BaL 23.11.19 - Haydn: Symphony no. 102

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

A wise decision I would say ferney! Sets up a Haydn seek!

Done - with just one post requiring "editing" (jlw's #131, which was divided into two and rent asunder to fit in with the two Threads: my apologies).

[jayne lee wilson]

Done - with just one post requiring "editing" (jlw's #131, which was divided into two and rent asunder to fit in with the two Threads: my apologies).

Nothing wrong a bit of interventionism, right?

[Nick Armstrong]

The show itself has always been live, so that would have been possible anyway. It’s the live, faux-conversational, BaL element which is the problem for many, including me.

And me. Another inconsequential BAL with a ridiculous howler only saved by SW’s professionalism ... which would have been better deployed providing a considered solo analysis. Yes, interesting to hear one or two of the extracts which I didn’t know (esp. the ‘winner’) but the phoney chat...

[cloughie]

That's nearly as bad as the sobriquet I used to refer to the much missed general store which replaced the old Co-op department store in Bracknell and which was run by an extended Sikh family (the very building now gone due to the ill-named 'Lexicon' redevelopment of the town centre (looks like they never got past the cover of their Scrabble word search tome), i.e. the "Sikh and find shop".

I have a couple of High Street (or I should say Fore Street) literary or musical connections - 'Hawkshead Revisited', then there's a song 'Life is like a Mountain Warehouse' and the cut-price Weather Report 'Poundland' fits nicely into the ManTran vocal version!

[edashtav]

I've been listening to the recommended Roy Goodman #102 coupled with #101. Both are fine and without directorial eccentricities. I can understand why SW recommended the Bb whilst missing the wonderful flautist on the Fey recording. I grew up learning the work from Chas. Groves and the BMO/BSO whose interpretation still has merit. I experienced no problems with Roy Goodman on fortepiano except for an occasional lead from him as he used his fp continuo to insustthe pace. I enjoyed the ample acoustic that didn't lack immediacy.

I must dust down my Minkowski version but for now, I'm happy to walk the walk with SW.

[jayne lee wilson]

GOODMAN/KUIJKEN/MINKOWSKI…

HANOVER BAND/GOODMAN……(Hyperion lossless download).
Subtlety, detail, light and shade…Goodman’s intro to (i) strikes you immediately as finding more in the music, the dynamic gradation, the detailed, layered translucency, (which is tonally very beautiful too), and the fortepiano adding its own colour and commentary. The allegro is very fast, light and agile, but with lift, life, and big exciting dynamic punches.
It’s a very winning blend of qualities.

The same light & lovely touch in the adagio (not too serious and never solemn), then a swift minuet whose dynamics are restrained, relative to the big climaxes in the outer movements; the trio passes nonchalantly, sweetly, with sly nudges from the winds, not-a-care-in-the-world.
Those first and last movements are among the quickest I’ve heard; but again, the finale doesn't feel rushed or overdriven: keeps its bounce and swing, the cat-and-toy-mouse playfulness.
Recorded sound is excellent; highly detailed, spacious and very natural; with a certain sparkle to its resonances, the piano perfectly balanced, always audible in the mix. Very appealing to the ear.

Taking a broadly similar but more detached approach, Kuijken (DHM/JVC Japan CD) has that exciting contrast between light textures and powerful dynamic swings, with a more epic, soaring character, compared to Goodman’s more intimate, almost mischievous feel.
Minkowksi’s Musiciens du Louvre (Naive 24/44.1 download) sound bigger and weightier, but this often loses some of those textural and dynamic contrasts; rhythms tend to be stiffer, more metrical, with less schwung than the other two. Heavier, sometimes harder and denser into climaxes, lacking the fresh openness of Kuijken or Goodman, I can never quite escape the driven-ness of the Minkowski, which seems to chase the lighter moods out of the allegros. I miss the fun, and the classical delicacy here.

The MduL are more “Beethovenian”, closer to a modern sonority than the other period instrument orchestras and I feel a little anonymous as a result; but this is not a bad performance at all - some may prefer the larger scale, the warmer adagio sound. But for me it is simply less special, less distinctive in the orchestral sound or character.

To sum up: Minkowski emphasises energy and power, heading off into the Beethovenian Symphonic future;
Kuijken has an elegant epic air, a Baroque-Operatic elevation, with the harpsichord’s delicacies twinkling below;
but I feel it’s Goodman (with a nod and a wink from his 1798 Broadwood) who is more attuned to the Haydnesque essence: the fun and suaveity, gravity, humour and mischief, in both sound and expression.

[Bryn]

He's not dead in any important sense! And as to whether he would have seen music as being there to "express human emotions" ... well, I doubt he would have gone along with any such romantic notion. But then, who am I to speak for him? Sometimes, though, I feel the "helping hand" he's offered these days is rather too close to helping far-from-lame dogs over styles.

Just came across this Busoni quote on Darragh Morgan's Facebook page. He found it while preparing the (missing) programme notes for his new Feldman CD:

“What the composer’s inspiration necessarily loses through notation, his interpreter should restore by his own”.

[Master Jacques]

Just came across this Busoni quote on Darragh Morgan's Facebook page. He found it while preparing the (missing) programme notes for his new Feldman CD:

“What the composer’s inspiration necessarily loses through notation, his interpreter should restore by his own”.

A revealing quote, which tells us a great deal about Busoni's aesthetic. It begs the question, of course, as to what has or has not been "lost" by notation in the first place. That's where the debate was, is and always will be, even in Haydn's case (who leaves rather more than [e.g.] Boccherini to the performer's taste, intelligence and stylistic knowledge.)

[Bryn]

Just came across this Busoni quote on Darragh Morgan's Facebook page. He found it while preparing the (missing) programme notes for his new Feldman CD:

“What the composer’s inspiration necessarily loses through notation, his interpreter should restore by his own”.

Oops! Seems I had first come across that quote around three decades ago, then managed to forget all about it. Paul Zukofsky cited it in a letter to Feldman, written as a draft for an intended programme note for this very work. In that same letter/programme note Zukofsky also mentions how "your [Feldman's] music is the most architectural since Bruckner's, and like Bruckner, evolves slowly over time."

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Oops! Seems I had first come across that quote around three decades ago, then managed to forget all about it. Paul Zukofsky cited it in a letter to Feldman, written as a draft for an intended programme note for this very work. In that same letter/programme note Zukofsky also mentions how "your [Feldman's] music is the most architectural since Bruckner's, and like Bruckner, evolves slowly over time."

Haydn #102?

[Pianorak]

HANOVER BAND/GOODMAN……(Hyperion lossless download).
Subtlety, detail, light and shade…Goodman’s intro to (i) strikes you immediately as finding more in the music, the dynamic gradation, the detailed, layered translucency, (which is tonally very beautiful too), and the fortepiano adding its own colour and commentary. The allegro is very fast, light and agile, but with lift, life, and big exciting dynamic punches.
It’s a very winning blend of qualities.

The same light & lovely touch in the adagio (not too serious and never solemn), then a swift minuet whose dynamics are restrained, relative to the big climaxes in the outer movements; the trio passes nonchalantly, sweetly, with sly nudges from the winds, not-a-care-in-the-world.
Those first and last movements are among the quickest I’ve heard; but again, the finale doesn't feel rushed or overdriven: keeps its bounce and swing, the cat-and-toy-mouse playfulness.
Recorded sound is excellent; highly detailed, spacious and very natural; with a certain sparkle to its resonances, the piano perfectly balanced, always audible in the mix. Very appealing to the ear.

Thank you, Jayne. Agree with every word (although CD in my case). Maybe you or somebody else can tell me how Harnoncourt/RCO ended up among Other Recommended Recordings in preference to Davis/RCO. I think Eine Alpensinfonie has a point ref. 102: <<Maybe it’s just me, but everything Harnoncourt touches seems to turn to sludge.>> I thought Davis found the same "subtlety, detail, light and shade" as Goodman except in the Menuetto which I felt lacked the "bounce and spring" of the Goodman. But I much prefer the Davis to the Harnoncourt.

[HighlandDougie]

Thank you, Jayne. Agree with every word (although CD in my case). Maybe you or somebody else can tell me how Harnoncourt/RCO ended up among Other Recommended Recordings in preference to Davis/RCO. I think Eine Alpensinfonie has a point ref. 102: <<Maybe it’s just me, but everything Harnoncourt touches seems to turn to sludge.>> I thought Davis found the same "subtlety, detail, light and shade" as Goodman except in the Menuetto which I felt lacked the "bounce and spring" of the Goodman. But I much prefer the Davis to the Harnoncourt.

It’s an error as Sarah Walker’s recommended ‘modern instrument’ version was Sir Colin Davis and the KCO, not Harnoncourt.

[Bryn]

Haydn #102?

No, the one mentioned in the meander from the thread from which the quoted post was drawn. :p

Best of luck creating an oxbow from that meander.

[jayne lee wilson]

Thank you, Jayne. Agree with every word (although CD in my case). Maybe you or somebody else can tell me how Harnoncourt/RCO ended up among Other Recommended Recordings in preference to Davis/RCO. I think Eine Alpensinfonie has a point ref. 102: <<Maybe it’s just me, but everything Harnoncourt touches seems to turn to sludge.>> I thought Davis found the same "subtlety, detail, light and shade" as Goodman except in the Menuetto which I felt lacked the "bounce and spring" of the Goodman. But I much prefer the Davis to the Harnoncourt.

For my comments on Harnoncourt ,see #19..... he's a great musical hero for me with an amazing very innovative recorded catalogue - COE, CMW... and the RCOA set of the Haydn Londons is my favourite modern-instrument set....(coupla years ago I hunted down the original CDs 2ndhand for a few quid each with the lovely Canalettos on the covers)... but I'm a devoted Harnoncourt fan, so as usual my worship is subjective...

But I mean "sludge"!? Oh, come on now... the COE Beethoven and Schumann, the fantastic Berlin Schumann/Schubert 4ths, all those CMWs of Mozart and Haydn, the RCOA Schubert? Very vital, sharply defined and refreshed accounts, nearly all wonderfully well-recorded....seek them out and enjoy!

[silvestrione]

For my comments on Harnoncourt ,see #19.....

But I mean "sludge"!? Oh, come on now... the COE Beethoven and Schumann, the fantastic Berlin Schumann/Schubert 4ths, all those CMWs of Mozart and Haydn, the RCOA Schubert? Very vital, sharply defined and refreshed accounts, nearly all wonderfully well-recorded....seek them out and enjoy!

But alas, for some of us, we are just allergic to Harnoncourt, even if we're not quite sure why. Is it too calculated, unspontaneous, every note thought through? Possibly, but then I like Michelangeli, of whom the same could be said.....