Music you've still not grown to like

[cloughie]

correct. and the memory of it is "in the moment" too.

I can't say the any Rimsky Korsakov does anything for me. always seems hopelessly one dimensional, a bit like ( in folkrock) The Levellers seem.

I imagine I am wrong about old Rimmers though.

Try Antar ts

[Serial_Apologist]

You can dip into any form of music at any stage you want independently from what has gone before, or is to come. Music is appreciated in the moment, or later if you want. That's a matter for the listener. I disagree that music can only be appreciated in hindsight or even in a particular context.

I would agree if we're talking about music that's being listened to for the first time. That would go for improvised music, operating as it does on the "pavement art" theory. But most if not all of the music we're talking about here was intended to be re-presented in the form deemed by the conductor to be faithful to its composer's intentions, and listened to on the basis of growing acquaintance that makes its replication worthwhile, which in turn is a different listening experience, wouldn't one say, involving memory and association? Initial impressions can only take one so far...

[Serial_Apologist]

Try Antar ts

Or "The Golden Cockerell".

[teamsaint]

Try Antar ts

I certainly will Cloughie, and hope to be proved hopelessly wrong !!

( for the levellers, you could try " The Game" from Levelling the land......otherwise its hopeless !!)

[johnb]

I'm another who has problems with Nielsen. I want to like his music and I do still listen to it in the hope that I will grow to love it but I always come away with the feeling of having been shouted at (loudly) for the best part of 30 or 40 minutes. Who knows, I might end up blungeoned into submission - eventually.

Sibelius I have always loved but the older I get the less I 'understand' his symphonies. All very curious.

[Lento]

Nielsen Maskarade Overture: manages to be (I imagine) very tricky and very irritating, imv.

[cloughie]

I'm another who has problems with Nielsen. I want to like his music and I do still listen to it in the hope that I will grow to love it but I always come away with the feeling of having been shouted at (loudly) for the best part of 30 or 40 minutes. Who knows, I might end up blungeoned into submission - eventually.

Sibelius I have always loved but the older I get the less I 'understand' his symphonies. All very curious.

The Sibelius I listen to most of all these days is Pohjola's Daughter (Barbirolli or Collins), En Saga (Dorati or Collins), and Leminkainen Suite (Kamu or Jensen). I listen least to the Violin Concerto which I for no real reason do not enjoy anymore.
Nielsen I like less than Sibelius but 1 2 4 and 5 I'm OK with but never really cracked 3 or 6.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Bruckner Symphonies 0-4, 6-9.

I do have a soft spot for number 5.

[HighlandDougie]

Bruckner Symphonies 0-4, 6-9.

I do have a soft spot for number 5.

Well at least you like the 5th. But the 7th, not even conducted by Bernard Haitink? If we are in confessional mode, I must admit that Mahler's 8th Symphony leaves me utterly cold, especially the "Veni, veni, creator spiritus" first movement. I just can't help wondering why a man of such towering musical genius could come up with something so, err, banal.

[Tony Halstead]

Bruckner Symphonies 0-4, 6-9.

I do have a soft spot for number 5.

My Bruckner 'soft spots' are: Symphonies 1,3,4,7,8,9, but I don't 'get' nos 5 and 6, sorry!
I used to really dislike no.3 and then in 1983 I played it in the Proms with the Philharmonia conducted by the wonderful Lovro von Matacic... he single-handedly 'converted' me.

Incidentally, I now suspect after 32 years that I 'did something wrong' in that concert as it turned out to be my simultaneous 'debut and farewell' as a 'guest principal' of the Philharmonia!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I did find this week's Composer of the Week persuasive in helping me to appreciate Bruckner.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Dave, musical appreciation is completely and utterly personal.
It changes over time.
Also: it can be developed

Exactly so - and it is such a joy (suddenly or gradually) to find your life enhanced by repertoire that previously you've been indifferent or even hostile to. Thanks to Belohlavek and the BBCSO, the Music of Martinu has become a great joy to me a few years ago after decades of frustration - and only this year, the Rachmaninoff Piano Concertos "clicked" (thank you, Messrs Wils and Horenstein and RPO).

That's life, and it's great.

[ChrisBennell]

Try Antar ts

Interestingly, Antar was the first piece of Rimsky I got to know back in the 50s - and before I knew Scheherazade. Antar used to be broadcast quite often on the BBC in those days, but I only finally acquired a CD about 3 years ago. Wonderful stuff and I can forgive the repetition in the piece.

My experience is that personal tastes definitely change over the years. It was about 40 years before I enjoyed the Strauss 4 Last Songs, for example! Now it is a firm favourite. I still struggle with Don Quixote, though.

Dream of Gerontius can be a unique experience - but I don't want to hear it more than once every few years as I find it so intense. I got to know this having sung it in a choir in Dorchester Abbey some years ago.

[Jonathan]

I have a problem with Sibelius too. I think it's about time I gave him another go though. No problem with Bruckner but a mental block with Mahler but I will have another go with the symphonies again too.

[visualnickmos]

What! I say old chap - surely the first Piano concerto - must do something for you??? The opening bangs, crashes and general noise is something to behold.....