What Classical Music Are You listening to Now? IV

[smittims]

Thanks, Roger and Quarky. I've read that Blumlein preferred the term 'binaural' to 'stereophonic', maybe as the latter was already in some use to describe an apparently, or illusory, spacious mono sound.

My choice today : Gyorgy LIgeti. Piano and harpsichord works. A Charity shop bargain found this morning. Most of the works are early, i.e. non-avant-garde, and quite delightful. The CD label , 'Col Legno', also brought out a fascinating Boulez disc containing the only recordings I know of two of his early works, Polyphonie X and Poesies pour pouvoir.

[Stanfordian]

'Schubert, Webern, Mahler' – Kent Nagano
Franz Schubert
String Quartet in D minor, D 810 'Death and the Maiden'
(arranged for string orchestra by Gustav Mahler)
Anton Webern
Langsamer Satz (slow Movement) string quartet in one movement
Franz Schubert
German Dances, D 820
(arranged for orchestra by Anton Webern)
Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Hamburg / Kent Nagano
Konradin Seitzer (violin); Hibiki Oshima (violin),
Naomi Seiler (viola), Clara Grünwald (cello)
rec. 2021 Elbphilharmonie (Schubert), Laeiszhalle (Webern) Hamburg, 2021
Farao Classics, CD, new release

[Roger Webb]

A really outstanding disc of Debussy piano music played by Saskia Giorgini, featuring the two sets of Images, Pour le Piano, Estampes and finishing with a sensitively played L'Isle joyeuse, all captured in excellent Pentatone sound. Interestingly she chooses to play a Bösendorfer.

It won't replace my overall current favourite, Stephen Osbourne, but a very fine album.

Listen to the release Images by Saskia Giorgini on Qobuz https://open.qobuz.com/album/h2ss8vyn1lm3b

[Sir Velo]

Listen to the release Images by Saskia Giorgini on Qobuz https://open.qobuz.com/album/h2ss8vyn1lm3b

Thanks for that Roger, downloaded and cued for listening later in 24/96 sound quality. If The Gramophone is to be believed this should be a memorable release: "To hear Giorgini play the two books of Images is to hear distilled, in purely musical terms, the palette and brushwork of Monet and Renoir. From ‘Hommage à Rameau’, imbued with near-tragic longing, to the exquisite rhythmic grasp and polyphonic resourcefulness of ‘Mouvement’, you may find yourself, as I did, struggling to imagine when you might have heard it better."

Can't remember when I've read such encomiums. If I were cynical I might think of Joyce Hatto, but I'm sure there's no such jiggery pokery going on here!

[smittims]

Debusssy: Images
Chausson: Symphony in B flat.

The BBC Symphony Orchestra, Pierre Monteux. Royal Festival Hall, May 1955. An ICA classics CD from a Richard Itter tape.

I find all these Itter archive recordings (originally mono) are balance-biased toward the left of the stereo spectrum , as if his recording head was uneven. I've had this with cassette recorders.

[Roger Webb]

Thanks for that Roger, downloaded and cued for listening later in 24/96 sound quality. If The Gramophone is to be believed this should be a memorable release..........

Can't remember when I've read such encomiums. If I were cynical I might think of Joyce Hatto, but I'm sure there's no such jiggery pokery going on here!

Haven't read the Gramophone review, but I can concur that the Images are magical here, 'Reflets', always an indicator of what's to come is so sensitively handled here...and powerful too, the left hand makes the most of the 'full' timbre of the Bösendorfer - BTW if it's a 'Hatto' they'd have to 'borrow' a recording using this unusual choice of instrument....Schiff comes to mind.....but in Debussy?!

On the subject of the piano, it might be worth having a look at this perf on the Debussy Blüthner in Brive... Including my comments on this piano in relation to 'Reflets'.

https://youtu.be/Qdp9bDUsRk4?si=QvThE63q0e50yPym

[Stanfordian]

J.S. Bach – 'Revelation' – 'Alto Arias – Zvi Emanuel-Marial
Cantata Geist und Seele wird verwirret, BWV 35
Arias from St. Matthew Passion, St. John Passion,
Christmas Oratorio, Mass in B minor
Zvi Emanuel-Marial (countertenor)
Sebastian Breuninger (solo violin)
Michaela Kuntz (solo oboe/oboe d’amore)
Unnamed ensemble using modern instruments / Shalev Ad-El (direction/organ)
Recorded 2020 Christuskirche, Oberschöneweide, Berlin
Hänssler Classic, CD

Schubert
Piano Trio No. 1 in B flat, D.898
Piano Trio No. 2 in E flat, D.929
Notturno in E flat, D.897
Sonatensatz, D.28
Frank Braley (piano), Renaud Capuçon (violin), Gautier Capuçon (cello)
Recorded 2006 MC2 Maison de la Culture de Grenoble
Virgin Classics, CD

[oliver sudden]

BTW if it's a 'Hatto' they'd have to 'borrow' a recording using this unusual choice of instrument....Schiff comes to mind.....but in Debussy?!

Paul Jacobs used a Bösendorfer for Debussy, with splendid results!

[Roger Webb]

Paul Jacobs used a Bösendorfer for Debussy, with splendid results!

When I put that I knew someone would come up with one! Thanks Oliver, I'll see if it's on Qobuz......

...........yes it is, and the Images/Estampes album has the Poison d'or panel on the cover that is at the museum in St Germain en Laye and supposed to be that which inspired the work...a copy of which I have framed standing on my chess table.

[MickyD]

When I put that I knew someone would come up with one! Thanks Oliver, I'll see if it's on Qobuz......

...........yes it is, and the Images/Estampes album has the Poison d'or panel on the cover that is at the museum in St Germain en Laye and supposed to be that which inspired the work...a copy of which I have framed standing on my chess table.

"Poisson", I hope!

[Roger Webb]

"Poisson", I hope!

Yes, I must have been thinking of one of my wifes many perfumes, Poison, Dior......which always got me a bit worried!

Edit. Make that wife's!

[Stanfordian]

Verdi – 'Don Carlo'
(five act Italian version of 1867)
Plácido Domingo (Don Carlo), Montserrat Caballé (Elizabetta), Shirley Verrett (Princess Eboli),
Sherrill Milnes (Rodrigo), Ruggero Raimondi (Philip II), Giovanni Foiani (Grand Inquisitor),
Simon Estes (Monk)
Ambrosian Opera Chorus,
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, London / Carlo Maria Giulini
Studio recording 1971, Walthamstow Town Hall, London
EMI (HMV), remastered Warner Classics 3 CD set

[Sir Velo]

Paul Jacobs used a Bösendorfer for Debussy, with splendid results!

Don't forget Alexander Melnikov on an Erard, performing the 2nd book of Preludes as part of Harmonia Mundi's Debussy centenary celebrations. There;s even a duet "to die for" with Olga Pashchenko in a four hand transcription of La Mer,

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8456733--debussy-preludes-la-mer

https://play.qobuz.com/album/cs4ed9h3r4m6a

[vinteuil]

Don't forget Alexander Melnikov on an Erard, performing the 2nd book of Preludes as part of Harmonia Mundi's Debussy centenary celebrations...

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8456733--debussy-preludes-la-mer

... and if you want Book One, there's Jos van Immerseel - also on an 1897 Érard -

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Debussy-Preludes-Jos-Van-Immerseel/dp/B000003UYA

.

[gradus]

Haven't read the Gramophone review, but I can concur that the Images are magical here, 'Reflets', always an indicator of what's to come is so sensitively handled here...and powerful too, the left hand makes the most of the 'full' timbre of the Bösendorfer - BTW if it's a 'Hatto' they'd have to 'borrow' a recording using this unusual choice of instrument....Schiff comes to mind.....but in Debussy?!

On the subject of the piano, it might be worth having a look at this perf on the Debussy Blüthner in Brive... Including my comments on this piano in relation to 'Reflets'.

https://youtu.be/Qdp9bDUsRk4?si=QvThE63q0e50yPym

One of Debussy's pianos was a Bluthner bought in England I believe.