What are you listening 2 now?

[aligreto]

Try the free download Stockhausen remixes on here http://centrebombe.org/remixed.html  .

Thank you for that. I will investigate later.

[Tsaraslondon]

Disc 1

La Mer
Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune
Jeux

New Philharmonia Orchestra - Pierre Boulez.

This is an early Japanese transfer to CD of Boulez's CBS Debussy recordings. They are models of clarity, but I've always found them a little chilly and lacking in atmosphere.

[steve ridgway]

Nono: Works for Soprano and Orchestra.

[asin] B000025RHQ[/asin]

[Mirror Image]

Fun stuff.

Yes, indeed. I enjoyed Trouble in Tahiti quite a lot when I revisited about a week or so ago.

[Mirror Image]

Bernstein: Symphonic Dances from West Side Story. I'd forgotten just how good this work is:

+1 Vandermolen.  It was this recording that blew me away and made me aware of Bernstein as a composer and West Side as a show.  I remember they played this version one Saturday morning on Radio 3 - probably some time in the mid 70's and I was knocked out.  Saved up my pennies and went to Rushworth's in Liverpool and bought this LP;



Odd how familiar this cover is.  Also odd - and I've never understood why - on this version the orchestra don't shout "Mambo" - perhaps CBS thought it was a tad too populist!  Every other performance I know includes the shout - and it is in the score.

Great stuff, gents! Roasted Swan you bring up an interesting point about the shout of Mambo in the early Bernstein recording. I never really noticed it until about a week ago when I revisited this particular performance. Too populist? That very well could be, but this doesn't deter me from the magnificence of Bernstein's way with the music and it appears that you share the same sentiment.

[Traverso]

I think that I might need something stronger"

that sounds disturbing 

[Mirror Image]

Funny enough Jeffrey, Bernstein's music leaves me stone cold. Could not explain this sentiment though.

This is interesting to me as you praise a lot of unknown composers (and many of them are unknown for good reason), but you can't muster up the strength to get inside of Bernstein's own music? If you like Mahler, Stravinsky, and jazz and like these ingredients shook up together to create an explosive cocktail, then Bernstein is your man.

[Mandryka]

Op 111

He can do something which I really like: he can play lightly, impishly, playfully. This is a real saving grace, and makes the performance memorable. It also made me curious about what he does with op 106/i.


A callow interpretation. The first movement made me think of something by Liszt, in my book that's not a complement. Still, the light mischievous sounding  playing and the original approach made it at least interesting. The second movement seemed a fairly middle of the road interpretation, clearly executed at a professional concert pianist's level, but for me just now it didn't really create much by way of tension and release, so it kind of fell slightly flat, a non-event. I know if it were a concert I would enjoy, clap, and immediately forget. Or rather forget everything except the light and glittering sound he can make.

The piano is a bit hard and tends to be balanced towards higher registers, a pure sound, not a sound rich in overtones. I suspect this is a property of the instrument and performer more than the studio engineer. When he plays loud he can (not always) make an unpleasant hard tone.

[aligreto]

Tchaikovsky: Violin Concerto [Chung/Dutoit]





I prefer her earlier version under Previn; more youthful exuberance and dynamic energy.

[aligreto]

that sounds disturbing 

Not as much as the music 

[Traverso]

Not as much as the music 

[aligreto]

Respighi: Pines of Rome [Maazel]


   


For me this is a very fine performance of this work. It is rich in texture and it is a very powerful presentation overall.

[Symphonic Addict]

Delighted and surprised by the quality of these works. Cilea's Sonata is an amiable and kind of joyful work with much lyricism and some tuneful moments. The Petrassi (Preludio, Aria e Finale) is amazing, and sounds inescapably to Hindemith, although nothing wrong with that. Finally, Sandro Fuga's 1st Cello Sonata features quite eloquent and deep passages that will surely touch some fiber on you. The 1st movement is magnificent in my view. Strong finds, mostly the Petrassi and Fuga.

[Maestro267]

Vaughan Williams: Symphony No. 6
Bournemouth SO/Bakels

Tippett: Piano Concerto
Ogdon (piano)/Philharmonia Orchestra/C. Davis

Butterworth: Symphony No. 1
Munich SO/Bostock

[aligreto]

Schubert: Die Schone Mullerin [Fischer-Dieskau/Moore]





The Fischer-Dieskau/Moore partnership was such a very fine and mutually complementary one.

[j winter]

Excellent, as is all of the series I've heard...

[André]

[SonicMan46]

Well, today and likely tomorrow, I'll be spending time w/ the composer below:

Czerny, Carl (1791-1857) - own just a dozen discs or so - first 4 up for a listen below - his list of compositions adds up to 861 Opus numbers, but many have multiple items and he also has 'unpublished' works - Dave

Carl Czerny (21 February 1791 – 15 July 1857) was an Austrian composer, teacher, and pianist of Czech origin whose vast musical production amounted to over a thousand works. His books of studies for the piano are still widely used in piano teaching. He was also noted as one of the few pupils of Ludwig Van Beethoven. (Source)

     

[vandermolen]

Heart warming memory. You surely treasure this.

Oh most definitely my friend! He actually sent me two cards one thanking me for the 'high opinion' I had of his Third Symphony and he said that he'd forwarded it 'to that fine conductor Martin Yates' who conducted those Dutton releases.

[vandermolen]

Previn playing Gershwin with the LSO.

I liked that old HMV series. Now they only seem to do the most popular classics on their own label. That fine old series included things like Dilkes's Moeran, Bax and Ireland CD and the  CD release of Gibson's VW Symphony 5 and Berglund's VW Symphony 6.