What Classical Music Are You Listening To?

[Peter Friedman]

Four Ballades

[soulpope]

17 hours ago, Peter Friedman said:

Four Ballades

Formidable ....

[soulpope]

[soulpope]

[Peter Friedman]

Disc 1 - No.20 & No.49

[Peter Friedman]

Beethoven - String Quintet Op.4

Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1, Op.23

[soulpope]

7 minutes ago, Peter Friedman said:

Beethoven - String Quintet Op.4

!

[Peter Friedman]

[HutchFan]

I've heard a bit of Brendel's Liszt before (on a Philips LP), and his approach struck me as too measured and sober. (Brendel's critics would say that's always the case. Not me though. I love Brendel's Beethoven and his Haydn. I just thought Liszt was a mismatch for Brendel, temperament-wise.) Then I heard the music on this Vanguard CD. It's very different from what I remember of the Philips LP; it's much more quicksilver-y and impetuous.

Now that's what I'm talking about.  

 

Edited June 28, 2018 by HutchFan

[Larry Kart]

I just realized that without planning to do so, I now have no less than four recordings of Chausson's Concerto  (some say "Concert") for Violin, Piano and Strings. The most recent acquired one is with Zino Francescatti, Robert Casadesus, and Guilet Quartet from 1954 in a 3-CD Music & Arts set of Francescatti recordings; the others are with Cortot and Thibaud  and Co. from 1931 (Biddulph); Augustin Dumay and Jean-Phillipe Collard and the Muir Quartet from 1985 (EMI LP); and  Elmar Oliveira, Robert Koenig and the Vista Nova Ensemble from 1995 (Biddulph). A superb and substantial work, albeit with some Franck-ian tendencies, the Concerto is a bitch to perform and to record. As the liner note for the Oliveira disc says, "The work is fairly unique in its treatment of the two solo instruments which -- despite the virtuosity required from them -- are not soloists in the sense of either a traditional concerto or a concerto grosso but rather emerge as if in a relief-frieze against the quartet background. Thus the challenge is one of balance, for both players and the recording engineer -- how do we properly weigh these parts again each other and, if we as players do get it right (and no doubt there is more than one way to get it right), has the engineer managed to capture just what we did?

The Cortot-Thibaud recording has much cachet, but not so much for me; the sound is 1931, and Thibaud IMO is not in Franscescatti's class. Indeed, Franscescatti's performance would perhaps be a easy winner except that the recording is rather clotted for 1954, and Casadesus is either too reticent or rather dimly captured, I suspect both. Nonetheless, Zino is really "in there" in every way; incredibly seductive and elegant, he sings Chausson's song. Oliveira, by contrast, is perhaps a shade (but just a shade) too forthright, but pianist Robert Koenig is a revelation -- this is the way the piano part has to go alongside the violin and string quartet IMO; the piece's quirky three-way discourse is fully, thrillingly  present. Dumay and Collard are pretty good but rather over-heated, though I'll keep their recording for its disc-mate, Chausson's uncompleted string quartet. So it's got to be both Francescatti and Casadesus and Oliveira and Koenig, Anyone have other candidates? BTW, I tried out on You Tube Isabelle Faust and Alexander Melnikov  and Co. and Jeremy Denk and a young Korean fiddler and Co. Faust's ensemble has an attractive gentle graininess, but she herself lacks profile  or maybe even just chops, while Denk seemingly decided that he had the primary part and just overwhelmed everyone else. Some brilliant playing per se from him, but the work lay in tatters.

 

Chausson's Concerto reminds me of the strange powerful work of the painter Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (see below), which looks or can look quaint and archaic but also can seem oddly modern and certainly had a big influence on Picasso, for one:

[Chuck Nessa]

Sometimes I think I hear god in the Tannhauser overture and sometimes I think it's a trick. Anyway, it sounds great.

[Ken Dryden]

I've been on a pipe organ kick lately and I finally got around to hearing this CD tonight:

Edited June 29, 2018 by Ken Dryden

[soulpope]

12 hours ago, HutchFan said:

I've heard a bit of Brendel's Liszt before (on a Philips LP), and his approach struck me as too measured and sober. (Brendel's critics would say that's always the case. Not me though. I love Brendel's Beethoven and his Haydn. I just thought Liszt was a mismatch for Brendel, temperament-wise.) Then I heard the music on this Vanguard CD. It's very different from what I remember of the Philips LP; it's much more quicksilver-y and impetuous.

Now that's what I'm talking about.  

 

Same here .... Brendel's Liszt on Vanguard excells ....

[soulpope]

Yesterday evening .... :

Superb Marin Marais hommage by outstanding gamba player Paolo Pandolfo ....

[soulpope]

7 hours ago, Chuck Nessa said:

Sometimes I think I hear god in the Tannhauser overture and sometimes I think it's a trick. Anyway, it sounds great.

Listening to this Tennstedt+ LSO performance I think divine englightment could be appropriate ,,,,

Edited June 29, 2018 by soulpope

[soulpope]

More nearness to eternity courtesy of Sergiu Celibidache + Münchner Philharmonker ....

[soulpope]

[Peter Friedman]

Bach - Cello Suite No.1

Chopin - Cello Sonata

[soulpope]

[Peter Friedman]

Op.1/4 , Op.1/6, Op.2/1

[Chuck Nessa]

1 hour ago, Peter Friedman said:

Op.1/4 , Op.1/6, Op.2/1

An amazing set.

[soulpope]

Earlier today .... :

[soulpope]

As my wife also demands a say regarding the playlist  .... :

[Peter Friedman]

Schubert - Symphony No.8, D.759 "Unfinished"

Saint-Saens - Cello Concerto No.1, Op.33

[soulpope]

Bruckner 7 Celibidache + Müchner Philharmoniker (EMI)