Karl Amadeus Hartmann, Recommendations.

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Just bought via Arkivmusic for $44:



What I'm planning on doing is selling my old set, which I bought used, via Ebay or to a member here who wants to buy it and keeping the brand new set. But I won't do this until Arkivmusic actually ships the set. This set is on backorder right now and I questioned them about their backorders and here's what they wrote to me:

Thanks for contacting us.

Our warehouse in Canada expects Hartmann: 8 Symphonien, Gesangs-szene /Kubelik, Bavarian Rso (CD, 60187) to be in stock any day now.   

Items shipped from our Canadian warehouse may take longer for delivery to U.S. addresses.  In general, we find shipments being transported via Canada Post and US Postal 1st Class Mail arrive within two weeks, but some orders are delivered after 30 days (depending on the region and the Postal Service). 

Thanks for shopping at ArkivMusic.com and please let us know if we may be of further assistance.

[jlaurson]

Does anyone here think Hartmann's music would be difficult to perform? I know I do. Just listening to Symphony No. 2 'Adagio', for example, gives the orchestra a workout. I'm sweating just thinking about it.

Relevant cross-post from "Considering"

1.)Why would you say hell would freeze over before Munich Philharmonic record a Hartmann cycle? What's been happening with this orchestra lately?

2.) Hmmm....Nagano in Hartmann? Sounds interesting.

3.) One Mr. Gergiev will be playing a major role in deciding what will be performed.

4.) I forgot he was taking over the Munich PO. Oh well...the Berlin Radio Symphony seems like a good choice for Hartmann even though Munich was his hometown.

5.) Does anyone here think Hartmann's music would be difficult to perform?

1.) Because it's not that kind of orchestra... it's not their repertoire, and worse: Hartmann is associated with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra... which makes it additionally unlikely that they'll go out of their way and do something artistically gratifying but economically risky. (Not just risky but, frankly, expensive and with no chance of proper return.)

Which brings me to 4.) By BRSO I meant the above-mentioned Bavarian RSO, not Berlin.

3.) I don't think Gergiev would be the problem, actually. They'll have plenty guest conductors, for one, and Gergiev, although you can color me a sceptic, is actually quite open minded and will surprise the audience yet. Not, in all likelihood, with Hartmann... but with at least a bit of fine out-of-the-way stuff.

http://ionarts.blogspot.com/2013/02/valery-gergiev-signs-contract-with.html

2.) Nagano's performance of the Hartmann Fourth Symphony was one of the highlights amid the highlight-studded 2011 Salzburg Festival. (And I mean real, genuine artistic highlights, not empty-splash name-recognition laziness that has become the sad norm with such festivals. Not to name names, or anything.
http://ionarts.blogspot.com/2011/08/notes-from-2011-salzburg-festival-12.html

Let's not forget Hartmann's Simplicissimus: http://ionarts.blogspot.com/2010/12/best-recordings-of-2010-5.html

[Karl Henning]

Let's not forget Hartmann's Simplicissimus: http://ionarts.blogspot.com/2010/12/best-recordings-of-2010-5.html

I had forgotten; thanks for the reminder!

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The only symphony of Hartmann I have trouble with is the 8th, but I'm learning my way through it. It's completely unforgiving and a hotbed of angst. Cato or anyone into Hartmann's music have any pointers about this symphony? I would like to get some different opinions on it.

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My brand new Wergo symphony set has been shipped via Arkivmusic! Very happy about this as now I can have a new set and sell the one I bought off Amazon MP. Anyone interested in buying my old Wergo send me a PM.

Edit:

I'll be selling my Hartmann set for $35 and this includes free shipping. The item's condition is used, like new, but there is a little wear on the outside box but this is the only cosmetic damage to the set. All discs play great as I have ripped them to one of my iPods and had no issues during the transfer whatsoever. You can't buy this set for $35 and, as I have stated in one of my posts, this set is indispensable.

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For those Hartmann newbies curious about the symphonies, read this when you have time:

http://www.wrightmusic.net/pdfs/karl-amadeus-hartmann.pdf

[jlaurson]

My brand new Wergo symphony set has been shipped via Arkivmusic! Very happy about this as now I can have a new set and sell the one I bought off Amazon MP. Anyone interested in buying my old Wergo send me a PM.

Edit:

I'll be selling my Hartmann set for $35 and this includes free shipping. The item's condition is used, like new, but there is a little wear on the outside box but this is the only cosmetic damage to the set. All discs play great as I have ripped them to one of my iPods and had no issues during the transfer whatsoever. You can't buy this set for $35 and, as I have stated in one of my posts, this set is indispensable.

That raises the interesting legal question as to whether you are allowed to keep the electronic files after you sell the set for which you (or at least somebody) paid for.
Actually, there's an interesting legal question about whether you were allowed to copy them onto your iPod in the first place (in the UK: no!, in the US: not explicitly yes or no, though there's an industry- (and obviously consumer-) wide assumption that, if you own the music, you are practically, if not theoretically, allowed to do so.)

I'm not bringing this up to moralize or point the finger at you, but because I'm genuinely interested in the topic and writing about it.

For those Hartmann newbies curious about the symphonies, read this when you have time:

http://www.wrightmusic.net/pdfs/karl-amadeus-hartmann.pdf

Our friend Dr. Wright is a bit harsh and unappreciative (not to say ignorant) when says "He was not just a composer of pretty tunes as was Schubert."
I know about the use of hyperbole and comparative bashing as tools to really bring into focus the excellence of one thing -- vs. another, if necessary.
I got a letter to the editor recently for quoting (not even stating myself, but quoting) Christoph Eschenbach saying that he'd give any or all of Mozart's early Symphonies for any one of Haydn's... complaining that Haydn didn't need championing-by-way-of-Mozart-denigration. But to say Schubert just composed pretty tunes? While that's true, it's actually *also* true that the world could go on merrily without Mozart's early symphonies. Substitute Michael Haydn, lose nothing... or at least we can understand where someone is coming from, who says that. But lumping all of Schubert together like that... somehow bothers me a bit.

...ah, I realize now, that's his style: hyperbole. Elgar the worst (not that I'm inclined to disagree vociferously), Scherchen the best German conductor of the last 150 years (how do you determine that, except ideologically?)

Oh... ok, and what (and HOW) he says about Britten, even where it aims at a kernel of truth, brings all the flags up... potential crank and kook, who happens to be accidentally right about Hartmann.

Oh... and it's badly written hobbyist rubbish. "What can I say of the Symphony no.8 written in 1960-62?" -- Why, what snappy use of a rhetorical device there! And then the hysterical copyright claim that one so often finds with the mediocre... and which I'm purposely defying by quoting two shitty sentences.

[Karl Henning]

Well, but you're quoting for educational purposes, Jens . . . .

[Sergeant Rock]

For those Hartmann newbies curious about the symphonies, read this when you have time:

http://www.wrightmusic.net/pdfs/karl-amadeus-hartmann.pdf

Thank you, MI, for that link. One of the funniest things I've read in quite a while. Dr. Wright is a hoot 

Sarge

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I guess I won't be quoting anything from Dr. Wright again! I didn't really read the article in detail and thought it was just an overview of the symphonies. My mistake.

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That raises the interesting legal question as to whether you are allowed to keep the electronic files after you sell the set for which you (or at least somebody) paid for.
Actually, there's an interesting legal question about whether you were allowed to copy them onto your iPod in the first place (in the UK: no!, in the US: not explicitly yes or no, though there's an industry- (and obviously consumer-) wide assumption that, if you own the music, you are practically, if not theoretically, allowed to do so.)

I'm not bringing this up to moralize or point the finger at you, but because I'm genuinely interested in the topic and writing about it.

As long as I'm not selling a CD of the symphonies I ripped to my iPod, then I can do what I want with the music since I did buy the box set. In fact, as I noted above, I bought a brand new one too.

[jlaurson]

As long as I'm not selling a CD of the symphonies I ripped to my iPod, then I can do what I want with the music since I did buy the box set. In fact, as I noted above, I bought a brand new one too.

Now I'm confused. You are buying the same set twice? Why? And you're not selling the set you ripped on your iPod?

And again, this is curiosity, not wagging my finger. Also interesting, because people naturally assume they have rights about their music that they don't.

I'm currently looking into the matter of whether it can or should be legal to re-sell music downloads -- as you would assume that resale is a right acquired with purchase, as it is with other goods (used books, cars, pencils, LPs). Turns out: No. In a way, you are ever only licencing music... except that music companies consider downloads sales, because that means they get a greater profit-margin than they do from licensing (such as to radio stations). (Remember when it was illegal to record anything on tape-decks, even for your own use? And how DAT-machines were banned and doomed to a niche market, because of piracy concerns?) OK... maybe not fascinating to everyone... but I could get lost in that sort of stuff.

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Now I'm confused. You are buying the same set twice? Why? And you're not selling the set you ripped on your iPod?

And again, this is curiosity, not wagging my finger. Also interesting, because people naturally assume they have rights about their music that they don't.

I'm currently looking into the matter of whether it can or should be legal to re-sell music downloads -- as you would assume that resale is a right acquired with purchase, as it is with other goods (used books, cars, pencils, LPs). Turns out: No. In a way, you are ever only licencing music... except that music companies consider downloads sales, because that means they get a greater profit-margin than they do from licensing (such as to radio stations). (Remember when it was illegal to record anything on tape-decks, even for your own use? And how DAT-machines were banned and doomed to a niche market, because of piracy concerns?) OK... maybe not fascinating to everyone... but I could get lost in that sort of stuff.

Jens, did you not read this post I made?

I'll be selling my Hartmann set for $35 and this includes free shipping. The item's condition is used, like new, but there is a little wear on the outside box but this is the only cosmetic damage to the set. All discs play great as I have ripped them to one of my iPods and had no issues during the transfer whatsoever. You can't buy this set for $35 and, as I have stated in one of my posts, this set is indispensable.

People's rights with the CDs they buy is limited, yes, no question about it. But what I do with the music in my own home is strictly my business as long as I'm not duplicating and trying to sell it to somebody, then there's nothing legally that could be done to me. They would have to lock up millions of people for doing this if they locked me up.

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Anyway, getting back to Hartmann, listened to the Symphonische Hymnen last night and loved it. Anyone else heard this work? This Kubelik recording is the only performance of it on record and, quite frankly, I don't see how it could be bettered anyway. The Bavarian RSO played great as usual. These guys really know Hartmann's idiom well.

[Sergeant Rock]

I guess I won't be quoting anything from Dr. Wright again! I didn't really read the article in detail and thought it was just an overview of the symphonies. My mistake.

Well, it wasn't a total waste. I certainly appreciate his advocacy for a composer who deserves to be better known. I don't understand, though, his need to belittle other great composers as though that somehow elevates Hartmann. And then there are the silly statements like "the virtuoso fugue begins and it makes the great fugues of Bach and Handel seem mundane." Or the really distasteful, bigoted statements like "the gross immorality of the German people."  His prudish attack on FKK was pretty funny especially considering Walt Whitman's worship of the human body (which Hartmann must've been aware of). But maybe Hartmann really did object to Munich's Englischer Garten 

Sarge

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Well, it wasn't a total waste. I certainly appreciate his advocacy for a composer who deserves to be better known. I don't understand, though, his need to belittle other great composers as though that somehow elevates Hartmann. And then there are the silly statements like "the virtuoso fugue begins and it makes the great fugues of Bach and Handel seem mundane." Or the really distasteful, bigoted statements like "the gross immorality of the German people."  His prudish attack on FKK was pretty funny especially considering Walt Whitman's worship of the human body (which Hartman must've been aware of). But maybe Hartmann really did object to Munich's Englischer Garten 

Sarge

Yeah, I think Dr. Wright should've left other composer's names out of his article too. There's really no need in it. I didn't read that remark about the German people, but it sounds moronic and completely off-base.

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I read the post... I just don't understand it. There seems to be some information assumed that I'm lacking. You bought one Hartmann set and selling another at the same time... ?
Or your selling the one you just bought? Sorry I'm being dense here.

I'm selling the used set and keeping the brand new set. Since I'm in awe of these symphonies, and since most of the symphony sets I've acquired have been brand new, I wanted to have a new set of the Hartmann. I figured this would also be a way for someone else who doesn't own the set themselves to buy it from me so they'll now own it too. I can't tell you how many times I've read "the Wergo set is too expensive." What I'm asking for this used set I own is cheap compared to Amazon MP and Ebay.

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Ah! No wonder I didn't understand you. I couldn't imagine why someone would buy one and the same set twice, so I assumed you must have been talking about Metzmacher's.
Well, I hope if finds an appreciative taker!

No problem, Jens. Now back to Hartmann...

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Hartmann is da bomb!!!! Man, this composer is just incredible.

[snyprrr]

Hartmann is da bomb!!!! Man, this composer is just incredible.

yea? yea? what? what? DETAILS MAN, DETAILS!!!