Scriabins Temple

Started by mikkeljs, November 20, 2007, 04:44:56 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

snyprrr

Quote from: zamyrabyrd on July 08, 2018, 07:44:17 AM
Can you give some examples of the quieter stuff?  I'd like to hear other than variations of the Poem of Ecstasy.

PS He actually succumbed in Moscow in 1915, so also missed the Revolution. Interesting to speculate what would have happened with him.

Check these out:

15/4

16/4
16/3

17/3
17/6

31/4

33/1***
33/2

35/2- my notes "Lovecraft Largo"

37/1
37/3

39/3

48/2***



Let's just leave off there, before the rush to the final phase... (before the "morceaux era")


The works I just cited should blow some people away... there is some unparalleled beauty going on here....



I'M ABOUT 4/5 DONE WITH MY INITIAL SURVEY/RESEARCH... He's really made an impact this time.... can't stand his "clangy" stuff (mostly the hard core Preludes)... but, wow, he certainly doesn't shy away from normal beauty! AND THEN THERE'S THE MYSTERY CHORDS AND SUCH- feels like juicy laboratory experiments come to life...I JUST DON'T HEAR THIS KIND OF THING IN DEBUSSY...



SONATA 8 is my BigDaddy work a the moment... but I haven't really delved into 7 or 10 (waiting on Volodos)... 6 will take sometime...




LISTITSA- I'm really enjoying her 'unknown pieces' recital. I'm so surprised by his Op.1 Waltz, and the surprises keep coming... some pieces seem prolix- 'Allegro de concert' and the 'Polonaise' didn't do much for me... 59/1, however...

ASHKENAZY 'Vers la Flamme'- though the programme on offer has many goodies, and compliments the Listitsa perfectly, VAsh maaay just be a wee bit old to be playing these... I'm not criticizing his whole performance, it's just that I can hear more than he's giving... SOME TIMES... still, with the pieces offered, I.am.not.complaining.

VOLODOS- can't wait!

DEMIDENKO- Sonata No.2... can you really find a better presentation?? -this is some reeeally fine stuff here, fortes are absorbed nicely... I like Pogo, but DemiD is no one's
                           shiner.

RUDY- his survey of the 'Late Works' may be unparalleled... seems soooo superior... my HIGHEST SCRIABIN RECOMMENDATION!!!



Other CDs that have piqued my interest:

1) Dinova on DoReMi

2) not "Oldfather", but the other well known "Carter type pianist" on a small label playing a verrry personal selection of small pieces






CATO- I'm leaning towards Feinberg in the Mazurkas... can we talk about Pizzaro vs. Music&Arts Guy vs. Marta/Nimbus vs. ... who else??...







STILL WANT TO KNOW HOOOW HE GOT THAT PIMPLE!!!!

Cato

Quote from: snyprrr on July 09, 2018, 07:05:54 AM


CATO- I'm leaning towards Feinberg in the Mazurkas... can we talk about Pizzaro vs. Music&Arts Guy vs. Marta/Nimbus vs. ... who else??...


STILL WANT TO KNOW HOOOW HE GOT THAT PIMPLE!!!!



Who else?




Also, Ruth Laredo, who died 13 years ago at a too-young age!



As for the septicemia from an infected "pimple" (more accurately a boil or "furuncle") on his lip, the mustache is probably the reason.  Probably it hid the boil for too long, and I can imagine Scriabin (perhaps) not wanting to shave the mustache because of vanity, and thinking the pimple/boil would just dissipate on its own.  One source (Peter Deane Roberts in a collection of essays called Music of the Twentieth Century Avant-Garde (Larry Sitsky, Editor) ) says that Scriabin had noticed a sore one his upper lip in 1914, a year before his death.  Possibly it never completely healed, but stayed dormant, and then something caused it to become inflamed again.  Another source said it was an insect bite, rather than a sore caused by dirt or bacteria building up in the thick mustache.

But this source The Alexander Scriabin Companion, offers the best medical explanation:

https://books.google.com/books?id=QQ8oDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA129&lpg=PA129&dq=Scriabin+%2B+boil+on+the+lip&source=bl&ots=uW8s2YnRDB&sig=9bbePX8ww9HG0Ea2CDbHzK11KUY&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjAv7HWiJXcAhVNbK0KHWPYDuwQ6AEIWjAP#v=onepage&q=Scriabin%20%2B%20boil%20on%20the%20lip&f=false
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

snyprrr

Quote from: Cato on July 10, 2018, 09:39:33 AM
Who else?




Also, Ruth Laredo, who died 13 years ago at a too-young age!



As for the septicemia from an infected "pimple" (more accurately a boil or "furuncle") on his lip, the mustache is probably the reason.  Probably it hid the boil for too long, and I can imagine Scriabin (perhaps) not wanting to shave the mustache because of vanity, and thinking the pimple/boil would just dissipate on its own.  One source (Peter Deane Roberts in a collection of essays called Music of the Twentieth Century Avant-Garde (Larry Sitsky, Editor) ) says that Scriabin had noticed a sore one his upper lip in 1914, a year before his death.  Possibly it never completely healed, but stayed dormant, and then something caused it to become inflamed again.  Another source said it was an insect bite, rather than a sore caused by dirt or bacteria building up in the thick mustache.

But this source The Alexander Scriabin Companion, offers the best medical explanation:

https://books.google.com/books?id=QQ8oDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA129&lpg=PA129&dq=Scriabin+%2B+boil+on+the+lip&source=bl&ots=uW8s2YnRDB&sig=9bbePX8ww9HG0Ea2CDbHzK11KUY&hl=en&sa=X& did him ved=0ahUKEwjAv7HWiJXcAhVNbK0KHWPYDuwQ6AEIWjAP#v=onepage&q=Scriabin%20%2B%20boil%20on%20the%20lip&f=false

Scriabin primped like a teenage girl :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

Yea, pictures of him at school, sans 'stache, reveal a Prokofiev-like, cartoonish, upper lip, that, one can see, is the source of the 'stache... oooh, such vanity in Scriabin!! I see it was his VANITY that did him in.

And yea, that "thing" is soooo problematic for me... I have a 'stache-phobia that way... it's such a horrendous 'stache, you can definitely see something bad happening there...

oh, and the account... yukkk...

I STILL THINK GOD HIMSELF STRUCK DOWN Scriabin, for his unbridled vanity, in such an embarrassing way... I can only imagine how the "god-man" Scriabin must have thought- "Is THIS how I go down???...MEEEE????"...


One can see from ANY pic of him, how he LOOOOOVES himself to no end, his chin jutting up, so full of his theosophistry...


Is there a HUMBLE Scriabin out there? ...certainly not Szymanowski,lol,...

snyprrr

Piano Sonata No.9 Op.68 'Black Mass'[


I have just heard Horowitz's 1953 'live' performance of Op.68. WOOOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The piece seems to technically last for about 8 minutes. Ugorski takes 10!!! Horowitz's studio recording takes 9. Here, he takes 6:36!!!!!!!!!!!!

Seriously, it is the ONLY version now for me that IS correct. WTF are all these other people DOING??? Nobody even comes close...Novitskaya is great at 7:37, but Horowitz then shaves a minute off that, and, BAMM!!!, he nails the "demonic" element that no one else gets.

Maybe the devils that Scriabin was communing with settled on Horowitz?/ I always thought VH was an OLD MAN, but, wow,...



Oh, I am no longer any good for the duration...


WHY DO THE MASTERS ALWAYS HAVE BAD SOUND!!!???!!! Why can't anyone ever play like the oldsters... there's nothing to  it, just play it FAST

what's the problem people????

Cato

Have you heard this?  Vers la Flamme also with Horowitz detonating the notes (he once called the work an "atomic bomb").  0:)

https://www.youtube.com/v/MueioLajS2E
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

Madiel

Quote from: snyprrr on July 11, 2018, 06:23:55 AM
what's the problem people????

The problem is that liking things played FAST is not necessarily valued by that large segment of the population that doesn't tend towards writing in all caps and using many more punctuation marks than usual.  You like your music manic because that's the way you roll. Not all listeners or performers share your personality.

As to why you like older recordings, different cultures also have different artistic values so maybe it just happens that there were more people who valued FAST classical music at that time compared to now.
I am now working on a discography of the works of Vagn Holmboe. Please visit and also contribute!

snyprrr

Quote from: Madiel on July 12, 2018, 04:26:48 AM
The problem is that liking things played FAST is not necessarily valued by that large segment of the population that doesn't tend towards writing in all caps and using many more punctuation marks than usual.  You like your music manic because that's the way you roll. Not all listeners or performers share your personality.

As to why you like older recordings, different cultures also have different artistic values so maybe it just happens that there were more people who valued FAST classical music at that time compared to now.


No. Sonata 9 simply needs to be played correctly, which is..."fast"... @6:45 on the clock... no "values" involved, just CORRECTNESS... Ugorski clocking in at over 10 minutes, is just WRONG headed in his interpretation, that's all... most people are"wrong", and that includes SuperStar Pianists too!!

some Scriabin needs to be played "slow"...



yea,... no,... I'm right as usual 0:)




And, lol, I'll go further and say that, after hearing Horowitz53 and not coming to the same conclusion will make ONE wrong too!


This is not about "taste", just "correctness". Sure, I have a taste for Beethoven5 played at a snail's pace, but, of course, that's just NAUGHTY on my part... I know full well how it ought to sound...



Blatty would agree, I think... I'm sure of it.




You tell me, does the "devil" play it slow, or fast???? It's so funny, because the actual character of the music changes - those opening downward blah-blah-bllah- played slowly they sound dreary and tired (almost as if God is weary of the devil), but, when played at the correct, mischievous, tempo, those downward notches take on a "moving" quality... the devil on the move.

There is NO "Scriabin Danger" in the slow playing, and this is called 'Black Mass' after all.THIS IS NOT ABOUT MUSIC, and, perhaps, Horowitz was possessed of a "devil"??? ...at least in 1953??


I'm sure Scriabin would agree, too $:)




Yes, hearing 53 has changed me >:D 0:) >:D 0:) >:D 0:)...




Demidenko is 9:16. As good as he may be, it's not the same piece of music as Horowitz53. That's almost 3 minutes difference in a piece that averages @8:16!


REMEMBER- Jesus said unto Judas "Do what thou do... QUICKLY"


Evil must be done away with quickly, there, done,check's in the mail.

snyprrr

Sonata No.8 Op.66

Is this the most advanced music ever written? I've been plowing through performers, up to about seven- Ponti=9:57   Zhukov=16:45- yes, it's incredible!! (median performance=13;20)


Most performers play this as if it were being created out of thin air, and it's such a thoroughly involving score from front to back, notes "plucked" out of space, great swells...


The Ponti is really boss, but then, the Zhukov almost sounds like a whole other piece (and wow is he delicate!). Lettberg seemed mysterious in deep ambience; Donohoe was vigorous, Ohlsson was more like Zhukov; Ashkenazy fared surprisingly well, and Austbo had much of the best of all worlds. I have Rudy, who ranks right at the top (though, everyone seems to do this one well enough).


Scriabin really lets the music "show" you things, the shapes the music makes suggests the opening of the vortex, over and over, recreating itself- but in a much more varied way than 'Vers la flamme'. I struggle to come this work to any other Composer...



I'm still saving Sonatas 6-7 until the mail arrives,... oh goody!!...

snyprrr

Piano Sonata No.10 Op.70

I'm just not 'getting it'. It seems quite "pure",... yet, "godless" (as in, what's the point)... I've only heard one rendition where it actually sounds like "insects" (don't remember), and this was the fastest performance I'd heard: yes, at that speed, the insects "come alive"... in all other versions, all I hear are "trills".

In a way, it's quite Moderne, as in Debussy's Etudes... but,at the speeds most are playing (@12.3 minutes... some go to 14.5, the quickest one was around 10), the piece barely hangs together for me... there's just so many silences and spaces, followed by a little tinkling or noodling...

Is everyone missing the boat here?? Does the piece need to be radically reinterpreted?


I have Volodos: at 12 minutes, all I get is a "beautiful" rendition of music that I'm not understanding (I understood it quite well when I heard that fast version).

ANYONE????

Cato

Quote from: snyprrr on July 23, 2018, 06:39:44 AM
Piano Sonata No.10 Op.70

I'm just not 'getting it'. It seems quite "pure",... yet, "godless" (as in, what's the point)... I've only heard one rendition where it actually sounds like "insects" (don't remember), and this was the fastest performance I'd heard: yes, at that speed, the insects "come alive"... in all other versions, all I hear are "trills".

In a way, it's quite Moderne, as in Debussy's Etudes... but,at the speeds most are playing (@12.3 minutes... some go to 14.5, the quickest one was around 10), the piece barely hangs together for me... there's just so many silences and spaces, followed by a little tinkling or noodling...

Is everyone missing the boat here?? Does the piece need to be radically reinterpreted?


I have Volodos: at 12 minutes, all I get is a "beautiful" rendition of music that I'm not understanding (I understood it quite well when I heard that fast version).

ANYONE????

Try Michael Ponti's performance:

https://www.youtube.com/v/rcigKVyqsMM
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

snyprrr

YES! Ponti keeps pooping up as a singular voice of blazing glory, such as in his 10 minute No.8. Neuhaus, also, is the only one who actually made the music sound like... and I do think No.10 sounds like the sounds of Egypt and scarabs and mysterious purity of sand...

Been dipping into the Decca 'Mysterium'...


btw- No.10 reminds me of Debussy's Etudes... soooo modern, we really need a super avant player to tackle these Last Works.



been on the Scriabin train for a  ...month now,... such an arc of trajectory

Cato

Quote from: snyprrr on July 31, 2018, 03:40:47 AM
YES! Ponti keeps pooping up as a singular voice of blazing glory, such as in his 10 minute No.8. Neuhaus, also, is the only one who actually made the music sound like... and I do think No.10 sounds like the sounds of Egypt and scarabs and mysterious purity of sand...

Been dipping into the Decca 'Mysterium'...

been on the Scriabin train for a  ...month now,... such an arc of trajectory


Scriabin is an addictive drug, so be careful!   $:)  Especially with the Scriabin/Nemtin MYSTERIUM !

Or is too late?!   :o :o :o ??? ??? ???  8)   
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

snyprrr

Quote from: Cato on July 31, 2018, 07:47:16 AM

Scriabin is an addictive drug, so be careful!   $:)  Especially with the Scriabin/Nemtin MYSTERIUM !

Or is too late?!   :o :o :o ??? ??? ???  8)

I've gotten through most of it in the car now... and wow, yea, it's massive, AND YET SEEMS TO JUSTIFY ITS LENGTH!!!- I love the idiom- pre-Denisov dripping/rising- IT MIGHT MAKE ME SEEK OUT R.STRAUSS!!! even...lol

Yes, Scriabin/Nemtin is so advanced if it were truly of the time, it does open up the egocentric/messianic centers of the mind... I liked the piano/organ duet... soooo many textural delights in the whole piece.


MOST OF MY SCRIABIN PURCHASES have been lost in the mail, so I'm having to draggg this whole thing out... haven't even listened to Sonata 7 yet because I've been waiting...

Neihaus is playing 6 7 8 n 10 very very fast, and this is the way I hear these pieces, but we need Pace or Hodges to play them that fast. Normal Pianists are ALL adding two minutes a piece to these works (even Volodos)...


MUST.HAVE.FAST.LATE.SCRIABIN.

FAST.

Again, the greatest single Scriabin I have now heard is the Horowitz 53 Ninth. Shoulda been in the Exorcist!!




snyprrr

I dunno, I'm finding most of the Etudes, along with most of the Op.11 Preludes, to be a lot of minor key angsty sounding "Romantic" stereotypical bla bla... I just don't care for "piano banging".

When Scriabin gets around to totally transforming the actual nature of the "drammatico...patetico" allegro type style, all the angst transforms into fantastical shapes of movement. With the famouse 8/12 Etude, I just hear something from a film from the 1940s...

Chopin doesn't seem as 'hand on the forehead' as Early/Mid Scriabin, but then, I guess AS was a spoiled brat?


Etude 48/1: I have Ashkenazy- I think I like the piece, but I seem to think Vladmr can't play it as well as, say, LangLang or Volodos. Here is a piece where the tons of notes are "rippling" instead of "pounding/clanking". Scriabin needs all the clarity he can get, and I don't think I want to hear actual struggle with Scriabin, just superhuman virtuosity!

With LangLang, I can appreciate the Pianism, even if I don't like the piece...


Mirror Image

Quote from: SurprisedByBeauty on February 07, 2019, 03:34:43 AM


As @ionarts resumes a regular schedule of #CDReviews, with Charles (#BrieflyNoted) on Saturdays and me on Wednesdays, here's my first contribution to the new routine: Dip Your Ears, No. 223 (Vadym Kholodenko's Scriabin)

http://ionarts.blogspot.com/2019/02/dip-your-ears-no-223-vadym-kholodenkos.html ...

#DipYourEars


I haven't read your review, but I've read some less flattering things about this newer Kholodenko recording.

I suppose I should post this (originally appeared in the 'Purchases' thread) -

Quote from: Mirror Image on May 27, 2019, 11:45:16 AM
I've recently become rather infatuated with the music of Scriabin, so here's a few recent purchases:







I own the Scriabin Complete box on Decca, but I'm not too enthralled with the performers involved. No offense to Ashkenazy, who is a fine pianist, he's not the only answer in Scriabin and I find he lacks a certain nuance in Scriabin's music. One of the more overrated, IMHO, pianists in the Decca set is Valentina Lisitsa. Who, by the way, ruined Hilary Hahn's recording of Ives' Violin Sonatas. I also wanted to get Lettberg's set for the earlier piano works and so I'll own works outside of the oft-recorded, Piano Sonatas. Anyway, I also wanted to have a set of the symphonies (even though I already own Svetlanov's). The Muti set is incredible and, for me, this is one of the landmark sets for these orchestral works.

Cato

Up-and-coming pianist Valere Burnon plays the Scriabin Piano Sonata #2 at a competition.  The performer is also a champion of the post-Scriabin composer Sergei  Protopopov.


https://www.youtube.com/v/Pl5ibSsudAw
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

vers la flamme

Scriabin is one of my favorite composers, as one might be able to deduce from my username here. I am not always receptive to his music, but when I am, it hits hard. I am currently enamored with his early piano concerto, which is not too far removed from the concerti of Tchaikovsky or Rachmaninov; more accurately, it is something like a Russianized Chopin concerto, maybe a little bit more on the impressionistic side. Very beautiful.

Anyone been listening to Scriabin lately? I am due for a new set of the solo piano music, I think. I have been listening to Vladimir Horowitz, these two discs:





Both are absolutely amazing, the latter also includes a great Rachmaninov second piano sonata. But I have been thinking of getting the Maria Lettberg integral set lately, if it's still to be had for cheap. Or maybe Dmitri Alexeev playing the Preludes on Brilliant.

vers la flamme

As for the orchestral music, I'm collecting the Golovschin/Moscow set on Naxos. So far, so good. I also want the Ashkenazy set on Decca, but Golovschin is fine for now. I suspect Muti is probably more than adequate too but I have a strange bias against him as a conductor.

Cato

Quote from: vers la flamme on November 25, 2019, 02:07:14 AM
As for the orchestral music, I'm collecting the Golovschin/Moscow set on Naxos. So far, so good. I also want the Ashkenazy set on Decca, but Golovschin is fine for now. I suspect Muti is probably more than adequate too but I have a strange bias against him as a conductor.

I heard the early symphonies through the Svetlanov recordings from Melodiya in the early 1970's and found them to be most excellent!

The DGG recording with Pletnev conducting the Third Symphony is also excellent.
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)