What are you listening 2 now?

[Que]

The 1st complete set I've heard that ticks ALL the boxes.

[Todd]

The 1st complete set I've heard that ticks ALL the boxes.

It's a corker, that's for sure: https://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php/topic,23753.msg857330.html#msg857330

[AnotherSpin]

[Todd]

A big ol' slug of Father Kars tickling the ivories.  A few years ago I started in on a Vingt Regards survey, but stopped when it stopped being fun.  (Such things must always be fun.)  Maybe I return to it, maybe not, but this is the set to beat. 

[SonicMan46]

Glazunov, Alexander (1865-1936) - Symphonies, Concertos, et al w/ Jose Serebrier and two orchestras in an 8-CD box - reviews attached.  Dave

 

[hopefullytrusting]

Okay, more Piston - just past 2 PM - the first section of his Three Counterpoints played by some children:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVp1MoRAbJk

Piston doesn't seem to be a composer with a following, or a whole slew of recordings, especially live, but this is a charming section. Yes, the counterpoint is clear, which means that, at times, the melody is nonexistent, as the purpose is the interplay, but the tones are rich, as are the hues. It is colorful, and the children handled the cross-play at cross-purposes well. I do sort of wonder how these kids even came across this piece, as the composer is already relatively obscure, and this piece is equally obscure. It is very short, which is lovely, and I would have loved to hear the kids play the rest, as they were all excellent, but I will also settle for what I can get. Flat recommend.

[Linz]

Anton Bruckner Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, 1894 Original Version. Ed. Leopold Nowak
Berliner Philharmoniker; Herbert von Karajan

[ritter]

A varied programme of music by four great composers of the 20th century, with the Concertgebouw Orchestra.

Alban Berg: Der Wein - Elly Ameling (sop.), Erich Leinsdorf (cond.). Bruno Maderna: Violin Concerto - Theo Olof (vln.), Diego Masson (cond.). Pierre Boulez: 'cummings ist der Dichter' - NCRV Vocal Ensemble, Gilbert Amy (cond.). Luciano Berio: Calmo - Dorothy Dorow (sop.), Diego Masson (cond).

On CD 9 of this set:



The Maderna and Berio works are from the same concert in October 1975, which I suppose was in memory of Maderna, who had died two years earlier (Berio's Calmo —here given in its original, shorter version— was written in homage to the deceased Maderna).

[Linz]

Sergiu Celibidache CD 3
Johannes Brahms Symphony No. 3 in F major Op. 90
London Symphony Orchestra, Sergiu Celibidache

[Brian]

Goran Filipec is one of Naxos' best piano finds in recent years.

Okay, more Piston - just past 2 PM - the first section of his Three Counterpoints played by some children:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVp1MoRAbJk

Piston doesn't seem to be a composer with a following, or a whole slew of recordings, especially live, but this is a charming section. Yes, the counterpoint is clear, which means that, at times, the melody is nonexistent, as the purpose is the interplay, but the tones are rich, as are the hues. It is colorful, and the children handled the cross-play at cross-purposes well. I do sort of wonder how these kids even came across this piece, as the composer is already relatively obscure, and this piece is equally obscure. It is very short, which is lovely, and I would have loved to hear the kids play the rest, as they were all excellent, but I will also settle for what I can get. Flat recommend.

I got to interview one of Walter Piston's students, Samuel Adler, who is still alive and composing at age 97. He said this:

"Walter Piston was one of my teachers. Absolutely fantastic composer. He was very impersonal. We never had private lessons. But when I graduated, I was already drafted, and he had to hand my dissertation back. So he said, 'Why don't you come to my office?' I went there and he said, 'You know, Sam, I worry that my music will not be known or played in 25 years. That it will only be known that I've written an orchestration book, a harmony book, and a counterpoint book.' I said, 'You're the most famous composer in America!' He says, 'Yes. Now. But maybe in 25 years, you know?'

"And I worry about that too. I have written an orchestration book that has sold over a million copies. It's translated in 10 languages. I sometimes wonder and hope that it isn't the only thing I'm remembered for."

(sorry to link out but full transcript)

[Linz]

Alfred Schnittke Concerto Grooso No. 2 Natalia Gutman, cello, Oleg Kagan, violin
Faust Cantata
USSR Ministry of Culture Symphony Orchestra, Gennady Rozhdestvensky

[hopefullytrusting]

I got to interview one of Walter Piston's students, Samuel Adler, who is still alive and composing at age 97. He said this:

"Walter Piston was one of my teachers. Absolutely fantastic composer. He was very impersonal. We never had private lessons. But when I graduated, I was already drafted, and he had to hand my dissertation back. So he said, 'Why don't you come to my office?' I went there and he said, 'You know, Sam, I worry that my music will not be known or played in 25 years. That it will only be known that I've written an orchestration book, a harmony book, and a counterpoint book.' I said, 'You're the most famous composer in America!' He says, 'Yes. Now. But maybe in 25 years, you know?'

"And I worry about that too. I have written an orchestration book that has sold over a million copies. It's translated in 10 languages. I sometimes wonder and hope that it isn't the only thing I'm remembered for."

(sorry to link out but full transcript)

Well, I love this for a few reasons. That is definitely a sentiment that many pedagogues feel, especially creative ones, which was captured brilliant by the Twilight Zone episode - The Changing of the Guard. Teaching can feel very hopeless, and to have written a book with that amount of success - is equally frightening. I will look up his music later, as I am a fan of Piston - he's so blunt.

On a sidenote, now that I know Brian's last name:

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Bloch: Voice in the Wilderness.

[Linz]

Anton Bruckner Anton Bruckner Symphony No. 2 in C Minor, 1872/77 Mixed Versions. Ed. Leopold Nowak
Wiener Philharmoniker, Carlo Maria Giulini

[Mister Sharpe]

I got to interview one of Walter Piston's students, Samuel Adler, who is still alive and composing at age 97. He said this:

"Walter Piston was one of my teachers. Absolutely fantastic composer. He was very impersonal. We never had private lessons. But when I graduated, I was already drafted, and he had to hand my dissertation back. So he said, 'Why don't you come to my office?' I went there and he said, 'You know, Sam, I worry that my music will not be known or played in 25 years. That it will only be known that I've written an orchestration book, a harmony book, and a counterpoint book.' I said, 'You're the most famous composer in America!' He says, 'Yes. Now. But maybe in 25 years, you know?'

"And I worry about that too. I have written an orchestration book that has sold over a million copies. It's translated in 10 languages. I sometimes wonder and hope that it isn't the only thing I'm remembered for."

(sorry to link out but full transcript)

Compare that to Philip Glass who says he doesn't care how or if he is remembered at all!

[André]

[Karl Henning]

Bartók: Sonata for two pianos and percussion

It's been high time since my last listen to this work. Fascinating and original as ever.

I once wandered into a rehearsal of this piece in Oklahoma.

TD:

[(poco) Sforzando]

Goran Filipec is one of Naxos' best piano finds in recent years.

I got to interview one of Walter Piston's students, Samuel Adler, who is still alive and composing at age 97. He said this:

"Walter Piston was one of my teachers. Absolutely fantastic composer. He was very impersonal. We never had private lessons. But when I graduated, I was already drafted, and he had to hand my dissertation back. So he said, 'Why don't you come to my office?' I went there and he said, 'You know, Sam, I worry that my music will not be known or played in 25 years. That it will only be known that I've written an orchestration book, a harmony book, and a counterpoint book.' I said, 'You're the most famous composer in America!' He says, 'Yes. Now. But maybe in 25 years, you know?'

"And I worry about that too. I have written an orchestration book that has sold over a million copies. It's translated in 10 languages. I sometimes wonder and hope that it isn't the only thing I'm remembered for."

(sorry to link out but full transcript)

I know very little Piston and no Adler, but I know and love their orchestration texts (especially Piston).

[Brian]

I know very little Piston and no Adler, but I know and love their orchestration texts (especially Piston).

Piston's Second Symphony is one of the great expressions of the American romantic-modern school, structurally very similar to the Barber Violin Concerto actually: two intensely emotional movements, the second highlighted by a long woodwind melody, followed by a fast, facile, structurally lightweight finale. Piston's Violin Concerto and later symphonies are somewhat sterner, more neoclassical and strict. He has a ballet, The Incredible Flutist, that's more populist in the Copland manner with a moment where the orchestra musicians are asked to hoot and holler.

Samuel Adler I'll go into more detail since I listened to his music very extensively before interviewing him. He went through many phases. He was early on a student of Hindemith, Copland, and Piston, and heavily influenced by all of them. The First Symphony has a Copland-ish optimism and those long melodies that suggest the American outdoors. It's not especially great, but the Second is quite interesting to me, written after the death of his father (also a composer of Jewish sacred music). Within just a few days of 11/22/1963, he wrote a short memorial piece for the Dallas Symphony to play, which I find quite bad, but his Elegy in memory of Marjorie Fulton (Lynn Harrell's mother) has become his most played and recorded piece.

Later, Adler went through a "wild child" phase that includes some really hairy, freaky stuff. In our conversation he called Symphony No. 6 (recorded by Serebrier) his "wild and crazy one" with a twinkle in his eye. Then followed quite a lot of Jewish sacred music, wind band music, a Viola Concerto much admired by Hurwitz, and even a Catholic mass for Notre Dame University. (He told me when they called him, he said, "Are you sure you don't have the wrong number?")

He's still active now but has turned to orchestrations and arrangements. He's assisted violinist Noah Bendix-Balgley in orchestration of a klezmer violin concerto, and finished orchestrating a Marcel Dupre piece for pops concerts. I think his approach to composition was to always be working on something - literally hundreds of pieces in his catalog - with some detriment in terms of the consistency of inspiration. This doesn't surprise me as when we spoke, he told me of his great admiration for how Hindemith could demonstrate the "ease" of composing by simply sitting down at the teacher's desk and writing out a perfect miniature in 10 minutes. So facility rather than felicity was important to him.

[JBS]

The whole opera, in fact--I'm not in the mood to go digging through Discogs for an image.