Originally posted by jayne lee wilson
View Post
Prom 21 - 30.07.17: Beethoven – Symphony No. 9, ‘Choral’
Collapse
X
-
Last edited by Bryn; 28-07-17, 20:23.
-
-
Originally posted by Darkbloom View PostMy memories of Colin Davis live were usually always positive, but his Ninth with the LSO in the 90s was not one of his best. Very routine. I think Brendel played Mozart in the first half so perhaps more time was spent in rehearsal on that.
It remains the only time I've heard the 9th in concert and I don't recall it as a poor performance; but then, I had (and still have) no comparative standard of 'live' performance.
Comment
-
-
Originally posted by cloughie View PostJayne, if you'd said the Eroica I would agree with you, as that was the first big symphony, but for reasons I do not know as soon as the first voice comes into the finale I've a need for the off switch, and it's not just the fact there are voices in symphonies - Mahler 2,3 and 4 are fine, though after all these years I still don't get 8. i think the Eroica and Berlioz Fantastique* were the Symphonic milestones of the earlier C18th that led to the later Symphonic giants.
*They were two works on first hearing in my teens c1961/2 which made me go wow!
I can't explain why,almost sounds vulgar in parts,not the right word probably but I just don't like the sound it makes,that Turkish music thingy is like fingernails on a blackboard to me.
The rest of the Symphony is hairs on the back of the neck stuff,as are some parts of the finale.
Each to their own.
Comment
-
-
Originally posted by cloughie View PostJayne, if you'd said the Eroica I would agree with you, as that was the first big symphony, but for reasons I do not know as soon as the first voice comes into the finale I've a need for the off switch, and it's not just the fact there are voices in symphonies - Mahler 2,3 and 4 are fine, though after all these years I still don't get 8. i think the Eroica and Berlioz Fantastique* were the Symphonic milestones of the earlier C18th that led to the later Symphonic giants.
*They were two works on first hearing in my teens c1961/2 which made me go wow!
It's something quite new - a vast, expanded, multiform symphonic apotheosis of popular song.
Beethoven was always ahead of the game, and still is....!
"An absolutely contemporary piece of music that will be contemporary for ever...." said Stravinsky of Beethoven's Grosse Fugue...
Dunno what HE thought of the 9th Symphony but the description seems equally apt, if not more so...
When criticism is aimed at such towering, radical (or just very popular) masterpieces of this kind, I always think of Basil Bunting's poem about Ezra Pound's Cantos....
"On the Flyleaf of Pounds Cantos, from Odes I:37 (1949)
There are the Alps. What is there to say about them?
They don't make sense. Fatal glaciers, crags cranks climb,
jumbled boulder and weed, pasture and boulder, scree,
et l'on entend, maybe, le refrain joyeux et léger.(**)
Who knows what the ice will have scraped on the rock it is smoothing?
There they are, you will have to go a long way round
if you want to avoid them.
It takes some getting used to. There are the Alps,
fools! Sit down and wait for them to crumble!"
(**) "and one hears, (maybe), the joyful and uplifting chorus"
***
The Ode to Joy shows no signs of crumbling just yet....Last edited by jayne lee wilson; 29-07-17, 03:44.
Comment
-
-
Originally posted by jayne lee wilson View PostDo you know Norrington's later SWR live one, Tony? It's a truly great one, stunningly well-recorded (German Radio SQ at its finest) with an unforgettable emotional and dynamic impact! WoW!
Thanks for the recommendation!
Comment
-
-
Originally posted by Brassbandmaestro View PostAnyone know what Mahler's thoughts of Beethoven were, especially the 9th Symphony?
See https://davidpickett.wordpress.com/2...inth-symphony/ for instance.
William Steinberg recorded the Mahler re-orchestration back in 1966. It used to be on an MPF or CFP LP IIRC.
Here you go:
Comment
-
-
Originally posted by Bryn View PostWell he 'updated' the orchestration, so he must have had some sort of regard for it.
See https://davidpickett.wordpress.com/2...inth-symphony/ for instance.
William Steinberg recorded the Mahler re-orchestration back in 1966. It used to be on an MPF or CFP LP IIRC.
Here you go:
Don’t cry for me
I go where music was born
J S Bach 1685-1750
Comment
-
Comment