Tchaikovsky

Started by tjguitar, April 16, 2007, 01:54:11 PM

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Florestan

Quote from: SymphonicAddict on July 20, 2019, 11:28:06 AM
The frequent complaint about him is the saccharine thing and the "lack" of development in his music (or rather little contrapuntal development).

These are typically German complaints, as if Beethoven-like music were the only music worth its name --- which is bullshit on stilts.

QuoteAll his music shines for the endless memorability and real sense of passion in many of his works. His music resonates with me powerfully, no matter if he is overplayed or if there is an excess of overfamiliarity, I love almost every single piece from his.

Amen, brother!
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ChopinBroccoli

Quote from: Florestan on July 20, 2019, 11:33:56 AM
He's one of my top 10 favorite composers, and top 3 favorite Russian composers. I relish his "syrupy sentimentalism" big time and I agree he's one of the greatest melodists ever.

My point was simply that people love him for reasons different than those for which they love Beethoven. Nobody ever accused Beethoven of being "sentimental", nor did they claim Beethoven was a great melodist. It's no coincidence that Tchaikovsky himself praised Mozart no end while he held Beethoven in mere high esteem --- a stance I share entirely.

Tchaikovsky's music is beautiful and pleasant ---as is Mozart's. Beethoven's music is sublime and great --- as is Wagner's. Give me the former over the latter any time.

So we basically agree, we just sort of awkwardly arrived at agreement :)

I love Tchaikovsky... I love Mozart and Beethoven as well... I respect Wagner (I do not enjoy Opera ... if Wagner had composed more outside of the realm of Opera, I'd likely adore him... there's much incredible orchestral incidental music from his Operas that I think is fantastic)
"If it ain't Baroque, don't fix it!"
- Handel

ChopinBroccoli

Quote from: Florestan on July 20, 2019, 11:38:19 AM
These are typically German complaints, as if Beethoven-like music were the only music worth its name --- which is bullshit on stilts.


Definitely true
"If it ain't Baroque, don't fix it!"
- Handel

Florestan

Quote from: ChopinBroccoli on July 20, 2019, 11:41:17 AM
I love Tchaikovsky...

So do I.

QuoteI love Mozart

So do I.

Quote
and Beethoven as well...

I love many of his works --- but overall I respect him more than I love him.

QuoteI respect Wagner

I don't. I fully subscribe to Tchaikovsky's manifolded criticism of Wagner, see here:

http://en.tchaikovsky-research.net/pages/Richard_Wagner

QuoteI do not enjoy Opera

I do --- Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi and Puccini first and foremost. Then Handel, Mozart, Weber and Bizet.

Quote
... if Wagner had composed more outside of the realm of Opera, I'd likely adore him... there's much incredible orchestral incidental music from his Operas that I think is fantastic)

See the link above.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ChopinBroccoli

Quote from: Florestan on July 20, 2019, 12:00:24 PM
So do I.

So do I.

I love many of his works --- but overall I respect him more than I love him.

I don't. I fully subscribe to Tchaikovsky's manifolded criticism of Wagner, see here:

http://en.tchaikovsky-research.net/pages/Richard_Wagner

I do --- Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi and Puccini first and foremost. Then Handel, Mozart, Weber and Bizet.

See the link above.

I implore you, please ... I understand criticism of Wagner and Tchaikovsky wasn't wrong in some of his assessments but I can't listen to this album and still dismiss Wagner

"If it ain't Baroque, don't fix it!"
- Handel

Florestan

Quote from: ChopinBroccoli on July 20, 2019, 12:25:59 PM
I implore you, please ... I understand criticism of Wagner and Tchaikovsky wasn't wrong in some of his assessments but I can't listen to this album and still dismiss Wagner



Au contraire, if anything this album is a big time confirmation of Tchaikovsky's criticism of Wagner.

"Wagner was a great symphonist, but not a composer of opera"

"Someone who in the past was very close to Wagner told me what he had once heard from the composer in a moment of frankness between good friends: "How I sometimes wish I could sit down to write a string quartet or a symphony—but I can't, for it is my duty not to step out of the boundaries of opera music!"

With these few words Wagner makes it clear to what extent a preconceived theory can lead astray a stubborn German who, whilst he may be admirably earnest and serious, is nevertheless endowed with a limited mental horizon [6]. "
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ChopinBroccoli

I agree though, that's my point ... that album (though I've chosen the wrong cover... the one I'm talking about is the classic 1968 release) shows that Wagner as symphonist would've been utterly sublime ... it also illustrates the greatness of the Cleveland Orchestra and Szell

So when I praise Wagner, I'm praising him not for his Opera (which I loathe) but for his orchestral music which is absolutely remarkable
"If it ain't Baroque, don't fix it!"
- Handel

Florestan

Quote from: ChopinBroccoli on July 20, 2019, 12:53:06 PM
When I praise Wagner, I'm praising him not for his Opera (which I loathe) but for his orchestral music which is absolutely remarkable

That's why I don't praise Wagner at all: he didn't mean to write absolutely remarkable "orchestral" music, and his "operatic" music is the most boringly unbearable of it all I've ever listened to.

Tchaikovsky again:

Perhaps the Nibelungen is a very great work, but what I do know for sure is that never before has there been anything as boring and tedious as this spun-out yarn. An accumulation of the most complicated and refined harmonies, the colourlessness of everything that is sung on the stage, endlessly long dialogues, the pitch darkness in the theatre, the absence of anything interesting and poetic in the plot — all this exhausts one's nerves to the utmost degree. So this is what Wagner's opera reform is striving after? Composers in the past sought to delight people with their music; now what they do instead is to torment and exhaust them. Of course, there are wondrous details, but everything taken together is frightfully boring!!!
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ChopinBroccoli

Quote from: Florestan on July 20, 2019, 01:06:40 PM
That's why I don't praise Wagner at all: he didn't mean to write absolutely remarkable "orchestral" music, and his "operatic" music is the most boringly unbearable of it all I've ever listened to.

Tchaikovsky again:

Perhaps the Nibelungen is a very great work, but what I do know for sure is that never before has there been anything as boring and tedious as this spun-out yarn. An accumulation of the most complicated and refined harmonies, the colourlessness of everything that is sung on the stage, endlessly long dialogues, the pitch darkness in the theatre, the absence of anything interesting and poetic in the plot — all this exhausts one's nerves to the utmost degree. So this is what Wagner's opera reform is striving after? Composers in the past sought to delight people with their music; now what they do instead is to torment and exhaust them. Of course, there are wondrous details, but everything taken together is frightfully boring!!!

The 1968 Szell/Cleveland I referenced above is well over an hour of absolutely thrilling, ingenious music. 

The writer of that music is Richard Wagner.  The influence of that music is enormous and undeniable. 

Therefore, Wagner can't be dismissed. 

I too, would rather eat a bowl of cast iron spikes than sit through his operas (but I feel that way about all Opera... I hate Opera) but that simply isn't germane to how I objectively assess his place in music history nor how I subjectively derive great enjoyment from his incidental music. 

I would never in a million years torture myself by sitting through Il barbiere di Siviglia but the overture to it is something I will happily sit through and enjoy ... therefore, I don't dismiss Rossini
"If it ain't Baroque, don't fix it!"
- Handel

Scion7

When, a few months before his death, Rachmaninov lamented that he no longer had the "strength and fire" to compose, friends reminded him of the Symphonic Dances, so charged with fire and strength. "Yes," he admitted. "I don't know how that happened. That was probably my last flicker."

Symphonic Addict

Looks like a father who feels proud of a noteworthy child.
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Albion

There are few moments more thrilling than the end of Act 2 of "The Sleeping Beauty" (1890). My favourite cycles of the ballets are Previn (Warner), and Lanchbery (complete on Musical Heritage Society, rather than the truncated Classics for Pleasure/ EMI). I was disappointed with the Jarvi on Chandos. Any other recommendations, including DVDs?
A piece is worth your attention, and is itself for you praiseworthy, if it makes you feel you have not wasted your time over it. (SG, 1922)

relm1

Quote from: Albion on February 16, 2022, 03:54:16 AM
There are few moments more thrilling than the end of Act 2 of "The Sleeping Beauty" (1890). My favourite cycles of the ballets are Previn (Warner), and Lanchbery (complete on Musical Heritage Society, rather than the truncated Classics for Pleasure/ EMI). I was disappointed with the Jarvi on Chandos. Any other recommendations, including DVDs?

I adore MTT with various London orchestras. 

Swan Lake finale here with LSO:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJEZox9KnNY

Nutcracker here with Philharmonia:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG7kAQPUE3Y

Roasted Swan

Quote from: Albion on February 16, 2022, 03:54:16 AM
There are few moments more thrilling than the end of Act 2 of "The Sleeping Beauty" (1890). My favourite cycles of the ballets are Previn (Warner), and Lanchbery (complete on Musical Heritage Society, rather than the truncated Classics for Pleasure/ EMI). I was disappointed with the Jarvi on Chandos. Any other recommendations, including DVDs?

The version that opened my ears to this astounding work is the famous Dorati/Concertgebouw performance.  Oddly recorded over multiple sessions and indeed years but it sounds superb.  NB:  you must get the original 3 disc set as illustrated below - the later Phillips "twofer" cuts some of the score to squeeze it onto 2 discs.  For all 3 ballets the Ermler/Royal Opera House are truly excellent.  Real "pit" performances with very fine playing the best fusion of Russian soul and Western orchestral polish.  Only trouble is they are quite tricky to find at a reasonable price - especially Sleeping Beauty.  Jarvi in Bergen is a BIG disappointment in all 3 - just too fast and emotionally detached.  Very well played and recorded but Jarvi mailing-in an interpretation.....



The Ermlers did make it onto the Sony label - Nutcracker and Swan Lake are relatively easy to find and also musically excellent but I did struggle to find Sleeping Beauty in either iteration.  For a real Russian performance Svetlanov is suitably red in tooth and claw....


Albion

I was frankly astounded by Jarvi's "Panorama" which sounds as though it's on an acid trip. There's a hilarious moment in the Dorati "Sleeping Beauty" where the cellos misread the tenor for the bass clef (I seem to recall in the opening March), sounds more like bloody Charles Ives...  ::)
A piece is worth your attention, and is itself for you praiseworthy, if it makes you feel you have not wasted your time over it. (SG, 1922)

Albion

Quote from: Albion on February 18, 2022, 08:00:22 AM
I was frankly astounded by Jarvi's "Panorama" which sounds as though it's on an acid trip. There's a hilarious moment in the Dorati "Sleeping Beauty" where the cellos misread the tenor for the bass clef (I seem to recall in the opening March), sounds more like bloody Charles Ives...  ::)

Yep, check out the descending bass line in the passage from 2:29 onwards...  ;D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNQWet5Ai64
A piece is worth your attention, and is itself for you praiseworthy, if it makes you feel you have not wasted your time over it. (SG, 1922)

Brian

Quote from: Albion on February 18, 2022, 08:42:28 AM
Yep, check out the descending bass line in the passage from 2:29 onwards...  ;D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNQWet5Ai64
Wow! How did everybody miss that?  ;D
(The video was blocked in my country but for everyone else, it's the Dorati/Concertgebouw/Decca Sleeping Beauty, the march [track 2])

Albion

Quote from: Brian on February 18, 2022, 09:18:13 AM
Wow! How did everybody miss that?  ;D
(The video was blocked in my country but for everyone else, it's the Dorati/Concertgebouw/Decca Sleeping Beauty, the march [track 2])

Astonishing, isn't it? Never come across any review that points it out. Perhaps Dorati had nipped to the loo at that point...

;D
A piece is worth your attention, and is itself for you praiseworthy, if it makes you feel you have not wasted your time over it. (SG, 1922)

staxomega

Quote from: Florestan on July 20, 2019, 01:06:40 PM
That's why I don't praise Wagner at all: he didn't mean to write absolutely remarkable "orchestral" music, and his "operatic" music is the most boringly unbearable of it all I've ever listened to.

Seriously? Or is this some inside joke that has eluded me :) Parsifal is quite high up there with pieces of music I can listen to and lose track of time.

Karl Henning

Quote from: hvbias on February 18, 2022, 10:00:39 AM
Seriously? Or is this some inside joke that has eluded me :) Parsifal is quite high up there with pieces of music I can listen to and lose track of time.

Love Parsifal.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot