The Five Pieces You Never Want To Hear Again!

[hornteacher]

well, so? Bass players don't do much in most classical music anyways, what if they don't like what they do? the music is still good.

Very true.  I'm just relaying my experiences as a performer in a tongue-in-cheek manner.

[Marc]

I really wouldn't know. Don't I want to hear Dvorak's New World again? Or Pachelbel's Canon? Or Ravel's Bolero? I only listen to them (maybe) once a year, and when listening I consider them as marvellous again. No problem.

I'd like to mention though that Bach never wrote a so-called 'Air on the G string'. It was an arrangment by violinist August Wilhelmj (1845-1908), who changed this beautiful movement into a popular 'sultry tune' (as the Dutch musicologist C. Höweler (somehow) called it).

Is there any Purcell left in Stokovski's Dido's Lament?
Or any Albinoni in Giazotto's Adagio in G minor?

Don't get me wrong: I like to listen to both the Stokovski and the Giazotto, let's say: once in every two years.

No, really, I don't know any piece I never want to hear again, except maybe for anything sung by Mariah Carey.

[Kullervo]

John Adams - Nixon in China
Philip Glass - Einstein on the Beach
Anything by Erik Satie
Luigi Nono - Fragmente-Stille
Alvin Lucier - "I am sitting in a room"

[Mark]

I don't think I have any. There are pieces I don't want to hear for a long time, but I'll re-evaluate them later, when ready to come to them afresh.

Ditto.

[PerfectWagnerite]

Charles Ives: A Universe Symphony

If you have not heard it consider yourself lucky.

[Kullervo]

Charles Ives: A Universe Symphony

If you have not heard it consider yourself lucky.

I was curious about this, but not too curious. Do you normally dislike Ives?

[PerfectWagnerite]

I was curious about this, but not too curious. Do you normally dislike Ives?

I actually like Ives very much. Somehow this work really turn me off. The entire first movement (about 30 minutes long) repeats a same pattern on the percussion. Yeah there are a few variations thrown in but it is extremely tedious. The rest of the work is no better. You know, the usually screeching strings playing meaningless notes in the upper register. The booklet gives a lengthy talk about the construction of the work which looks really interesting on paper but as far as sound goes is nauseating.

Also I never want to hear anything by Bright Sheng again. How he manages to get the attention he gets boggles the mind. The guy has no talent whatsoever.

[not edward]

Charles Ives: A Universe Symphony

If you have not heard it consider yourself lucky.

I've been told by Ivesians that this work is 90% Larry Austin and 10% Charles Ives. I'd agree with the 'avoid' on it, though I might bring it out again some day...haven't for about five years though.

[Bonehelm]

That sabre dance thingy. I don't know where I heard it or how or when, but it was BAD.

[Kullervo]

That sabre dance thingy. I don't know where I heard it or how or when, but it was BAD.

That's from Gayaneh by Aram Khatchaturian.

[Don Giovanni]

Alvin Lucier - "I am sitting in a room"

I've heard that this is an amazing piece. What is it that you dislike about it?

[Kullervo]

I've heard that this is an amazing piece. What is it that you dislike about it?

It's basically just an experiment with sound recording technology, not far from what I did with my handheld tape recorder when I was 12. There's nothing endearing or artful about it, and it definitely doesn't warrant more than one listen (actually, you don't even have to listen to the whole piece to "get" it). Additionally, his stutter makes it even more unlistenable than it is to begin with.

[Black Knight]

Only Bach's Air on a G String for me.

[Sergeant Rock]

If I never hear the Firebird again I won't mind.

That sabre dance thingy. I don't know where I heard it or how or when, but it was BAD.

I'd rather hear the Sabre Dance every day than here the Firebird again...not because the Firebird is bad but because if Stravinsky is played on the radio or programmed in the concert hall, 9 out of 10 times it's that damned Firebird. Enough already. At least the Sabre Dance is short.


Sarge

[Sergeant Rock]

1. Beethoven's 5th symphony
2. Dvorak's 9th symphony
3. Tchaikovsky first piano concerto
4. Tchaikovsky violin concerto
5. 3 b's violin concerto, Brahms, Beethoven, Bruch

So young, and already so jaded... 

Sarge

[Iago]

Yes, agreed, the topic seems to mean 5 pieces that are bad, laughingly bad, like Ed Wood movies:

Hollywood Suite
Niagara Falls Suite
Mississippi Suite
Hudson River Suite
Death Valley Suite

by Ferde Grofe.     

Who said (besides YOU) that they are laughingly bad?
Arthur Fiedler didn't think so.
Leonard Bernstein didn't think so.
Andre Kostelantz didn't think so.
George Gershwin didn't think so.
Felix Slatkin didn't think so
Leopold Stokowski didn't think so.
Eugene Ormandy didn't think so.

But YOU think so.

Hmm, let me see now. Whom shall I believe?

[beclemund]

I do not listen to the radio enough or watch that much TV, so I have not yet experienced burn-out on any particular piece of music. The most played pieces of music on my iPod currently are Es sang vor langen Jahren, Che gelida manina, Non piu andrai, Der Hölle Rache and the Adagio to Bruckner's 8th (I blame Giulini for that ) and I am nowhere near tired of hearing them.

[david johnson]

any pop or p/w music that takes itself too seriously.

classical...i don't have a problem, but i do take breaks from certain selections.

dj

[S709]

Alvin Lucier - "I am sitting in a room"

YES! Me too. It is overly long (40 minutes or more), and it is not really interesting at all to listen to. His voice very slowly changes into a droning mass of sound as it is played back over itself or something like that. I don't much like his pieces based on brainwaves either. But then his CD "Still Lives" is great!

Steve Reich: Four Organs. A little salt-shaker-like sound accompanied by looooong and identical held organ chords. Repeated ad nauseum for 20 minutes.

John Cage: Fontana Mix. 13 minutes or so of random radio noises at random times (random as in: the radios are randomly tuned, it is literally random). Hideous!

Eric Whitacre: Godzilla Eats Las Vegas! Exclamation mark is part of the title... this is supposed to be 'fun' but I can't stand it.

Jani Christou: Epicycle I, described as a "Happening for a modifiable vocal and instrumental ensemble, actors, tapes, visual projections and free participation of the public." The recording I have of it sounds like simply 45 minutes of a recording device left in a room where somewhere in the distance someone is playing some jazz, people are talking, other noise... a terrible "concept piece".

[Kullervo]

YES! Me too. It is overly long (40 minutes or more), and it is not really interesting at all to listen to. His voice very slowly changes into a droning mass of sound as it is played back over itself or something like that. I don't much like his pieces based on brainwaves either. But then his CD "Still Lives" is great!

Steve Reich: Four Organs. A little salt-shaker-like sound accompanied by looooong and identical held organ chords. Repeated ad nauseum for 20 minutes.

John Cage: Fontana Mix. 13 minutes or so of random radio noises at random times (random as in: the radios are randomly tuned, it is literally random). Hideous!

Eric Whitacre: Godzilla Eats Las Vegas! Exclamation mark is part of the title... this is supposed to be 'fun' but I can't stand it.

Jani Christou: Epicycle I, described as a "Happening for a modifiable vocal and instrumental ensemble, actors, tapes, visual projections and free participation of the public." The recording I have of it sounds like simply 45 minutes of a recording device left in a room where somewhere in the distance someone is playing some jazz, people are talking, other noise... a terrible "concept piece".

Haha, great choices, Chris. The Whitacre piece you mentioned reminded me of another awful "exclamation point" piece... Tristian Murail's Vampyr!. Ten minutes of a guitar going "WEEEEEEOOOOOWOOOOO BOW CHICKA BOWBOW MEEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRR".