What Are You Listening To?

[stlukesguild]

Another big shift in direction

 

[Hermes2020]

That certainly takes me back in more ways than one.

 

[stlukesguild]

Fournier is one of my favorite performers of Bach’s Cello Suites (not in this set). I’m currently listening to disc 1 which includes Schumann’s cello concerto, Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme, and Brahms’ Double Concerto. I’ve never been a big Schumann fan… but this performance really has me.

 

[brianvds]

Fournier is one of my favorite performers of Bach’s Cello Suites (not in this set). I’m currently listening to disc 1 which includes Schumann’s cello concerto, Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme, and Brahms’ Double Concerto. I’ve never been a big Schumann fan… but this performance really has me.

Presumably, Schumann sounded too much like Brahms, and did not write enough operas to your liking.

 

[Hermes2020]

Patricia Kopatchinskaja gives an exuberant performance of Stravinsky's Violin Concerto.

 

[stlukesguild]

I’ve never really thought of Schumann sounded all that much like Brahms. Schubert… or Mendelssohn strike me as closer. Brahms’ density seems much closer to Bruckner. Honestly, not many composers seem to have produced a wealth of opera as well as other works. Mozart, Handel, and Tchaikovsky immediately come to mind as exceptions… and we might add Richard Strauss and arguably Haydn to that list. None of Schubert’s operas seem to have entered the common repertoire. Beethoven had but a single opera. Bach had none… composing for the church. Operatic composers such as Puccini, Verdi, Rossini, Wagner, Offenbach, Gluck, etc… seem known for little beyond their operatic work.

 

[stlukesguild]

Patricia Kopatchinskaja gives an exuberant performance of Stravinsky's Violin Concerto

Her recording of Beethoven’s violin concerto is stunning… and remains my “go to” recording.

 

[stlukesguild]

Karajan is not the conductor I initially think of for Haydn… but his troupe of singers here is unrivaled and the resulting recording is stunning.

 

[Hermes2020]

Patricia Kopatchinskaja gives an exuberant performance of Stravinsky's Violin Concerto

Her recording of Beethoven’s violin concerto is stunning… and remains my “go to” recording.

Thanks for the tip. I will check it out. Isn't the hunt some people call classical music exciting?

 

[stlukesguild]

Gardener and his period appropriate instruments and orchestra scale inspired an increased admiration for Brahms. Each disc in this set includes several choral works. The covers are all details from Howard Hodgkin’s painting.

 

[stlukesguild]

Isn't the hunt some people call classical music exciting?

It’s such a vast universe of music. Rock is some 75 years old. Jazz and Country & Western are around 100… and almost limited exclusively to the music of the United States, Britain, and other English-speaking nations. “Classical Music” dates back to the 13th century or earlier and includes music from an amazing array of cultures. It’s almost mind-boggling to consider that Hildegard of Bingen, Monteverdi, Gesualdo, Bach, Haydn, Schubert, Mahler, Wagner, Stravinsky, Barber, Bernstein, Philip Glass, Daniel Catan, etc… are all categorized as “classical music”.

 

[brianvds]

Still on the Glass trip:

Believe it or not, that's me enjoying opera. I wish someone would upload the whole thing, with subtitles, to YouTube. I think there is a sound recording of it on the tube. But an opera is a show. I want to see it, and have subtitles so I can understand what's going on, otherwise it's like listening to only the sound of a movie, or seeing a foreign language movie without subtitles.

Anyway. This particular bit is as mesmerizing as anything Glass ever wrote. There is something apocalyptic about it, which I suppose was exactly how the Ancient Egyptians felt when Akhnaten turned their entire religious system upside down.

On a lighter note, when the women begin to file out, it strangely reminds me of the 1980s film version of Dune - they somehow look to me like a gaggle of Bene Gesserit. And of course, Egypt is a desert planet.

 

[stlukesguild]

Back to Jordi Savall and medieval music. On this disc… and Orient-Occidental II… Savall, and the musicians of Hesperian XXI… explore the bridge between Eastern and Western music of the Middle Ages.

 

[brianvds]

Thanks for the tip. I will check it out. Isn't the hunt some people call classical music exciting?

Particularly if you run into something like this...

 

[Hermes2020]

I would have liked it done in the style of Bartok as well.