Works You Feel Guilty for Enjoying

[hornteacher]

I got the idea for this thread after I found myself listening to Pappano's recording of the 1812 Overture which includes a full chorus singing the Russian Hymns within the piece.  I enjoyed the recording but felt guilty because 1812 is such a piece of schmaltzy fluff.  Anyone else have similar reactions to other pieces?

[Dundonnell]

Carmina Burana by Carl Orff

It is cheesy too in a way and the critics(used to?) hate it....but it is GREAT fun

[mn dave]

I never understood feeling guilty about music.

[Drasko]

I never understood feeling guilty about music.

What he said.

[Brian]

Works I Do NOT Feel Guilty for Enjoying   :
1812 Overture, Franz von Suppe's overtures, everything by Johann Strauss, Holst's "The Planets", things by Elgar and Khachaturian, Offenbach's "Gaite Parisienne", the Rage over a Lost Penny, the Romanian Rhapsody No 1, the world's worst performance of Also Sprach Zarathustra, and the "Most Unwanted Song".

Works I DO Feel Guilty Enjoying:
"Superbad"  

[Kullervo]

I don't feel guilty about liking anything, but I would have trouble explaining why exactly I enjoy something like, say, "Caribbean Queen" by Billy Ocean, or Scritti Politti's Cupid and Psyche '85. I never have this problem with classical music.

[Symphonien]

Works I Do NOT Feel Guilty for Enjoying   :
... world's worst performance of Also Sprach Zarathustra ...

Now where the hell did that clip come from? They manage to make the bass at the beginning sound like didgeroos and the brass sound like elephants! The rest is too excruciating to listen to...

[Brian]

Now where the hell did that clip come from? They manage to make the bass at the beginning sound like didgeroos and the brass sound like elephants! The rest is too excruciating to listen to...

A public high school in Sweden. From Bjorling's hometown, according to Dundonnell.
I love how even the drums are completely off.

[Ugh!]

Works I Do NOT Feel Guilty for Enjoying  :
the world's worst performance of Also Sprach Zarathustra, and the "Most Unwanted Song".

I am sure this will come across as insane - but I do not feel guilty for stating that it is by far the most exciting rendition of that part of the work I have ever come across, almost Tibetan!

http://www.youtube.com/v/Na7x-CUqNnY

[marvinbrown]

I got the idea for this thread after I found myself listening to Pappano's recording of the 1812 Overture which includes a full chorus singing the Russian Hymns within the piece.  I enjoyed the recording but felt guilty because 1812 is such a piece of schmaltzy fluff.  Anyone else have similar reactions to other pieces?

  Yes and I am going to get crucified for posting this but what you describe above is exactly how I feel about Puccini's Madam Butterfly...... ........

  marvin

[karlhenning]

. . .  I enjoyed the recording but felt guilty because 1812 is such a piece of schmaltzy fluff.

No, what you're guilty of, is of dismissing the 1812 as "a piece of schmaltzy fluff" 

[Tsaraslondon]

I don't feel guilty for enjoying any of the music I like, whether it be Neopolitan song, Barbra Streisand singing Canteloube's Brezairola, or any of the operettas and musical comedies I like. I don't feel guilty for liking Madonna or Robbie Williams, I might feel guilty if I didn't also love and appreciate the music of Verdi, Wagner, Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, and a host of other great composers too numerous to mention, but I make no excuses for the lighter fare that makes its way to my CD player from time to time.

[hornteacher]

No, what you're guilty of, is of dismissing the 1812 as "a piece of schmaltzy fluff" 

I accept that.  How do I get beyond the shameless patriotic "My country kicked your country's rear end, so there." feel to the piece?  Even Tchaikovsky is reported to have said his heart wasn't in it when he wrote it.  How can I approach this music in a different way?

[karlhenning]

I accept that.  How do I get beyond the shameless patriotic "My country kicked your country's rear end, so there." feel to the piece?  Even Tchaikovsky is reported to have said his heart wasn't in it when he wrote it.  How can I approach this music in a different way?

Don't know what to suggest, as I've just always liked the piece (one of the first classical works I was ever aware of).

[The new erato]

I have such impeccabke taste that anything I like is per se worth liking. 

[Bulldog]

What he said.

What they said.

[drogulus]

I accept that.  How do I get beyond the shameless patriotic "My country kicked your country's rear end, so there." feel to the piece?  Even Tchaikovsky is reported to have said his heart wasn't in it when he wrote it.  How can I approach this music in a different way?

     I saw the (not very good) film of War and Peace, and what I got from it is that the Russians didn't feel that they had defeated Napoleon by dint of some national superiority, but rather that they had survived a plague through sheer endurance. I haven't read the book (I don't know why, since I loved Anna Karenina).

[donaldopato]

Bolero... always great fun, always hear something new in the orchestration.

[knight66]

I can't think of anything I feel guilty enjoying. If I liked Andy Williams I would feel guilty about that; but I don't, so I don't.

Mike

[Kuhlau]

No, what you're guilty of, is of dismissing the 1812 as "a piece of schmaltzy fluff" 

Quite so.

FK