Vivaldi

[Richard Barrett]

You don't half like to fill up my screen, BeefO.

I have that CD but I haven't listened to it yet.

As for the "earlier" Vivaldi "never saying boo to a goose", I wouldn't agree. His L'Estro Armonico collection (published in 1711 but no doubt written over a longer period before that), for example, involves more variation in structure than most of the work that came later. Also there are his operas which are in many ways a lot less stereotyped in form and expression than the concertos. (And the concertos for cello and bassoon are often less "regular" than those for violin.) But indeed the "late" pieces are something else.

[Beef Oven!]

You don't half like to fill up my screen, BeefO.

I have that CD but I haven't listened to it yet.

As for the "earlier" Vivaldi "never saying boo to a goose", I wouldn't agree. His L'Estro Armonico collection (published in 1711 but no doubt written over a longer period before that), for example, involves more variation in structure than most of the work that came later. Also there are his operas which are in many ways a lot less stereotyped in form and expression than the concertos. (And the concertos for cello and bassoon are often less "regular" than those for violin.) But indeed the "late" pieces are something else.

I agree with what's been said about the Carmignola recordings, not the boo to a goose bit. I should have made that clear.

Opus 3 & Opus 8 rock like Led Zep I & II.

(it's a great cover, so it deserves to be big (resizing takes too long))

[MickyD]

Yes, I have all those Carmignola discs and they are so worth acquiring. These are excellent, too -

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vivaldi-Violin-Concertos-331-217/dp/B000EULVZE/ref=sr_1_5?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1461432956&sr=1-5&keywords=vivaldi+carmignola

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vivaldi-Concertos-Violins-Viktoria-Mullova/dp/B0019RQTUS/ref=sr_1_6?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1461432956&sr=1-6&keywords=vivaldi+carmignola

...as well as this mixed bag of Vivaldi, Locatelli and Tartini:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Concerto-Veneziano-Vivaldi/dp/B0007CEXAO/ref=sr_1_14?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1461432956&sr=1-14&keywords=vivaldi+carmignola

[Richard Barrett]

(resizing takes too long)

Not according to about 25 emails I receive every day.

[MickyD]

Not "from back in the '80s", though.

The list of publications in Professor Talbot's CV does not suggest that he authored any book matching MickyD's description in the 1980s (the "Dent" publication from 1978 is the Master Musicians volume):

http://vivaldinew.homestead.com/file...ICHAEL_CV_.pdf

Well, I'm baffled, folks...I really do remember a large book by Talbot with a wonderful Canaletto cover picture, which I always regret not having bought.

[doversoul1]

No, it's none of those - it was, if you'll forgive me, a sort of coffee-table affair - but definitely by Michael Talbot. Maybe it was a more fully illustrated version of the ones mentioned here.

Vivaldi by Michael Talbor; London (1978, rev. 1993),

From Selected Bibliography in Baroque Music by Nicholas Anderson (Thames and Hudson1994)

[ed.] from the pdf inferneyhoughgeliebte’s post:

It has also been published in Italian (Turin, EDT, 1978),
So maybe this?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vivaldi-Talbot-Michael/dp/882223846X/ref=pd_rhf_se_p_img_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=ZBK04PJE0TZW0GB9BX7C

[ed. 2]

a wonderful Canaletto cover picture

ah... a wrong cover

[MickyD]

Yes, ds, but I am talking a long time ago, so quite likely that it is the same book, but a different cover. Thanks anyway. And as you and I know, that book about baroque music by Nicholas Anderson is a good read.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Vivaldi by Michael Talbor; London (1978, rev. 1993),

From Selected Bibliography in Baroque Music by Nicholas Anderson (Thames and Hudson1994)

No - that is the Dent "Master Musicians" volume, originally in hardback (1978) with this cover:



... then revised as a paperback in 1984 with this cover:



... and revised even further for its 1993 incarnation:

[Richard Barrett]

(mine is the 1993 edition with yet another cover)

I was just looking at the Robbins Landon book in US Amazon to see if it might be worth acquiring, and noticed that one of the reviews described it as "kind of wordy". I wonder what that person was after in a book.

[Beef Oven!]

(mine is the 1993 edition with yet another cover)

I was just looking at the Robbins Landon book in US Amazon to see if it might be worth acquiring, and noticed that one of the reviews described it as "kind of wordy". I wonder what that person was after in a book.

But he's not lying - I just opened my copy to a page at random and counted 362 words, and that's just ONE PAGE!

P.S. Many thanks for the steer on this book, doversoul. It looks pretty good having had a quick flit-through and I can't wait to start it

[MickyD]

Sorry to have caused all this detective work, all because of a distant memory of mine!

Here's the short, lively Concerto 'Alla Rustica', superbly recorded by the AAM way back in 1977 and which for me, still sounds exciting. It was on an LP of concertos for various instruments - I think it just pre-dates the Harnoncourt Four Seasons and was really rather revolutionary in bringing a whole new sound-world to Vivaldi:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwlnAcksO5U

[Quarky]

I think that a major change in the way his music was performed and appreciated came with Harnoncourt's recording of the Seasons, released in 1977. For the first time the enormous variety of colour and expression latent in the music was brought out, with the help of Baroque instruments and a no-holds-barred attitude to how they might be played and how they might sound. (One example: the slow movement of the "Spring" concerto, where the "barking" of the viola part sounds in the famous ASMiF recording like a smoothly integrated part of the violin's dreamy accompaniment, whereas with Harnoncourt it sounds like, well, a dog barking, as suggested in the score.) This I think led directly to new generations of performers exploring the rest of the Vivaldi repertoire with this kind of approach, like Giardino Armonico, Ensemble Matheus, Pomo d'Oro, Concerto Italiano and the rest, finally bringing out IMO what is most distinctive in Vivaldi.
.

Many thanks for this thread, and all Youtube links, which I find very useful in investigating this composer - ungentrified.

Unfortunately Harnoncourt's Four Seasons doesn't appear available in any digital version, only the CD. Do I really want to spend £10, I am asking myself.

[Bryn]

Many thanks for this thread, and all Youtube links, which I find very useful in investigating this composer - ungentrified.

Unfortunately Harnoncourt's Four Seasons doesn't appear available in any digital version, only the CD. Do I really want to spend £10, I am asking myself.

Leaving aside the fact that a CD is a digital medium, try http://www.qobuz.com/fr-fr/album/viv.../0825646652495

[MickyD]

Many thanks for this thread, and all Youtube links, which I find very useful in investigating this composer - ungentrified.

Unfortunately Harnoncourt's Four Seasons doesn't appear available in any digital version, only the CD. Do I really want to spend £10, I am asking myself.

You can get the whole set of the Op.8 concertos (including the 4 seasons) from Harnoncourt on a budget set of 2 CDs for less than a fiver:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Il-cimento-dellarmonia-e-dellinventione/dp/B00277YJN8/ref=sr_1_4?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1461490268&sr=1-4&keywords=harnoncourt+vivaldi

[Quarky]

You can get the whole set of the Op.8 concertos (including the 4 seasons) from Harnoncourt on a budget set of 2 CDs for less than a fiver:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Il-cimento-...ncourt+vivaldi

Many thanks MickyD. I will order that when I get home later today!