Strange bedfellows?

[Pulcinella]

At the risk of revealing more about my own musical ignorance than I should, at least in public, I was surprised to learn (from Roger Nichols' book on Ravel) that the first complete performance of Pierrot Lunaire in Paris (which he says was not until 1922) was conducted by........Darius Milhaud.
Maybe my reaction should instead have been: Well, why not?
But Milhaud is not someone I would have thought of in that role, though I have discovered from Wiki that [the dates don't quite match]:

Contemporary European influences were also important. Milhaud dedicated his Fifth String Quartet (1920) to Arnold Schoenberg, and the following year conducted both the French and British premieres of Pierrot lunaire after multiple rehearsals.

Does anyone else know of other cases of what might to them seem (at least at first glance) strange bedfellows?

[Ein Heldenleben]

Henry Wood’s UK premiers contain so many pieces that most concert goers wouldn’t normally associate with him. Webern , Mahler , Shostakovich, Hindemith What a remarkable figure he was. What a mouth watering list of masterpieces ...

Wood's UK premieres included Bartók's Dance Suite; Chabrier's Joyeuse marche; Copland's Billy the Kid; Debussy's Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune and Ibéria; Hindemith's Kammermusik 2 and 5; Janáček's Sinfonietta, Taras Bulba and Glagolitic Mass; Kodály's Dances from Galanta; Mahler's Symphonies Nos. 4, 7 and 8, and Das Lied von der Erde; Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 1 and Violin Concerto No. 2; Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No 1; Ravel's Ma mère l'oye, Rapsodie espagnole, La valse and Piano Concerto in D; Rimsky-Korsakov's Capriccio Espagnol, Scheherazade, and Symphony No. 2; Saint-Saëns's The Carnival of the Animals; Schumann's Konzertstück for four horns and orchestra; Shostakovich's Piano Concerto No. 1 and Symphonies Nos. 7 and 8; Sibelius's Symphonies Nos. 1, 6 and 7, Violin Concerto, Karelia Suite, and Tapiola; Richard Strauss's Symphonia Domestica; Stravinsky's The Firebird (suite); Tchaikovsky's Manfred Symphony and Nutcracker Suite; and Webern's Passacaglia.[67]

[Bryn]

At the risk of revealing more about my own musical ignorance than I should, at least in public, I was surprised to learn (from Roger Nichols' book on Ravel) that the first complete performance of Pierrot Lunaire in Paris (which he says was not until 1922) was conducted by........Darius Milhaud.
Maybe my reaction should instead have been: Well, why not?
But Milhaud is not someone I would have thought of in that role, though I have discovered from Wiki that [the dates don't quite match]:


Does anyone else know of other cases of what might to them seem (at least at first glance) strange bedfellows?

Since Ravel was mentioned, if only in passing, I would just add that while studying in Paris, Enver Hoxha, late head honcho of Albania, skipped a party meeting in order to attend one of his friend Maurice's concerts. While much 'bourgeois' music was suppressed during his rule, Ravel's was an exception.

[edashtav]

Since Ravel was mentioned, if only in passing, I would just add that while studying in Paris, Enver Hoxha, late head honcho of Albania, skipped a party meeting in order to attend one of his friend Maurice's concerts. While much 'bourgeois' music was suppressed during his rule, Ravel's was an exception.

That’s a winning tale, Bryn.

My own mismatches come from Arnold Bax’s stories of Alfred Kalisch’s Music Club. AK liked to invite leading European composers to an evening of their works and AB, possibly the best sight reader in London, got the nod to play some of their piano works. Debussy came and went without difficulty, but Vincent d’Indy, a known Anti-Semite was confronted by a panoply of young Jewish Artists including singers and Myra Hess. To be fair, AB, recorded that D’Indy kept ‘a civilised façade’.

Arnold Schönberg arrived four years later in 1912. AS was sensitive re revivals of his own apprentice works and AB had a life-long detestation of atonal and dodecaphonic music. Arnold S. possibly knowing that he was about to be fêted with his juvenilia, arrived 45 minutes late, holding up proceedings, but once in his seat of honour, Bax comments that when ‘the evening’s music was under way he looked quite pleased with himself. Not once did that bald head become roseate with the flush of shame or embarrassment; nor indeed was there any need, for all that neurotically emotional early work of his is extremely deftly written, even though it may be thought almost too flattering to Bayreuth.’

I suspect that was the only time that the two Arnolds shared a chord.

[vinteuil]

Since Ravel was mentioned, if only in passing, I would just add that while studying in Paris, Enver Hoxha, late head honcho of Albania, skipped a party meeting in order to attend one of his friend Maurice's concerts. While much 'bourgeois' music was suppressed during his rule, Ravel's was an exception.

... strange bedfellows indeed : Enver Hoxha, Maurice Ravel, Norman Wisdom -

https://uk.movies.yahoo.com/why-is-norman-wisdom-so-popular-in-albania-145138703.html

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