BaL 25.02.17 - Ives: Symphony no. 2

[jayne lee wilson]

Gosh, having now listened to both, the Tilson Thomas version is far preferable to the new Morlot/Seattle. The latter seems very soft-focus, with a 'woolly' recording; the Concertgebouw recording is much better, and better played with bracing edge to the brass that eclipses their American counterparts...

AS a bit of a Morlot/Seattle fan (see above) this intrigued me so I listened to the 2nd Movement, streamed via Qobuz HiFi (lossless FLAC). I can see what you mean - despite being recorded in the same hall with one of the same engineers, it's recorded far more spaciously than the Dutilleux, not with such analytical or coloristic immediacy - but very atmospherically too and, with a higher volume than usual for this source/medium, I found it really did open up in this lovely acoustic, and the low brasses, fully-textured, rich and powerful, were splendid toward the end. VERY impressed with the direction too, as Morlot took an unusual, exhilarating turn of speed into the last climax, then - foot off the gas in an instant, gave us a featherlight, playful final phrase. Excellent!

So, having felt somewhat unenamoured of the work itself, when I tried to play it last week - I'm off to buy the hi-res of this one immédiatement. (Leaving out the Gershwin if choice there be).

So thanks for the recommendation Caliban .!..

[Nick Armstrong]

So thanks for the recommendation Caliban .!..

Only too happy to oblige

I've read the thread but can't remember, have you heard the Concertgebouw/MTT? If you like the Morlot, you might love that ....

[seabright]

A cheap BAL despite the cut Lenny in 1958 enough for me .

I'm with Barbiollians on this one: I have the 1958 Lenny (fast) and the 'Phase-4' Herrmann (slow) and both are quite enough for my "library," not least because I can't remember when I last played either of them! In fact, they're really only there to make up the Ives symphonies numbers on the shelf, so to speak, with No. 1 by Morton Gould and the Chicago SO, No. 3 with Bernstein and the NYPO, and No. 4 with Stokowski and the American Symphony. And if ES & AMcG ever do an Ives 4 chit-chat, I'll still stick with Stokowski whatever they decide!

[gurnemanz]

That Sony Ives Threefer was great value at about £9 when I bought it a few years ago. - now a bit overpriced. It also includes both versions of The Unanswered Question, which I first heard live about 40 years ago. I heard it for the second time in January in Cologne with Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen. I was struck by the effect of having the three groups spatially spread around the hall to pinpoint the dialogue between the solo trumpet and the woodwind group.

[jayne lee wilson]

Browsing around I found an excellent Ives Symphonies Collection article by Ken Smith in Gramophone 7/2004. Bernstein '58 and Schermerhorn preferred, with Mehta also rated above e.g. MTT or Ormandy (audiophile choice but with a big BUT musically), for the sharper American accents...

"Don't pay too much attention to the sounds, or you might miss the music". George Ives to his son, quoted by Ken Smith in approbation of how the Nashville vernacular gets it right...

The original 3/83 MH review of MTT thought it had excellent sound, but musically a shade too "traditional-symphonic" compared to the schwungier idioms of Bernstein or Bernard Herrman with the LSO.....

[Pulcinella]

I was pleased to be able to hear the whole of the MTT performance on Sunday, but it didn't displace my affection for Bernstein (had prepared by listening to the later DG but I have the earlier recording too) and now I know why: it's schwungier!
I might even listen to the Mehta again, after reading the comments in the article that jlw quotes from. It got rather short shrift on Saturday, iirc.

[jayne lee wilson]

I listened to MTT’s Ives 2nd with the Concertgebouw on the Qobuz HiFi lossless stream, and found it: perfectly well-balanced, mid-hall in the perspective familiar from Haitink’s many recordings there. Tonally neutral, very carefully-prepared and beautifully played….
What it lacks is - spontaneity. It sounds almost over-rehearsed, all the work already done before the final polished commitment to the tape. For me it soon became predictable in tempi and phrase: not a note out of place, the recap seemed more than usually a chore, and by the end of the allegro (ii) I was already just a little bored.

Too churlish?

I’d already been listening to the 2012 recording from Ludovic Morlot with the Seattle Symphony, which is available in 24/96 (more on this later), but to even things up I stayed with the Qobuz lossless stream for the comparison. From the start, this live performance is much freer in its phrasing, with a fresher, more soaring string tone as well; listen for Morlot’s subtle, natural but very telling rubato - e.g. at the end that second movement, how he lingers teasingly on the violin line coming out of the last climax, then articulates that last kittenish phrase with playful insouciance, his orchestra with him note-by-note. MTT plays this pretty damn straight.
Or take the horn, flute and cello solos in the 3rd and 5th movements: there’s a lovely, soulful lilt to the Seattle principals’ shaping of the phrase (cello especially), and that lingering rubato again, with Morlot palpably following each tiny move with his orchestra in response, really listening to his soloists. Note specifically how he shades his way, so fluently, into, and out of, each finale interlude. Fully engaged in the moment, drawing the listener in.
(The detached phrases toward the end of the adagio are so tender and delicate!). MTT and his players are, consistently, polished but literal, temperamentally cool.

These differences carry right through both performances, but there’s a little more to it: in the maestoso (iv), MTT is very deliberate, the allegro which follows too briskly unrelatable. His tempi through the finale are quite stiff, again not relating well to each other and, each time the allegro returns following the horn/flute interludes he’s slow - too staidly Brahmsian - and loses momentum, spoiling the fun a bit. Compare Morlot at any point here to note again his affectionate phrasing, livelier rhythms and far better related tempi. Keep ‘em movin’! And those lovely soloists, so in love with their music.

***
Then you turn to the 24/96 replay (wave files, JRiverMC19, Macbook Pro) of this Seattle recording, and the music simply floods into your room. Set spaciously (and atmospherically) mid-hall but without undue resonance, dynamics at both ends of the scale impress with their hush and power but more impressively still: how the weight and fullness - the sheer “roundness” - of the orchestra expands so effortlessly into climaxes, with especially striking low-brass textures. Lovely blend of wind/strings/brass in the adagio. The final climaxes are thrillingly weighty, but with one of those gifts of hi-res, a natural transparency too (the MTT at this point, impressively clear-textured itself, sounds just a little contrived compared to the Benaroya Hall production)...
There is brief, cheering applause - I wished it had gone on longer! Morlot’s Ives 2 is a whole lotta love and a whole lotta fun.

***

Wait a minute, the last chord! Well, Morlot does extend it - a bit…not by as much as some. It sounds just right in context.
Is this is a problem for conductors? If you truly cut it off as, apparently, you brutally should, (as per Schermerhorn say), this can seem to undermine the glorious riot of the final climax which has gone before.
Is the dancehall reference - one big dissonant bark, that’s all folks, we’re blown out, we wanna drink, we gotta go - meaningful now, or does it simply sound “odd”? I think that’s why quite a few conductors prolong it, they may feel that, brutally short, it leaves too bathetic an impression - even if Ives may have wanted such an shocking aftertaste, they feel they can’t do it.

But I’m not sure if, in extending it, the intention is to intensify the shock; or attempt a more traditionally conclusive feel, which yet subverts that fulfilment in its dissonance.

[jayne lee wilson]

Doin' some Ivesian bummin' around, found this excellent Houston SO audio guide to Symphony No.2, with many excerpts from the American hymn and song sources....

http://houstonsymphonyblog.org/10/16/ives-symphony-2/

Those fiddlers are good stuff huh?

[Bryn]

Hi Bryn,
Has the download still got the 'glitch' at 3' 52" in the third movement? After being patronised by a 'Ryan' at Bandcamp I deleted my download and ripped the CD, which is glitchless.

I contacted Bandcamp re. the problem and have had an apologetic response from Ryan who advises that Bandcamp has no control over such matters, and that I would need to take it up with the "artists" via a link on the download page. Why he could not do that himself is a mystery. I will now relate the sorry tale to Yale. I will even offer them a repaired copy of the third movement.

[Beef Oven!]

Doin' some Ivesian bummin' around, found this excellent Houston SO audio guide to Symphony No.2, with many excerpts from the American hymn and song sources....

http://houstonsymphonyblog.org/10/16/ives-symphony-2/

Those fiddlers are good stuff huh?

Great stuff!

Thanks for the link, Jayne - really interesting

[jayne lee wilson]

It might be worth emphasising that when you start playback of the original hymns and fiddle-tunes on the Houston blog, these originals will continue if you then start off the symphony excerpts, so you can hear the symphonic version superimposed upon the source: the tune, and what Ives does with it, simultaneously - really useful and enjoyable...!

http://houstonsymphonyblog.org/10/16/ives-symphony-2/

[soileduk]

I contacted Bandcamp re. the problem and have had an apologetic response from Ryan who advises that Bandcamp has no control over such matters, and that I would need to take it up with the "artists" via a link on the download page. Why he could not do that himself is a mystery. I will now relate the sorry tale to Yale. I will even offer them a repaired copy of the third movement.

Did you get anything like this...........

Thanks for the detailed explanation, Peter. The track I have been testing is the one you've linked here, and I have tested it as though I were a typical user — playing the 128k stream from the website, and downloading the on-demand files in different download formats through the download page (we cache files after multiple requests, so you and I are looking at the exact same zip).

To sanity check, I just tested the streams and downloads again — there was no glitch at the mark you specified. It increasingly sounds like some aspect of your setup is to blame (perhaps there is a peak in the amplitude at exactly that point, or a sample window handled poorly by one or another element in your playback chain for unusual reasons). At any rate, the track itself is perfectly fine.

I'd recommend you try playing the file(s) from a different system to confirm for yourself that the files are error-free, and then systematically remove elements from your playback chain until you discover which is responsible for the glitch. Sorry about the trouble.

Thanks,
Ryan

All this bullshit and the glitches were still plainly audible. In fact they were plainly obvious on their website basic audio sample. It beggared my belief that this cloth eared clown was patronising me when he could have said more honestly ''we've got your money now F-off''.

[Bryn]

Did you get anything like this...........

Thanks for the detailed explanation, Peter. The track I have been testing is the one you've linked here, and I have tested it as though I were a typical user — playing the 128k stream from the website, and downloading the on-demand files in different download formats through the download page (we cache files after multiple requests, so you and I are looking at the exact same zip).

To sanity check, I just tested the streams and downloads again — there was no glitch at the mark you specified. It increasingly sounds like some aspect of your setup is to blame (perhaps there is a peak in the amplitude at exactly that point, or a sample window handled poorly by one or another element in your playback chain for unusual reasons). At any rate, the track itself is perfectly fine.

I'd recommend you try playing the file(s) from a different system to confirm for yourself that the files are error-free, and then systematically remove elements from your playback chain until you discover which is responsible for the glitch. Sorry about the trouble.

Thanks,
Ryan

All this bullshit and the glitches were still plainly audible. In fact they were plainly obvious on their website basic audio sample. It beggared my belief that this cloth eared clown was patronising me when he could have said more honestly ''we've got your money now F-off''.

No, just a short apologetic message advising contacting the "artist", which I did, getting a swift response from Brian S Robinson at Yale, thanking me and requesting that I send the repaired file. I have done so and also sent the glitched 'original'.

[Bryn]

Re. the Concertgebouw/MTT Ives 2nd, I find it more than a little curious that the only Ives recording in the 152 CD RCO Radio Anthology boxed set is the First Orchestral Set "Three Places in New England" conducted by John Adams. Indeed, MTT does not feature at all. Perhaps there were contractual problems re. CBS (now Sony), though perhaps not, since he also recorded for DGG.

[soileduk]

Well done. I must admit that as I had the CD I just wanted to leave it there and move on. I'm glad you've done what,perhaps, I should have.