Gould Piano Trio: Radio 3 Live today (Tuesday 3rd)

[doversoul1]

This looks good and this sounds intriguing:
an arrangement of Janácek's String Quartet No.1.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01f689m

Live from the Wigmore Hall
Dvorák: Piano Trio in G minor Op. 26
Janácek: String Quartet No. 1 'Kreutzer Sonata' (arr. Korber)

[Alf-Prufrock]

Do you know, I think I'd rather listen to Janacek than to Korber (who he?)

A jocular message, I know, but I have got rather tired of arrangements of otherwise perfectly good compositions, especially when the originator is already a major figure. As an example, I really cannot stand the etiolated reductions of Strauss waltzes by various members of the Second Viennese School : small-band performances of the original works sound so much superior.

[kernelbogey]

I have got rather tired of arrangements of otherwise perfectly good compositions, especially when the originator is already a major figure.[...]

Do you also reject Schoenberg's orchestral arrangement of the Brahms Piano Quartet for the same reason? I'd say the original and the arrangement have their merits.

[Bryn]

I far prefer the Schönberg private performance versions of the Strauss stuff to the originals.

[Alison]

It was lovely to hear the op 26 Piano Trio again, a work I associate with chamber music
recitals at university.

I had no idea then that it was to prove such a rarity in the concert hall - and on the airwaves.

[Bryn]

... Korber (who he?)

http://en.beethovenfest.de/archiv/2011/kuenstler/till-alexander-koerber/

[Alf-Prufrock]

I did say my remark was jocular! I have already suffered the experience of listening one after the other to three Strauss waltzes arranged one each by Schoenberg, Berg and Webern. It is not a recital I should wish to repeat.

Kernelbogey, I could not stand the Schoenberg version of the Brahms Piano Quintet for forty years or more. It took a performance by the BPO and Sir Simon to convert me, though I still prefer the original. I am still not sure why Schoenberg thought the brush-up necessary.

Listening to music is a continually educative matter and I do not close my mind to anything, I hope; but like and dislikes are a gut matter, and such things are very difficult to turn round. I don't think I will ever prefer the arrangements to the original Strauss waltzes, however - sorry, Bryn.

Thanks, Bryn, for the information on Korber. But was his intervention into Janacek either necessary or desirable? Did he add anything? And if he did, was it Janacek or Korber? (I have not heard it yet but will do so over the weekend.)

[kernelbogey]

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Kernelbogey, I could not stand the Schoenberg version of the Brahms Piano Quintet for forty years or more. It took a performance by the BPO and Sir Simon to convert me, though I still prefer the original. I am still not sure why Schoenberg thought the brush-up necessary.

Alf; when Arnie made his orchestral arrangement, the Brahms Piano Quartet wasn't often programmed, and when it was, he found that the "star pianist" usually drowned out the string trio. In 1937, when he made the orchestration, he was in extreme financial difficulties and such orchestral arrangements were very popular (Stokowski/Bach, for example) so there was a double incentive. Ironically, the popularity of the original Piano Quartet seems to have started to grow only after Arnie's arrangement.

[Alf-Prufrock]

Thanks, ferney, for the information. All is clear now. I have heard a performance in which the piano was too loud and therefore brash.