Musical questions and answers thread

[ardcarp]

New question. Does anyone know anything about Roberto Gerhard? He was much talked about in the mid 20th C when I was a student, but one hardly hears anything about him, and I can't recall hearing any of his music on R3. This may just be my ignorance of course. Can anyone shed light..beyond what's available on Wiki?

[Roehre]

Which convention? The Library of Congress lists him as Beethoven, Ludwig Van. Again, definitive.

Van Allen
Vanden Berg
Van Holland
Van Oldenbarnevelt,
to mention a couple of names which you most likely won't find under the A, B, H or O respectively in American libraries and (most of the time) bibliogaphies, as you would expect in British, let alone German, Dutch or French ones.

[Roehre]

New question. Does anyone know anything about Roberto Gerhard? He was much talked about in the mid 20th C when I was a student, but one hardly hears anything about him, and I can't recall hearing any of his music on R3. This may just be my ignorance of course. Can anyone shed light..beyond what's available on Wiki?

A couple of years ago IIRC Chandos recorded his symphonies in brilliant performances and they weren'teven the first ones to do so.

[MrGongGong]

New question. Does anyone know anything about Roberto Gerhard? He was much talked about in the mid 20th C when I was a student, but one hardly hears anything about him, and I can't recall hearing any of his music on R3. This may just be my ignorance of course. Can anyone shed light..beyond what's available on Wiki?

This has recently been published
a bit pricey but we all have public libraries don't we ?

http://www.ashgate.com/isbn/9781409445159

[David-G]

Re Lillas Pastia:

I'd always assumed a woman, but without any real justification. The score seems to give the part as 'spoken'.

Sites which purport to give the meaning of first names do seem to assume it is a female name.

Thanks, Don. I have in fact now answered my own question, having found online a copy of Merimee's original novella (well worth reading!). This is the relevant sentence: “She was at the tavern of Lillas Pastia, an old man who kept a fish restaurant, a Gypsy with a face as black as a Moor.” Curious that he should have had a sex change in the present CG production.

[verismissimo]

Van Allen
Vanden Berg
Van Holland
Van Oldenbarnevelt,
to mention a couple of names which you most likely won't find under the A, B, H or O respectively in American libraries and (most of the time) bibliogaphies, as you would expect in British, let alone German, Dutch or French ones.

Now I'm confused. Where should I be filing Hertz van Rental?

[umslopogaas]

#141 "Where should I be filing Hertz van Rental?" Under D for in the Drive, presumably?

#136 ardcarp, I think Roberto Gerhard has slipped out of fashion. Back in the LP era you could track down several of his works. I have:

Symphony 4 and Violin Concerto (Yfrah Neaman, violon), BBC SO cond. Colin Davis (Argo ZRG 701)
Collages, BBC SO cond. Frederick Prausnitz (HMV ASD 2427)
Wind Quintet, London Wind Quintet (Argo ZRG 5326)
Symphony 1 and Dances from Don Quixote, BBCSO cond. Dorati (Argo ZRG 752; also issued on HMV ASD 613)

There was also a series of modern classical music issued by Decca called Decca Headline, which I think included some Gerhard, but I dont have those discs.

I dont know if any of these made it to CD, but most recordings do.

[hedgehog]

Re Gerhard, if not mentioned before - there is a excellaent recording of his string quartets on Aeon with the Arditti Quartet.

http://www.outhere-music.com/en/albums/complete-string-quartets-chaconne-for-solo-violin-aecd-1225

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I know very little about Gerhard's life, other than he was anti-Franco and pro-Serialism (so, an all-round good egg in my book ). He assisted Schönberg when he [Arnie] was being hounded by the pro-Nazi elements in Germany, and lived the last decades of his life in England.

Oh, and he wrote some cracking Music - one of that "second" generation of Serialists who included Dallapiccola and Lutyens (and Searle, Spinner and Skalkottos). The Symphonies are fantastic (CHANDOS and Montaigne/Auvidas both have complete cycles) as are the final (incomplete) series of Chamber Concertos which was intended to represent all the signs of the zodiac. These were on the DECCA Headline LP umslopagaas mentioned, but don't seem to be currently available. Then there's his "Cantata" The Plague (also on Headline, briefly on CD) and his film score for This Sporting Life.

Amazon has a good couple of pages devoted to Gerhard, and a decent starting point might be this overview of his career:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gerhard-Cancionero-Pedrell-Orchestra-Cambra/dp/B0017TZ918/ref=sr_1_23?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1389265948&sr=1-23&keywords=roberto+gerhard

And a good resource from youTube (bless it!) - amongst my favourites:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cvf5O13Hhtw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WciujZwNcbU

... there: that'll hook you!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Re Gerhard, if not mentioned before - there is a excellaent recording of his string quartets on Aeon with the Arditti Quartet.

http://www.outhere-music.com/en/albu...olin-aecd-1225

[Don Petter]

Re Lillas Pastia: Thanks, Don. I have in fact now answered my own question, having found online a copy of Merimee's original novella (well worth reading!). This is the relevant sentence: “She was at the tavern of Lillas Pastia, an old man who kept a fish restaurant, a Gypsy with a face as black as a Moor.” Curious that he should have had a sex change in the present CG production.

Good investigation!

One thought - Is it still possible that Bizet (or perhaps his librettists, Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy) could have changed the role for some reason? According to Wiki the role in the premiere was played by 'M Nathan', but I haven't been able to find more about him/her.

[verismissimo]

Good investigation!

One thought - Is it still possible that Bizet (or perhaps his librettists, Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy) could have changed the role for some reason? According to Wiki the role in the premiere was played by 'M Nathan', but I haven't been able to find more about him/her.

Oxford Reference (online) refers to "him/her" as Mons. Nathan.

[ardcarp]

Thanks for all the Gerhard recommendations...and the book Mr G-G. Lots of catching up to do. He is a bit out of fashion, so due for a big revival. We need a decent antidote to....oh, I'll climb off my horse before I put my foot in it.

I might start with the string quartet.

[Rolmill]

The only Gerhard I can find in my CD collection:

A couple of Gerhard discs on Auvidis Montaigne (now subsumed into Naïve?), part of a 5 CD "edition" of his orchestral music from the late 1990s using Spanish orchestras and conductors - some slightly scrappy string playing, but very enjoyable (and some hard to find) repertoire. My discs include Don Quixote, Pedrelliana, Albada, Pandora, Ariel and Soirees de Barcelona, though the symphonies feature on other instalments.

The piano concerto is included on one of Peter Donohoe's estimable Naxos discs of British piano concertos (it presumably sneaks in on the basis of residence, as fhg notes above!).

Definitely worth pursuing I would say, though it may not be easy to avoid top dollar prices.

[jayne lee wilson]

If you really want to pursue Roberto Gerhard go for the Chandos series - wonderfully well-recorded, very devoted performances from Bamert and the BBCSO. In the Piano/Strings Concerto, the Tozer/Bamert one on Chandos (c/w Symphony 3 & Epithalamion, great CD) is better than the Naxos. I bought the whole Chandos series, there's not a dud among them. Best to start? I would say Symphony 1/Violin Concerto.
But the Auvidis recordings of the Symphonies are also excellent, closer and warmer if less atmospheric, good if you want another view.

That Argos LP ums. mentioned above of Symphony 4/Violin Concerto (Neaman/Davis/BBCSO) is available on Lyrita SRCD 274 and it's a 24-carat stunna - probably the best single CD of all. And there's some fascinating ensemble works on the Stradivarius label, my favourite is Nonet/Hymnody/Leo on 33615.