BaL 22.02.14 - Haydn: Symphony no. 44

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I hadn't read that. My understanding is that he has a clavichord at home which he plays every day. And his playing (and conducting) of Mozart on a Walter fortepiano with the OAE at the Sheldonian last year was a great treat.

Good to hear (in both sense of the expression) - IIRC, Schiff was quoted from an interview (?in Gramophone?), so the tone of his comment may have been lost in print.

[verismissimo]

Good to hear (in both sense of the expression) - IIRC, Schiff was quoted from an interview (?in Gramophone?), so the tone of his comment may have been lost in print.

And, of course, the clavichord is a hammerklavier producing piano and forte, unlike the harpsichord. Bach (JS) loved his clavichord. We might hear it more often!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

And, of course, the clavichord is a hammerklavier producing piano and forte, unlike the harpsichord.

Perhaps not too much in the way of forte, but it is much more expressive than the harpsichord.

[MickyD]

This was an interesting series that Christopher Hogwood did on the clavichord...word had it that he was even going to do a disc of Beethoven on the instrument, but I don't think it ever happened.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dclassical&field-keywords=the+secret+clavichord#/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dclassical&field-keywords=the+secret+Hogwood&rh=n%3A697386%2Ck%3Athe+secret+Hogwood

[waldo]

I played a clavichord for the first time a few weeks ago - several of them, in fact.

Yes, they are very quiet, so the dynamic range is not quite what you might think. It is also quite hard to vary the dynamics without also messing about with the pitch. When you press the key hard, the "hammer", a kind of vertical tongue of metal, pushes the strings up and the pitch changes. If you waggle the key, you get a funky kind of vibrato. The tone was not especially beautiful: a bit tinny, actually.

At the same time, I tried out some harpsichords. I am not a fan of these on recording, but "live" the sound is ear-prickingly ravishing. Also, the various stops and what-not give it slightly more "expressivity" that you might imagine. It is not true, by the way, that you can't vary the volume by hitting the key harder: you can. But not much.

Putting the two instruments together, it is easy to see just how primitive the clavichord is in comparison to the harpsichord. The harpsichord is a sophisticated feat of engineering, as well as wonderful piece of furniture. It makes a rich, beautiful sound which would easily fill a large room. The clavichord is not much more than a child's coffin with strings lashed across its open face. The mechanism is about as rudimentary as you can imagine: a tongue of metal attached to a key.

[jayne lee wilson]

No further comment on Scherchen placing the (very slow!) adagio second? (See post no.29). It does work rather well...
It's unique to that recording then?

[waldo]

No further comment on Scherchen placing the (very slow!) adagio second? (See post no.29). It does work rather well...
It's unique to that recording then?

Yes, I had a listen just after your initial post. I thought it was absolutely terrible. Unspeakably, ludicrously slow. I think I stopped breathing at one point and blacked out.

But then I only know the work from pacy HIP performances........

[verismissimo]

No further comment on Scherchen placing the (very slow!) adagio second? (See post no.29). It does work rather well...
It's unique to that recording then?

I haven't heard Scherchen, Jayne, but HCRL had enormous influence on the performance of Haydn over several decades - see post 27 - so it's unlikely that others would have thought it advisable musically.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Putting the two instruments together, it is easy to see just how primitive the clavichord is in comparison to the harpsichord. The harpsichord is a sophisticated feat of engineering, as well as wonderful piece of furniture. It makes a rich, beautiful sound which would easily fill a large room. The clavichord is not much more than a child's coffin with strings lashed across its open face. The mechanism is about as rudimentary as you can imagine: a tongue of metal attached to a key.

Yes but..

The clavichord is sensitive to the human touch, whereas the beautiful piece of furniture has all the sensitivity of an electronic keyboard (and I exclude the touch sensitive versions of the latter). Sometimes simple can be better.

[jayne lee wilson]

Yes, I had a listen just after your initial post. I thought it was absolutely terrible. Unspeakably, ludicrously slow. I think I stopped breathing at one point and blacked out.

But then I only know the work from pacy HIP performances........

Well, if you blacked out, that does rather devalue your considered judgement... and Bruggen is not very pacy... but never mind. I only wanted some intelligent comment. Too much to ask, obviously.

[richardfinegold]

I have been listening to the Fischer set of the complete symphonies over the past few weeks and while I don't have another recording handy to compare #44, this version strikes me as very satisfying.

[waldo]

Well, if you blacked out, that does rather devalue your considered judgement... and Bruggen is not very pacy... but never mind. I only wanted some intelligent comment. Too much to ask, obviously.

Do you always react like this when someone disagrees with you?

I only said I thought it was awful. Isn't that allowed? I did think it was awful. Absurd, actually. At least I took the time to follow your "intelligent" recommendation and listen.

What do you want? A musicological treatise to justify my final judgement?

As for Bruggen (you mentioned him, not me; I merely said HIP), I think you must have been looking at overall timings for movements. In actual fact, if you measure the tempo, he is TWICE the speed of Scherchen. Howgood is even faster again: almost THREE times the speed. For most mortals, that's "pacy" - at least in comparative terms.

[rauschwerk]

I have been listening to the Fischer set of the complete symphonies over the past few weeks and while I don't have another recording handy to compare #44, this version strikes me as very satisfying.

Fischer's performance is very refined, but somewhat lacking in Haydn's trademark nervous energy. Pinnock has plenty of that, but I do regret his decision not to make the second half repeat in the finale.

Scherchen is just hopeless. Where does one start? Where the heck are those crucial sforzati at (for example) bars 52-55 of the finale? This sounds like a first run through with an orchestra of indifferent sight-readers! Changing the order of movements is an act of outrageous vandalism.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Changing the order of movements is an act of outrageous vandalism.

Possibly, but it's quite easy to change them back by CD player programming.

[rauschwerk]

Possibly, but it's quite easy to change them back by CD player programming.

Of course, but with the original LP issue it would have been a pain.