BaL 9.09.23 - Building an essential library of great recordings

[Ein Heldenleben]

Thanks for sticking with the whole show – I didn't realise we were going to be at it for 2.5 hours, but it was very enjoyable to do. And yes, when I was first asked to pick five recordings months ago, the Kempe Ariadne was just about the first one I reached for. In spite of stiff competition (especially that late live Böhm performance on Orfeo), I still think Kempe's is in a class apart. Sad to see that it doesn't seem to be available at the moment except as a download.

Neither did I ! Was it live ? If so it seemed pretty flawless . That’s a lot of time to fill even with whole movements .
PS good to see the Glagolitic come up. It was very much in general - as Nick says - an off -the- beaten track selection even though when the Dumky came up I said Beaux Arts Trio will be the choice.

[makropulos]

Neither did I ! Was it live ? If so it seemed pretty flawless . That’s a lot of time to fill even with whole movements .
PS good to see the Glagolitic come up. It was very much in general - as Nick says - an off -the- beaten track selection even though when the Dumky came up I said Beaux Arts Trio will be the choice.

Yup - absolutely live – thus a 6:00am start for me to be sure of getting from Northants to the studio by 8:15 when we assembled. Weather was pleasantly mild as we went into Broadcasting House and monstrously hot as we staggered out. Still, we had some smashing stuff – was I was delighted by things like Joanna's choice of the pre-war Rubinstein Chopin, and always good to have just about anything by the Beaux Arts. As for the Glag. Mass, I had to have one of the big Janacek pieces in my list and they didn't want to overload the show with too much opera. You can imagine what a near-impossible task it was to find just five recordings...

[Master Jacques]

Yup - absolutely live – thus a 6:00am start for me to be sure of getting from Northants to the studio by 8:15 when we assembled. Weather was pleasantly mild as we went into Broadcasting House and monstrously hot as we staggered out. Still, we had some smashing stuff – was I was delighted by things like Joanna's choice of the pre-war Rubinstein Chopin, and always good to have just about anything by the Beaux Arts. As for the Glag. Mass, I had to have one of the big Janacek pieces in my list and they didn't want to overload the show with too much opera. You can imagine what a near-impossible task it was to find just five recordings...

I too enjoyed the debate between you and your fellow presenters, thank you, and heard some recordings (such as your choice of that vibrant live Boult Elgar 1) which were new to me.

I've raised at least one eyebrow at your revelation that "they didn't want to overload the show with too much opera". Your wonderful Kempe Ariadne was the only operatic item, which seemed simply a regrettable oversight - as was selecting yet more Mahler/Bernstein for the "vox pop" addition, when (e.g.) Haydn, Handel, Verdi and Wagner remained unheard.

But in the light of their steering, it appears that Radio 3 consciously second H M Government's and the Arts Council's aim of expunging opera from national musical life, by hook or crook. I know that listeners to the unspeakable morning shows dislike anything involving operatic voices (excluding crossover from the "Great American Songbook", of course) and I am very depressed to learn that this prejudicial snobbery may have infected Record Review as well.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Yup - absolutely live – thus a 6:00am start for me to be sure of getting from Northants to the studio by 8:15 when we assembled. Weather was pleasantly mild as we went into Broadcasting House and monstrously hot as we staggered out. Still, we had some smashing stuff – was I was delighted by things like Joanna's choice of the pre-war Rubinstein Chopin, and always good to have just about anything by the Beaux Arts. As for the Glag. Mass, I had to have one of the big Janacek pieces in my list and they didn't want to overload the show with too much opera. You can imagine what a near-impossible task it was to find just five recordings...

Well thanks v much for making the effort though the final on air product seemed effortless . Overloading with Opera not possible IMHO ; but those Rubenstein recordings are peerless.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I too enjoyed the debate between you and your fellow presenters, thank you, and heard some recordings (such as your choice of that vibrant live Boult Elgar 1) which were new to me.

I've raised at least one eyebrow at your revelation that "they didn't want to overload the show with too much opera". Your wonderful Kempe Ariadne was the only operatic item, which seemed simply a regrettable oversight - as was selecting yet more Mahler/Bernstein for the "vox pop" addition, when (e.g.) Haydn, Handel, Verdi and Wagner remained unheard.

But in the light of their steering, it appears that Radio 3 consciously second H M Government's and the Arts Council's aim of expunging opera from national musical life, by hook or crook. I know that listeners to the unspeakable morning shows dislike anything involving operatic voices (excluding crossover from the "Great American Songbook", of course) and I am very depressed to learn that this prejudicial snobbery may have infected Record Review as well.

I think you’re getting a bit over excited. What was the standout in last nights LNOP? - Lise Davidsen by a mile .

[Master Jacques]

I think you’re getting a bit over excited. What was the standout in last nights LNOP? - Lise Davidsen by a mile .

I hope I'm getting excited enough to do something about it! Getting the world's top diva to sing a few granny's favourites at the Last Night of the Proms is (in fact) merely another aspect of Radio 3's capitulation when it comes to supporting opera. Can you tell me, when was the last time Radio 3 recorded an opera for broadcast in their studios?

That's what they ought to be doing, rather than airily tossing a few popular titbits to the crowd. No, Ein Heldenleben, it Won't Do.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I hope I'm getting excited enough to do something about it! Getting the world's top diva to sing a few granny's favourites at the Last Night of the Proms is (in fact) merely another aspect of Radio 3's capitulation when it comes to supporting opera. Can you tell me, when was the last time Radio 3 recorded an opera for broadcast in their studios?

That's what they ought to be doing, rather than airily tossing a few popular titbits to the crowd. No, Ein Heldenleben, it Won't Do.

Well they relayed at enormous expense Les Troyens which has attracted very few comments on this forum which makes me think it didn’t get much of an audience generally.* The Night at the Opera thread is one of the thinnest posted on the forum sadly so perhaps opera isn’t that popular generally. Don’t blame me - pre lockdown I was spending a couple of thou a year on tickets -now not so much .

*‘unlike the JEG shenanigans

[Nick Armstrong]

Overloading with Opera not possible IMHO

OHHH yes it is…!

Delighted to hear that the only one in this BAL survey is one of my two favourite R Strauss operas…

[RichardB]

I think people who stream will still build libraries of music, it's just that the libraries will be in the form of lists in their streamer rather than physical entities such as CDs.

Quite. If I want to listen to a particular work I don't necessarily want to make my mind up between all the possible recordings of it, when on my playlist I have a smaller number of recordings I know I like, or possibly only one. On other occasions I might want to make comparisons. Slave to fashion? Well, I guess that goes with being interested in the music of my own time and how it evolves (through technological developments among other things), rather than clinging to a fixed repertoire that's receding into the past (like CDs are!).

[Ein Heldenleben]

OHHH yes it is…!

Delighted to hear that the only one in this BAL survey is one of my two favourite R Strauss operas…

….which marks you out as a person of enormous taste and discrimination. Several years ago I sat in the stalls at Covent Garden having splashed out on just about my favourite opera on the grounds that at the back of the balcony it might be difficult to hear. I was idling musing on how the opera marked something of a high point in Pre WW 1 Franco German culture - Moliere , Hugo Von H and Strauss etc when I became aware that the audience around me was largely in their twenties. They’d all got cheap last minute tickets I guess because the tickets had sold so poorly. Can’t understand why it’s not more popular…

[Master Jacques]

Well they relayed at enormous expense Les Troyens which has attracted very few comments on this forum which makes me think it didn’t get much of an audience generally.* The Night at the Opera thread is one of the thinnest posted on the forum sadly so perhaps opera isn’t that popular generally. Don’t blame me - pre lockdown I was spending a couple of thou a year on tickets -now not so much .

*‘unlike the JEG shenanigans

As with Dialogues of the Carmelites, Les Troyens was imported on the cheap from other festivals which had paid for all the rehearsal time and had the benefit of the adrenaline-fuelled first nights. Kurtág's Endgame was piggy-backing off an upcoming stage production featuring the same cast and conductor. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was it as far as complete opera was concerned. Opera-lovers certainly feel that Radio 3's annual spend of taking Metropolitan opera broadcasts, while ignoring much of what's going on at home, is a complete dereliction of duty.

No wonder opera fans don't bother with the BBC much any more. Because the BBC certainly doesn't bother with them.

(Les Troyens is often a bit of a bore. It is horribly uneven, in my opinion, and its reputation has become curiously inflated. I'm not surprised at the comparative lack of interest on here).

[makropulos]

I too enjoyed the debate between you and your fellow presenters, thank you, and heard some recordings (such as your choice of that vibrant live Boult Elgar 1) which were new to me.

I've raised at least one eyebrow at your revelation that "they didn't want to overload the show with too much opera". Your wonderful Kempe Ariadne was the only operatic item, which seemed simply a regrettable oversight - as was selecting yet more Mahler/Bernstein for the "vox pop" addition, when (e.g.) Haydn, Handel, Verdi and Wagner remained unheard.

Thanks. As for opera, there was no sinister subtext, and I'm hoping that maybe one of these days they could be persuaded to do something similar to yesterday devoted entirely to opera. Needless to say, Verdi and Wagner were very high on my list of regrets! (I'm sure you can guess how many versions of the 'best five' I had before submitting the choices we ended up with).

[Ein Heldenleben]

As with Dialogues of the Carmelites, Les Troyens was imported on the cheap from other festivals which had paid for all the rehearsal time and had the benefit of the adrenaline-fuelled first nights. Kurtág's Endgame was piggy-backing off an upcoming stage production featuring the same cast and conductor. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was it as far as complete opera was concerned. Opera-lovers certainly feel that Radio 3's annual spend of taking Metropolitan opera broadcasts, while ignoring much of what's going on at home, is a complete dereliction of duty.

No wonder opera fans don't bother with the BBC much any more. Because the BBC certainly doesn't bother with them.

(Les Troyens is often a bit of a bore. It is horribly uneven, in my opinion, and its reputation has become curiously inflated. I'm not surprised at the comparative lack of interest on here).

I’m an opera lover and I don’t share this negative perception of Radio 3’s treatment of it. Those Proms two opera relays would have been amongst the most expensive of this years Proms. Opera on 3 relays the best Met and ROH performances and I listen virtually every week. I live 300 miles from the West End and without them I would be deprived of an art from that I partly subsidise through tax though from time to time I pay £700 odd in train ticket and hotel costs to see in person . For me those relays are something of an artistic lifeline.

I’ve never seen the R3 opera audience figures but I suspect they are small. If it’s still the case that the cast and orchestra get an additional 100 per cent of their fee for a radio relay then they will be by far the most expensive elements in the Radio 3 schedule - though the Met costs might be part of a cheaper deal. For me Opera on 3 is worth the licence fee on its own - though as current BBC pensioner my view cannot be considered unbiased.

[Nick Armstrong]

….which marks you out as a person of enormous taste and discrimination. Several years ago I sat in the stalls at Covent Garden having splashed out on just about my favourite opera…

Why thank you

And I’ve recounted more than once in these parts how in the mid-80s, I splashed out twice in order to hear 3 times (I’d been taken the first time) the fabulous production at CG with Jessye Norman and Kathleen Battle (plus Norman Bailey & James King for good measure) under Jeffrey Tate…

[Ein Heldenleben]

Why thank you

And I’ve recounted more than once in these parts how in the mid-80s, I splashed out twice in order to hear 3 times (I’d been taken the first time) the fabulous production at CG with Jessye Norman and Kathleen Battle (plus Norman Bailey & James King for good measure) under Jeffrey Tate…

worth remortgaging the house for ….