What are you listening 2 now?

[AnotherSpin]

Mullova delivers Bach with the flawless precision of a well-oiled machine. And about as much feeling for the music. I gave up before the end.

[steve ridgway]

Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 2

I find this piece quite enjoyable, particularly the busy piano .

[Madiel]

Doing the OperaVision thing again, this time with Rossini's Guillaume Tell.

And it's really very dull.

About the most interest I'm getting out of the first hour is in analysing just why I'm finding it so uninteresting. Maybe one factor is that Rossini is a little older than most of the opera that I prefer (from Verdi through to the first part of the 20th century). One definite factor is that this production in Tokyo isn't filmed/recorded quite up to the usual OperaVision standards: there's nothing wrong with the quality per se, but the sound is a bit distant. And then, the production itself really doesn't seem to have any dynamic ideas about how to perform the work.

Having invested more than an hour to go through the overture and first Act, I'm not sure that I'll come back to invest another 2.5 hours in the rest. There are better options (including maybe that Boris Gudonov that just got added to the channel...).

[steve ridgway]

Pierre Henry - Concerto Des Ambiguïtés

Quite an interesting collection of electronically manipulated piano sounds .

[Que]

A rerun of this:



Very pretty. They do the full service with plainchant, which is well done.
Excellent (or even better than that), spatial recording in the Stiftskirche Wechselburg.

[AnotherSpin]

The covers of fra bernardo's albums rarely leave anyone unmoved. This one, for instance, brings to mind Soviet Constructivism of the 1920s. You could almost imagine it being designed by someone like Alexander Rodchenko.

Of course, it has little to do with the music itself. The music is wonderful.

[AnotherSpin]

[Harry]

Johann Gottlieb Goldberg.
Chamber Music
Trio Sonatas.
Sonatas in A, C, B-flat, G, and F for Violins and Basso continuo; Sonata in C for 2 Violins, Viola and Basso continuo and 6 Polonaises for Harpsichord.
Musica Alta Ripa.
Recorded: 1996, Oranienburg von Schloss Nordkirchen, Germany.
Streaming: FLAC 44.1kHz/16 bit. (No PDF file.)

A composer whose name has long been eclipsed by the very work written for him—namely, Bach's famous Goldberg Variations—Johann Gottlieb Goldberg (1727–1756) is far more than a mere historical footnote. Born in Danzig and a pupil of both J.S. Bach and Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, he was regarded as a prodigy, a gifted harpsichordist and composer whose promise was cut short at the age of just 29. And yet, what he left behind, though slender in quantity, shows astonishing command of counterpoint, imaginative invention, and a voice that bridges the grandeur of late baroque with the clarity and grace of the galant style.

This disc by the ever-eloquent Musica Alta Ripa is not merely a revival of a forgotten name—it is a reclamation of a musical lineage nearly lost. The Sonata in C major for two violins and basso continuo—once attributed to J.S. Bach as BWV 1037—is a luminous example. The alla breve second movement in particular dances with fugal precision so persuasive that for decades it fooled the scholars. But the voice is Goldberg's, and its confident lyricism and contrapuntal dexterity show a composer of equal ambition and craft.

The remaining trio sonatas, too, are filled with courtly elegance, engaging rhythmic play, and masterful voice leading. They occupy a world not far from C.P.E. Bach's more restrained chamber works or Telemann's later quatuors—a space where ornament gives way to line, and rhetoric to melodic intimacy. Particularly compelling is the Sonata in F major, whose final movement sparkles with energy, and the Sonata in B-flat, where the violins intertwine like tendrils of vine, each echoing and answering the other with subtle wit.

The Six Polonaises for solo harpsichord offer a delightful diversion into the world of solo keyboard dance. These are not mere salon pieces—they're studies in character and gesture, full of shifting moods and clever turns of phrase. Each has a narrative flavour, as if Goldberg had a cast of noble figures in mind, sashaying through a Danzig ballroom lit by flickering candlelight.

Musica Alta Ripa deliver this repertoire with unfussy grace and radiant intelligence. Their articulation is crisp, but never dry; their tempi measured and breathing. These players know the value of giving the music time to unfold, to speak plainly and poetically, and they do so with great warmth and a natural blend. The recording, while dating from 1996, remains more than serviceable—intimate and clean, with fine instrument placement and clarity of texture.

For those whose ears are tuned to the counterpoint of Bach and the lyricism of Telemann, Goldberg's chamber music is not merely a curiosity—it is a continuation, an echo, and at times, a rival. One senses a young voice confidently finding its way in the light of great masters, and leaving its own graceful signature along the path.

As an afterthought...
Though Goldberg's name became immortal through Bach's Aria with thirty variations, his own music deserves more than passing curiosity. As a student of the Thomaskantor, Goldberg absorbed the art of counterpoint with astonishing ease. Yet he was also of his time: a generation poised between the complexity of the high Baroque and the emerging transparency of early Classicism. His works are not mere imitations of Bach but show a young man translating the old tongue into a new idiom—lightened, adorned, yet underpinned by rigorous thought. In his short life, he embodied the bridge between two eras, and in these sonatas, that quiet transformation becomes audibly real.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Prokofiev 5, Rodzinski/NY.

[Harry]

Marin Marais.
Suites for Oboe.
Suites C major, D minor, E minor, G major, G minor, B major (from Livres 2-4 de Pieces de viole).
Performed by: Christopher Palameta, Eric Tinkerhess, Romain Falik, Lisa Goode Crawford.
See back cover for details.
Recorded: 2014, Venue: Unknown. No PDF file.
Streaming: FLAC 44.1kHz/24 bit.
Label: Audax.

In the twilight hush of the French Baroque, where refined sensibility met ornamental grace, Marin Marais reigned as both master violist and composer of intimate profundity. His Pièces de viole, particularly in their second to fourth books, are among the most exquisitely wrought gems of the French instrumental tradition. They whisper of courts and candlelight, of private sorrow delicately veiled in ornament.

But what happens when these delicate utterances are voiced by an instrument other than the viol? What happens when the oboe—brighter, reedier, and touched by a Romantic hue—takes the lead?

Christopher Palameta answers this question with undeniable skill. His transcriptions of Marais's suites for the oboe, supported by an elegant continuo team, are sensitive and often beautifully rendered. The recording is warm, close, and revealing, and the continuo group lends just the right balance of structure and subtlety.

Yet even as one admires the artistry and poise of the playing, there is a lingering sense—like the faint discomfort of something essential, has shifted. The oboe, particularly as voiced here, seems to stray from Marais's intended timbral world. Its tone, darkened by 18th-century craftsmanship, carries a romantic weight that casts a different emotional light on these suites. Gone is the soft, sighing grain of gut strings beneath fingers, replaced by the burnished clarity of the reed.

To Palameta's credit, these are not merely arrangements but affectionate homages to a master. He treats Marais's lines with loving care and real musical insight. Yet the transformation is complete—and with it, the spiritual intimacy of the original is to some extent altered.

The suites themselves remain marvels of lyrical invention, with the characteristic dance forms—Sarabande, Gigue, Rondeau—elevated to miniature tone paintings. In transcribed form, one hears new contours and expressive possibilities. But one also hears the oboe pushing gently at the edges of what feels idiomatic.

For all that, this is a fine document of musical exploration. It will not replace the viola da gamba in these works—not for this listener, nor likely for many devotees of Marais. But it offers another way of hearing, of imagining, of reanimating the past. Whether one embraces or resists the transformation, there is merit in the experiment.

In the end, perhaps it is a question of taste—and of timbre. The original Pièces de viole murmur with melancholy and charm. These Suites for Oboe, by contrast, speak clearly, even brightly, as if the soul of the music had moved from dusk to dawn.
It is well recorded and performed.

An afterthought...On timbre and transformation.

The music of Marin Marais dwells in the hush between sigh and silence, where the resonant murmur of the viol once spoke of grace unspoken. When the oboe steps forward, it does so not as a usurper, but as a guest in borrowed silks—elegant, articulate, yet not quite native to the room. One may miss the shadowed intimacy of gut and bow, but in Palameta's reverent hands, the past is not lost—merely refracted through another prism. And in that refracted light, a new tenderness is glimpsed, but at least by me not appreciated.

[AnotherSpin]

[Que]

[Que]

Marin Marais.
Suites for Oboe.
Suites C major, D minor, E minor, G major, G minor, B major (from Livres 2-4 de Pieces de viole).

Transcriptions!    I wondered about that.

[Spotted Horses]

Listened to Bacewicz second quartet again (in its entirety) recorded by the Lutoslawski Quartet. Despite having issues with the Lutoslawski Quartet's recording of Bacewicz' first quartet, I find this exquisite.



Wonderfully alive texture in the outer movements, and a central slow movement which is out of this world.

[Harry]

Superb CD

[Que]

Mullova delivers Bach with the flawless precision of a well-oiled machine. And about as much feeling for the music. I gave up before the end.

Agreed.

Superb CD

Agreed.

[Harry]

Agreed.

Agreed.

Agreed    

[not edward]

Been spending some time with the last two DSCH symphonies of late, and I think I prefer this to Sanderling's Cleveland version, which I think pushes the tempi just a little bit too much.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Stravinsky: Agon - Schuller: Seven Studies on Themes of Paul Klee.

[Linz]

Anton Bruckner Symphony No. 5 in B Flat Major, 1878 Version Ed. Leopold Nowak
Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart