Originally posted by Thomas Roth
I do hope that JLW has not been put off from contributing by this ill-mannered post.
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Jayne is one of the most valuable contributors to this forum and as dependable a voice as we have on here. Your points would be better made if they were done so in a civilised and appropriate manner.
I do hope that JLW has not been put off from contributing by this ill-mannered post."The sound is the handwriting of the conductor" - Bernard Haitink -
The gripes of Roth are not to be taken personally: I have in the past been advised by him to "have my ears tested". It's all part of the variety of these Boards: take nothing personally and carry on sharing your opinions with those who find them useful and insightful![FONT=Comic Sans MS][I][B]Numquam Satis![/B][/I][/FONT]Comment
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"The sound is the handwriting of the conductor" - Bernard HaitinkComment
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It seems to me that we have two of 'The Four Temperaments' exhibited by our protagonists: the one sanguine, the other choleric. I know which I prefer.Comment
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Which would be all very well if Rattle had recorded more than just the fourth. Or am I missing something?Originally posted by Thomas RothComment
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I wish that I could be as sanguine but - and I realise that I am straying into grumpy old sod territory here - I find comments which are, as Petrushka tactfully puts it, "ill-mannered", a depressing commentary on how we seem to conduct ourselves these days. What is it about blogs, chat-rooms, forums etc that seems to give people the impression that they can say what they want, irrespective of what the impact might be on the recipient. It's a battle lost, I fear, but I just wish people would mind their Ps and Qs a little more. Or maybe some people find it impossible to be other than verging on the rude.Originally posted by ferneyhoughgeliebte View Post
And back on topic, the Gilbert is well-recorded but in a hall which is not famed for its acoustic splendour. I suspect that the engineers may have added something to the mix (a touch of reverberation?) which certainly enhances the result. Played via my (Swedish) Blu-Ray/SACD player in multichannel format, it sounds fine but, as performances, for me, they don't quite reach the heights of Myung-Whun Chung, which is BIS recording at its best in an acoustically splendid hall. That label is currently recording a new SACD Nielsen cycle (by/with whom I do not know) which is due to start appearing next autumn, if Robert von Bahr is to be believed.Last edited by HighlandDougie; 15-12-12, 18:31.Comment
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I understand from a RvB post elsewhere it's the "Royal Stockholm PO under no less than Sakari Oramo".Originally posted by HighlandDougie View PostComment
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Yes, you are all so nice and well behaved. Like Luisi in Honegger, like Rattle in everything.Comment
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白目Comment
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I don't know what Frosty the Snowman thinks, but the NYPO and Alan Gilbert didn't warm me up much with their account of Nielsen's 2nd.
Broadly, whilst Gilbert glories in the climaxes he rather leaves quieter passages to look after themselves; they're very under-characterised, even anonymous. The Choleric movement is bullish rather than angry, entirely missing the essential waspish snap of the most idiomatic readings. The Phlegmatic movement rather too literally expresses its title - we look for a bucolic tipsiness here, not an evocation of rehearsal-room boredom. If I became very gloomy indeed in the midst of the following, wallowing Melancholia, it was more a case of waiting for the interminable thing to end than an emotional empathy. As Fanning put it, this "movement is distinctly lacking in flow"...
He goes on "[Gilbert] takes almost every espressivo or tranquillo as an invitation to luxuriate [...] and the result is a near-fatal loss of momentum in many of the lyrical passages". I would add that this clearly applies to the outer movements, especially damaging in the recapitulation of (i), followed by a coda whose choler is very phlegmatic indeed!
I listened to this as a 24/96 Flac file, which should be accurate as that is its native recorded format; but of course it's possible that the CD/SACD incarnations may differ in some respects. Having said that, I would not be impressed with the sound even on a plain vanilla CD. It's fairly smooth and clear, with a good dynamic range; but woodwind detail is rather distant, and there's a dullness (occasionally a bass-heaviness) to the sound which fails to give us much sense of the acoustic, and it comes vacuum-packed - all atmosphere (what little there is) taken out between the movements, and a rapid silence after the final climax and reverberation.
And, as you'll gather, no applause from me.Last edited by jayne lee wilson; 15-12-12, 22:06.Comment
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