What Classical Music Are You listening to Now? IV

[Pulcinella]

I had the same problem when I went to play the Litton! I reordered it. Is there a cat burglar breaking into the homes of forumites and stealing their CDs of Ives Second Symphonies?
Too bad Agatha Christie isn’t with us. Surely she could make something of the material

I'm fully expecting it to turn up the same day as its replacement drops through the letter box.

Yes, I know I could/can stream it but in fact the CD purchase was by my partner on holiday in France (the receipt is tucked away safely in the case!) so it was a bit special.

[Petrushka]

I had the same problem when I went to play the Litton! I reordered it. Is there a cat burglar breaking into the homes of forumites and stealing their CDs of Ives Second Symphonies?
Too bad Agatha Christie isn’t with us. Surely she could make something of the material

Just checked to see if my copy of the Ives 2 (Bernstein) is safely in place. Yes, it's still there despite not having been played for ages.

[Pulcinella]

Just checked to see if my copy of the Ives 2 (Bernstein) is safely in place. Yes, it's still there despite not having been played for ages.

But has it got my fingerprints on it (though I'm usually careful not to touch the surface!)?


Which recording, btw? Sony or DG?

[Petrushka]

But has it got my fingerprints on it (though I'm usually careful not to touch the surface!)?


Which recording, btw? Sony or DG?

DG! Wondering now if it's included in the Bernstein remastered box on Sony which I have.

[Pulcinella]

DG! Wondering now if it's included in the Bernstein remastered box on Sony which I have.

Yes: the Sony version is disc 13 in the remastered set.

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8345984--leonard-bernstein-remastered

[Petrushka]

Yes: the Sony version is disc 13 in the remastered set.

https://www.prestomusic.com/classica...ein-remastered

Thanks. I was too lazy to rummage through all my boxes upstairs!😀

[smittims]

The Brandenburg Concertos. The Boston Symphony soloists and strings, Charles Munch.

This set was frankly a stereo remake of the late-78 set by Koussevitzky with many of the same players: Roger Voisin, Richard Burgin, and Lukas Foss on piano. It would sound odd today but it was quite normal then to play the Brandenburgs with a piano and a sizeable string section, who make a beautiful sound. Klemperer's and Karajan's sets were still to come, though they use a harpsichord. . As late as the mid-sixties Rudolf Serkin recorded the fifth on grand piano with Pablo Casals.

[oliver sudden]

The Brandenburg Concertos. The Boston Symphony soloists and strings, Charles Munch.

This set was frankly a stereo remake of the late-78 set by Koussevitzky with many of the same players: Roger Voisin, Richard Burgin, and Lukas Foss on piano. It would sound odd today but it was quite normal then to play the Brandenburgs with a piano and a sizeable string section, who make a beautiful sound. Klemperer's and Karajan's sets were still to come, though they use a harpsichord. . As late as the mid-sixties Rudolf Serkin recorded the fifth on grand piano with Pablo Casals.

There is an absolutely extraordinary Brandenburg 5 directed from the piano by Furtwängler—the first movement cadenza is utterly hypnotic. (Well, there are at least two I think. I know I prefer one of them but I’ve forgotten which. Not very helpful.)

Frankly I would rather hear piano than harpsichord if a modern string section is involved. Indeed even if there are too many Baroque string instruments the harpsichord all too easily ends up as an annoying background tinkling.

(There’s a Casals Brandenburg 2 with the trumpet part played by Marcel Mule on sopranino saxophone!)

[Stanfordian]

What did you make of the slow movement of K. 467?

Hello richardfinegold,

I'm not keen on that arrangement. It's an encore piece used as a fill-up, I reckon.

This is one of the best played chamber discs that I have, but I play it for the Mozart K. 452 and the Beethoven, Op. 16.

[Stanfordian]

Donizetti – Dom Sébastien
French Grand Opera in five acts (1837)
Concert performance using critical edition published by Ricordi (2003)
Zayda - Vesselina Kasarova (mezzo); Dom Sébastien (King of Portugal) - Giuseppe Filianoti (ten); Grand Inquisitor - Alastair Miles (bass); Abayaldos, chieftain - Simon Keenlyside (bar); Camoëns - Carmelo Corrado Caruso (bass); Dom Henrique - Robert Gleadow (bass); Dom Antonio - Lee Hickenbottom
Orchestra and Chorus of the Royal Opera House, London / Mark Elder
Recorded at 2005 concert performance, Royal Opera House, London: 2005 Cadogan Hall, London (Ballet Music)
Opera Rara, 3 CD set

[smittims]

Thanks, oliver. The Furtwangler Brandenburg 5 I know is from the 1950 Salzburg Festival. He also did the Third , and , although it was supposed to be a Bach concert, included the Eroica! It was issued by EMI in 2000.

Our old friend Roger Webb (where is he, by the way?) contributed some interesting info about the Brandenburg saxophone in an earlier discussion.

I've just heard two works by British composers who disregarded the idea of 'barriers' in musical taste. Richard Rodney Bennett's second symphony, and Eric Coates' Ballad for string orchestra. Thisis a good candidate for a quiz. I bet few would identify the composer as it's not in his usual idiom. Both conducted by John Wilson (need I add?).

[burning dog]

Inspired by recent proms I've been playing some of my oldest vinyl purchases

Seiji Ozawa & Boston Symphony Orchestra
Hector Berlioz: Symphonie fantastique

Sir John Barbirolli, New Philharmonia Orchestra
Mahler: Symphony No. 5

[richardfinegold]

I listened last night to Monteux and the Boston SO in Tchaikovsky 5. This was one of my first LPs and I would play it sometimes twice a day. This was a Sony box set of Monteux that I had purchased a while ago but never played. For years I had made do with an earlier CD release on BMG. The sound on the Sony reissue left the proverbial jaw on the floor. The double basses at the end of I were unbelievably clear. It just so hard to realize that this was recorded the year that I was born-would that I had aged as gracefully. I pulled out the BMG and compared the whole of I and yes the newer mastering was much clearer and natural sounding.
The Fifth is sometimes dismissed as mawkish. IMO it’s Tchaikovsky at his most direct, baring his soul, particularly in II, the heart of the piece. I’ve heard many alternative recordings and most treat it as a showpiece with some embarrassment about the raw emotion on display. Monteux seemed to get it just right. There are live recordings of him leading both the VPO and LSO from just a few years later and they essentially are the same interpretation but never sound hackneyed or routine

[smittims]

The fifth is my favourite Tchakovsky symphony. I admire its classical form and singing qualities throughout. I believe , in his own way, he was tryig to do a 'Mozart' symphony on his own terms. I cannot understand why Toscanini thought it 'banal' when he liked 'Manfred' so much.

My last listening was Thurston Dart's 1959 Brandenburg One, with the Philomusica of London. This was the notorious version where he tried out his theory that Bach intended the horn parts, which jam uncomfortably with the oboes in the standard version, to be played an octave higher on piccolo trumpets. It certainly sounds credible to me , and refreshingly different.

[silvestrione]

My home ground with Max is definitely the Fires of London music (partly because Alan Hacker is such an important figure for me as a clarinettist) and Vesalii Icones is a big favourite—a very neglected piece I think (as do you if I understand you correctly).

I played Ave Maris Stella recently with my Köln colleagues. I’ve always been struck by the fact that the official Fires recording of that has almost none of the players that premiered the piece—there was a big changing of the guard between the two events. I had always wanted to hear the ‘original cast’, then I found out relatively recently that a recording of the premiere exists, and I managed to hear it. I was astonished at how badly it seemed to fit the original players, even allowing for how terrifying it must have been to play that piece new. I got the impression Max’s music had moved on from his performers, even slightly before those performers moved on from his music…

It must be tricky to be a pioneer. You have to think up a new path, then you need to make it properly yours, then people eventually have to follow you down it (without overtaking you of course) because if that doesn’t happen eventually you’re just a misfit

Brilliant post (only just caught up with it)! Ave Maris Stella is my favourite Max piece. With Mirror of Whitening Light, though I haven't played that for a while.

I heard Alan Hacker do the Mozart Clarinet Quintet, years ago, in, I think, Bromsgrove. He also played a tune for the little girl in the front row, with whose family he'd been staying. 'Annie Laurie', or similar.

Isn't there an attractive clarinet-only piece Max wrote for him?