the Rawsthorne VC mentioned above, play OK but with knocking noise from the player itself not through speakers.     

[André]

Barbirolli's wonderful performance of Elgar's Dream of Gerontius is here coupled with Dame Janet Baker's peerless recording of his Sea Pictures.

In the main work Richard Lewis, so wonderful in Malcolm Sargent's old recording, was reportedly suffering from a cold and it does occasionally show, partuclarly in his middle voice. Kim Borg has all the requisite authority for his roles, but his peculiar English might not be to everyone's taste, though I can't say it bothers me particularly.

No, the main reasons this recording so often emerges as a prime recommendation is for Barbirolli's wonderfully paced, heartfelt conducting and for Dame Janet's superb consolatory Angel, which has never been bettered.

We certainly agree on this  .

For another, just as spellbinding (if uneven) take on the work, Barbirolli's Rome version is incredibly intense, and this time the Gerontius (Jon Vickers) is the star of the cast. These two are my favourite versions of this masterpiece.

[André]

Every odd year the bug bites and I listen to this recital by the Dutch warbler, Christina Deutekom kicking heels in 3/4 time.

[vers la flamme]

Well done you for sticking with it and being willing to explore his music further and re-visiting works which didn't click with you initially--seriously!   

His string quartets are favorites of mine--particularly these ones.

Have you tried any of his piano music?  This album is considered a classic by Janacek fans (Rudolf Firkusny was a student of Janacek's at one point in his life--for starters...)     You can read more about him here:  https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-rudolf-firkusny-1415563.html). 

As for the quartets, these are a couple of treasured ones in my collection:    and this one:  and also the ones by the Quatour Talich: 

Happy exploring!

Best wishes,

PD

Thanks, PD. I just put on that Firkusny on Apple Music. Sounding nice so far. I do like the Pavel Haas quartet so I'll keep my eyes open for that disc you mentioned.

[aligreto]

Verdi: Don Carlo [von Karajan]


   

[SonicMan46]

Grieg, Edvard (1843-1907) - Piano Concertos - Andsnes & Kovacevich - starting through my Grieg collection; I've had Stephen K. for years but did replace an older CD w/ this newer one with 'improved sound'; Andsnes is a much more recent addition.   Dave

 

[Mirror Image]

Villa-Lobos
Erosao, "Origem do rio Amazonas"
Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra
Roberto Duarte

[T. D.]

Great set!

[Papy Oli]

Good evening all,

RVW 5 & 9
Bakels / Bournemouth SO

[asin]B00000I6I9[/asin]

[Kontrapunctus]

[Pohjolas Daughter]

Thanks, PD. I just put on that Firkusny on Apple Music. Sounding nice so far. I do like the Pavel Haas quartet so I'll keep my eyes open for that disc you mentioned.

Looking forward to hearing (well, reading actually) your thoughts on his music.

Delighted to read that you also like the PHQ!     By the way, not certain whether or not you noticed, but the Pavel Haas Quartet split up Janacek's quartets between two albums...both of which I enjoy.  They included the excellent quartets by the composer whose name they took on each of the two albums.  I suspect that these quartets might also resonate with you as he was a student of Janacek's.His story--a way too brief one and alas, ending horribly.  You can read a bit about him here:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavel_Haas

Best wishes,

PD