Extremely annoying pieces of classical music

[Don Petter]

Chris,

I'm pretty sure WB didn't teach at Churcher's, but I thought the College spread the story that he had been an old boy at some stage. Maybe it's my memory at fault. (It is now 50 years since I left!) His singing at 'my' concert was real enough, and he came across as a very nice man as well as a wonderful singer. Thanks for reminding me of him.

[greenilex]

People do get annoyed by "Carmina Burana". Was CO really a Nazi?

I heard it first at just the right age and have the original DG LP. I sang alonga Orff for years.

[MrGongGong]

People do get annoyed by "Carmina Burana".

indeed
but the rice is included

[EdgeleyRob]

I can't stand night on a bare mountain for some reason, it just "does my head in" but I don't know why !

[scottycelt]

Franz Schmidt's Fourth Symphony ... makes even Mahler sound like a veritable bundle of joy.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Anything by Gilbert and Sullivan.

It isn't everyone's cup of tea, but have you heard Sullivan's grand opera, "Ivanhoe"? It's an interesting blend of his own familiar style and Wagner.

[Mr Pee]

It isn't everyone's cup of tea, but have you heard Sullivan's grand opera, "Ivanhoe"? It's an interesting blend of his own familiar style and Wagner.

Sullivan crossed with Wagner.....sounds somewhat alarming. I have visions of Siegfried's funeral procession set to a jaunty, major key, 6/8 tum-ti-tum-ti-tum while a load of am-dram extras prance around upstage dressed as Chinamen.

[StephenO]

It isn't everyone's cup of tea, but have you heard Sullivan's grand opera, "Ivanhoe"? It's an interesting blend of his own familiar style and Wagner.

Only extracts, I'm afraid, but I was quite impressed with the bits I did hear. That was Sullivan minus Gilbert, of course. It's the tum-te-tum-te-tum, meant-to-be-funny-but-not aspects I can't stand. Just a musical blind spot of mine, I suppose.

Edit: Just seen Mr Pee beat me to it with the "tum-ti-tum-ti-tums"!

[Zucchini]

Chopin Nocturnes, Mazurkas, Waltzes. Perfect for playing on the white electric baby grand in Bournemouth hotels at Sunday lunchtime; accompanied by the rattle of knives and forks and shouted requests for Happy Birthday Hilda and Can You Do The Morse Tune Or It May Be Miss Marple, but that's all. Even Zimerman and Pires don't persuade me and Rubinstein sounds quirky and dated by today's standards.

[Suffolkcoastal]

I don't find all Sullivan that bad, the Symphony in E 'Irish' is a most attractive work. For me of course as many MB's will know it's most of Mahler which makes me dive for the off switch, especially Symphonies 2, 3 & 8 which I cannot abide. The continual Mahlerian over exposure also drives me mad. I'm afraid R3 is rapidly making me dislike works I used to enjoy due to over-exposure Ravel's La Valse I never want to hear again for a number of years and if the G major concerto exposure isn't cut then the same will happen to that work too. Most of Mozart's Divertimenti, they just go on and bore me to death. A lot of Bel Canto operas, especially Bellini & Donizetti. Everything I've come across so far by the American composer Arnold Rosner, repetitive tedious and bland in the extreme. Finally the Rutter's, Nyman's and Patrick Hawes's of this world, I just find their music totally facile and I really get riled when they get played or performed at the expense of the huge number of far superior living composers.

[subcontrabass]

Chopin Nocturnes, Mazurkas, Waltzes. Perfect for playing on the white electric baby grand in Bournemouth hotels at Sunday lunchtime; accompanied by the rattle of knives and forks and shouted requests for Happy Birthday Hilda and Can You Do The Morse Tune Or It May Be Miss Marple, but that's all. Even Zimerman and Pires don't persuade me and Rubinstein sounds quirky and dated by today's standards.

I find Chopin generally to consist of vacuous note spinning, with not even an interesting melody for relief (the only exception to the last point being his Variations on 'La ci darem la mano").

[Pianorak]

@Zucchini #84

Could you perhaps elaborate what you mean by "today's standards", presumably of playing Chopin. Sergio Tiempo, the Argentine-Venezuelan pianist, plays Chopin like no one else (heard him on a recent R3 lunchtime concert - not sure he has recorded). Have you listened to Fou Ts'ong playing the Chopin Mazurkas?

[Uncle Monty]

I don't find all Sullivan that bad, the Symphony in E 'Irish' is a most attractive work. For me of course as many MB's will know it's most of Mahler which makes me dive for the off switch, especially Symphonies 2, 3 & 8 which I cannot abide. The continual Mahlerian over exposure also drives me mad. I'm afraid R3 is rapidly making me dislike works I used to enjoy due to over-exposure Ravel's La Valse I never want to hear again for a number of years and if the G major concerto exposure isn't cut then the same will happen to that work too. Most of Mozart's Divertimenti, they just go on and bore me to death. A lot of Bel Canto operas, especially Bellini & Donizetti. Everything I've come across so far by the American composer Arnold Rosner, repetitive tedious and bland in the extreme. Finally the Rutter's, Nyman's and Patrick Hawes's of this world, I just find their music totally facile and I really get riled when they get played or performed at the expense of the huge number of far superior living composers.

Interesting hit-list, SC!

I believe we are both devotees of RVW, for whose music and person, as you know, my love is boundless and unconditional! But I think I'll have to register a disagreement about Mahler. It hasn't been a quick conversion, but I am firming up on the belief that Mahler 3 (along perhaps with Bruckner 9) is the greatest work in the symphonic repertoire. But I guess neither will ever be everyone's cup of tea.

Also I've enjoyed Nyman a lot over the years. I already had a pretty intimate knowledge of the kinds of works he drew on for his own compositions, e.g. Purcell, and so he was really pushing at an open door in my case. I know his harmonic progressions are not the subtlest, but I find them strangely satisfying.

[Mandryka]

Final movement of Beethoven's 8th Sympony: yuk!

Most Rossini opera overtures.

The 'children's march' from Carmen: yuk!

Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (the opening).

Bach's Brandenburg Concertos (whenever forced to listen to them, I find myself howling at the radio/CD player: 'STOP!')

Unaccompanied choral music that goes on for longer than five minutes.

[Nick Armstrong]

Final movement of Beethoven's 8th Sympony: yuk!

Most Rossini opera overtures.

The 'children's march' from Carmen: yuk!

Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (the opening).

Bach's Brandenburg Concertos (whenever forced to listen to them, I find myself howling at the radio/CD player: 'STOP!')

Unaccompanied choral music that goes on for longer than five minutes.

I can see where you're coming from with most of those but the Brandenburgs?!? All of them?

I can imagine them coming into the 'over exposed' category, but do you really find them intrinsically annoying? No matter who is performing them?? They were always on at home when I was growing up in a lumbering performance by Münchinger I think.. they were in the 'parental music... yawn' category until I heard them afresh in more modern performances... But I never found them irritating in themselves...