Record Review: non-BaL discs reviewed, etc.

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  • Barbirollians
    Full Member
    • Nov 2010
    • 11671

    Originally posted by Il Grande Inquisitor View Post
    I've just reviewed this for January's IRR. The phrase 'akin to drenching a Fabergé egg in cheap glitter' was used...
    It sounded like Pictures crossed with a bad Overture 1812 performance ! Not to my taste.

    What did forumites think of the A Sinf Shostakovich chamber symphonies performances - a bit lush sounding to my ears but judging by the Weinberg extract they played the acoustic sounded a bit reverberant.

    Comment

    • LeMartinPecheur
      Full Member
      • Apr 2007
      • 4717

      Originally posted by johnb View Post
      I can't remember ever getting hot under the collar when listening to CD Review - until this morning.

      That dreadful bloated arrangement of Mussorgsky's Pictures orchestrated by someone called Breiner. Even worse was the simpering admiration lavished upon it by Sarah Walker. This really undermines the authority of CD Review (which had until now resisted the rush to Radio 2.5). (Or was this a joke which I didn't get.)

      (I need to rush to the bathroom to throw up.)
      I guess you're hinting that you didn't like the Breiner orchestration and Ms Walker's presentational style? That of course is your right.

      Can't quite see how that necessarily 'undermines the authority of CD Review' though
      I keep hitting the Escape key, but I'm still here!

      Comment

      • richardfinegold
        Full Member
        • Sep 2012
        • 7657

        Originally posted by Roehre View Post
        And then the more "authentic" Rimski Korssakow or Stokowski or a "modern" Van Keulen.....
        What, no critique of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer?

        Comment

        • johnb
          Full Member
          • Mar 2007
          • 2903

          Originally posted by LeMartinPecheur View Post
          I guess you're hinting that you didn't like the Breiner orchestration and Ms Walker's presentational style? That of course is your right.

          Can't quite see how that necessarily 'undermines the authority of CD Review' though
          Me? Not liking Breiner's orchestration? What gave you that idea?

          Perhaps I am mistaken but I thought that the presenters on CD Review should, ideally, give considered critical (in the best sense of the word) judgements on the recordings being played. Otherwise the programme would merely be a show case for the record companies.

          Of course, some people will disagree with my opinion that the orchestration was a bloated, toe curling, seemingly electronically processed exercise in self indulgence and bore little if any relationship to the spirit of the piano original. However, my criticism of Sarah Walker wasn't really about her presentational style - it was about her judgement.

          Comment

          • Alison
            Full Member
            • Nov 2010
            • 6455

            Sarah Walker seemed to know a lot about Mr Breiner and seemed full of enthusiasm before even mentioning the new disc. Does she know him personally one wonders? It seemed a bad misjudgment within a review otherwise containing lots of sensible and sensitive comment.

            Comment

            • Roehre

              Breiner is one of Naxos' arrangers-in-residence I guess, as it's he who also prepared all the orchestral suites of the Janacek operas for Naxos. He also did a couple of other "jobs", like a nice Christmas music spoof: twentieth Century Carols in an eighteenth Century sounding arrangement - very craftfully done, though of course a bit kitschy.

              Comment

              • doversoul1
                Ex Member
                • Dec 2010
                • 7132

                I thought Sarah Walker’s comments on the orchestral arrangement of Shostakovich’s string quartet were very useful from the point of a learner. She explained what made this work so powerful precisely because it was written for four instruments instead of an orchestra. It was a good way of demonstrating this point but I’m not sure about its merit for listeners.

                Incidentally, did no one find anything enjoyable in the rest of the programme? Admittedly, it was rather heavy on the pieces from pre-Mozart era when, to most people, serious music was yet to begin…
                Last edited by doversoul1; 08-12-13, 10:02.

                Comment

                • teamsaint
                  Full Member
                  • Nov 2010
                  • 25196

                  Originally posted by doversoul View Post
                  I thought Sarah Walker’s comments on the orchestral arrangement of Shostakovich’s string quartet were very useful from the point of a learner. She explained what made this work so powerful precisely because it was written for four instruments instead of an orchestra. It was a good way of demonstrating this point but I’m not sure about its merit for listeners.

                  Incidentally, did no one find anything enjoyable in the rest of the programme? Admittedly, it was rather heavy on the pieces from pre-Mozart era when, to most people, serious music was yet to start…


                  Blimey, that means I have a 50 CD box of light music on the way via Santa. hey ho...or ho ho ho....

                  Anyway, I quite enjoyed Sarah Walkers enthusiasm, but then I had nasty cold symptoms yesterday so my judgement was probably up the creek, and TBF, she didn't seem to have researched the Breiner that thoroughly.. She is good at enthusiasm, and there is a place for it. Not sure it's on CD review though.
                  Last edited by teamsaint; 08-12-13, 10:31.
                  I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own.

                  I am not a number, I am a free man.

                  Comment

                  • Bryn
                    Banned
                    • Mar 2007
                    • 24688

                    Originally posted by Alison View Post
                    Sarah Walker seemed to know a lot about Mr Breiner and seemed full of enthusiasm before even mentioning the new disc. Does she know him personally one wonders? It seemed a bad misjudgment within a review otherwise containing lots of sensible and sensitive comment.
                    She simply does her homework. After all, his Janacek suite arrangements have been around for years. You might find it interesting/enlightening to read the Jeremy Siepmann interview with Breiner on the Naxos site. I did find myself questioning Breiner's assertion that "My goal is to make it sound as close to the original composer as I can manage. Stokowski’s case was exactly the opposite. He wanted everything to sound like Stokowski".

                    Having sampled further via the YouTube offering (the whole of "Pictures at[sic] an Exhibition"), I have decided to make do with that for the time being. As far as I am concerned, he produces some interesting and often enticing orchestral timbral associations, and at least he did not leave the odd promenade out, as Ravel et al did.

                    I note that Naxos has also released his orchestrations of the 14 Preludes by Debussy. Can he have done any more damage than Colin Matthews?

                    Comment

                    • ferneyhoughgeliebte
                      Gone fishin'
                      • Sep 2011
                      • 30163

                      Originally posted by Bryn View Post
                      I note that Naxos has also released his orchestrations of the 14 Preludes by Debussy. Can he have done any more damage than Colin Matthews?
                      The "damage" here being done more to Mr Matthews - the Debussy Preludes being indestructable?
                      [FONT=Comic Sans MS][I][B]Numquam Satis![/B][/I][/FONT]

                      Comment

                      • Nick Armstrong
                        Host
                        • Nov 2010
                        • 26524

                        Originally posted by johnb View Post
                        a bloated, toe curling, seemingly electronically processed exercise in self indulgence
                        I can't wait to hear this part of the programme! (I wouldn't have said that before reading this excellent thread - 'Pictures' is one of those pieces I frankly wouldn't care if I never heard again... )
                        "...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..."

                        Comment

                        • amateur51

                          Originally posted by Caliban View Post
                          I can't wait to hear this part of the programme! (I wouldn't have said that before reading this excellent thread - 'Pictures' is one of those pieces I frankly wouldn't care if I never heard again... )
                          I've just laid out good money for Boris Giltburg's EMI recording


                          Comment

                          • EdgeleyRob
                            Guest
                            • Nov 2010
                            • 12180

                            Originally posted by richardfinegold View Post
                            What, no critique of Emerson, Lake, and Palmer?
                            Now yer talkin'.
                            This was the first arrangement I ever heard back in the day.

                            Comment

                            • Alison
                              Full Member
                              • Nov 2010
                              • 6455

                              Originally posted by Caliban View Post

                              And judging by the timings now on the R3 schedule, Nicey's been allotted a full 55 minutes for this one. The ensuing Sarah Lenton / Stephen Johnson / Harriet Smith () Gush-fest isn't scheduled to start till 10am.
                              Let's hope Harriet picked up some tips from Nicholas Andersons wider use of vocabulary last week.

                              Comment

                              • Black Swan

                                Originally posted by Caliban View Post

                                And judging by the timings now on the R3 schedule, Nicey's been allotted a full 55 minutes for this one. The ensuing Sarah Lenton / Stephen Johnson / Harriet Smith () Gush-fest isn't scheduled to start till 10am.
                                I love your comment, Caliban, my feelings exactly. I will be listening to Building a Library as I am looking for a blue ray recording of Parsifal.. But the Gush fest as you put it leaves me cold.

                                Comment

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