Ravel's Bolero

[BBMmk2]

This work is my worse nightmare!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

This is partly why I launched the 'Recordings in Discussion' subforum!
Perhaps with Master Jacques' consent (and an obliging host) this thread could be moved there, with the necessary tweaks to the heading (and possibly the first sentence of the original post)?

I've moved it here, now that Pandora's Box has been opened, with a view to restoring it to Summer BaL once the Proms take over. Hopefully, everyone will be happy with this.

[cloughie]

The great thing about Summer BAL is that we do not have Andrew McGregor interrupting us and telling us what to think .

Ssh, he’ll be registering with us dreckly!

[gradus]

Bolero? Monteux.

[Master Jacques]

This work is my worse nightmare!

Oh dear! Maybe try Monteux, if you haven't already. There's so much musical interest, so much breathtaking variety of timbre, texture and harmonics (those flutes in sixths at one point, for example) within that looping melody and repeated rhythm, that it might just cure you. Who knows? His version is remarkable for the different character the tune takes on, with all those shifting parameters.

Thank you hosts for moving this thread to the correct place.

[cloughie]

Oh dear! Maybe try Monteux, if you haven't already. There's so much musical interest, so much breathtaking variety of timbre, texture and harmonics (those flutes in sixths at one point, for example) within that looping melody and repeated rhythm, that it might just cure you. Who knows? His version is remarkable for the different character the tune takes on, with all those shifting parameters.

Thank you hosts for moving this thread to the correct place.

No, MJ, I think you miss Bbm’s point, however well Bolero is played, it is still Bolero, and if it is not your marmite, then you will not like it. I’m with Bbm!

[Bryn]

In my earlier post regarding the McFerrin and Ravel/Wolff recordings, I forgot to mention the Zappa version. Very much an arrangement (but then, compressed versions were often to be found in the days of 78s) but a worthy supplement, I feel:

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Ssh, he’ll be registering with us dreckly!

That wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Although I don’t like his twoferism, his detailed knowledge and experience would be of great benefit here.

[cloughie]

That wouldn’t be such a bad thing. Although I don’t like his twoferism, his detailed knowledge and experience would be of great benefit here.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

My first experience of Bolero was at a Hallé Industrial Concert in 1960 or ‘61. There was an item in the first half that I wanted to hear. When my father saw the proposed programme, which ended with Bolero, he said (in hid broad Lancashire accent) “Who-ho-ho-ho-ho-hor! Gad! It’s terrible! It goes on and on, the same tune played again and again, getting louder and louder. It drives you mad”. Despite his protestations, he took me to the concert, which was quite an experience. Once the full orchestra had joined in, the conductor, George Weldon, stopped conducting, and even turned round to glance at the audience, resuming conducting shortly before the key shift near the end.
I loved it and still do.
No jokes about repeats, please.

[Pabmusic]

My first experience of Bolero was at a Hallé Industrial Concert in 1960 or ‘61. There was an item in the first half that I wanted to hear. When my father saw the proposed programme, which ended with Bolero, he said (in hid broad Lancashire accent) “Who-ho-ho-ho-ho-hor! Gad! It’s terrible! It goes on and on, the same tune played again and again, getting louder and louder. It drives you mad”. Despite his protestations, he took me to the concert, which was quite an experience. Once the full orchestra had joined in, the conductor, George Weldon, stopped conducting, and even turned round to glance at the audience, resuming conducting shortly before the key shift near the end.
I loved it and still do.
No jokes about repeats, please.

My mother's father (whom I never knew) loved - at least - popular classics - and most of all Ravel's Bolero. Which Mum always pronounced Boleero.

Love it myself - and I've played 1st side drum in it! (Can make your wrists ache, so I was advised - this is true - to do wrist exercises to make it even with either hand... I was a teenager.)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

... his detailed knowledge and experience ...

Of what?

[Pulcinella]

Listening now to Boulez and the NYPO.
It's the last item (track number 12) on the last of three CDs in a set I have kept as not all items made it into the 'complete' Boulez Sony box.
I was surprised to see that the CD player registered 29 tracks on the CD: the 'repetitions' (there must be a better word: iterations?) are individually indexed!
The big box version (there too Bolero is the last item on the CD (CD28); track number 10) has only one index point.

I fail to see how anyone can resist getting caught up in the magnificent swirl of this piece!

PS: Mistake corrected: starts at track 12 not 10, so 18 sections, as Alpie pointed out.
Mea culpa.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Of what?

I was thinking of recordings.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

It's the last item (track number 10) on the last of three CDs in a set I have kept as not all items made it into the 'complete' Boulez Sony box.
I was surprised to see that the CD player registered 29 tracks on the CD: the 'repetitions' (there must be a better word: iterations?) are individually indexed!

That does surprise me. I can only locate 18 sections. The structure is basically AABB, repeated 4 times with evermore instrumentation, plus two coda portions.