Goehr

[french frank]

As far as I am aware there is no DRM on BBC radio podcasts. They are just low data rate mp3s IIRC.

Just checked. In this case it's a 128kbps joint stereo mp3.

Thanks, Bryn - sound quality not really important here - one goes elsewhere to seek out the music. And I travelled to … Malvern - my first visit - to hear Promised End. It was good to hear his reflections on it, especially as I gathered he was not much given to reflecting on his completed works :-).

Yes you are absolutely right, Sandy G has a wonderful down-to-earth sense of humour.

Lovely story, Tony. He came over as both an individualist and a sympathetic character: they don't always go together.

[ahinton]

I agree entirely with FF and S_A about this programme - and Tony's reminiscences add welcome extra flavour to an already well-seasoned dish. This was indeed Music Matters at its best and Tom Service opened his mouth in all the right places and none of the wrong ones, didn't gush once and, above all, let Goehr take centre stage throughout, even subtly encouraging him to do so. Far from mere modesty on Goehr's part, I was struck with how very honest and forthcoming - and, where he felt it appropriate, self-deprecatory - he was in ways that were clearly the very opposite of compliment-seeking. I wasn't at all surprised to hear him talking a lot of good sense but I was very glad that he was given ample opportunity to do so nonetheless; an object lesson in how to conduct such an interview, without doubt.

I once had some lessons from a composer who had studied not only with Messiaen (as Goehr did) but also with Milhaud who once told him that it was important for a composer to be able to write bad music really well; whatever (if anything) he might have meant by this, I imagine that Goehr would have been far more persuasive in correcting this perplexing notion!

[ahinton]

I follow the drift of your argument in #13 SA, but am struggling with 'surface prominence'. How does this apply to (for instance) The Symphony in C, Pulcinella or L'Histoire du Soldat? Does it imply superficiality?

Well, I'm afraid that it does so for me, just as it does in all too uncomfortably many of his post-WWI works - but that's only my take on it!

[Roehre]

Repeated tomorrow, monday November 30th 10 pm

[Serial_Apologist]

I follow the drift of your argument in #13 SA, but am struggling with 'surface prominence'. How does this apply to (for instance) The Symphony in C, Pulcinella or L'Histoire du Soldat? Does it imply superficiality?

Yes, for me I suppose it does, to some extent, though I would admit now not all of Stravinsky's Neo Classical works, which I would see as starting with the Piano Sonata and Piano Concerto of 1923, rather than the wonderful "Soldier's Tale", and continuing to "Orpheus" and the Mass of 1948/9. (Some would include the "Cantata on Old English Tunes" and the transitional non-serial sections of "Agon"). I would not "accuse" the Symphony of Psalms of superficiality, nor the Symphony in Three Movements, a powerful emotion-borne work, nor "Orpheus" and the Mass, since from both of the latter I gain a deep sense of warmth and detachment, if that's not in flat contradiction, approximating that which I also find in Satie's "Socrate" and a number of Malipiero's Neo Classical works from the 1930s, most notably the Violin Concerto. The harmonic language in all these works is remarkably close to the mature Vaughan Williams's, if the "feel" is more detached. The Stravinsky works I most dislike begin with "Pulcinella" and continue through the subsequent ballets, particularly "Persephone"; I find in them a sort of opacity: the materials seem to be carefully pre-considered and carefully decked out without much happening to them. It's all too neat and complacent somehow; my late father used to say listening to these works evoked going around a National Trust stately home, where everything is politely explained by the guide, not without a certain cutesy humour, and you're taking in the scent of aristocratic antiquity and looking at furnishings that might be pastiche or the tables and chairs that have been sitting there since 1700 or whenever - who cares, sort of thing, but don't on any account touch! Stravinsky's comment to the effect, and one is not sure if he was serious, that his music was incapable of expressing anything, seems particularly to apply here, and it's so sad when one remembers the vitality and sensuality of his music of the Diaghilev era.

[Pianorak]

. . . But thoughts on Boulez were revealing.

Love this one: "Boulez himself suffered, I think, from a slightly Max Planck-type influence."

[ardcarp]

Stravinsky's comment to the effect, and one is not sure if he was serious, that his music was incapable of expressing anything

One is sure he wasn't! Stravinsky talked too much about his music, saying things for 'effect'.

I'm heavily in love with the Violin Concerto (especially with Hilary Hahn playing it) but I don't think I've ever heard VW mentioned in connection with it before!!!

[Serial_Apologist]

One is sure he wasn't! Stravinsky talked too much about his music, saying things for 'effect'.

I'm heavily in love with the Violin Concerto (especially with Hilary Hahn playing it) but I don't think I've ever heard VW mentioned in connection with it before!!!

Ah, my fault for expressing myself badly there, and apologies: the violin concerto to which I was referring as being harmonically in a similar modal terrain to much of the mature RVW was Malipiero's (of 1937). Ironically, Vaughan Williams's VC of 1925 is one of his most Neo Classical and probably Stravinsky-influenced works!

[french frank]

Love this one: "Boulez himself suffered, I think, from a slightly Max Planck-type influence."

I thought I'd made a witty joke in response to that, but I obviously didn't press the button. Just as well, I expect

[ahinton]

I thought I'd made a witty joke in response to that, but I obviously didn't press the button. Just as well, I expect

Oh, no - go for it, FF!

[Serial_Apologist]

Oh, no - go for it, FF!

Yeah! walk the walk if not the planck, ff!

[french frank]

Yeah! walk the walk if not the planck, ff!

Ahem, ahem …

I suggested Boulez went round sighing: o quantum est in rebus inane

[Serial_Apologist]

Ahem, ahem …

I suggested Boulez went round sighing: o quantum est in rebus inane

Possibly - I'm too old now to remember my O Level school Latin.

(Strangely enough though, my octogenarian dad wasn't; I remember wheeling him around mediaeval churches, and he was translating all the Latin inscriptions on the tombstones!)

[Bryn]

Possibly - I'm too old now to remember my O Level school Latin.

(Strangely enough though, my octogenarian dad wasn't; I remember wheeling him around mediaeval churches, and he was translating all the Latin inscriptions on the tombstones!)

Googling too ubiquitous and trivial an activity for you, I suppose.

[Serial_Apologist]

Googling too ubiquitous and trivial an activity for you, I suppose.

That was long before the days of Google... and, of course laptops!