What are you listening to now?

[aligreto]

Beethoven: String Quartet Op. 130 [Végh Quartet]....





A performance of magnificent poise and integrity.

[aligreto]

....CD 1 of this set. New acquisition. Recommended by many on GMG, and justified.

A set that is still on my Wish List but will be a definite listening project for 2018.

[Traverso]

Bach

Ton Koopman


 

[Biffo]

Malcolm Arnold: Symphony No 5, Op 74  - Munich Symphony Orchestra conducted by Douglas Bostock - a lively performance, well played; it is a while sine I heard the Sony/Conifer recording from Handley and the RPO so I can't make any comparisons.

[Karl Henning]

On the drive to Alewife this morning:

Сергей Сергеевич [ Sergei Sergeyevich (Prokofiev) ]
Симфония № 6 ми-бемоль минор, соч. 111 [ Symphony № 6 in e^b minor, Opus 111 ] (1947)
BSO
Leinsdorf

[SurprisedByBeauty]

#morninglistening on #EasterSunday: #Wagner's #Parsifal w/@WNOtweet on @WarnerClassics after same @WrStaatsoper.

: http://a-fwd.to/3BUFlAM

w/#ReginaldGoodall, #WaltraudMeier, #DonaldMcIntyre et al.

[Sergeant Rock]

Shostakovich Symphony No.2 B major "To October"...Rostropovich conducting the LSO




Sarge

[ritter]

#morninglistening on #EasterSunday: #Wagner's #Parsifal w/@WNOtweet on @WarnerClassics after same @WrStaatsoper.

: http://a-fwd.to/3BUFlAM

w/#ReginaldGoodall, #WaltraudMeier, #DonaldMcIntyre et al.

How is that, Jens? IIRC, this was Waltraud Meier's first recording of Kundry, a role she would own for some 20 years. I have another Goodall Parsifal, with Jon Vickers and Amy Shuard (live form Covent Garden, on the ROH's now defunct house label). i must confess it's possibly the worst recording of the opera I have ever encountered...

[aligreto]

Beethoven: Violin Sonata No. 5 Op. 24 "Spring" [Dumay/Joao Pires]....

[RebLem]

On Sunday, April Fools Day, 2018, I listened to 5 complete CDs + one performance from another.


1)  CD 8 in the 10 CD SONY set entitled "Leopold Stokowski: The Columbia Stereo Recordings."  |Tr. 1-11.  P.I. Tchaikovsky (1840-93):  The Sleeping Beauty, Op. 66 (1889): Aurora's Wedding (42'56)--National Philharmonic Orch., rec. West Ham Central Mission, London, 24-25, 27 MAY 1976.

This is grand, glorious music.  Somehow, I could not escape feeling the ending couple movements would have made a great, alternate score for the scene at the end of one of the Star Wars movies where the three heroes are ushered into Princess Leia's throne room to be honored and decorated.  It is grand and magisterial.


2)  Don Gillis (1912-78):  |Tr. 1.  Twinkletoes (1956) (4'33)  |Tr. 2.  Rhapsody for Harp & orch. (1953) (14'56)  |Tr. 3-5.  Piano Concerto 1 "The Encore Concerto" (1956) (18'24)  |Tr. 6.  Short Overture to an Unwritten Opera (1945) (4'21)  |Tr. 7.  Rhapsody for Trumpet & Orch. (1970) (17'51)--Ian Hobson, cond. (& pianist in the concerto), Sinfonia Varsovia, Anna Sikorzak-Olek, harp (Tr. 2), Kryzsztof Bednarczyk, trumpet.  An Albany Records CD.  Rec, in Studio S1 of Polish Radio 6 JAN 2007 (Tr. 2), 7 JAN 2007 (Trs. 1, 3-6), & 21 APR 2007 (Tr. 7).

This is the last of my current stash of CDs of the music of Don Gillis.  I may purchase others later, but this is it for the time being. 

At some point, Gillis conceived of the idea of writing a ballet about a young, crippled girl whose dream of becoming a ballerina is brought to life by a new surgical procedure.  He began work on it, but eventually thought that the plot was too unoriginal, and he abandoned the idea.  But, he did gather together the music he had already written for it, and presented it as the present piece, "Twinkletoes."  He intended it as a counterpoint to his cowboy related music in works like Shindig and Portrait of a Prairie Town, to show that he was capable of writing tender, introspective music, too.  Gillis said that the idea came to him as a result of his travels as recording engineer on a Far Eastern tour with the Symphony of the Air, successor to the NBC Symphony.  His ballerina idea involved  the desire to travel the world as a big part of the girl's motivation.

Gillis wrote the harp rhapsody in 1953 and dedicated it to Edward Vito, the NBC Symphony's harpist.  Gillis conducted it himself with the NBC  Summer Symphony 20 JUN 1953 along with two others of his works.  Critical opinion was divided.  Harold C Schonberg in the NYT wrote that Gillis "has little to say but says it at great length and very loudly."  Others disagreed.

A couple of anecdotes appear in the accompanying booklet explaining why Gillis wrote the first of his two piano concerti.  They are, in some respects, contradictory, but they have some common elements:  he heard pianists in casual conversation at dinner parties complaining of the dearth of short concerti that could be paired with a short Mozart concerto, so the pianist could play two short works instead of one long one, and still fill out half a symphony program.  My mind immediately went to the Prokofiev 1, 3, 4, & 5, especially the 1st, which is the shortest of them, but it apparently did not occur to Gillis or his pianist friends.  At any rate, he decided to write a short concerto to help meet these pianists' needs, but, he says, in one of the stories, "it was greeted with all the enthusiasm usually reserved for a slow trip to the gallows."  And, if I may say so, it is no wonder why.  This is the simplest, least complicated, least sophisticated, and most repetitive of the works on this disc.  It is sprightly, and dumbly opitimistic and cheerful, but there is little here in the way of thematic development.

Even the liner notes here concede that the title of the "overture" is a joke.  "With no hint of arias, love songs, or even comical turns to come, this piece clearly isn't, nor was it ever truly intended as, an opera overture.  It is barely an overture at all, to anything.  But, it is short.  An unassuming ball of energy, it simply opens, closes, and gets perforated with a sassy Latin motif.  An airy pastoral section, virtually lifted from the opening movement of Gillis's First Symphony, makes two brief appearances.  And at the very end, a neat contrivance: a sudden hush, a slithery slide in the violins, than bang!--its over."

The Trumpet Rhapsody was written for Carl Hilding "Doc" Severinsen (born July 7, 1927)--yes, the same guy who was Johnny Carson's bandleader for many years.  He premiered it with something called the Dal-Hi Symphony in Dallas on 23 MAY 1970.

This is much better than the two previous works.  It is four linked episodes, which carry the trumpet into extremes of range and expressivity.  It begins with a burst of energetic music that patches the episodes together, in accelerates from the langour of blues into a klezmer-ish C Minor quiickstep, transforms into pop lyricism, and ends with a blend of martial tattoos, Latin rhythms, and melismatic flashiness.


3)  CD 6 of the 8  CD Warner Classics set entitled "Annie Fischer: The Complete London Studio Recordings."  |Franz Schubert (1797-1828):  |Tr. 1.  Impromptu in A Flat, D. 935 # 2 (7'23)  |Tr. 2.  Impromptu in F Minor, D 935 # 4 (5'51)  |Tr. 3-6.  Piano Sonata in B Flat Major, D 960 (33'19)  |Tr. 7-9.  Robert Schumann (1810-56): Fantasy in C Major, Op. 17 (29'00).--Rec. Abbey Rd Studio 3, 12 NOV 1960 (Tr. 1-2), 30 MAY & 1-2 JUN 1960 (Tr. 3-6), 12 OCT 1958 & 5 FEB 1959 (Tr. 7-9).  Lic. from EMI.

I went to Amazon to read the nine reviews there of this set, to try to find the words I needed to express my inchoate feelings about these peformances.  I was not particularly successful; nothing I read quite captured the feeling I got from these performances.  I felt, listening to this disc, like a small child in the hands of someone he knows loves him and has has and the composer's interests at heart, trying to introduce you to him, so you too can be a friend of the composer.  Fischer just lets the music speak for itself, she opens it up for you, like a wonderful book by a very wise author.  And we also feel a sense of intimate connection with Fischer, too, in whom we have supreme confidence and a sense of comfort brought on by the sense of collegiality she conveys, saying, "I am a personal friend of Schubert and Schumann, and I want to introduce you to them, because I just know we can all be close friends."  She is a master, loving and embracing and warm.


4)  Joan Tower (b. 1938):  |Tr. 1.  Night Fields (1994) (15'37)--The Muir String Quartet (Bayla Keyes, 1st violin, Peter Zazofsky, 2nd violin, Steven Ansell, viola, Michael Reynold, cello) 
|Tr. 2.  Snow Dreams (1983)  (19'14)--Carol Wincenc, flute, Sharon Isbin, guitar.   
|Tr. 3.  Black Topaz (1976) (13'09)--Laura Flax, clarinet, Patricia Spencer, flute, Jonathan Haas, Deborah Moore, percussion, Stephen Gosling, piano, Mike Powell, trombone, Chris Gekker, trumpet.
|Tr. 4.  Tres Lent (in memoriam Olivier Messiaen) (1994) (8'28)--Andre Emelianoff, cello, Joan Tower, piano.
|Tr. 5.  Stepping Stones (1993) (19'04)--Double Edge (duo pianists Edmund Niemann & Nurit Tilles)
A New World Records CD rec. @ American Academy of Arts & Letters, NYC 26-28 SEP 1994. 

I thought it might be interesting to let Joan Tower speak for herself, not particularly about these works, but about music in general, and her love of chamber music and chamber musicians in general.  After the first talk, there is a commercial, and then another talk.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrzVchdRdSY


5)  W.A. Mozart (1756-91):  Symphony 41 in C Major, K. 551 "Jupiter" (1788) (28'06)--Georg Solti, cond., Chicago Symphony Orch..  Live performance in Orchestra Hall, Chicago, 18 MAY 1978.  From CD 2 of Vol. 6 in the CSO's limited edition "From the Archives" series.  Vol 6 is devoted entirely to the music of Mozart. 

I suppose the CSO chose to issue this particular box to counter the usual perception that the CSO is fine with the late romantics, but a little slack when it comes to anything before Beethoven.  And many have the same perception of Solti, associated, as he is, with the music of Wagner and Strauss.  But let us remember that The Marriage of Figaro was the very first work he ever conducted anywhere, that he has recorded 4 of  the last 5 Mozart operas, and others as well, as well as a Mozart chamber music record on which he serves as pianist.  And he also recorded all the Haydn London Symphonies, though not with the CSO.

I find this to be a fine, elegant, and masterful performance.


6)  W.A. Mozart (1756-91):  Tr. 1-4.  Sym. in D Major, K. 97 (73m) (10'42)  |Tr. 5-8.  Sym. in D Major (73n) (11'46)  |Tr. 9-11.  Sym. 11 in D Major, K. 84 (74q) (9'27)  |Tr. 12-15.  Sym. in B Flat Major, K. Anh. 216 (C11.03) (13'53)  |Tr. 16-19.  Sym. in F Major, K. 75 (14'16)  |Tr. 20-23.  Sym. in C Major, K. 96 (111b) (14'04)--Trevor Pinnock, cond., The English Concert.  Rec. Henry Wood Hall, London, 1, 5, 6, & 9/1992.

More stylish noodling.  You know, I wish more conductors would just stay away from complete sets of things unless they make sense.  The Hogwood set, which is more complete than any and is a real work of scholarship, which contains everything that even smelled a little like a fragment of a symphony, is something every Mozart lover should have as a reference set--and they're damn good performances, in the bargain.  But all these other sets, which purport to be complete, but aren't quite if you get down to the little niggling bits, are really not necessary.  This Pinnock set at least is very stylish, but if you listen to the Mackerras set for example, which I bought mostly because his 1966 recording of Handel's Messiah strikes me as the greatest recording ever made of that work, seems perverse to me.  Every little piece has a certain sense of urgency about it, as if every musician in the orchestra were trying to hold back a strong desire to pee. 

This applies to lots of other composers, too.  How many people, for example, are really interested in buying complete sets of the Dvorak symphonies that include the first four?  Why don't more conductors just record the last five, the ones people really like, the ones written after Dvorak had found his voice?

[San Antone]

Walter Gieseking : Complete Bach Recordings | CD1, Partitas

Excellent.

[Todd]

Alicia de Larrocha's style.  With the mikes picking up some breathing and vocalizing, Larrocha opens the Adagio at a lovely tempo that is neither too fast nor too slow.  Her touch is subtle.  Her tone is lovely, with a few tinges of attractive brightness.  Her ornamentation is eminently tasteful, which ends up being the best overall word to describe the sonata.  The minuets are likewise played with the same combination of traits, with well judged rhythmic sense tossed in, though one may (or may not) want more pronounced left hand playing.  The Allegro is light and elegant and quite lovely. 

[Florestan]

In another thread Louis Spohr was offered as an example of a "mediocre composer of too many symphonies". I strongly object to this notion: nine published symphonies are not too many, nor is he a mediocre composer. On the contrary, his symphonic output is original, witty, full of interesting ideas and arresting moments. His orchestration is colorful and effective and he had an obvious gift for catchy, expansive and uplifting tunes.

The piano trios show his lyrical, poetic, intimate side; the instruments are treated equally and blend in the most felicitous manner, passion and sensibility abound and there are stunning moments, as the Scherzo of the first Trio, which sounds almost like a tango.

Highly recommended.

[Traverso]

Alicia de Larrocha's style.  With the mikes picking up some breathing and vocalizing, Larrocha opens the Adagio at a lovely tempo that is neither too fast nor too slow.  Her touch is subtle.  Her tone is lovely, with a few tinges of attractive brightness.  Her ornamentation is eminently tasteful, which ends up being the best overall word to describe the sonata.  The minuets are likewise played with the same combination of traits, with well judged rhythmic sense tossed in, though one may (or may not) want more pronounced left hand playing.  The Allegro is light and elegant and quite lovely.

I have the recordings she made for Decca, how are these RCA recordings compared with the older ones? I like the way she plays Mozart and off course the Spanish repertoire.

[Harry]

In another thread Louis Spohr was offered as an example of a "mediocre composer of too many symphonies". I strongly object to this notion: nine published symphonies are not too many, nor is he a mediocre composer. On the contrary, his symphonic output is original, witty, full of interesting ideas and arresting moments. His orchestration is colorful and effective and he had an obvious gift for catchy, expansive and uplifting tunes.

The piano trios show his lyrical, poetic, intimate side; the instruments are treated equally and blend in the most felicitous manner, passion and sensibility abound and there are stunning moments, as the Scherzo of the first Trio, which sounds almost like a tango.

Highly recommended.

Agreed to both CD'S and many more of his compositions. People that say he is mediocre are musical nitwits.

[Traverso]

Bach Cantatas

[Florestan]

Agreed to both CD'S and many more of his compositions.

I am familiar primarily with his exquisite violin concertos but I plan to explore his symphonic and chamber output in-depth.

Btw, Joachim Raff was also nominated in the same "mediocre composer" category . If his other symphonies are on a par with "Lenore", the only one I am familiar with, then this is another injustice.

[Harry]

I am familiar primarily with his exquisite violin concertos but I plan to explore his symphonic and chamber output in-depth.

Btw, Joachim Raff was also nominated in the same "mediocre composer" category . If his other symphonies are on a par with "Lenore", the only one I am familiar with, then this is another injustice.

Raff is also a favourite composer in my book, I have virtually all that was recorded.
His symphonies are all gorgeous. Have them all, luckily.
I give those people who rate such composers mediocre, 5 rotten tomatoes.

[Todd]

I have the recordings she made for Decca, how are these RCA recordings compared with the older ones?

I haven't heard her Decca Mozart sonata recordings, so I don't know.

[aligreto]

Rautavaara: String Quintet [Jean Sibelius Quartet/Gustafsson]....





First listen to this work and I liked it.