BaL 15.10.11 - Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I do not think RN has been a didact. He has had theories based on history...

The trouble with RN's theories is that many of them are formulated to enable him to play the music in the way he pleases, the actual evidence being created in Hogwarts, even going against written and recorded evidence. If they were based on real evidence, I would indeed respect him, just as I respect JEG and Mackerras.

Having read Berlioz's autobiography more than once, I'd be very surprised if he did not prefer the interpretations of Davis, Barbirolli and Stokowski.

And you say that 'HIPP' performers think they know it al!.

Please read what I actually impled, which was that "I would be surprised if..." in view of reading Berlioz's own writings.

I was rather hopng that this thread wouldn't turn into a pro- and anti Norrington-battlefield.

I think that's because his followers "push" RN rather more quickly than they do with anyone else. I once played a Beethoven symphony under a conductor who wanted us to play it at a faster tempo "like Roger Norrington", as though that in itself was a good thing. The fact that Toscanini and many more modern conductors had already done the same did not detract from the fact that RN had stolen the publicity for himself.

[BBMmk2]

I have LSO/C Davis version

[EdgeleyRob]

The Concertgebouw /Davis is still one hell of a great record and available for less than £4 on Amazon ! I am also a fan of the missing Abbado , Beecham and Barbirolli's recordings.

The Concertgebouw /Davis is the only version I have although I haven't lstened to it for ages. I will put that right today.

[Nick Armstrong]

The Concertgebouw /Davis is the only version I have although I haven't lstened to it for ages. I will put that right today.

Same here Rob. It's not a piece i feel compelled to go back to often. The 'scene in the fields' is pretty underwhelming I think. Plus it gets trotted out at concerts so often - I've heard it twice at Proms in the last few years. More than enough to be going on with. It's near enough to becoming an over-familiar war-horse as it is....

[BBMmk2]

Stephen Johnson be the one to make it fresh again!!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

One section that fascinates me in any performance is how the woodwind cope with their glissandi at the beginning of the finale. There aren't many instruments that can do a true slide. Orchestral strings and the trombone - no problem; clarinets - with difficulty, but there are many good players who can manage it effectively; pedal timpani, of course, but most instruments have to fake it.

[vinteuil]

Same here Rob. It's not a piece i feel compelled to go back to often. The 'scene in the fields' is pretty underwhelming I think. Plus it gets trotted out at concerts so often - I've heard it twice at Proms in the last few years. More than enough to be going on with. It's near enough to becoming an over-familiar war-horse as it is....

OK, for you, Kalamazoo, the prescription is the following:

a) - an attentive listen, score in hand, noting Berlioz's use not only of the obvious old trombones and new ophicleides, but also the use of old natural trumpets and the new cornets à pistons;
b) - a re-reading of pp 352-375 of vol. one of David Cairns' biography;
c) - a penitential - but very enjoyable - pèlerinage to la Côte-Saint-André, to absorb where Berlioz was coming from.

(there are some good restaurants dans les parages... )

[Biffo]

Regarding the bells, Berlioz only seems to mention them in his Memoirs when he had difficulty finding them on his tours abroad and the one or two pianos seemed to the preferred alternatve. Possibly this is why he added pianos to the score as an alternative. He also seemes to have had difficulty in finding harps on his tours and again used the piano as a stand-in. There is no mention of a lack of bells in the early Paris performances.

The 'programme' seems to trouble some people, if it does just ignore it and listen to the music. Berlioz only intended the full literary apparatus to be used when the SF was performed in conjunction with the monodrama 'Lelio'. I rarely think about it any more but then I am chronically lacking in imagination and just prefer to listen to the music, even in the much more pictorial tone poems of Strauss. I know from discussions in other forums that some people see colours, all kind of weird images including moustachioed Edwardian gentlemen when listening to music. Dull sort that I am, I 'see' nothing.

[vinteuil]

The 'programme' seems to trouble some people, if it does just ignore it and listen to the music. .

Cairns is very good on why the notion of 'programme music' seems to deter some from really enjoying the Symphonie Fantastique - he shows how it mattered to Berlioz, but also how it shouldn't get in the way of those (such as me) who might otherwise turn up their noses at such a low form of art as 'programme music'...

[french frank]

Amazing, given that Berlioz is so often dismissed as just a bombastic kind of Brahms, that this BaL has attracted so much interest, six days before the broadcast .

[Don Petter]

makropulos:
Long list! And yet even with all those, my favourite recording seems not to be available at the moment - Paul Paray on Mercury.

The Mercury/Paray version is available from Amazon but only at silly prices. The CD version is on sale at £26.95 and the hybrid SACD from £38.99 with one copy at £45.53. Fortunately, I bought a copy when it was available at a sensible price. Why were so many of the Mercury re-releases available for such a short time and does anybody pay these silly prices?

You can download it for free from this blog site:

http://rareclassicalvinyl.blogspot.com/

(Scroll down to number 49 of the 101 entries.)

Lots of Mercury goodies here, and I can vouch for the quality of the transfers.

[Don Petter]

mais bien évidemment....

The France-Musique 'critics forum' programme (now called for reasons which elude all rational people, "Le Jardin des Critiques") considered the piece a couple of weeks ago.

The two recordings which emerged on top were by Les siècles, under François-Xavier Roth (2009, Musicales Actes Sud) and the Thomas Beecham performance with the Orchestre national de l'ORTF in 1959 for EMI.

With commendable lack of chauvinism, they chose Beecham as the best of the best, for its sheer vigour and style and hallucinatory brilliance, relegating their compatriot because the orchestra, ophicleides and all no doubt, just didn't have the 'oooomph'. I actually loved the grainy, woody, visceral sounds of Les siècles...

I see the Beecham has just (12th Sept) been reissued:

http://www.crotchet.co.uk/0851822?utm_source=google&utm_medium=datafeed&utm_campaign=products

Yours for just £7.50! He would be my choice, even at full price.

[vinteuil]

mais bien évidemment....

The France-Musique 'critics forum' programme (now called for reasons which elude all rational people, "Le Jardin des Critiques") considered the piece a couple of weeks ago.

The two recordings which emerged on top were by Les siècles, under François-Xavier Roth (2009, Musicales Actes Sud) and the Thomas Beecham performance with the Orchestre national de l'ORTF in 1959 for EMI.

With commendable lack of chauvinism, they chose Beecham as the best of the best, for its sheer vigour and style and hallucinatory brilliance, relegating their compatriot because the orchestra, ophicleides and all no doubt, just didn't have the 'oooomph'. I actually loved the grainy, woody, visceral sounds of Les siècles...

"With commendable lack of chauvinism" they chose "the Orchestre national de l'ORTF [Office de Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française]"

[vinteuil]

I see the Beecham has just (12th Sept) been reissued:

http://www.crotchet.co.uk/0851822?utm_source=google&utm_medium=datafeed&utm_campaign=products

Yours for just £7.50! He would be my choice, even at full price.

... various amazon sellers even cheaper - incl. postage, abt £5...

[Nick Armstrong]

"With commendable lack of chauvinism" they chose "the Orchestre national de l'ORTF [Office de Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française]"

True, vins-de-France.... I was being conductor-centric