Essential Classics - The Continuing Debate

[gurnemanz]

Today's Toscanini offering blew my mind:

Götterdämmerung: Dawn and Duet
Singer: Helen Traubel. Singer: Lauritz Melchior. Orchestra: NBC Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Arturo Toscanini.

Stunning...

I can't think of anything else to say.

I wasn't listening today but did get this Melchior box a few years ago. That excerpt + a lot more to blow the mind on 10CDs for a mere £13. Review and full contents here. A great voice and fascinating to read up on his colourful life.

[Mal]

Wagner is a blind spot for me, I can take some orchestral excerpts (e.g. George Szell's with the Cleveland Orchestra...) But this Toscanini selection didn't do it for me, maybe 'cause there was singing involved :). Still, Toscanini's Beethoven 7 blew my mind, as did today's "Enigma Variations". I'd never really got this work before, finding all but Nimrod rather a bore. But Toscanini finds the necessary insight and inspiration in his 1935 performance with the BBC SO. He has been accused of being a bit "showy" and "not English enough" in this piece. Probably by the stuffiest of English critics, and not the unstuffy Rob Cowan, who choses it as his desert island "enigma", and the performance of *any* piece he'd want to attend if he could go back in time. I can hear why. Book me a place on that time machine...

[LeMartinPecheur]

(I'm trusting you here; I know we start Das Rheingold with an E flat, but am not sure where we get to 24 hours later!)

EA: surely the apparent Db at the close is just the early and baleful intervention of historically informed performance practice?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

EA: surely the apparent Db at the close is just the early and baleful intervention of historically informed performance practice?

Surely that would result in it being in D?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Today I agreed to pick up a neighbour (educated and in his 30s) from the garage where he was leaving his car for repairs. I happened to have Radio 3 on, and I offered to turn it off. He said he'd like to listen, though he said it wasn't his kind of music. Almost immediately after this, the infantile play-it-backwards game came on. Without hesitation, I said "Kol Nidrei" with confidence. A few minutes later, Rob confirmed this, followed by the usual irritating list of those who'd been desperate enough to tweext Radio 3 in order to hear their names read out on the airwaves.

My passenger didn't comment on this, but was full of admiration for my correct answer. But as the usual verbal padding followed, he said "This is rubbish". He was referring to the endless talking, saying it lacked substance. (He'd played the clarinet up to Grade 8 in his youth, but had let it drift since then.) He had not complaints about the music.

This incident confirmed what I've believed for some time. Here was someone who was ideal material for getting to know Radio 3 better, but had been put off by the channel continuing to treat its listeners like needy children.

However, it wasn't all bad news, as he took up my offer to lend him some CDs.

[oddoneout]

For a while I had thought that the lists of those getting it right had been pruned, but they seem to have got longer again. I really don't understand why the answer can't be given with 'well done to all those who got it right' and the names put on one or other of the various 'platforms'(ie off air) if felt necessary. After all they must all come in electronically these days, and 'consent to publish' must be assumed already for broadcast purposes so why not online? As a bonus(?) possibly more people would see what a clever clogs Harry from Elsewhere is that way.

[Paulie55]

This morning Radio 3 was still tuned in on my radio after last night's Chailly concert.

I had the serious misfortune to catch ten minutes or so of this programme. It was like the worst sort of dumbed down schmaltz on Classic FM.

Rob Cowan whilst highly knowledgeable comes across as oily and irritating and there was an absurd " Who am I " segment - with Stephen Johnson doing his impression of the Mystery Voice from I Am sorry i have't a clue and then all manner of gooey e-mails read out about Rossini .

What is this trash doing on radio 3 ?

This trash is STILL being broadcast daily and Rob Cowan is STILL here! His pronunciation hasn't improved, it's become worse.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Switched my radio on at about quarter-to-eleven this morning and was delighted to hear Birtwistle's Triumph of Time, in the powerful performance conducted by Boulez - one of the greatest Musical achievements from these islands - and still makes Turnage's Three Screaming Popes sound as if its based on paintings by Norman Rockwell.

Then, just as I was about to contact the programme with my thanks, RC decided it was appropriate to read out a "witty" limerick from some twit from the Home Counties who is no doubt very pleased with himself. Why does RC feel obliged to do this on the very rare occasions that he deigns to include Music by a living composer on the playlist? Does any other radio station include derogatory comments from listeners about what has been played? What relevance to any of the Music played do listeners' half-heard opinions have? (Our witty correspondent spent much of the time taken by the work to write his magnum 'opeless; what right does he think he has to voice any opinion based on this slovenly attention to the work?)

Needless to say, the tone of the subsequent e-Mail I sent to the programme was the opposite to that which I had originally intended.

[french frank]

Needless to say, the tone of the subsequent e-Mail I sent to the programme was the opposite to that which I had originally intended.

Did he read it out?

I really don't know what to make of this. The "diktat" to include new music in the daytime programmes has - I'm sure - come from on high. (It may even have been said that such a policy is welcome.) I suppose it's the famed BBC 'balance' to then say how awful it is

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Did he read it out?

I don't know - I suspect that my reference to a "cloth-eared clot" might have excluded it - as I switched off following the comment that was read out. I can't have Beethoven on "in the background" whilst I type - and certainly not when my mood had been so discumbobulated. (That's part of my quarrel with that aspect of the "show" - listeners so love/hate the Music being broadcast that they stop listening attentively in order to compose an e-Mail/text/tweet??? )

I really don't know what to make of this. The "diktat" to include new music in the daytime programmes has - I'm sure - come from on high. (It may even have been said that such a policy is welcome.) I suppose it's the famed BBC 'balance' to then say how awful it is

But - genuine question - is this "balance" represented on other BBC stations? My experience of R2 is limited to the Waiting Rooms of Doctors and Dentists (who presumably have the station on default in the knowledge that whatever latex-glove-based experience happens to you once you get into the consulting room can only be an improvement) - and I've never heard any of the presenters read out derogatory comments from listeners on the Music just played.

[french frank]

But - genuine question - is this "balance" represented on other BBC stations?

I'm darned sure it isn't! What is it about? Is it to reassure all the people who didn't like it that they're not alone? It was an aberration? Don't go away: normal service will be resumed as soon as possible?

I've just listened and the comments about the email vapid. "A rather interesting limerick […] thank you for writing that in …"

[oddoneout]

I loathe the works of HB and only kept the radio on to a)confirm the composer was who I thought it was and b) in the hopes of hearing something more acceptable before too long. I wasn't therefore outraged at the limerick, but I was very surprised at it being read out immediately after the piece in question and thought that an error of judgement.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I loathe the works of HB and only kept the radio on to a)confirm the composer was who I thought it was and b) in the hopes of hearing something more acceptable before too long. I wasn't therefore outraged at the limerick, but I was very surprised at it being read out immediately after the piece in question and thought that an error of judgement.

Exactly - it's not unusual to hear people expressing their dislike of Birtwistle; but what mentality is at "work" that thinks it's a good idea to follow a broadcast of a piece with derogatory comments from the audience?! If it is a matter of "the famed BBC 'balance'", then similar negative comments should follow broadcasts of every piece of Music that's broadcast - after all, if every performance of Mahler, Beethoven, Shostakovich, Bach etc is to be greeted by superlatives from the presenter, then such opposing opinions are more appropriate there? Ridiculous idea.

[french frank]

and thought that an error of judgement.

That seems to be the nub of it.

I think one of the problems is these long presenter-led/CD-based programmes of which Essential Classics is the main one: who is the intended audience if they play Leroy Anderson followed by Conlon Nancarrow and Harrison Birtwistle.

And with all due respect to the Geordies here re Breakfast, I really couldn't stand Bach, Ligeti, and Owen Brannigan singing the Blaydon races tucked in between the two. It isn't just a question of musical taste but of creating a certain mood and then shattering it.

[french frank]

"the famed BBC 'balance'",

Just in case there was any doubt: I was being ironic I might as well have said 'the infamous BBC 'balance' '.