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Post by jk on Nov 14, 2020 8:55:36 GMT -5
Time for another work from the man in my avatar. I heard Buxtehude's " Jesu, meines Lebens Leben" this morning on Dutch classical radio, in the version linked below. This is for JH, who eased me onto the Baroque trail at the end of last year:
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Post by jk on Dec 28, 2020 6:17:43 GMT -5
It was posting Hindemith's concerto in the viola thread that reminded me that I still had to post his Concertino for Trautonium and Strings on this forum. To quote commenter Alcaeus89's wry description, "this is such a wonderfully weird piece. Like being serenaded by a banana". en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trautonium
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Post by jk on Jan 8, 2021 11:56:12 GMT -5
This is for littlesurfer, who first linked part of this legendary 1958 performance in the "Brian Wilson Hymn Book" thread and whose departure still troubles me; and for a good friend of mine who suffered a very recent loss: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concerto_for_Two_Violins_(Bach)
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Post by jk on Jan 9, 2021 6:11:47 GMT -5
It's that day again... January 9th 1905 is the fateful day in Russian history when soldiers of the Imperial Guard fired upon unarmed demonstrators marching on the Winter Palace in St Petersburg, killing several hundred of them. Shostakovich commemorates it in the second movement of his Eleventh Symphony (1957), although it is more likely a depiction of the then recent crushing of the Hungarian Revolution by Soviet troops. This is the complete symphony performed by the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra under Shostakovich's favourite conductor Yevgeny Mravinsky. This must be the recording made in 1959, on 2 November it would seem (not 1967, as stated by the uploader). Important note: Play at a reasonable volume -- much of the first movement is very quiet and, more importantly, you may otherwise miss the deathly hush (here at 30:04) in the second movement. I. The Palace Square II. The 9th of January (starts 15:33) III. Eternal Memory (starts 34:01) IV. Tocsin (Alarm) (starts 45:48) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._11_(Shostakovich)
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Post by jk on Jan 10, 2021 16:42:52 GMT -5
While at a low point a couple of days ago I happened upon this two-piano score of an obscure concerto by a Belgian composer, Arthur De Greef (1862–1940). His is a new name to me -- a composer who seems to have had quite a reputation in the world of late 19th-century piano music but is lost from view today. A pity, as the piano concerto in question (No. 1 in C Minor, 1914) is an engaging work and as such helped to cheer me up no end. Warning to score readers: the piano part is the very devil to follow at times! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_De_Greef_(composer)
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Post by jk on Jan 12, 2021 16:40:29 GMT -5
Doing some research for a post elsewhere devoted to Erik Satie's Socrate (1917–18), I discovered the remarkable woman who commissioned it, the seriously wealthy Princesse Edmund de Polignac (1865–1943). Born Winnaretta Singer, she used her fortune to benefit not just the arts but all aspects of life. One of the many other musical works she commissioned was Francis Poulenc's Concerto for Organ, Timpani and Strings (1934–38), a great favourite of mine that I don't believe has been posted here yet. I regard the 1961 recording of this thrilling work by organist Maurice Duruflé with the Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire conducted by Georges Prêtre as definitive:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_Concerto_(Poulenc)en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnaretta_Singer
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Post by jk on Jan 16, 2021 13:38:05 GMT -5
I unearthed this a couple of years back on "my" hobby forum and decided it was too good to deny you folks. It's Bach's Goldberg Variations and, well... uploader Christopher Kullenberg describes it best: For some wednesday fun, I had my machines work for me to record the Goldberg variations. Maybe this interpretation is along the lines of Leibniz. Or, more likely, it is just for fun Beware of strange sound bumps, my old Juno 106 has rather worn down electronics that crack and detune at times (not to be confused with the crazy portamento), and my computer is sometimes too slow to process real-time data over MIDI.
Harmonic modulation: J. S. Bach / Laws of Nature. Envelope generation: Linux RT Kernel, MIDI. Timbral modulation: Roland Juno 106 - Filter/Cutoff/LFO/Portamento. Effects: Electro Harmonix Delay, Ardour2 Stereo Reverb.
Everything was recorded in one take so there are some sloppy glitches here and there. Also, the levels of the analog Juno are rather unpredictable, so the recording is a bit uneven at times.
He's not kidding. I'll just add that it reminds me of old JSB running in some cross-country marathon, where he often has to squelch through fields of mud and occasionally ends up flat on his face. This really is worth a listen -- it will make you smile and even laugh outright at times. I can't recommend it highly enough: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldberg_Variations
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Post by jk on Jan 25, 2021 17:12:43 GMT -5
I heard this delightful piece on Dutch classical radio this morning and was a little surprised to learn that it was by Haydn. It's the opening movement of his Symphony No. 15 in D Major. The opening adagio with its evocative horn calls is sheer magic: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._15_(Haydn)
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Post by jk on Jan 27, 2021 5:20:56 GMT -5
For well over half a century, Pfitzner was just a name I used to see opposite Palestrina in lists at the back of miniature scores. Yesterday I heard the opening prelude to Hans Pfitzner's opera Palestrina (premiered 1917) and had to hear more. Here are the opera's three preludes to each of the three acts, performed by Orchester der Deutschen Oper Berlin conducted by Christian Thielemann. (I've taken the liberty of reproducing the entire YouTube blurb by uploader G.B.N., as it's too good to lose to the vagaries of the world wide web.) I. Ruhig - Andante II. Mit Wucht und Wildheit [starts at 7:32] III. Langsam, sehr getragen [starts at 14:21] en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestrina_(opera)Palestrina is Pfitzner’s masterwork, and the preludes are probably some of the finest passages of the opera. Logic suggests that these Preludes represent the best music Pfitzner ever wrote, which is partly true. They certainly are the most often performed pieces by Pfitzner and show us Pfitzner at his most versatile and refreshing. What makes them appealing as concert pieces is the logic they share as a self-sufficient collection. Throughout them we can appreciate Pfitzner’s harmonic ingenuity, as well as his sense of pragmatic, austere, yet highly effective orchestration. He’s no Strauss or Mahler, more like Reger or Brahms, yet he’s still able to reach some very original soundscapes throughout. The first prelude, which is the opening to the drama, starts quite uniquely. Flutes doubled by solo violins enter with a rising interval getting progressively larger. The lowest voice is held as if it were an organ, and the voices stack onto each other creating unique sonorities. The textures suggest the polyphonic tradition of the late renaissance although the contrapuntal logic is obviously very modern. Throughout this entire prelude Pfitzner's harmony is dictated by the logic of the independent voices, which leads to peculiar sonorities, parallel fifths, fourths, harsh dissonances, all of which are treated with exquisite delicacy. Thielemann takes this entire piece a tad more slowly than other recordings (check Keilberth’s historic production – he devised the current 1963 score under the direct guidance of Pfitzner himself), which lends an almost ethereal quality to the high melodies, and a very free sense of tactus. This section is repeated in clarinets and violas (d'amour!), and a choral is presented in the flute, in a more rhythmically clear manner. This section ends with a very personal closing gesture: syncopated quarter notes and a sixteenth-note flourish, which throughout the opera stands pretty much as Palestrina's signature. A timpani roll and a single low D introduce a desolate falling melody in the violins. More instruments join the mass, and the closing gesture is heard again. A dramatic moment is introduced at 05:17, with the thundering roll of the timpani: both themes, the long rising plainchant and the more fluent, falling melody, are combined in a passage full of sorrow and desperation. The flute choral returns. Pfitzner's original prelude linked directly to the main plot here, introducing some very interesting improvisations on the viola and clarinet, but in setting these as standalone pieces, he modified the ending of this prelude including the closing bars of the actual opera, which ends with the signature gesture. The second prelude starts out as quite the opposite of the first: a stormy, furious, and chromatic moto perpetuo signaled by the opening call of the six horns. The trumpets menacingly suggest another motive, the inverse of the horn call until they present it in its full with trombones, in a genius passage. The first section seems to be based mostly on this chromatic ostinato and this insistent motive. It's an unwieldy beast, that retorts in almost atonality. Slowly after a final entrance of the trumpets and an explosion it melts away into an ample melody in the mass of the woodwinds, an elaboration of this first theme. The music seems to halt for a short instance before a monumental climax is reached at 11:11, where Pfitzner instructs the conductor to beat in groups of three bars, that is to say, periodically. The whole orchestra is involved here, like a massive full organ. The lament of the first prelude appears later on as the main melody. Everything cools down, an ominous figure in the low brass emerges slowly, like the shadow of a giant snake. Suddenly, the horns introduce the first theme again and the piece ends abruptly. The third and final prelude is a slow and gentle thing, almost as if the previous one had drained all the energy out of us. It starts softly in the strings, with an expressive downward phrase in the violas, and a countersubject of insistent quarter notes that is going to permeate throughout the entire piece. The mood is reminiscent of the most pious Wagner. The entrance of the horns and woodwinds creates an ample space, like a dome. After a while, a single, simple melody line in the clarinet suspended over a web of strings initiates a new section. The motive is imitated in other voices, and the texture thickens. We reach a fully passionate highpoint with the persistent quarter notes in tenuto as the accompaniment. It all subdues and Pfitzner seems to want to return to the original material, but everything is compressed here and we quickly return to the cantilena-like melody in flutes and clarinets. There's some more meandering by the orchestra until all dies down in the somber key of Bb minor.
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Post by jk on Jan 29, 2021 10:19:17 GMT -5
Since abandoning my two topics on women composers, I have been obliged to take another tack. This came to me on a plate courtesy of a statement made in 1990 by the Russian composer Galina Ustvolskaya when turning down an invitation to attend a concert held by the Women's Composer Institute of Heidelberg that included her fourth symphony: "With regard to the 'Women's Composer Music Festival', I would like to say the following: Can a distinction between music written by men and music written by women really be made? If we now have 'Music Festivals of women composers', would not it be right to have 'Music Festivals of male composers'? I am of the opinion that such a division should not be allowed to persist. We should only play music that is genuine and strong. If we are honest in that, an interpretation in a concert of women composers is a humiliation for music. I sincerely hope that my comments do not offend anyone, what I say comes from my innermost being." With that in mind, here is the Icelandic composer Veronique Vaka (born 1986) with an impressive piece of musical landscape painting called Lendh (2018), of which the composer says: "This musical composition is an expression of what I see, hear and feel in unspoiled nature: a poetic linkage of the senses. The inspiration and guide for the work is the geothermal area in Krýsuvík. I have analysed the geologic and geographic features of the area and transformed the landscape as I perceive it into musical notation. From that abstract representation, time progression and structural events of the work evolve." It is played here by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra conducted by Daníel Bjarnason: www.veroniquevaka.com
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Post by jk on Feb 9, 2021 16:26:18 GMT -5
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Post by jk on Mar 1, 2021 7:53:25 GMT -5
Hector Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique is a staple concert closer and deservedly so. However, its sequel, Lélio, subtitled "Le retour à la vie" (the return to life), is scarcely if ever heard these days. Maybe its format -- six sections of music for various combinations of voices and instruments interspersed with dramatic spoken texts -- is an obstacle to its performance. There's also the dilemma of the language of those spoken passages: a translation from the original French into English would increase its understanding but lessen its dramatic impact. Here are two musical excerpts from Lélio, performed by the John Alldis Choir and the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by the great Berlioz interpreter Sir Colin Davis. First, the second musical section, "Choeur d'Ombres" (chorus of shades): And second, the thrilling sixth piece (the finale, to all intents and purposes), "Fantaisie sur 'La Tempête' de Shakespeare", with its (for Berlioz) unique instance of an orchestral piano, here played à quatre mains: www.hberlioz.com/Special/abailey.htm en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lélio
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Post by jk on Apr 11, 2021 16:30:38 GMT -5
Obadiah Shuttleworth (died 1734) is a name straight out of a Charles Dickens novel. Apparently all that remains of his musical output are two Concerti Grossi [regrettably no longer available on YouTube] both of them arrangements of music by Arcangelo Corelli. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obadiah_Shuttleworth
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Post by jk on Apr 20, 2021 3:56:48 GMT -5
I saw a performance of the first movement (Allegro) of this Vivaldi concerto (RV 237) on Dutch telly last Sunday and was blown away by how the lower parts drop out from time to time, leaving the upper strings arpeggiating all over the place. And then back they come, to stunning effect. (It reminds me of what happens in The Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again".) It's great fun grappling with this autograph score (a little coffee helps): en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Vivaldi
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Post by jk on Apr 30, 2021 3:46:08 GMT -5
Besides being a multi-instrumentalist, Georg Philipp Telemann (1681–1767) clearly had a sense of humour. His Intrada–Suite for Two Violins in D (published 1728/29) is "generally known as Gulliver Suite, but there is no reference to the novel in the manuscript. The connection becomes all too obvious in the titles of the various movements, though. After an intrada we hear a Lilliputsche Chaconne which must be the shortest chaconne in history: just 26 seconds. It is largely notated in hemidemisemiquavers (1/64) and quarter demisemiquavers (1/128), which suits the tiny size of the Lilliputians. The plump gigue which follows it effectively portrays the giants of Brobdingnag." [ Source] Here are the chaconne and gigue in question: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Philipp_Telemann
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Post by jk on May 13, 2021 3:04:33 GMT -5
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Post by jk on Jun 3, 2021 15:51:17 GMT -5
Twenty-five years ago I visited the Italian city of Florence. I'd forgotten most of the trip until I unearthed a diary from that year which included a flyer for an organ concert given there on 20 October 1996. The organist was Maurelli Francesco, who is nowhere to be found on the internet. Although the bulk of the programme was taken up with Bach, it closed with a chorale by Franck and opened with the Praeludium in G Minor (BuxWV 149) by our old friend Buxtehude. Who would have thought that a quarter of a century later he would be a musical hero of mine. This is for JH, who gently but firmly pointed me down the Baroque road two years ago. The organist is Michael Farris: www.sfsymphony.org/Data/Event-Data/Program-Notes/B/Buxtehude-Praeludium-in-G-minor-BuxWV-149
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Post by jk on Jun 14, 2021 6:06:24 GMT -5
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barnsy
Kahuna
Posts: 186
Likes: 278
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Post by barnsy on Jun 21, 2021 12:28:38 GMT -5
For me one of the most majestic sights at a concert featuring a full orchestra is the violins all frantically bowing in unison. One of my favourite pieces, Mozart's Symphony No.31 ("Paris"), had this when I saw it live and you can get a taste of it in this recent spirited performance by young musicians from the Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic (the founder of this Academy, Herbert von Karajan, had been a Nazi Party member though he was cleared of illegal activity - if you'd rather avoid).
My favourite rendering of it is one conducted by Otto Klemperer, the audio of which can be heard at
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Post by jk on Jun 24, 2021 16:06:59 GMT -5
For me one of the most majestic sights at a concert featuring a full orchestra is the violins all frantically bowing in unison. One of my favourite pieces, Mozart's Symphony No.31 ("Paris"), had this when I saw it live and you can get a taste of it in this recent spirited performance by young musicians from the Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic (the founder of this Academy, Herbert von Karajan, had been a Nazi Party member though he was cleared of illegal activity - if you'd rather avoid). I didn’t know that about Karajan but it's okay -- those were tricky times. Back in the mid '60s I bought an LP of music by Richard Strauss conducted by Karajan for side one, which combined two favourites, Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks and the "Dance Of The Seven Veils" from Salome. But it was side two that really took my fancy. Released in March 1961, this is Karajan's take on Strauss’s intensely moving Death and Transfiguration played here by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_and_Transfiguration
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Post by jk on Jun 28, 2021 11:27:36 GMT -5
I heard another movement from this work this morning on UK classical radio and was intrigued by the Guernsey connection. We visited this second largest of the Channel Islands on at least three occasions in the early years of the previous decade. Once again, the YouTube blurb is sufficient: "John Ireland completed 'Sarnia', a suite of three pieces, in 1941 and it was to be his last major piano work. The music was inspired by his short-lived residence in Guernsey, an island that he loved, and Ireland's sense of the past is reflected in his use of the Roman name for Guernsey - 'Sarnia'. "The third movement 'Song of the Springtides' carries a quotation from the poet Algernon Swinburne: 'Upon the flowery forefront of the year/One wandering by the grey-green April sea .../Along the foam-flowered strand/Breeze-brightened... ' The piano writing is colourful and brilliant, almost Debussy-like in its evocation of the sea. "Eric Parkin, who studied Ireland's music with the composer, made this recording of 'Sarnia' in 1978." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guernsey
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Post by jk on Jul 5, 2021 15:25:57 GMT -5
Shamefully, this legendary version of Carl Nielsen's Fifth Symphony (1922) has yet to be transferred to CD. Recorded in 1969 for the Unicorn label by Jascha Horenstein and the New Philharmonia Orchestra, this may well be its first appearance on YouTube. In this electrifying performance of Nielsen's greatest symphony, snare drummer Alfred Dukes takes up with a vengeance the composer's challenge to improvise "as if at all costs he wants to stop the progress of the orchestra" with a terrifying salvo of rim shots in one of the most stunning passages in recorded 20th-century orchestral music (beginning at 14:20). But please, listen to the first movement in its entirety -- this is some of the most startlingly original and affecting music ever composed: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._5_(Nielsen)
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Post by jk on Jul 30, 2021 6:33:40 GMT -5
The only isolated movement from Brahms's Symphony No. 3 I'd ever heard on the radio was the "listener-friendly" third in 3/8 time -- until now. This is the finale, in the version I heard this morning performed by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra under Robin Ticciati. A stormy, troubled affair, it ends in a blaze of evening sunshine: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._3_(Brahms)
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Post by jk on Sept 3, 2021 4:53:25 GMT -5
Orazio Benevoli (or Benevolo, 1605–1672) is a Middle Baroque era composer whose fame regrettably seems largely to rest on a work he never wrote. Discovered in the 1870s, Missa Salisburgensis à 53 voci (of which more later) was long attributed to him -- until six years ago in fact, when new conclusive evidence pointed to it having been written by Heinrich Biber some years after Benevoli's death. Benevoli deserves to be better known for what he did write, such as the beautiful Missa Si Deus pro nobis: "This is its first ever recording. Hervé Niquet must have called up all his forces of Le Concert Spirituel for the occasion. Singers and instrumentalists are placed around the sound spectrum in eight groups, comprising five to 10 performers each, each of the vocal choirs being supported by a mix of chamber organs, sackbuts, a quintet of dulcians and various stringed instruments." [ Financial Times] Missa Si Deus pro nobis is an example of what is called * Colossal Baroque*, a category I find endlessly fascinating. Here are the opening "Kyrie" and "Gloria":
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orazio_Benevoli
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Post by jk on Sept 12, 2021 14:14:54 GMT -5
"Departed Former Member" is a designation one inevitably comes across while exploring this forum. Anonymous it may seem, yet almost all posts attributed to such can be traced back to their original owners, either because they get quoted by username, or through the tell-tale subject matter or recognizable writing style. So most if not all DFMs are still with us in spirit, if not in person. It would nice to imagine them forming a little society, the DFMA, where they periodically get together to swap anecdotes. This is for them. It's the 1962 recording of "Apothéose: Le Jardin féerique" from Ravel's Ma Mère l’Oye by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Pierre Monteux: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma_mère_l%27Oye
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