BaL 6.01.24 - Haydn: The Creation

[silvestrione]

The Rademann is available on Qobuz if you search hard enough!

[gurnemanz]

Disappointingly, the Accentus CDs are a long wait, for some reason. And the Presto download does not have a digital booklet...

CDs out stock at UK distributor Naxos. Amazon UK have it as an import from Greece. German dealer jpc is offering immediate delivery. Lack of booklet at Presto is a deterrent to purchase and has the drawback for many of only containing the German text. I'm going to make do with Spotify. I can use the text and translation from another set, but these can easily be found online.

[Sir Velo]

The Rademann is available on Qobuz if you search hard enough!

It certainly is hard search . I originally entered various permutations of "Haydn Creation Rademann" and nothing came up, so decided to settle for the McCreesh/Gabrielis. However, following the link to " Gaechinger Cantorey" was successful. This is where the Qobuz UI does them no favours. No booklet either;. So far enjoying the McCreesh immensely although not catching all the dialogue, despite theoretically being in English! Have the Jacobs, Antonioni, Herreweghe and Christophers lined up on Qobuz for comparative listening and will now probably add the Rademann if only to check whether its selection was due to it being anything other than the last to be released!

[Goon525]

The problem with the Rademann on Qobuz was solved for me by using the German name of the work. It’s not entirely fair to criticise their UI for not having a global translation service built in.

[Sir Velo]

I'm a Qobuz subscriber and while I admire the range of recordings and the sound quality of the offering the UI is unacceptably poor. Moreover, it is perfectly correct to criticise an app which sells directly to English speakers on the fact that the software does not automatically translate German (or any other language) into English. Furthermore, it is random as to how it works. For example, a search of "Haydn Creation" brought up at least 50 recordings, the majority of which are in the German and have "Die schöpfung" as their title. Almost all apps or software which have a global business apply some form of AI to auto translate original languages into English and vice versa. Try Googling "Wienerwald" for example. The majority of your search will bring up Vienna Woods in the results. It should not be up to the customer to have to translate every single work into the original language in order to come up with the required result. For one thing, it is bad business practice. I know how to use Qobuz and have learned to accept its vagaries in return for what I consider to be superior product, but another customer will give up and, what's worse, will likely give up on Qobuz and go to Spotify of Apple Music where they will have a better experience.

[Nick Armstrong]

I know how to use Qobuz and have learned to accept its vagaries in return for what I consider to be superior product, but another customer will give up and, what's worse, will likely give up on Qobuz and go to Spotify of Apple Music where they will have a better experience.

I completely agree, and am in the same boat - sticking with it as the best option but having to navigate round its weaknesses and second-guess its unhelpful search vagaries.

The thing that most annoys me is the frankly crass track listing approach: where a recording has multiple works and/or multiple composers, tracks tend to get just their ‘allegro con brio’ (or whatever) heading, with inconsistent indications of which piece they’re in (the recent Hans Gál Concertinos recording http://open.qobuz.com/album/s8np2ndqmkvsa is a prime offender )

[MickyD]

CDs out stock at UK distributor Naxos. Amazon UK have it as an import from Greece. German dealer jpc is offering immediate delivery. Lack of booklet at Presto is a deterrent to purchase and has the drawback for many of only containing the German text. I'm going to make do with Spotify. I can use the text and translation from another set, but these can easily be found online.

There seems to be no problem ordering the CDs from Amazon France as far as I can see at the moment.

https://www.amazon.fr/Cr%C3%A9ation-HOB-Xxi-2/dp/B0BGNX1PHL/ref=sr_1_1?__mk_fr_FR=%C3%85M%C3%85%C5%BD%C3%95%C3%91&crid=2VUJ02U3143FO&keywords=rademann+haydn&qid=1704813471&sprefix=rademann+haydn%2Caps%2C127&sr=8-1

For my part, I was sorry not to have heard a mention of the big band Hogwood version in English on the programme. But I agree with others on here, a very good BAL indeed.

[CallMePaul]

Although JS said that he had a marginal preference for English over German as the language for the work, all but two of his selections used the German text, even those featuring native English speakers as soloists. Neither of the English versions reached his final selection, however. Given that the English text was the original text, which Haydn had translated into German for Viennese audiences, I would have liked to have seen more consideration of English versions and a recommendation for an English version (of the two sampled I have a marginal preference for Christophers). Given that more continental singers are now prepared to sing English texts in a variety of contexts and even more speak the language fluently, perhaps conductors should encourage them to sing the English version, ie The Creation rather than Die Schöpfung?

[Master Jacques]

Although JS said that he had a marginal preference for English over German as the language for the work, all but two of his selections used the German text, even those featuring native English speakers as soloists. Neither of the English versions reached his final selection, however. Given that the English text was the original text, which Haydn had translated into German for Viennese audiences, I would have liked to have seen more consideration of English versions and a recommendation for an English version (of the two sampled I have a marginal preference for Christophers). Given that more continental singers are now prepared to sing English texts in a variety of contexts and even more speak the language fluently, perhaps conductors should encourage them to sing the English version, ie The Creation rather than Die Schöpfung?

Double-standards apply. If the original language of a choral work or opera was German, or French, or Czech, or Hungarian, then there's a clamour to hear them in that language (we needn't go into why that is). If the original language was English, there is rarely any clamour to hear the work in its original language, and absolute content with hearing it in translation. I could list a whole series of English operas which were premiered here in Italian!

A recent, very peculiar example was the first CD recording of Ethel Smyth's early opera, the vocal score of which features the original English text and the German translation in which it was first performed, as well as the dual title The Forest - Der Wald. Although even Covent Garden had done it in English, as The Forest, the excellent recording - although mercifully sung in English - insisted on titling the CD Der Wald, as if giving it a foreign name made it a more respectable opera. It's a strange world, where English loses out both ways.

[gurnemanz]

Given that the English text was the original text, which Haydn had translated into German for Viennese audiences ...

But the reason he had it translated was that his English was not good and he intrended to set the music to the German text. As a general principle, as with any song or opera, I would prefer to hear the text as actually set by the composer and would tend to opt for recordings of Creation in German - which I believe most are. You can certainly make a case for preferring English in live performances in English-speaking countries. especially given the text's origins. I have sung it several times, only ever in English.

Here's a quote from a very thorough online analysis I came across:

It is clear that, although Swieten endeavoured to keep the two texts similar in metre, Haydn composed to the German text and made rhythmic modifications to accommodate the English text at a later stage. It is hard to make a satisfactory case for any of the musical numbers having been composed initially to the English text, even in those parts - the Biblical quotations from Genesis - which have reached us unaltered. In every case the German flows better, as is to be expected from a German-speaker whose English was admittedly poor.

source

[Master Jacques]

Here's a quote from a very thorough online analysis I came across:

It is clear that, although Swieten endeavoured to keep the two texts similar in metre, Haydn composed to the German text and made rhythmic modifications to accommodate the English text at a later stage. It is hard to make a satisfactory case for any of the musical numbers having been composed initially to the English text, even in those parts - the Biblical quotations from Genesis - which have reached us unaltered. In every case the German flows better, as is to be expected from a German-speaker whose English was admittedly poor.

source

Thank you for the interesting link to Neil Jenkins's article. He gives a sound narrative of the convoluted verbal process which produced the English version first presented to Haydn. But the idea that the composer couldn't set English well is prejudice, as (e.g.) his 12 English Canzonettas and 400+ English-language Welsh and Scottish folksong settings show conclusively. Frankly, I doubt whether listeners have ever been much bothered by the alleged infelicities of his English setting in The Creation: the (minor) deficiencies are in the text, not the composition. People tinker with it unnecessarily.

Prejudice against any English-language setting (especially from German critics keen to 'reclaim' the work) lies at the root of this particular Snark hunt. The reality is more complex, and far more interesting!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I recall my fellow music students organising a surprise party for my 21st birthday. They had also clubbed together to buy me the Bernstein/CBS recording of The Creation. I was struck by their generosity, but was a little disappointed by the recorded balance - artificially close soloists and a somewhat “hard” choral sound. But the most annoying thing was the rather obvious pre-echo on the LP just before the mighty splendour of the word “light” in the opening recit and chorus.
Later, I was to buy the Munchinger/Decca recording, which is superb in every way.

[smittims]

I too owned that CBS recording, my first hearing of The Creation, and I was puzzled by Bernstein's attraction to this work. Was he perhaps one of those people Whistler describes, who felt that had he been present at the original event he might have made some useful suggestions?