jonfan - a good many people listen to BAL on their kitchen or car radios. Sound-wise, yes, you'd need to rely on what's said and then go to say Spotify or whatever to sample but as far as interpretation is concerned it would be easily managed. And that for me is the crux of the matter, I mean comparing what Honeck, Karajan or Toscanini do with a piece. Sound is important but you need to be able to listen through it as well as to it.
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Further from Facebook
"About a year ago I happened to ve walking down Regent Street near Broadcasting House and saw a chap coming towards me with a security tag around his neck and, yes, a rucksack ! Rob was extremely gentlemanly when I importuned him to tell him how much I liked his programme and style of presenting. A red-letter day to have such a chance meeting :)"
May I add my best wishes Rob and thanks for the memories ......Comment
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Thank you anton - a warming image to recall, the way I would like to remember my days at R3. Certainly the way I felt them to be. Best. RobOriginally posted by antongould View Post
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Rob, you’ve alerted me to fantastic recordings from the past over the years and your enthusiasm has been infectious. Today’s BAL was a case in point, listening on my kitchen radio I could hear Heddle Nash from 1945 and Antony Rolfe Johnson from 1993 in balanced sound using the engineering of the time. Fine, Culshaw, Legge, Floating Earth worked, and work, at producing perfectly balanced sound using the technology of their time and it is an effrontery to adjust the sound in an arbitrary way. Whether I’m in my car, in my kitchen or in front of my state of the art hifi, I expect to hear what the engineers put on the tape. Only that way can I judge different performances in an honest way.Originally posted by Rob Cowan View PostComment
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The recording quality often comes 2nd to the music and or performance. A lot of the music I listen to doesn't have a 'modern' recording or a recording at all, and sometimes is merely from a 40-70 year old radio broadcast, the work I'm currently listening to, Vitaly Gubarenko's 2nd Symphony, being a case in point. It is a privilege for me just to have the opportunity to listen to this music and I'm thankful to those people who take the trouble to make it available for others to hear.Comment
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I see the sense in that certainly. And yet I've just received from the States a wonderful set of the 48 featuring the Russian-American pianist Alexander Borovsky, chock-full of subtleties, flexible gestures and flashes of colour - and he never, absolutely never BANGS. The previously-unissued recording is from 1955 and after the first 30 second you stop listening to the (more than acceptable) mono sound and listen just to Bach and Borovsky, a 48 to set alongside piano versions by Edwin Fischer, Rosalyn Tureck, Jorg Demus and, more recently, Andras Schiff (especially his ECM set). May well fit in a sample to Cowan's Classics.Originally posted by jonfan View PostComment
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Well if leaving R3 means Rob is freed up participate often here on the Forum as a 'friend' (rather than 'employee'!) of the station, then I for one take that as a huge bonus!"...the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices..."
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And perhaps that other CD master, member Swain might make further contributions here, too.Originally posted by Caliban View Post
I can see I may have to add CFM to my car radio's 'favourite' pre-sets.Comment
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My sentiments too, Bryn. CFM with the ads, hmm. ah well. I do rather like RC, so maybe what will be will be.Originally posted by Bryn View Post
(I wonder if Rob would be able to tell who I actually am, without giving me away?
)
Bit like the knight Lohengrin?
Don’t cry for me
I go where music was born
J S Bach 1685-1750Comment
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Thanks Caliban. A bit like the old R3 'Message Board' days when aside from one or two snipers - remember the tireless Joyce Hatto promoter? He got his comeuppance! - we all had fun. Just forgive me if on occasion I don't have the time to engage as much as I'd like to. Best. Rob.Originally posted by Caliban View PostComment
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"...the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices..."
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Sycophants, Toadies ...
48 hours ago the usual 6-8 were slagging Rob off something rotten ...
Now he's appeared, they want to polish his wellies & carry his rucksack ...
Pathetic.Comment
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I was thinking that too! Strange.Originally posted by Zucchini View PostDon’t cry for me
I go where music was born
J S Bach 1685-1750Comment
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Name names. You'll have a hard job finding negative posts from me re. Rob. The programme structures he's been tied to, yes, but not the man. Good to re-encounter him in person at his fellow presenter's 50th do.Originally posted by Zucchini View PostComment
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For me, it is NOT Rob the man, but what he has manifestly been constrained to do by the gumps i/c R3.
We KNOW what he can do when given the chance, but Essential Classics ain't his best thing IMO.
Frankly, I think he's very shrewd in taking the offer to jump ship. He and Catherine Bott are R3's biggest losers.
My guess is that there will be more to come.Comment
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