What were you listening to? (CLOSED)

[Dundonnell]

I'm now into disc 3, Cellosonaten Nr. 3 & 4 (opp. 78 & 116), and looking forward to the remaining 23. Good solid and musical performances of some fine works well worth listening to.

Maybe you would like to say something nice about Max in the Reger thread?  Just a polite suggestion, you understand

[Wanderer]

[mn dave]

What does she need the microphone for?

She's ready to take your order!

[M forever]

Those are the kind of headphones sports commentators or event coordinators use, with a monitor headphone and microphone, and switch buttons to select different channels.

[Kuhlau]

Courtesy of a member here who sent me a recording in the post (received today with many thanks ), I'm now hearing Liszt's Faust Symphony for the first time, as performed by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under Kurt Masur, I believe. An interesting work, though I do find it wanders a little bit in the first movement.

FK

[Dundonnell]

She's ready to take your order!

If this is the New World, give me the Old anyday!

[Maciek]

And I thought it was Dvořák karaoke...

[M forever]

Courtesy of a member here who sent me a recording in the post (received today with many thanks ), I'm now hearing Liszt's Faust Symphony for the first time, as performed by the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under Kurt Masur, I believe. An interesting work, though I do find it wanders a little bit in the first movement.

Of course it does. Just like Faust's torn and wandering mind.

[mn dave]

And I thought it was Dvořák karaoke...

She doesn't know it, but if you hum a few bars, she'll fake it.  

[Brian]

She's ready to take your order!

http://www.instantrimshot.com

[mn dave]

http://www.instantrimshot.com

Awesome. I'm going to play with that button for, like, an hour.

[Kuhlau]

Of course it does. Just like Faust's torn and wandering mind.

Ah! An explanation. Thanks. I'm shamefully unfamiliar with the Faust story - an ignorance I need to correct.

FK

[karlhenning]

Rakhmaninov
Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Opus 27
Phila
Ormandy

Nice, but a little milky for my taste.

[UB]

This afternoon I have been listening to the music of Nicolas Scherzinger, a 40 year old Canadian composer now at Syracuse University.

Calico Dances for Solo Viola
Colloquy for violin and chamber ensemble
Elegy for violin and piano
Mirage for alto sax and piano
Through a winter Landscape for soprano sax and harp
Twilight for Chamber Orchestra

His style is along the lines of the neoclassic style of Stravinsky and I enjoyed all of them. I could not find any commercial recording from this composer, but if any become available I highly recommend you try him.

[Dundonnell]

Rakhmaninov
Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Opus 27
Phila
Ormandy

Nice, but a little milky for my taste.

My least favourite symphony

"milky" is one word for it.....'saccherine' is another

[UB]

I just found that you can download all those works of Nicolas Scherzinger and more here:

http://www.scherzimusic.com/mp3.html

Enjoy...

[karlhenning]

My least favourite symphony

"milky" is one word for it.....'saccherine' is another

Well, but I like the Jesús Lopez-Cobos / Cincinnati recording on Telarc very much.  It's dulcet music by nature, but for that reason (to echo a remark of Stravinsky's) there's no need to sweeten the sugar.

[M forever]

My least favourite symphony

"milky" is one word for it.....'saccherine' is another

Rachmaninoff's 2nd symphony - one of my all-time favorite pieces of music. Every time I hear it, I am just speechlessly in awe of the complexity and richness of invention, and the striking originality - there is no other composer who sounds like that - but most of that, like almost the entire material for the first movement, is derived from very small, concentrated cells and motifs. Yet the entire very complex symphony is developed organically from these. Although its basic attitude is that of grand, sweeping gestures and wide open symphonic vistas, there is stunning refinement of detail - like the transition to the second theme group in the first movement - just two chords, nothing more, but the entire scenery and harmonic light completely change in an instant. One of the most ravishing and precise moments in all music that I know. What an astonishing musical genius Rachmaninoff was.

Beyond the musical substance and depth, what really gets to me every time I hear this music is the deep human quality which shines through it.

BTW, the composer always spelled his name "Rachmaninoff" in Western letters, and his compositions and recordings were published under that form of his name.

[Harry]

Good morning all!

Disc II from this box, with the following works.

Noveletten opus 21.
Etuden fur den Pedalflugel, opus 56.
Jorg Demus, Piano.

A ongoing success story, at least for me.

[Harry]

Folk Music of Greece.
Sirtos Ensemble.
Harmonia Mundi Recording 1991-1993.

I am very prudent when I say that I played this disc at least 500 times. And that makes this disc the most popular one in my collection.
Its a collectors item, and it is very hard to find a copy. No image alas, at least I could not track it.