BaL 14.05.16 - Haydn: String Quartet in G, Op 77, no 1

[Nick Armstrong]

Bump

Yes you and Ms Gill would obviously be great chums

I have a wonderful disc of Op. 77/1 & 77/2 plus String Quartet in D minor Op. 103 by Quatuor Mosaïques. I don't envisage adding another recording to my collection.

[Beef Oven!]

A mate called just as this BaL was going to start and it felt too nerdy to ask if I could 'phone back when I'd finished listening to R3's BaL episode.

I'll catch up on iPlayer, but it's not the same.

[aeolium]

(except I would have ridiculed the 'Festetics' acoustic slightly more - not just a bathroom acoustic, but in the bathroom upstairs and down the end of the corridor....).

I thought it sounded as though they were playing in a cave....

I thought it was an OK review but there were things that irritated, such as her comments on extracts before she has played them - it's much better imv if reviewers let you hear the extract in an unprejudiced way and then give their views. It was good to hear quite a few extracts from the pre-war Pro Arte Quartet (I loved their portamenti) and she gave examples from a decent range of ensembles. I didn't particularly care for her leaving the slow movement to consider last; whatever her view of the importance of the movement in the whole quartet, I much prefer reviews that take us through the work in sequence.

[Nick Armstrong]

I'll catch up on iPlayer, but it's not the same.

Actually, I agree - it's better not listening live. Today's the first BAL I have listened to live for ages and I miss the ability to pause and listen again to an extract to try and hear something the reviewer has mentioned (today, the Lindsays' breathing).

Catch up or be square, Beefy !

Anyway, mates who phone that bloody early are best ignored anyway, imvvho!

[Alison]

Never got on with the Lindsays, me




I do find Ms Gill one of the worst offenders for skating through phrases at barely intelligible speed - I was listening in perfect conditions and still had to piece together sentences in my brain by supplying some of the last syllables she swallowed as she tore to the next full stop. Also it occurred to me that there's sometimes a bit too much 'me' 'my' and 'I' but perhaps she's just being honest about it being a subjective judgement and not about laying down any absolutes.

Certainly agree with all of that.

I guess taking the movements in order would have meant chucking out otherwise good versions at too early a stage. I liked her structure in the context of picking a winner at the end.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Never got on with the Lindsays, me.

I got on with them quite early on, when I was doing my Keele PGCE. Then they did a very silly thing, dropping the fact that they were a string quartet.

[Nick Armstrong]

I got on with them quite early on, when I was doing my Keele PGCE. Then they did a very silly thing, dropping the fact that they were a string quartet.

I'm amazed that some record-company branding eejit hasn't managed to drop the unfashionable ("Sage Gateshead", "Wigmore") direct article, so that it's "Haydn played by Lindsays"...

[verismissimo]

... I do find Ms Gill one of the worst offenders for skating through phrases at barely intelligible speed - I was listening in perfect conditions and still had to piece together sentences in my brain by supplying some of the last syllables she swallowed as she tore to the next full stop...

She did gabble, but I liked particularly her appreciation for lots of different styles and approaches - noting in particular her liking for the Pro Artes from the 1930s.

Next week we'll have the sarky Ms Joncus.

[Nick Armstrong]

I guess taking the movements in order would have meant chucking out otherwise good versions at too early a stage. I liked her structure in the context of picking a winner at the end.

Yes me too - made perfect sense to me to deal with the 'deciding' aspect last.

Likewise, picking up on an earlier post, I don't mind at all that the comments about an extract come before it is played - that way, one can listen out for what the reviewer means. (Comments coming after the extract make it doubly-necessary to replay the extract to try and hear what is being talked about - which is what I normally do, as mentioned up-thread. Incidentally, to be fair, that is much easier to do with the DAB-recorded-to-SDcard solution I usually use, than when using iPlayer)

[Bryn]

I thought it sounded as though they were playing in a cave....

I have the Festetics recording and I have to wonder whether the wrong track, or rather the wrong CD was played this morning. It sounded nothing like the Michael Bernstein produced recording I have.

[pastoralguy]

I found Ms. Gill's delivery strangely erotic...

[MickyD]

A mate called just as this BaL was going to start and it felt too nerdy to ask if I could 'phone back when I'd finished listening to R3's BaL episode.

I'll catch up on iPlayer, but it's not the same.

Surely just by looking at your staggering collection, Beefy, your mate must have formed that opinion of you already?!

[MickyD]

Lossless download, replete with free digital booklet, £5.99 direct from the Hyperion site.

To a non-techie like me, Bryn...what on earth is a 'lossless' download?

[aeolium]

I have the Festetics recording and I have to wonder whether the wrong track, or rather the wrong CD was played this morning. It sounded nothing like the Michael Bernstein produced recording I have.

It's been done before - Bach Violin and Oboe Concerto BaL this year. I'm glad others noticed the strange acoustic - I thought something had gone wrong with my speakers.

[Bryn]

It's a download where the data is compressed without losing any musical information, so that, in contradistinction to mp3, m4a et al, you get the full original sound on replay.

See http://www.howtogeek.com/142174/what...y-to-lossless/ for instance.