Ottorino Respighi: 21 - 26 Feb

[Serial_Apologist]

Otto, for short? Or is maybe Rino more cool?

Anyway, plenty to consider from this colourful Late Romantic Impressionist, who drew Wagner, Mahler, Strauss, Rimsky-K, Debussy, Ravel and early Stravinsky into a blend popular for a time - something of an Italian Bax I guess - but whose alleged brown-nosing of Mussolini tarred his subsequent reputation. Or is this unfair? Doubtless the Donald will not hide him under a Macleod!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0014npj

[Serial_Apologist]

I hope others are enjoying this sequence as much as me, being a real sucker for his kind of music. Respighi has gone right up in my estimation - a real evoker of atmospheres.

[antongould]

I hope others are enjoying this sequence as much as me, being a real sucker for his kind of music. Respighi has gone right up in my estimation - a real evoker of atmospheres.

I am enjoying it too serial

[hmvman]

A favourite composer of mine. Looking forward to catching up on this week's programmes.

[Jonathan]

I've recently got to know the recordings on Toccata Classics of his piano works. They are well worth a listen and are fascinating! My review of volume 2 will be on MusicWeb tomorrow.

[muzzer]

I saw Pappano conduct the LSO in The Pines of Rome a few years and it was magnificent, I shall look these progs out with great interest.

[gurnemanz]

I've recently got to know the recordings on Toccata Classics of his piano works. They are well worth a listen and are fascinating! My review of volume 2 will be on MusicWeb tomorrow.

More support here for Respighi piano works. There is a also a recommendable 2CD issue from Michele D'Ambrosio on Brilliant Classics. I got to know the recordings via a very rewarding download of 20th Century Italian Piano Music Vol 1, exceptionally well-priced at around £5 for 11 hours of music and consisting for me almost entirely of new discoveries. Also reviewed on MusicWeb. The enthusiastic review encouraged me to seek out Vol 2.

[cloughie]

I saw Pappano conduct the LSO in The Pines of Rome a few years and it was magnificent, I shall look these progs out with great interest.

Saw Sinopoli and the Philharmonia in the same work at B’ham Sym Hall - also magnificent - the brass spaced out at the back of the orchestra!

[Serial_Apologist]

Saw Sinopoli and the Philharmonia in the same work at B’ham Sym Hall - also magnificent - the brass spaced out at the back of the orchestra!

Hearing yesterday about the premiere of this work one wondered whether the birdsong episode was included, and if so, what kind of equipment would have been available to make this effective: a wind-up gramophone with a large horn would seem unthinkable!

[Bryn]

Hearing yesterday about the premiere of this work one wondered whether the birdsong episode was included, and if so, what kind of equipment would have been available to make this effective: a wind-up gramophone with a large horn would seem unthinkable!

Really?

[Serial_Apologist]

[hmvman]

Hearing yesterday about the premiere of this work one wondered whether the birdsong episode was included, and if so, what kind of equipment would have been available to make this effective: a wind-up gramophone with a large horn would seem unthinkable!

Some years ago somebody gave me some notes about 'Pines'. The record of the nightingale specified in Respighi's score was Gramophone Concert Record No. R6105 'The Song of the Nightingale', an Italian HMV issue. Its British equivalent (B390) was issued in 1910. Apparently, at the first performance in Rome on the 14th December 1924 under the baton of Bernardino Molinari, the gramophone was placed behind a curtain at the back of the stage with the horn poking through. The performance was greeted with booing and hissing from the audience.

As Bryn has pointed out there would've been machines capable of producing enough volume for the performance. Interesting, too, that the recorded section of the score has an accompaniment of muted strings and harp. Was that to mask the surface noise of the record, perhaps?

[hmvman]

That is a splendid machine, Bryn, by the way. In need of a little TLC though, methinks!