David Ayers

I get it. But it's going to cost you a dollar every time. Payable to B3groover.

Lon! A dollar in the box, please, every time you mention how great your system is!

Hope they play some good tune's.

I don't really know Holloway's criticism except for the Shostakovich essay. I do have a view on that essay as I have been thinking about it for a long time. He is surely right at identifying what Shostakovich's works are not - they are not Haydn or Prokofiev, if we want to put it that way. We can't put that in reverse, exactly, by saying that the lack of colour and wit are, say, 'deliberate'. But nearly so. These works are what they are and what they have become, and the frequent harmonic aridity is only one part of their meaning. What they are and how they mean is not part of Holloway's account at all, and probably rightly as the ditchwater dull and intellectually trivial MacDonald-type view had at the time he wrote taken too much hold and it is what Holloway is railing against. For all the things they 'don't have' or - more to the point - eschew, so many of Shostakovich's works are entirely memorable, with every step coming to seem inevitable. That's usually a sign of something. That they make no concession to joy or transcendence, that the doubts about the consolations of musical discourse are there from quite early and get written in ever deeper, is a key that Holloway maybe could have spotted but which is hard to make claims for against the rudimentary marketing around 'Shostakovich vs. Stalin.' A comparison of his Eighth to Weinberg's 19th ('Bright May', a 1985 celebration and memorial of the end of the war) gives pretty clear grounds for judgement, I think. Mind you, that your average Shostakovich symphony in concert is a bit like having your head battered by a piece of 2 x 4 still counts against him

Anyone here have any preparation in Ancient Greek or Latin? I have both and kind of take it for granted, but I know it is not universal by any means. Just curious, not a test.

I'll add that TUM maintain an exemplary website with full artist biographies and so on. You can't order from their site though!

Props for Aaltonen. Like Kalevi Aho, who we discussed in another thread, he was a recipient of one of those lavish fifteen year government arts grants. So no excuse for not being good!

And another euro-label triumph - in this case for the admirably focussed TUM Records in Finland. Their model involves support from music foundations and other sponsors, and mainly releases by Finnish musicians, with some collaborations (such as Occupy the World) and some entirely non-Finnish contributions (such as this one). Yet another euro-label that has found a way to do it....

He doesn't like storms and gets anxious. There's a pattern to how he comes to me and behaves which is very recognisable.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-30531060 My dog knows a storm is coming before I do, and I've learned to understand that he is telling me. He only knows maybe an hour before I do though, not a whole day! I'm a sucker for these 'sixth sense' stories about animals and birds, pets or otherwise.

John Coltrane

I dunno. Has the internet devalued reading and writing?

Gave it a quick listen but someone came and knocked at the door and I had to go answer.

I feel we started off on the wrong foot with the topic of Christmas music. Lets mention or post good ones here. No negative comments please.... Bereite dich, Zion, mit zärtlichen Trieben, Den Schönsten, den Liebsten bald bei dir zu sehn! Deine Wangen Müssen heut viel schöner prangen, Eile, den Bräutigam sehnlichst zu lieben!

What Lon said. Or more of the same. Either way, keep racking them up. Years, I mean, not CDs and empty beer bottles. However collectable.

Got it. Thanks.

Is this basically a blowing session or something more interesting?

David, I generally enjoy reading your contributions here and have nothing against you personally - but either you misunderstood what I meant by "leading edge", or you're completely nuts! Oh! I just picked up the general vocabulary, I wasn't thinking about your 'as near as he ever got' qualification - just agreeing with John Litweiler's observation about Miles and mainstreaming.

According to this, the sources are from Tony Williams and Spotlite Dial has had a checkered existence in terms of ownership and the original lacquers have been missing for 60 years. What is remarkable about our set is the work of Steve Marlowe and Jonathan Horwich. Using the best available transfers of the label's current owner, Tony Williams' Spotlite Records, they have done an amazing job of restoring and remastering these masters. Thanks for posting. It seems we are where we are - or already were.

Usually from Mosaic we get a discussion of the sources used and their limitations. We seem not to have had that on this occasion.

To my mind, Miles was all about good musicians marketing an idea of sophistication to audiences who had a few spare dollars - the 1969-1975 groups played palatable jams that could fit in as support for high-earning rock groups. No cutting edge. No one got cut. A few folks took a cut.

It is up everyone's alley. It basically *is* the alley. That is why we are all so curious....

How composers earn is a good question. In Pettersson's case I read that he had a Swedish government award from 1964. So there were lean years from 1952 when he had to resign his position as an orchestral player due to rheumatoid arthritis. He was from a relatively poor background. In Finland, Aho has had a state salary to compose since 1993. No wonder he can - as moms said - do what he likes. One difference is that Pettersson was an outsider, just a musician, while Aho was a professor of composition. These countries are doing a logical thing in trying to develop a national talent base and a national concert music, and in terms of the Nordic countries I'd say the big success is the number of conductors that come out of the Sibelius Academy- Salonen, Saraste, Vänskä, Oramo, Storgårds - but I do think some composers are pushed at us too hard.

Any word from the private sources on the uh sources?

Long time since I heard these recordings and I no longer own them, but I felt Coltrane's contributions did not make that much sense, didn't fit the music, and even seemed intended to irritate the bandleader and the audience, which they did.