Anyone else interested in classic music? I'm not (nearly) prolific enough to keep up with the regulars in the other "what's spinning" thread, so here is a place to post and/or discuss what you're listening to, what you like and what you don't or if you're just #classicalcurious.

I guess I'll start with Genesis 1:1, one of my desert island recordings.



On CD

Quote:


Welcome aboard!

I certainly do have experience with Archiv, which is the "Historically Informed Performance" division of DG aka Deutsche Grammophon (as you may very well know). I'll say straight up I'm not a big fan of HIP aka the authentic instrument movement, but some of it is excellent. This might even be pre-digital, its been one of demo LPs since the 80's:



And one of my favorite performances of another of Bach's greatest hits:



There are others, for example I like a lot of stuff by Trevor Pinnick. If you aren't sure what you are getting into I wonder if you can check out the titles on streaming to see what you've got rather than going through the production of spinning up each album.

Mrs. CA was out of the house so I got a chance to crank it up. I choose:



DSD rip of a SHM-SACD

This is a very famous recording of Tchaikovsky Symphony No.4 by the Leningrad Philharmonic made in London in the 60's. Every commentator on the recording always says something like "the orchestra plays like any mistake will get them sent to the GULAG." Since they said it I don't have to, but it is a stupefyingly virtuosic performance. And sounds really good too.

Whomever designed this church and the organ - man - they really got it right.  I grew up with a pipe organ, and have since listened to hundreds of recordings of various cathedrals over the years and many are 'off'.  Perhaps it's the recording.  Perhaps it's the organ, perhaps the architecture, maybe the organist or perhaps not enough pigeon shit in the attic... who knows.

The bass on this organ is so satisfying it's just addictive.  Wear headphones.  Don't waste your time on the stereo speakers.  I am having this intoxicating experience with a $120 headphone plugged into my imac.  That's it.

Steve

Ivan Moravec is my favorite pianist, and this is a collection of most of his recordings, missing the (very famous) Chopin Nocturnes. He didn't have a big repertoire, and most of it was on the introspective rather than the virtuoso side. But what he did record he did phenomenally well and beautifully.



On CD.

I've enjoyed this one recently. Sometimes I just want to hear a piano done well.
This Philips recording is very "live" and it's like the piano just breathes deeply inside my room.
A truly uplifting set of discs in one album.

It is also great when you find a used copy and, not only is it in nearly complete pristine condition after fifty years, but it includes all the side treasures as well. The stylized liner notes from Hanspeter Krellmann and letter of welcome from Julius Bloom of Carnegie Hall (looks hand signed, but I've known lots of people who do printing - that's unlikely. They used a different type and color of ink and a bit of pressure to achieve that illusion) are included.

This is the Discogs page, it is this one and all the identifiers match exactly. Still has the Opera Paraphrases LP, which I have not played.

https://www.discogs.com/release/3700972-Liszt-Michele-Campanella-Complete-Hungar...



Liszt, Michele Campanella – Complete Hungarian Rhapsodies

A fairly common issue, but a wonderful album still!

Quote:



Very interesting. Everyone loves the first Bachianas Brasileiras and the guitar music but I've been trying to get a little deeper into his output.



16/44 FLAC Download

This is intriguing, but I can't say I love it. I probably need to hear it a few more times. I'm pretty sure I have some of his string quartets too, maybe even those Dorian recordings. Need to spin them up as well.

Ah, the string quartet. I've always known they are important, but it has only been recently that I started to enjoy them. And now they are one of my favorite things. The thing that did it for me was the hearing the Hollywood String Quartet play the Schubert Quintet (granted not actually a quartet, but really close). I heard it on the radio when I was stuck in traffic and it just clicked. Maybe I have an affinity for the HSQ because I was born in Hollywood. And of course, the music Schubert wrote at the end of his life is amazing. The slow movement of the quintet is not exactly beautiful in the conventional sense IMO, but it has an electric stillness that grabs me and doesn't let go. BTW, the Hollywood String Quartet was a group of friends and colleagues who loved to play chamber music together. And their day job just happened to be first desk players in the big Hollywood studio orchestras. They are an amazing group.



On CD

The Schonberg Verklarte Nacht is very good too, but Schonberg is a topic for another day.

I listened to my Villa Lobos string quartet CD and it was great. Totally different reaction to when I heard it the first time, at least 15 years ago. Just goes to show times change, people change.





On CD

I'm glad you dug the Villa Lobos this time around. It's fascinating how we grow in understanding of music over time. Pieces or forms that we didn't relate too years ago we can discover real joy in now. The opposite is true as well. . . we can outgrow music that we once cherished (at least I can, and have.

As a man who has spent five decades listening to a lot of saxophonists and trumpeters and trombonists and clarinetists et al with piano, bass and drums, a string quartet is a format that I can connect to easily and have. I love the interplay and the tonal mingling of the four instruments crafted by musical minds. There seems an endless way to write for these voices. A lifetime can be spent enjoying and seeking new compositions and interpretations. The format certainly fascinates me, as does the various trios.

Richter! I agree that his is a unique, steadfast voice on the piano. I only have one collection of his work, this one:



Not the very best sound, but it hardly matters thirty seconds after a performance starts. I get lost in the music.

Rockin’ out with some John Mellencamp on vinyl!  Doing a little celebrating….after 18 of 25 years of work on the midnight shift…I just finished my last night shift!!  Starting on Monday….I will be now be a permanent fixture on the day shift from 6 AM-2PM!  Hoorah!!  

Congrats Dom! I know how important that is. I tried a second shift job about three years into my retirement (I've been retired 15 years now) and I just could NOT hack it. Day shift is a comfort well earned.

Murray Perahia! I have this set below, listened to the whole set (and watched the DVDs) with my Dad and then went through the whole set by myself on my main system, and have listened to bits and pieces since then. I really like the way he interprets and plays, and as you say the melody is an important element of his style.

Nice thread; thanks for putting it up. I started listening to suggestions last night and continued into the morning.  I have long been aware of classical music, but I had no idea where to jump in. The thread provides that.

And then there is Bruckner. I fell hard for Bruckner the first time I heard it, but it seems like a tough nut for a lot of people. The symphonies are long and rather technical, but they have episodes of unsurpassed beauty and grandeur. A possible entry point for the uninitiated or unconvinced is the 4th movement of the 5th symphony, which is pretty much a mini-symphony in it's own right. And the final coda is guaranteed to take your stereo, and your neighbors to the absolute limit.



16/44 FLAC download

Since the '50s the Chicago Symphony has been famous for its brass section. And if, in the 21st century, it doesn't really make sense to talk about which section of which elite orchestra is better than the others they play magnificently in these recordings.

Now disc 4

Mas de España.



16/44 FLAC Download.

Spanish piano music, well played and well recorded.

More Renaissance polyphony. This album is cool because each disc starts with a plainchant, which is like a medieval pop song, and then has a mass based on it and gives it the full polyphonic contrapuntal treatment. And the masses are amazing.



On CD.

Starting the morning off with something diffferent that I haven't heard for a while. This edition has a hi-res verson on DVD that sounds great, but my main system doesn't play DVD (my other two systems do) so. . .here's the excellent sounding cd version.

Shostakovich: Pavel Kogan, Moscow State Symphony Orchestra – Symphony No. 5 Opus 47

There's a sort of bold raucousness to some of Shostakovich that I like, but I haven't listened to a lot of his, and I don't gravitate to Russian composers as much.

My Dad was a big Mozart fan. I think he would answer sometimes that Mozart was his favorite. Sometimes Beethoven. Sometimes Gershwin. Those were his three favorite classical music genii.

I am much less a fan of Mozart than he. I don't hear the depth in the music that hit him immediately. But I respect the genius.

This morning I listened to most of the SACD disc in this release. The 2L series has a Blu-ray audio disc, and an SACD disc of the performances in each release. When I was using the PS Audio Directstream Memory Player transport I could play the Blu-ray and those discs sounded spectacular, perhaps a bit better than the SACD, which I sort of found amusingly scandalous. When I upgrated to the PS Audio PerfectWave SACD transport I lost the ability to play the Blu-ray discs, but the SACD discs did sound a little better, so no real loss.

The audio on this one is so sophisticatedly presented with room sound and a fully resonant instrumenal image that it takes a really fine system to decipher it with accuracy and portray the emotion. I have that. Vivid sound, especially the violin. A nice variety of pieces as well.



2l.no/pages/album/137.html

"Interactions" 2L-137-SABD

Bård Monsen, violin
Gunnar Flagstad, piano

Yes, I've heard nearly all Mozart and bought the complete Mozart box set for Dad and listened to most of it with him, and have a number of Mozart pieces myself, including the Perahia, etc. I like him fine. . . I just don't list him in my top favorites.

"Late in Mozart's life" was way too early to pass away!

Haydn invented the symphony, and Mahler pretty much stuck a fork in it. Took it to 11 if you will, more on that below.



SHM-CD. My second desert island recording.

Mahler was "complicated." He was obsessed with (among other things) his own death, and the idea that so many composers died after writing their ninth symphony. So after he wrote 8 symphonies the called the next one Das Leid von der Erde (The Song of the Earth). Then he wrote his ninth symphony which is largely about death, started a tenth (technically eleventh) and died before he finished it. After Mahler there really wasn't any practical way to make a symphony bigger or more emotional, so for the last century or so composers have generally gone either more "classical" or aggressively modern when writing a symphony.

That's some very good music.

 

Very cool Lon!

I did not know much about Mr. Biggs, and found out about him through Ormandy.

Best,

Geno

Brahms - 16 Hungarian Dances

Back from my road trip and glad to see some new entries while I've been away.

Very little classical music works for driving IMO, but for me Bach solo keyboard can't be beat.



On CD

This is a great collection of Bach on the harpsichord and organ (I like the harpsichord for driving, esp. the Partitas).

And Bach's kid, C.P.E.




On CD

This is a remarkable collection of remarkable keyboard music played on the modern piano. Much better than Mozart (YMMV) and while I can't say C.P.E. is better than his dad, he is very different, very individual and extremely interesting. This music should be as well known and J.S. Bach, Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Rachmaninov, Debussy or anyone else you name who has a reputation for keyboard greatness. And it makes the miles melt away.

Next, and I can only think that I wish I had more than excerpts.

I am trying a different method of saving, posting, etc.


Johann Sebastian Bach - Wilhelm Kempff – Das Wohl Temperirte Clavier I (Auszüge)



Seemed to work.

I really like this one--like all Mario Adnet's work to be honest. Here he is re-arranging and re-visiting pieces by Villa Lobos with "an ear towards" how Antonio Carlos Jobim was influenced by the composer.

As always the sound on this Adventure Music cd is excellent.

Mario Adnet: Um Olhar Sobre Villa-Lobos

Zubin Metha and the LA Phil was the home team for my early years as a concert goer. And in the 80's when I was scoping up everyone else's used LPs for a couple of bucks each I learned they made some really good records. Of course, they were London/Decca's JV, behind the Solti-Chicago varsity, but even taking into account my civic pride I liked the LAPO better, perhaps because they recorded in a better hall. I jumped on this box set when it came out early in the pandemic:

 


On CD

It is still available on Amazon for a cool $1200 .

Just got done listening to Also sprach Zarathustra, which sounds phenomenal, like most of the recordings in this box.

 

That Daphnis et Chloe recording is hot stuff, on many levels. Equally sexy IMO is the Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan by Wagner, YMMV.



On CD.

I also went with Charles Munch and the BSO. More great Living Stereo sound and equally great playing.

Sibelius is a favorite and great recordings like these on a great sound system make it easy to get lost in his unique sound world.



Symphonies 3 and 6, on CD

Antal Dorati was a great, and greatly underappreciated, conductor. I suspect because he was not a specialist in the "serious" music in the Austro-Germanic mainstream. But he knew how to make great sounding recordings, first with Mercury:



And even in early digital in Detroit:



Both on CD.

And then there was Brahms. Brahms is of course one the giants, and his reputation is mostly made on only the dozen works he wrote for orchestra: 4 symphonies, 4 concertos, 3 overtures and the Haydn Variations. In fact most of his published output is vocal music, because to the extent he had a day job beyond composing it was conducting various vocal ensembles around Vienna. But to me the great joy of Brahms is his chamber music, which is well known by chamber musicians but much less so by the music listening public. Which is a shame because it is every bit as genius as the symphonies and etc. that most people known. For example:



16/44 FLAC download.

The quintets are beautiful (esp. the second one, YMMV). And wear their genius lightly, relative to e.g. the sting quartets:



16/44 FLAC download

Which some people find a little too serious. Although I don't see how anyone can not be swept away by the slow movement of the 3rd quartet.

Mozart is mostly owned by the "historically informed performance" crowd these days, which I don't necessarily consider progress. Not compared to glorious "big band" Mozart in classic analog sound:



On CD

I like Bernstein a lot. I have the three box sets Sony put out--Symphonic works, chamber works and vocal works. In fact I have duplicates as I bought them for my father as well and grabbed those when he passed. Should sell them one day.

Right now, something I wanted to share with my father but didn't get a chance to: music for piano and/or violin and harp by Joseph Woelfl. Really great engineering which captures the essence of the music so well.

The second disc of this release, Lewis on tenor with a string quartet, the Lutosławski Quartet--my favorite of the two discs. Challenging, emotional . . .lovely!

James Brandon Lewis "For Mahalia, with Love"

I'm playing this one again, the second disc. I especially like the pizzicato sections. Hard to believe "These are Soulful Days" is his first composition for strings.

James Brandon Lewis "For Mahalia, with Love"

I've seen Johann Nepomuk Hummel described as "equal parts Beethoven and water." Which might be pointed in the right direction but doesn't really do the guy justice. He was a very important composer and teacher back in the day who now is mostly known now for writing one of the two major trumpet concertos in the repertoire. But he was primarily a keyboard composer (and virtuoso) and his music, which isn't Beethoven but is certainly worthwhile, should be much better know IMO.



16/44 FLAC download

For my money Beethoven's 2nd is one of his top 3 or 4 symphonies. But trying to choose between pretty much any of the symphonies is what I believe they mean by a "fool's errand." I haven't had much to say about Beethoven... yet. But I will.

Here is my latest acquisition, it is on sale at Qobuz, 7 CDs for about the price of 1. I'm tempted to say Villa-Lobo's best stuff, but certainly his most popular.



16/44 FLAC download. And like most things from BIS both the recording and performance is top shelf.

My post in this thread since I've been listening to my new UFO25s.

I was listening to Bach's glorious B Minor Mass.



On CD.

In a glorious old skool performance. The choir filled my entire room, the soloist floated in space and the orchestra sounded....well glorious. The B Minor Mass was essentially a job application Bach put in towards the end of his life. Much of it is actually recycled previous work but the first two movements, the Kyrie and Gloria (aka Missa Brevis) were newly composed, and usually are enough for me.

FTR he didn't get the gig.

That one does not fall short. I will get through all twenty discs eventually.
Nice find!

Another nice find.
I almost hate to admit this, but earlier in the week, I found this little gem at Goodwill.
I shop there for music, blades of high quality steel, Japanese, Swedish, German, Swiss, Sheffield England, Austrian, etc. or ironware of any sort.

Seventy nine cents, along with eight other classical CDs. I got my old fat man discount, of course, which brought me to that insane price per.

This one is guitar, which I feel a need for now. I was not familiar, but the label had a key word, Bach.

You can preview the album on a little Discogs inset, if you care to.

https://www.discogs.com/release/12548027-Ana-Vidovi%C4%87-Guitar-Recital

This Academy Of Ancient Music is awesome. I played three CDs from that box last night before I switched to the young award winner, Ana Vidovic.

I also started the day with the Academy. Good stuff.

Yes, I have played close to twenty of the Arkive selections. That's not even one third of them so far. No disappointments.
Sorry for not documenting more carefully.
I play a lot more than I post.

CAJ, I have a large appetite. It has always been so. Music, mostly live performance, has been a large part of my entire life.
I enjoy music in the extreme sense.

I will trek past every genre I have access to (I care about) on a weekly basis, maybe most in one day sometimes.

I grew up with bluegrass and country honky tonk playing in my living room or out in the yard. It was an almost constant thing. Generations of my kin have all done the same.
Sadly, I am not a musician; can not make my muscles do consistently what I can do for a few seconds, not in time and keeping rhythym. I went more to the mechanics of it all, then as times changed, the electronic tech.

I think I was eight when I set my first sound post on my grandfather's fiddle. I saw him struggling and I said, "Hey, I can do that!" I got laughed at by several, but he let me try and ten seconds later I had it. I had to move it, because I did not yet know where it was supposed to go. He told me where it needs to be and it just came naturally to me.

I have some chops though. If you heard me getting a specific sound on something you might think, "Wow, he's pretty good." But no, I can't keep rhythym. I can sense it and any lack thereof in almost an X-man kind of way but I can not do it from within my own being.

That is one reason why I was always better behind the board or dancing around a studio between takes or on stage flitting around in the dark to get things just right, fixing fifteen things that needed a tweak.

Music is what is left after we strip away all the things that tire and hunger us and make us fight. Music is one thing left that is real and it makes us better from the inside out.

I enjoy my music, as it is these days.


I began my early morning with Mozart.

Mozart, Camerata Academica Des Salzburger Mozarteums, Géza Anda, this one ...

I do have to curb my own pedantic tendencies at times.

I don't think I can say, "concerti," without looking around the room to see who heard that, either.
My high school sweet heart was a native Mexican flautista. Also an amazing modern jazz dance student from the Latin realm.
I identified with her musicianship more than her dancing prowess. I was proud to refer to her as a fluatista, if the issue came up in conversation.
I was also fluent in Spanish fifty years ago.


I'm maybe a little jealous about that complete set of Mozart concerti.

:looks around:

Mo Mozart.



16/44 FLAC Download.

The Prague Chamber Orchestra plays the Prague Symphony.

The first thing I reached for this morning after being out of town and away from the stereo for a few days:



On CD.

IMO if you want to hear the Chicago Symphony play Mahler 1 (and you'd be crazy not to) this is the recording to get.

I don't know when the Brandenburg Concertos became Christmas Music, but they are some of the finest music ever written whenever you choose to listen to them. I have like a dozen recordings but this is my favorite:



On CD.

Unrepentantly old school, but gorgeously played and recorded, it really makes me wonder why the "historically informed" crowd is always in such a hurry.

I bet it is fascinating. I also bet Glenn Gould is rolling over in his grave knowing people can listen to his outtakes now.

Gould's Goldberg is one of the most famous and best selling classical records of all time, and it is certainly worthy of all the hype. Less hyped is Zuzana Ruzickova, who was one of the leaders in the modern harpsichord revival after WWII.



On CD.

But I enjoy her Goldberg, and the rest of her Bach, as much as anyone's. I'm typically much more interested in the art of artists rather than the life of artists, but Ruzickova's life is hard to ignore. She lost much of the use of her hands in a concentration camp and basically taught herself to play all over again after she was liberated.

One of the first CDs I bought back in the mid-80's.



On CD.

I always get chuckle out of the warning that the CD captures the "staggering dynamics of the original performance." Esp. for a work like the Sibelius 6th that is mellow bordering on ambient. But it does sound great.

Lon wrote:

Quote:


I find it hard to deal with Glens tempo digressions and though I understand his reason, mainly to make the work flow as a whole rather then a collection of variations for me it becomes a bit syrupy, that´s even with out taking the humming into account, which is akin to adding drums and banjo ala Valdo de los Rios  

p.s I´m referring to his 1981 recording

Yeah well not saying I have a problem with Keith Jarret's humming just Goulds  would be interesting to compare the humming as ECM just released a recording of Jarret playing said Goldberg variations....

yeah is a re-issue of the 1989 recordings so has been getting some attention though it´s not very good tbh.

Funny enough my brother-inlaw just released the Goldberg variations on DG I got the double vinyl last month and have been comparing it with few others I have and reviewed a few I dont online but one does wonder how many versions of Goldberg one really needs as one would tend to pick a favourite and play that as needs arise and ignore the rest.

Quote:


JMO, but I've yet to be convinced by any jazz musician trying to record classical repertoire. Benny Goodman (and more recently Eddie Daniels), Wynton Marsalis, Jarrett...they all sound like jazzers trying to play legit.

Quote:


I feel like a dozen, plus or minus is about right. YMMV.

I wonder how many versions of e.g. Over The Rainbow Lon has? Over a hundred?

Keiths "well tempered klavier" was decent tbh. Is interesting to make comparisons of recordings and interpretations every now and then but there is just so much music out there that is interesting and too few days in a life to listen to any meaningful amount of it, well maybe if I´m lucky and have my hearing when I retire...

Don Quixote is probably the best thing Richard Strauss wrote, at least without singers. YMMV.



On CD.

Strauss is also one of the few German composers that Karajan does really well IMO. And he does this very well indeed.

Quote:


Let's say I dislike his early Beethoven (esp. the mono cycle with the Philharmonia) considerably less than the later remakes, but I can (and do) live without any of it. His Wagner (I know Tristan and The Ring) is interesting, but of course Wagner is only one exit up the road from Strauss, at least IMO.

For me where Karajan really shines is Sibelius, Tchaikovsky and some other Russians.



On CD.

This is my favorite set of the Tchaikovsky Big 3, and by a pretty wide margin.

If that´s the same one as this one in different cover...



It´s one of the best recordings I have..

If not you´ll like this one, the transcription of Verklarte Nacht for full orchestra is something else..

Quote:


mine is a cd re-issue from 1985 of the original 1974 vinyl release. Would be more accurate to say you have it in compilation...  :)

I´ve not looked for the vinyl anything from that time on vinyl from  Deutsche Grammophon is thin sounding on even thinner vinyl...

Interesting spin-back to earlier conversation though is that Schoenberg uses the motive B flat A, C, B or as notated in German B-A-C-H through the work.

Heavy stuff CAJames,

Is interesting connection with Mahler with that one though but reminds me of the soundtrack to a horror-movie...  ;D

Think I´ll stick with Bach for now, it´s late and been a long one.



Double CD with suits 1-6


image hoster

As we were talking about HVK and his Teutonic failings or victory´s depending on where one stands I looked through the Beethoven section at the record store and picked up two of his fabled 1963 recordings on DG



those thick strings make up for lack of dynamics, but then that´s the price of these on vinyl as DG like´d to stuff each side of the LP with too much content and the sound suffered as a consequence...

No wonder HVK was consulted over the size of the "new" Cd and we have him and Beethoven to thank for the size of the medium chosen to be able to hold the 9th symphony.