What are you listening 2 now?

[vandermolen]

Howard Hanson, Volume 5
The Mystic Trumpeter

James Earl Jones, speaker
Seattle Symphony & Chorale - Gerard Schwarz

Mystic Trumpeter seems to take a cue from Aaron Copland's Lincoln Portrait, although maybe the similarities seem tight because Gerard Schwarz and James Earl Jones teamed up to do that one too, on another Delos album.

The chorus takes preference over any speaking though, with Jones piping up three or four times only. He really bellows out the finale dramatically, but Walt Whitman's words don't seem to suit him this time around.

This isn't great music, something I would apply to the Copland as well; and the choral music is that mid-century style from Ron Nelson and Randall Thompson that, with a few exceptions, is often meander-y without much satisfying resolution. They are all still beautiful though.

The Seattle Chorale sings loads better than the I last heard them in Mendelssohn's Lobgesang, where their output was amateurish at best. VS

Dies Natalis is the highlight for me.

[VonStupp]

Dies Natalis is the highlight for me.

Aye, we think alike, for it seems that it will be the blockbuster of this recording.

VS

[vandermolen]

It is not often the writer of notes gets a mention on a Musicweb International review but in this case he does! The name rings a bell.

In all seriousness Jeffrey you should be applauded for not allowing this recording to bite the dust.

Thanks Lol and John. Although releasing Wordsworth's fine performance of Job on Alto was my idea, the notes were originally offered to someone else ( ), so, I made a bit of a song and dance about it and ended up writing them myself. The other interesting thing about that release is that it includes a spoken rendition of the poem on which 'The Lark Ascending' is based.

[Iota]

Go to Walter Zimmermann's soundcloud page and you'll see some interesting Henck recordings, otherwise unavailable.

Ta.

[VonStupp]

Howard Hanson, Volume 5
Lumen in Christo

Seattle Symphony & Chorale - Gerard Schwarz

The last work, for women's chorus and orchestra, rises out of the primordial ooze and bandies between that and supplicatory, lapping beauty. I don't think it was overly memorable, but nice writing from Hanson overall, with more homages towards older styles of music that I heard in Lux Aeterna.

This album is a bit of Howard Hanson hodge-podge, so I wonder if they had some left over, and threw them all in here. Odd they reissued everything else on Naxos except for Mystic Trumpeter (that I am aware of).

When it arrives, though, I will certainly look forward to breaking into Volumes 1-4. VS

[aligreto]

Borodin: Petite Suite [Rozhdestvensky]

[bhodges]

As part of a concert last night with five different ensembles, eighth blackbird did Lobster Tales and Turtle Soup (2016) by Australian composer Holly Harrison. Can't find a recording online, but if you like the "Pierrot sextet" chamber instrumentation (not to mention Lewis Carroll), do seek it out. I thought it was both engaging and hilarious.

https://www.hollyharrison.net/

--Bruce

[aligreto]

Villa-Lobos: Bachianas Brasileiras





No. 4 for Orchestra
No. 5 for Soprano and Cello Ensemble

[aligreto]

Barber: Adagio for Strings [Alsop]

[Que]

[Karl Henning]

Nice! For me, though:

Shostakovich
Symphony № 8 in c minor, Op. 65 (1943)
Berlin Symphony
K. Sanderling

[André]

Gustav Mahler: Symphony No.8 in E-flat major. Bernard Haitink, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, choirs, soloists

I think the RCOA is a more idiomatic Mahler orchestra than the Chicago Symphony, even if certain parts sound less powerful than in the Solti recording I've been listening to. I'm picking up on certain contrapuntal moments that kind of went over my head in previous recent listens. I'm not sure whether or not I've mentioned it before, but this Haitink recording is the one that finally made this symphony click for me.

It's still my favourite performance of the symphony. No other conductor has elucidated the screamfest mess that Part I often is under lesser hands and made it sound like music.

[Todd]

Nicely done, pretty much conventional takes on the Schubert pieces, but those really just set up the works by Michael Finnissy and Jorg Widmann.  The Finnissy is big and long and blends his own work and direct quotes from Schubert very nicely.  But not as nicely as Widmann, who takes the Schubertian inspiration and quotations to nearly Schubertian heights.  It's really something, packing a wallop for such a short set of pieces.  Every time I hear Widmann, I seem to have a similar reaction.

[André]

Kalnins: Soundtrack to the Film "Pūt, vējiņi": Finale. 
Symphonies 1-4.

St-Laurent Studio, concert performances from 11-1946 including the world premiere of Ropartz' 5th symphony - a white hot, scorching interpretation. The Honegger too is an apocalyptic performance (the French premiere of the work). Karajan gives an intense, monumental, tragic view of the symphony. Munch is implacable, all-consuming, harrowing (4 minutes faster in this half-hour long work, a sizable difference).

[Klavier]

I've been enjoying this new release. Excellent playing, but I wish he had not divided the Art of Fugue across two discs. It would fit on one, then put all of the other pieces on the second disc. I like his completion of Fugue 14--sounds legit! (For people who were concerned after hearing some of his own works, he does not invoke Prokofiev!)

[Todd]

[Mirror Image]

NP:

Adams
Harmonielehre
San Francisco SO
MTT



Fabulous performance. It's too bad MTT didn't do a Keeping Score on Harmonielehre. I think this is unequivocally a 20th Century masterpiece.

[JBS]

Bartok
String Quartets 5 and 6
Juilliard String Quartet

Recorded in August and May 1949.

[Mirror Image]

Thanks Lol and John. Although releasing Wordsworth's fine performance of Job on Alto was my idea, the notes were originally offered to someone else ( ), so, I made a bit of a song and dance about it and ended up writing them myself. The other interesting thing about that release is that it includes a spoken rendition of the poem on which 'The Lark Ascending' is based.

Very nice, Jeffrey.

[Madiel]

After weeks of largely pop, today I'm going classical.

Beethoven wind octet. Thoroughly delightful.