What are you listening 2 now?

[Florestan]

 

IIRC, our @Brian was present in the hall at the recording of the Fifth.

I still haven't listened to that set but all others you mentioned are excellent.

[Mandryka]

Do you really believe that jugglers played their tricks during Mass? What do you think the church was, some sort of circus? 

Absolutely, it would be more surprising if it wasn't a bit raucous and kinky, it's only natural. And there's a shed load of historical evidence -- f.e. a letter from Paris Uni to The King of France, c13


"Priests and clerks may be seen wearing masks and monstrous visages at the hours of office. They dance in the choir dressed as women, or disreputable men, or minstrels. They sing wanton songs. They eat black-puddings at the altar itself, while the celebrant is saying Mass. They play at dice on the altar. They cense "with stinking smoke from the soles of old shoes. They run and leap throughout the church, without a blush at their own shame. Finally they drive about the town and its theatres in shabby carriages and carts and rouse the laughter of their fellows and the bystanders in infamous performances, with indecent gestures and with scurrilous and unchaste word"

[Florestan]

Absolutely, it would be more surprising if it wasn't a bit raucous and kinky, it's only natural. And there's a shed load of historical evidence -- f.e. a letter from Paris Uni to The King of France, c13


"Priests and clerks may be seen wearing masks and monstrous visages at the hours of office. They dance in the choir dressed as women, or disreputable men, or minstrels. They sing wanton songs. They eat black-puddings at the altar itself, while the celebrant is saying Mass. They play at dice on the altar. They cense "with stinking smoke from the soles of old shoes. They run and leap throughout the church, without a blush at their own shame. Finally they drive about the town and its theatres in shabby carriages and carts and rouse the laughter of their fellows and the bystanders in infamous performances, with indecent gestures and with scurrilous and unchaste word"

Source and context, please?

[Mandryka]

Source and context, please?

George Coulton's Medieval Panorama p 606.  The context is a discussion of pagan practices in medieval France.  Paris University was trying to get the King of France to ban it, and he did ban it eventually -- to what extent the practices actually stopped is not clear to me.

[Florestan]

George Coulton's Medieval Panorama p 606.

Thanks, will investigate.

[Todd]

[AnotherSpin]

Absolutely, it would be more surprising if it wasn't a bit raucous and kinky, it's only natural. And there's a shed load of historical evidence -- f.e. a letter from Paris Uni to The King of France, c13


"Priests and clerks may be seen wearing masks and monstrous visages at the hours of office. They dance in the choir dressed as women, or disreputable men, or minstrels. They sing wanton songs. They eat black-puddings at the altar itself, while the celebrant is saying Mass. They play at dice on the altar. They cense "with stinking smoke from the soles of old shoes. They run and leap throughout the church, without a blush at their own shame. Finally they drive about the town and its theatres in shabby carriages and carts and rouse the laughter of their fellows and the bystanders in infamous performances, with indecent gestures and with scurrilous and unchaste word"

It seems there were times when churches were genuinely fun, and people gathered not merely to fork out for the upkeep of a bureaucratic hierarchy utterly divorced from anything divine.

[Spotted Horses]

Hindemith, Sonata for alto saxophone and piano



For whatever reason, didn't make a strong impression. And it is the second time I have encountered a poem spoken in German interrupting the sonata (after the althorn sonata). I think these sonatas for piano and winds are just not my thing.

Then, Cello and piano sonata (1948), the Melnikov collection



I much more attractive work, but I got the impression that the performance left something on the table. Listened to the piece again by Thereen and Pontinen



This one hit the spot. I will have to list to the other selections on this release.

[Wanderer]

No musical instruments are allowed in the church, only voices. Toaca is used in monasteries outside the church to summon monks or nuns to Mass or other divine services.

Oh, that's what they call the semantron in Romanian! 

[ritter]

No musical instruments are allowed in the church, only voices. Toaca is used in monasteries outside the church to summon monks or nuns to Mass or other divine services.

St first I read Tosca, and thought it was a really melodramatic way to summon monks or nuns...

[Linz]

Anton Bruckner Symphony No. 4 in  E  Flat Major: "Romantische", 1880 (aka 1878/80) - Ed. Robert Haas
Wiener Philharmonike, Bernard Haitink

[Karl Henning]

CD 5

Richard Wagner (1813-1883)
Wesendonk-Lieder (1862)
Janet Baker, mezzo

Modest Mussorgsky (1833-1881)
Selections fr. Boris Godunov (1872)
Yi Kwe Sze, bass
The Netherlands Radio Choir

Richard Strauss (1864-1949)
Vier Letzte Lieder (1948)
Elisabeth Söderström, soprano

The Wagner is a first listen, and while I might have been tempted to echo Scrooge's wish that the pleasure had been indefinitely postponed, who could resist Dame Baker?

[Mandryka]

St first I read Tosca, and thought it was a really melodramatic way to summon monks or nuns...

Nu exista sunet mai inaltator ca acesta

[Florestan]

Nu exista sunet mai inaltator ca acesta

Chiar crezi asta? Personal nu sunt un mare fan. 

[Todd]

Revisiting this locally recorded favorite.  Late last year, I attended a wedding at St Stephen, where this was recorded, and had a lengthy chat with the music director of the church.  The wedding had the most lavish music of any wedding I've attended, with the music director playing the organ, and a full choir singing.  It was a proper live performance of multiple works - not a live recording, to be clear - and the processional was not by Wagner, but rather Charpentier.  During the chat, I convinced the music director to introduce some Cristobal de Morales to their repertoire. 

[Linz]

Dmitri Shostakovitch Symphony No. 11 in G minor, Op. 103 'The year 1905'
Dresdner Philharmonie, Michael Sanderling

[JBS]

[brewski]

Listening to Haydn's String Quartet Op. 33, No. 2, "The Joke," performed by the Cong Quartet at Banff, and they are doing some sly work with it.

[Brian]

The string orchestra arrangement of Beethoven Op. 135 really brings out a surprising resemblance between the slow movement here and the slow movement of Mahler's Third.

IIRC, our @Brian was present in the hall at the recording of the Fifth.

I still haven't listened to that set but all others you mentioned are excellent.

Yes, indeed, a most memorable night!

[hopefullytrusting]

Today's a slew of brand, spankin' new Beethoven Op. 109, which only live on because of YouTube.

Erina Ishiyama (2024): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvDrXzNzF-U (spectacular, still need to listen to the rest)

Yağmur Ak (2025): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBJ6oleOn6Q
Nicole Loretan (2025): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HYXspwfLes
Benita Rose (2025): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E43YLLZY_vk