BaL 26.11.22 - Strauss: Don Juan

[Petrushka]

Klemperer for me. I think he catches the swagger of the character exactly.

As for Bernstein, well, I think he wanted to be a master interpreter of Strauss, but the two men were so different that there was an unsuperable barrier of which Lenny himself may not even have been aware.

All I've read about Strauss suggests that he was a difficult man to sum up. At times he liked to present to the world a persona which was misleading or open to misinterpretation. Elgar did this too in later life .

According to the New York Philharmonic performance archives https://archives.nyphil.org/performa...AN,%20OP.%2020 Bernstein performed Don Juan in a short series of concerts in September 1961 and again in January/February 1963.

There are no results on the VPO archive.

[smittims]

Hi, cloughie, I felt he was better earlier because he had more to prove. I prefer his NY 'Faust Symphony ' to his later one on DG, for instance. And I preferred his earlier Mahler 2 to his famous one with Janet Baker. But some of his very early recordings are more urgent still, e.g. his 'Jeremiah' Symphony with Nan Merriman and the S. Louis orch.

I have happy memories of Five Ways; I used to live near there 50 years ago. Ah, youth...and romance!.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

As I said earlier, I only bought one recording of the work “deliberately”: the one which heads the list:

VPO/ Karajan
SWR Baden-Baden
VSO/Frübeck de Burgos
NYPO/Nelsons
BBC SO/Pritchard
Concertgebouw/Jansons
RIAS SO/Böhm
Cleveland Orchestra/Ashkenazy
VPO/Previn
San Francisco SO/Blomstedt
Minnesota Orchestra/de Waart
Chicago SO/Solti
Munich Radio Orchestra/Strauss
Berlin PO/Furtwängler
Caracas SO/Furtwängler
VPO/Furtwängler

[cloughie]

Hi, cloughie, I felt he was better earlier because he had more to prove. I prefer his NY 'Faust Symphony ' to his later one on DG, for instance. And I preferred his earlier Mahler 2 to his famous one with Janet Baker. But some of his very early recordings are more urgent still, e.g. his 'Jeremiah' Symphony with Nan Merriman and the S. Louis orch.

I have happy memories of Five Ways; I used to live near there 50 years ago. Ah, youth...and romance!.

His Eroica, Schumann 2, Brahms 4, Dvorak 9 and Tchaik 6 with the NY Stadium SO are good 50s examples of his work!

[richardfinegold]

As I said earlier, I only bought one recording of the work “deliberately”: the one which heads the list:

VPO/ Karajan
SWR Baden-Baden
VSO/Frübeck de Burgos
NYPO/Nelsons
BBC SO/Pritchard
Concertgebouw/Jansons
RIAS SO/Böhm
Cleveland Orchestra/Ashkenazy
VPO/Previn
San Francisco SO/Blomstedt
Minnesota Orchestra/de Waart
Chicago SO/Solti
Munich Radio Orchestra/Strauss
Berlin PO/Furtwängler
Caracas SO/Furtwängler
VPO/Furtwängler

It is obviously a crowd pleaser, and its relative brevity makes it both a good item for concert programming (it can either start or end a concert) and a great “filler” for both CDs and lps, thus leading to the the inadvertent acquisition of multiple versions. My first was Szell and Cleveland, other particular favorites being Reiner/Chicago and Karajan/Berlin. I have several Furtwangler’s as he seemed to program this a bit. This is one work where I want modern sound and an upper tier Orchestra. No recordings by the
Pickelbratt Radio Symphony Orchestra on a Vox lp made from gravel and broken glass, please

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

This is one work where I want modern sound and an upper tier Orchestra. No recordings by the
Pickelbratt Radio Symphony Orchestra on a Vox lp made from gravel and broken glass, please

[akiralx]

I really like the SFSO under Blomstedt in Strauss these days.

[akiralx]

This is one work where I want modern sound and an upper tier Orchestra. No recordings by the
Pickelbratt Radio Symphony Orchestra on a Vox lp made from gravel and broken glass, please

Well, there is the Paris Conservatoire O under Knappertsbusch in the list - one to set the pulse racing?

[Keraulophone]

.
André Previn once suggested that to disguise the difficulty for a conductor and orchestra in getting the piece started, his downbeat should come as he (or she) mounts the conductor's rostrum or, at least, immediately he is in position.

Has anyone here ever witnessed such precipitate action by a conductor in the concert hall? Perhaps Mr Previn gave a preview of this approach in one of his Music Nights with the LSO on BBC television, first broadcast fifty years ago ; the memory fades.
.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

.
André Previn once suggested that to disguise the difficulty for a conductor and orchestra in getting the piece started, his downbeat should come as he (or she) mounts the conductor's rostrum or, at least, immediately he is in position.

Has anyone here ever witnessed such precipitate action by a conductor in the concert hall? Perhaps Mr Previn gave a preview of this approach in one of his Music Nights with the LSO on BBC television, first broadcast fifty years ago ; the memory fades.
.

I do remember this.

[Petrushka]

.
André Previn once suggested that to disguise the difficulty for a conductor and orchestra in getting the piece started, his downbeat should come as he (or she) mounts the conductor's rostrum or, at least, immediately he is in position.

Has anyone here ever witnessed such precipitate action by a conductor in the concert hall? Perhaps Mr Previn gave a preview of this approach in one of his Music Nights with the LSO on BBC television, first broadcast fifty years ago ; the memory fades.
.

I remember that programme very well. It was an Omnibus programme on BBC1 presented by Previn called 'Who Needs a Conductor?' It was broadcast on June 17 1973.

https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/da174c273cc246a6b8489b0860949c3c

[Pulcinella]

.
André Previn once suggested that to disguise the difficulty for a conductor and orchestra in getting the piece started, his downbeat should come as he (or she) mounts the conductor's rostrum or, at least, immediately he is in position.

Has anyone here ever witnessed such precipitate action by a conductor in the concert hall? Perhaps Mr Previn gave a preview of this approach in one of his Music Nights with the LSO on BBC television, first broadcast fifty years ago ; the memory fades.
.

There have been occasions when the music has started as the radio announcement is still going on, I'm pretty sure.

[Ein Heldenleben]

.
André Previn once suggested that to disguise the difficulty for a conductor and orchestra in getting the piece started, his downbeat should come as he (or she) mounts the conductor's rostrum or, at least, immediately he is in position.

Has anyone here ever witnessed such precipitate action by a conductor in the concert hall? Perhaps Mr Previn gave a preview of this approach in one of his Music Nights with the LSO on BBC television, first broadcast fifty years ago ; the memory fades.
.

Previn actually demonstrated this on TV as you say . But his purpose was to use the audience applause to mask any mishaps in the very tricky string opening. I tbink he meant it as a joke really. I’ve never seen a conductor do this but Daussgard did precisely that in his Nielsen performance this Proms season so I have heard it . My reading of his intent was not to let the energy level in the hall sag with silence .

[Ein Heldenleben]

Fantastic work, Alpie!

My introduction to Richard Strauss as a teenager. I can’t help but think of the thousands and thousands of hours violinists must have spent working at the first page! A real audition piece.

I read somewhere* that the VPO violins have a tradition of playing this spiccato. I’m not a violinist but presumably that makes things even trickier ?
*David Wooldridge ‘Conductors World’ . David says that it was Strauss himself who “taught” the VPO to do this . Since then that’s how they do it…

[smittims]

Yet on Strauss' famous recording with the Berlin Statskapelle they play it legato; at any rate, the ensemble is so slack some of them could be playing an upward glissando. Much easier!

I heard it said that when virtuoso orchestras came along who played evry note precisely, Strauss didn't like the result.