BaL 26.10.19/4.04.20 - Dvořák: Piano Trio No. 4 in E minor 'Dumky'

[Master Jacques]

Yes, they pretty much all have. Gapless playback has not been a problem on Qobuz for many years; it was an issue with Tidal early on, but I think they’ve solved it too. And, as I mentioned, Qobuz mostly provides booklet notes, texts and translations, though you do need an iPad or similar to read them on while you’re listening. No big deal, I’d have thought.

Thank you. Gapless (and seamless) is an absolute necessity for me, and I'm glad to know that the better streamers address that.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

So this repeated BaL has replaced Schumann's 3rd Symphony.
All because the BBC appears to have forgotten how good solo BaLs are/were.

[ardcarp]

✓

[HighlandDougie]

I sense that solo BaLs have become something of a shibboleth to the Record Review production team. Old farts and solo BaLs in one corner, zeitgeisty young things and twofers in the other. The Radio 3 Controller is a good man who loves music but, when I was part of a committee during the Olympics on which he sat wearing his Arts Council hat, the words "spine" and "jellyfish" used to come to mind. I am no doubt being unfair on Alan (the byzantine politics within the BBC are the stuff of myth - and TV programmes) but I fear that onefers have been consigned to the dustbin of broadcasting history.

[CallMePaul]

Surely the current style of BAL presentation could be done as so many radio and TV discussions are currently being done, with the reviewer at home and the presenter (AMcG) in the studio with assistants playing the reviewer's chosen excerpts? Having said that, I would have great reservations about a Russian music specialist being asked to review a Schumann symphony. I would hardly expect an early music specialist to review Shostakovich or Borodin, for example. I know that Mahan Esfahani did a BAL on La Traviata and he obviously did his homework, but I'm not sure that he was the right man for the job. As I missed the original review of the Dumky I did listen to this, but I don't want to hear repeats of BALs that were first broadcast recently and still fairly fresh in my memory.

[BBMmk2]

Perhaps going back to the old way of BaLs could be the best way, eg the reviewer sends their deliberations by tape or by telephone, if needs must.