What are you listening 2 now?

[Madiel]

Medtner, Mood Pictures (Stimmungsbilder), op.1

[Florestan]

It's an all-Schubert week bei uns, beginning with one of my faves.  He's a composer who years ago gradually Winterreisèd his way into my personal Top Ten, never, ever to depart.  He is clearly the greatest composer who ever lived, putting into the shade all of those also-rans before and after him who probably would have been better off if they had never picked-up a pen! (Apologies, er, I caught a bad bug from the GMG-Friends, Inc. thread but am much better now...though I will admit that running amok is a lotta fun  ).   

You could do worse than singing Schubert's inordinate praises. 

Jokes aside, he's in my Top Three Ever, together with Mozart and Chopin. Ever since many, many moons ago I bought the Brilliant Classics boxsets of piano sonatas and Lieder he entered, and never departed, my Top Ten and quickly made his way to Top Three. (Back then, when I first listened to those works I thought they were the most beautiful music ever penned --- okay, together with Brahms's chamber music boxset, also on Brilliant Classics, also bought at the same time). I can't think of a single work of his, be it the smallest piano piece, that I didn't like. Had he wrote some concertos and sucesful operas, he'd have given Mozart a hard run for his money as the greatest composer ever period.

And that recording is superb.

[Karl Henning]

Symphony No. 5 in D major --- Vernon Handley, Royal Liverpool PO

Hat tip to Jeffrey (vandermolen) for this moving, poignant and beautiful work.

I think you'll enjoy this, Andrei, which is a recent discovery of mine, and also at least an indirect debt to our Jeffrey:

https://www.youtube.com/v/4Fq3nk-cfZM

[Florestan]

I think you'll enjoy this, Andrei, which is a recent discovery of mine, and also at least an indirect debt to our Jeffrey:

https://www.youtube.com/v/4Fq3nk-cfZM

Saved for later listening, thank you, Karl.

[Biffo]

Sibelius: Symphony No 1 in E minor - Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jukka-Pekka Saraste - searing performance, left me shattered.

[Florestan]

Sibelius: Symphony No 1 in E minor

A strong contender for the best First, ain't it?

[Papy Oli]

Debussy / Ciccolini.
I just pressed Play at lunchtime and let is get on. I think that will do me the afternoon.
I think I will have to buy this.

[Florestan]

I think you'll enjoy this, Andrei, which is a recent discovery of mine, and also at least an indirect debt to our Jeffrey:

https://www.youtube.com/v/4Fq3nk-cfZM

Indeed I enjoyed it. Very calming, nerve-soothing and beautiful music with obvious Eastern undertones (Armenian folk music, I guess). A real find, Karl, thanks again. Is Hovhaness' music all in this vein? If yes, I should explore it further.

[Stürmisch Bewegt]

You could do worse than singing Schubert's inordinate praises. 

Jokes aside, he's in my Top Three Ever, together with Mozart and Chopin. Ever since many, many moons ago I bought the Brilliant Classics boxsets of piano sonatas and Lieder he entered, and never departed, my Top Ten and quickly made his way to Top Three. (Back then, when I first listened to those works I thought they were the most beautiful music ever penned --- okay, together with Brahms's chamber music boxset, also on Brilliant Classics, also bought at the same time). I can't think of a single work of his, be it the smallest piano piece, that I didn't like. Had he wrote some concertos and sucesful operas, he'd have given Mozart a hard run for his money as the greatest composer ever period.

And that recording is superb.

Thanks so much for your comments; I'm sure glad Schubert has friends! - I enjoyed from the get-go his Impromptus , my first exposure to him other than the Unfinished and the Greatest , but had long seen him as a lesser composer until I heard more of the chamber work and Lieder.  Oftentimes I hear a sadness in his merriment; an ironic smile in his more melancholic moments.  Really not much into the Greatness Machine, very slippery intellectually and also seems to me to inevitably entail some self-congratulation. Instead, I'm more comfortable "communing" with my favorites and loving the dickens outta 'em. 

[Karl Henning]

Indeed I enjoyed it. Very calming, nerve-soothing and beautiful music with obvious Eastern undertones (Armenian folk music, I guess). A real find, Karl, thanks again. Is Hovhaness' music all in this vein? If yes, I should explore it further.

I think you will find the exploration rewarding:

https://www.youtube.com/v/6cRMYYnZ7K4

[Roasted Swan]

Sibelius: Symphony No 1 in E minor - Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jukka-Pekka Saraste - searing performance, left me shattered.

Is that the "live" set or the earlier RCA studio cycle?

[Florestan]

Oftentimes I hear a sadness in his merriment; an ironic smile in his more melancholic moments.

My thoughts exactly. His is possibly the most bittersweet music ever penned. He is second to none in making major keys sound melancholy and sad and minor keys sound joyful and triumphant.

Anner Bylsma made what it is, imho, the most aprropriate comment on his music (quoted from memory): Schubert is the man who goes to the gallows and keeps telling his friends how undescribably rich and beautiful life is.

Really not much into the Greatness Machine

Oh, me neither, honestly. It was just a hyperbolic way to show my love for his music.

Instead, I'm more comfortable "communing" with my favorites and loving the dickens outta 'em.

[/quote]

My kind of guy. 

[Stürmisch Bewegt]

Anner Bylsma made what it is, imho, the most aprropriate comment on his music (quoted from memory): Schubert is the man who goes to the gallows and keeps telling his friends how undescribably rich and beautiful life is.

I hadn't heard that, thank you very much, and of course I love it! 

[Florestan]

TD



Two Scherzi D593

[Florestan]

I hadn't heard that, thank you very much, and of course I love it!

It's in a booklet, I'll look it up and quote it in full.

[Biffo]

Is that the "live" set or the earlier RCA studio cycle?

The RCA studio cycle. The 'live' cycle is out of my price bracket. After previous comments above I wasn't expecting it to be so intense.

The work is certainly a good contender for 'best first'. Not only was it Sibelius' first (if you exclude Kullervo) but the first Sibelius symphony I ever bought (Maazel/VPO). The Second was the first I heard live (Kletzki/CBSO).

[Roasted Swan]

The RCA studio cycle. The 'live' cycle is out of my price bracket. After previous comments above I wasn't expecting it to be so intense.

The work is certainly a good contender for 'best first'. Not only was it Sibelius' first (if you exclude Kullervo) but the first Sibelius symphony I ever bought (Maazel/VPO). The Second was the first I heard live (Kletzki/CBSO).

thankyou - I've usually liked what Saraste has done and would expect him to be very good in Sibelius so I've been surprised by the "bad press".   Not that I need more Sibelius (I'm saying that to the devil on my left shoulder as much as to anone else!)

[Mirror Image]

NP:

Mussorgsky
Pictures at an Exhibition
Andsnes



This is the only recording I own of the original solo piano version and, thankfully, it's a good one.

[André]

Fine but not especially distinctive music. This is good, but less interesting than the discs with symphonies 2 and 3. Unfortunately the discs with symphonies 1, 4, 5 and 6 are either oop or much too expensive.

Edit: after another go at the whole disc, I stand by my opinion about the two orchestral pieces: very nice, atmospheric but rather washed out in feeling and texture. The concerto though is of another ilk: after a first movement where there seems to be a fight between ideas, sort of a yin and yang combat, the following movements become more tuneful, very engaging and colourful - as if optimism had won the day. One to go back to, with pleasure.

[Traverso]

Messiaen