What are you listening to now?

[Brian]

Also I'm listening to Mahler 5 (Bernstein, Sony) and I think I can kind of put my finger on why I've been so much less enthusiastic about music lately: it's difficult for me to find anything that equals in emotional intensity all the, uh, falling in love I've been doing over the past month+.   

Hey, congrats, enjoy it!

I find that many of the best days in my life are without any listening time, simply because they're spent with friends and loved ones, or traveling.

[Wanderer]

.[asin]B001UR3A7M[/asin]

[Todd]

[jlaurson]

#morninglistening to #ReWriteofSpring by @AarhusJazzOrch on @dacaporecords. A tribute to S... http://ift.tt/24zO2f4


#morninglistening to #Buxtehude on @challengerec w/#TonKoopman & ABO, one bloody good disc... http://ift.tt/1t39jSi
Organ Works, v.3. You can really hear where Bach got some of his ideas... down to the Passacaglia perhaps.

[Brian]

Giving a first try to this performance of an old favorite work.

[Ken B]

Bits of A Little Night Music by Sondheim. I am going to a performance in Stratford later this month.

[Pat B]

Tchaikovsky: Manfred Symphony (Markevitch). Sounds great so far. H/T to Que for his persistent recommendation.

Giving a first try to this performance of an old favorite work.

Thoughts?

[André]

We might even call it the "Mozart limit" 

Seriously:  lowest-numbered Mozart symphony to which one deliberately returns . . . .

For me it's no. 25. Under that, they are...underage.

[Ken B]

Bartok
Violin Concerto 2
Dumay/Nagano

[André]

Meeting with 4 friends this PM to assess sundry and many versions of Stravinsky's Le Sacre du printemps. One of the guests will bring the Decca 100th Anniversary box (38 versions) and another, Sony's more modest 10 versions box. Considering the scope of what will be on offer, I will bring 2 versions not duplicated in either.

[Pat B]

For me it's no. 25. Under that, they are...underage.

Actually, none of the lower ones are minor.

Ugh. That was bad. Sorry.

[Que]

[

#morninglistening to #Buxtehude on @challengerec w/#TonKoopman & ABO, one bloody good disc... http://ift.tt/1t39jSi
Organ Works, v.3. You can really hear where Bach got some of his ideas... down to the Passacaglia perhaps.

That set is on my wish list!   

We are both Koopman fans...

Q

[Todd]

[Karl Henning]

Meeting with 4 friends this PM to assess sundry and many versions of Stravinsky's Le Sacre du printemps. One of the guests will bring the Decca 100th Anniversary box (38 versions) and another, Sony's more modest 10 versions box. Considering the scope of what will be on offer, I will bring 2 versions not duplicated in either.

My kind of party!

[bhodges]

My kind of party!

Yes, I'd be happy to come to that affair, as well! André, what versions are you pondering?

--Bruce

[jlaurson]

That set is on my wish list!   

We are both Koopman fans...

Q

I like Koopman very much in general -- and Buxtehude deserves precisely this kind of attention. What an astonishing project and result. There really needs to be more fanfare about this achievement. (I'm working on a little such fanfare myself.)

J.Brahms, Ragna Schirmer, Handel Variations, Waltzes, Rhapsodies

I was going to say: "FUNNY! I've just been listening to the very same disc myself!"
But it turns out that I was just listening to Ragna Schirmer's Handel disc, namely the Suite II/1 -- the Aria con variazioni of which is the basis of Brahms' Handel Variations.

[Karl Henning]

Yes, I'd be happy to come to that affair, as well!

Although it is a party which can bring our Neal only pain . . . 

[Brian]

Thoughts?

Slower than the norm, but mostly successfully - lots of attention to dynamics and detail, which can result in some passages sounding otherworldly or Wagnerian. The last 3 movements are even better-played than the first 3. The last 1-2 minutes of "Moldau" are soggy and tired, though (not a problem with Antoni Wit, who's actually slower), and in general balances favor brass over winds, which might or might not be something you like.

[Karl Henning]

Oh, if only Wagner belonged to some other world . . . .

0:)

[Ken B]

Although it is a party which can bring our Neal only pain . . . 

Some pain is earned.