What were you listening to? (CLOSED)

[Gurn Blanston]

No, I did not buy it but am listening to it on NML.



Judging from the Hoffmeister and Prussian quartets, they are a top notch group - but oddly, hardly any informaiton available on them.

Just a sideline; Snips was really keen on their Beethoven. From the info he gave from their Beethoven disks, they are from the former East Germany, IIRC. Thinking they were famous there, but not outside of there until recently being released over here.

[Antoine Marchand]

http://www.youtube.com/v/z-Rp-gRBl9c

[Todd]

I waited, like, three whole weeks to get the second volume of Giulini's American recordings.  I listened to disc 1, which has a much better than normal Schubert 4 along with a magisterial Dvorak 9.  The latter is a bit long, a bit slow, a lot detailed, with zooming and spotlighting and such, and it is simply gorgeous.  This I already knew.  I will say that as nice as the strings sound on the CD, they sound even better on the ancient LP I managed to find last year.  I know most of the rest of the recordings in the set from a mix of CDs and LPs.  Nonetheless, I look forward to marching through the set.  Great stuff.

[Antoine Marchand]

Excellent performance on modern piano. Great sound quality, too.

[Brahmsian]

Shostakovich

Symphony No. 2 in B major, Op.14 'To October'
Symphony No. 3 in E flat major, Op.20 'First of May'

Rundfunkchor

WDR Sinfonieorchester
Barshai

Brilliant Classics

*Tonight, these 2 symphonies are hitting the right notes!  Highly enjoying this.  Maybe my low expectations have helped? 

[Coopmv]

Now playing CD1 from the following set, which arrived two days ago for a first listen ...

[bhodges]

Brian: Symphony No. 1, "The Gothic" (Martyn Brabbins / BBC CO / BBC NOW / soloists, choruses, live from the BBC Proms) - First listen, from the gargantuan performance taped last Sunday, available here through Sunday. (Despite some other commitments this weekend, I was determined not to miss this.)

Hard to assess such a sprawling work on first hearing, but I will say I'm enjoying it. As one criterion, one could ask, "Do you want to hear it again?" and so far the answer is definitely "yes." My initial reaction: a thrilling, ambitious, pleasantly messy melange of many stylistic elements - the energy of these disparate parts feels brilliant on one hand, and on the other, sometimes like an overripe film score. But in much of it, Brian's creativity is undeniably powerful. Now I can understand the wide variety of opinions about the piece and the performance. Nevertheless, it must have been quite something to have been there - and also only increases my admiration for Brabbins, coordinating all of this.

--Bruce

[Coopmv]

Now playing CD2 from the following set for a first listen ...

[Conor71]

Shostakovich

Symphony No. 2 in B major, Op.14 'To October'
Symphony No. 3 in E flat major, Op.20 'First of May'

Rundfunkchor

WDR Sinfonieorchester
Barshai

Brilliant Classics

*Tonight, these 2 symphonies are hitting the right notes!  Highly enjoying this.  Maybe my low expectations have helped? 

I really like Symphonies 2 & 3 as well and think they are really quite good! - How are you enjoying the Barshai Set so far Ray?

[Brahmsian]

I really like Symphonies 2 & 3 as well and think they are really quite good! - How are you enjoying the Barshai Set so far Ray?

Always loved it.  They always had it at the library, and I would check it out often.  Now I finally have my own set and enjoy it immensely.  Still going to buy all the Petrenko/Naxos recordings as they get released.   

[listener]

GLOBUKAR   Discours II pour 5 trombones
BERIO  Sequenza V for trombone solo
STOCKHAUSEN  Solo for Melody-Instrument with Rükkoplung
Carlos Roqué ALSINA Consecuenza for solo trombone
Vonko Globukar, trombone
now I can put it away for another 30 years
LULLY   Te Deum
Soloists, vocal ensemble A Coeur Joie de Valence
Orchestre Jean-François Paillard
a big¸, enjoyable setting
Lord BERNERS  - collection on LP
Meriel Dickinson, sop; Bernard Dickinson, ten; Peter Dickinson, Susan Bradshaw & Richard Rodney Bennett, pianists

[mszczuj]

A near complete box of Mozart String Quartets by a quartet unknown to me before today: Suske-Quartett

Suske-Quartett was the first SQ I ever heard in my life. This was my very first LP with chamber music - Beethoven's op.74 and op.95. Later I bought op.59. I really like this performance and never have got more pleasure with middle quartets than then.

[Conor71]

Corelli: Concerti Grossi, Op. 6


First listen of this recently arrived Disc


[asin]B00001IVOM[/asin]

[val]

GOUNOD:    Faust, opera                         / Richard Leech, Cheryl Studer, Toulouse Capitole Orchestra, Plasson

I don't like this opera but this is a good version. A competent direction of Plasson, nice voice of Leech and a very touching and fragile Marguerite (Studer).
But the old version that I had on LP, conducted by Cluytens, was even better, with Los Angeles, Gedda, Christoff.

[Brian]

FALLA | El Sombrero de Tres Picos, Suites I and II
New York Philharmonic Orchestra; Rafael Fruhbeck de Burgos

This has to be the world record for most blatant Stravinsky quotes while still being awesomely and totally original. More directly: I love this music.

[prémont]

Just a sideline; Snips was really keen on their Beethoven. From the info he gave from their Beethoven disks, they are from the former East Germany, IIRC. Thinking they were famous there, but not outside of there until recently being released over here.

East German recordings (Eterna) have been available in large parts of Western Europe since long. I got my first recording with Karl Suske already in 1966 (Brandenburg concertos with Gewandhaus Bach orchestra / Helmut Koch).

[mc ukrneal]

Ballet music this afternoon (a number of discs from this one):
[asin]B00005ND46[/asin]
Outstanding music, very well performed. This is one of the best sets in my collection. Lots of excerpts here as well as a number of rarely heard ballets. A real treat!!

[Willoughby earl of Itacarius]

Ballet music this afternoon (a number of discs from this one):
[asin]B00005ND46[/asin]
Outstanding music, very well performed. This is one of the best sets in my collection. Lots of excerpts here as well as a number of rarely heard ballets. A real treat!!

Yes a real treat, as well as the big 50 box from Decca

[Antoine Marchand]

Trevor Pinnock's second recording of the manualiter partitas.

[asin]B00004TKFM[/asin]

Here a review on The Flying Inkpot.

Great and deserved marks on Amazon and The Flying Inkpot, but for some reason I don't get a personal connection with Pinnock as a harpsichordist. I don't feel his performance as a personal thing: Bach speaking directly to myself, as (those that I experience as) great performances do... Human brain is a complex thing. 

[Antoine Marchand]

East German recordings (Eterna) have been available in large parts of Western Europe since long. I got my first recording with Karl Suske already in 1966 (Brandenburg concertos with Gewandhaus Bach orchestra / Helmut Koch).

But knowing communist skills for successful commercial strategies,  I tend to think that recordings from East Germany never were widely available out of the Iron Curtain, excepting - I guess - when it was pursued a propagandistic goal.