The Classical Music Recommendation Thread

[karelm 2,902]

This is so gorgeous!  The whole album is sublime.  

 

 

[Tom Guernsey 2,277]

17 hours ago, karelm said:

This is so gorgeous!  The whole album is sublime.  

 

 

Seeing this post reminded me that I have several Vasks albums that I've not got around to listening to so I gave this one a spin at work today and it is indeed gorgeous. His 1st symphony is coupled on this recording and is also superb (some of the harmonic movement in that oddly reminded me of some of the more mellow parts of Star Trek: TMP). I also gave his concerto for cor anglais a listen earlier and that was also exquisite and properly haunting. The accompanying works are shorter pieces for orchestra but equally lovely.

 

I just discovered that I have 8 albums of works by Vasks which is odd as I recall not immediately being grabbed by his music but I'm glad I persevered as it really is superb. I have a feeling he's best known for his choral writing but oddly don't seem to own any of that! I'll clearly have to explore further...

[Tom Guernsey 2,277]

I went a bit mad in the Presto Classical sale, particularly Naxos hi-res downloads which are around £3 each, I've now bought almost everything that qualifies in the sale from my wish list (classical music really is a much cheaper hobby than film music!). I'm sure I'll have lots of great discoveries but I wanted to recommend the album Balance of Power by Peter Boyer, which is basically an album of short-ish orchestral works but basically if you want more music in JW 80s Olympic theme style, not to mention plenty that takes more than a little inspiration from his film music, if more in style than anything specific (a bit like Kevin Kaska's concert works that sound like action music from AOTC etc.), then this is definitely worth picking up. There's another Boyer album of his first symphony and various other short concert works which are all very much in the same vein.

 

I'm sure there's a thread for "music by other composers that sounds like JW" but I can't for the life of me remember what the title is, if anyone can point me in the right direction, I think even the less classically disinclined film music fan would find plenty to enjoy here!

[bollemanneke 3,334]

Is there a conductor who is known for ignoring all of Mozart and Beethoven's idiotic repeats consistently? Not exclusive to those two composers, just somebody who understands a piece of music has to move onwards, not backwards.

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

Perhaps you should switch to twelve tone music, which has a strict rule against repetition.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Perhaps bolle should only listen to software instruments playing MIDI files so he can just turn repeats off

[Loert 2,509]

Nothing wrong with music moving backwards...

 

 

[bollemanneke 3,334]

But that music is genius. Repeating half a chunk without any variations is ridiculous. If I want to hear it again, I'll rewind. That's what it's for.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

I've just published the newest in my series of score follow videos for Walter Piston chamber music.  This is Piston's String Quartet No. 4.

 

As great as his symphonies are, I think the string quartets might be where his greatest work lies.  In the future I'm planning to do further videos for his Flute Quintet (1942) and Piano Quintet (1949).

 

 

[karelm 2,902]

What would you say is the best recorded version of the opening from Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra?  I've probably heard this work live a dozen times by some of the best orchestras and heard over 100 recordings over the years and each leaves me wanting more.  

 

There are three broad approaches: vintage (prior to 1960), intermediate (generally from the mid 1960's to 2000), and contemporary (generally younger conductors such as Dudamel, Nelsons, etc.  Vintage tend to be brisker (Reiner, Bohm, etc.) and true to the score.  Intermediate tend to be more dramatic.  Contemporary is a mixed bag, sometimes seeming to want to shatter expectations.

 

EARLY:  Tend to be brisk and a bit controlled but precise (the timpani hits are played straight with no crescendo or ritardando as you tend to get in later interpretations).  Those are not in the score, so these are more matter of fact and true to the score. 

Karl Böhm, The Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra

 

Fritz Reiner, CSO was very, very influential for its intensity and rawness.  The CSO was the "sound of brass" for a generation of brass players because the famous players were instrumental in music education writing highly circulated etudes and performance technique manuals and the subsequent generation of players (from the 1970's - 2010's) studied with them or those influenced by them.  Here again, the interpretation is brisk and true to the score but edgier (on the verge of collapse).  

 

INTERMEDIATE:

Tended towards hyper romantic and dramatic.  Think von Karajan and Bernstein.  This is where you get the molto-crescendo and molto-ritardando that is not in the score.  You get more interpretive liberties, and the music slows down.  Emphasis is on the drama and spectacle rather than accuracy.

 

Timpani with molto ritardando and up close and present (sounds close mic'ed, infront of the brass).  This is a very fine recording other than a few slips here and there.

 

This Bernstein is from 1959 but I consider it more of an intermediate because his attitude was more flamboyant and romantic (dramatic) interpretation with liberties.  Another fine performance but too early to capture the full range of the massive orchestra.

 

Solti:  This is the CSO again but a generation after Reiner.  More romantic and bombastic and great, bright brass.  This is a great combination of the precision of the vintage with intensity of the modern interpretations, plus beautifully paced.

 

 

Johnny: Not the best.  Competition is too stiff.  I hate the low G on the timpani which doesn't have a tight tone but flabby and loses pitch.  It's just not that strong.

 

LATE/CONTEMPORARY

Dudamel: better live than on record, here he tends towards the safe and ultimately the performance isn't a standout though competent.

 

Andris Nelsons, CBSO - percussion way too loud.  This is Also Sprach of the Apocalypse.  

 

I can go on and on but each one leaves me wanting more.  Ideally, there would be a significant buildup of the three note trumpet "nature motif" of the sunrise.   By the third statement, they are bold and intense.  Similarly, the pacing shouldn't be rushed but I tend to prefer expansive though not lagging.  I believe performance tradition is just as valuable as what the composer wrote in the score so it doesn't bother me if almost all modern versions include a crescendo and ritardando in the timpani because I'm sure Strauss would have suggested some sort of interpretive shape is implied.  This is one of the greatest openings of all music and needs to have that scale of epicness in its interpretation - this is not just about a sunrise, this is about the end of an era (and the dawn of a new era)...the dawn of science and the demise of religion with mankind being the bridge between nature and the ultimate result of evolution, the Super-man.  I believe the music should start controlled and end virtually on the verge of collapse - right on the edge of what the orchestra can play.  If it sounds too easy for them, it's too safely interpreted.  But all this without sacrificing the slow tempo that indicates this is on the cusp of something very magnificent.  Not just about sunrise about the dawn of possibilities unimagined which is why it so perfectly fits the opening of Kubrick's film, "2001".

 

By the way, here is Strauss's interpretation.  It is a half tone too high but this is probably an artifact of early recording technology rather than out of tune.  You can hear the crescendo in the timpani that isn't in the score but steady tempo.  In short, he's adding some dynamic contours which no doubt served as a basis for some additional interpretive liberties in subsequent interpretations.

 

[michael_grig 464]

Thanks for putting this together @karelm! 

This is indeed one of greatest preludes in history!

43 minutes ago, karelm said:

 

 

I didn't know JW had made one! Thanks for showing it! The Dudamel one is one of my favorites! The woman getting scared at 1:33 is really delicious! the percussionist did a very good job when that happens!

What I often regret is that the rest of the piece falls short of this sequence. The transcendent touch that Strauss gives to the complete piece is otherworldly good! I've been studying the work of Friedrich Nietzsche lately and also trying to understand Also Sprach Zarathustra, which really drives you a little crazy, it's transcendental....

My favorite part of Also Sprach Zarathustra is actually not the beginning, but this moment: This is what really gives me the transcendental feelings!

 

43 minutes ago, karelm said:

 

 

Nelsons has recorded a new album - only with Strauss! The prelude on it is much better than the one you chose from Nelsons! The whole album is very enjoyable!

The Gewandhaus Orchestra (my local orchestra) performs extremely beautifully!

[karelm 2,902]

29 minutes ago, Michael Grigorowitsch said:

Thanks for putting this together @karelm! 

This is indeed one of greatest preludes in history!

I didn't know JW had made one! Thanks for showing it! The Dudamel one is one of my favorites too! The woman getting scared at 1:33 is really delicious! the percussionist did a very good job when that happens!

What I often regret is that the rest of the piece falls short of this sequence. The transcendent touch that Strauss gives to the complete piece is otherworldly good! I've been studying the work of Friedrich Nietzsche lately and also trying to understand Also Sprach Zarathustra, which really drives you a little crazy, it's transcendental....

My favorite part of Also Sprach Zarathustra is actually not the beginning, but this moment: This is what really gives me the transcendental feelings!

 

 

 

That section is the man is getting seduced seductively by two opposing ways of thinking - one through nature (the C major rising motif) and the other, through faith (B minor descending) which are always conflicting, never more so than the fugue at the end of part 1 which pits nature and faith against each other till the cosmos collapses with the grand nature motif indicating neither approach of itself is a path to enlightenment, but must be shed to achieve our true nature (part 2).  During this clip, the saint explains he's found refuge from sufferings and imperfections of the mortal world by following god using a seductive version of the faith theme because, as Nietzsche argues it, the comfort of religious faith is seductive.  But Zarathustra argues with the Saint that god is dead and humanity uses religion in its various incarnations to try to explain the mysteries of the cosmos, though never satisfactorily.  The music you pointed out is the seductiveness of faith.

 

That Andris is better than his CBSO that I linked in my post.  I bit too safe, though, no?  It feels like they've played this work a hundred times which the Gewandhausorchester has.  Here is a funny story told to me from principal trumpet of a major orchestra, there is an exposed trumpet octave leap in the second part that is quite tricky.  During rehearsals, the trumpet player would play the exposed leap always missing the landing note.  So, one time he'd play a partial too low, next time a partial too high.  The whole orchestra knew exactly how this was supposed to sound and kept on asking him "are you nervous about that solo" thinking he was truly struggling with it.  In fact, he was having some fun at their expense making them all nervous that he'll miss it while in fact he's played that work hundreds of times and knew that solo inside out.  Of course, he nails it in the concert, no doubt making some of his colleagues smile they've been had.

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

I've never compared them too thoroughly, but just as Kubelik is my go-to conductor for all things Dvorak & Co, I generally steer towards Karajan (and his 70s recordings) for Strauss, at least for orchestral works. With a few exceptions, that's where I got to know these works, and I haven't yet heard anything to draw me away from these versions. I prefer Kempe for the Alpensinfonie (and for Ariadne auf Naxos, but the operas are an entirely different matter), although that'll quite possibly change if ever the Karajan live recording from the Salzburg festival gets a release (i.e. a wider release than some obscure, ultra rare Japanese CD).

 

As for 2001:ASO, wasn't the version in the film actually a Karajan recording? I think they put the Böhm on the album just for copyright reasons (because as with the Ligeti (iirc), Kubelik didn't bother acquiring the necessary rights), but sneakily left the Karajan in the film - or was it the other way round?

[Disco Stu 15,495]

If I could get people to listen to just one obscure American symphony (meaning one not written by Copland, Barber, Piston, or Bernstein) then I would urge anyone and everyone to listen to Lukas Foss' first symphony, written at the tender age of 21.

 

It is firmly in the wonderful 1940s American school of neoclassicism and bears a notable Copland influence to my ears.  I love the story of a 15 year old Foss, freshly arrived in America, seeking out and "cold" introducing himself to Copland in 1937 in the lobby of a hotel.  Only a year later he was writing the official solo piano arrangement of Copland's Billy the Kid ballet!

 

 

[Loert 2,509]

On 29/08/2022 at 5:13 PM, karelm said:

What would you say is the best recorded version of the opening from Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra? 

 

This one never fails to give me the chills:

 

 

I've never heard that Strauss performance before. What I find interesting is how "detaché" the trumpets play the CGC motif. Somehow sounds more mechanical than the more legato interpretation in modern recordings. Like a message from another world!

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

18 minutes ago, Loert said:

This one never fails to give me the chills:

 

Yes, that's the classic 1974 Karajan that I have. I figured the Karajan @karelm posted would be the same (it has the same cover as the "DG Originals" release), but I see the credits aren't clear. Comparing them, they're clearly the same recording though.

 

(Bonus tip: Playing that piece twice with something like half a second or a second delay between them sounds pretty cool)

[Chen G. 3,941]

On 29/08/2022 at 7:13 PM, karelm said:

 

 

 

This may sound like blasphemy, but I always though the Dresden Amen from Parsifal would have been a hell of a substitute for Also Sprach Zarathustra in 2001. The Verwandlungsmusik would have also been great for some passages.

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

22 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

This may sound like blasphemy, but I always though the Dresden Amen from Parsifal would have been a hell of a substitute for Also Sprach Zarathustra in 2001. The Verwandlungsmusik would have also been great for some passages.

 

Whatever the merits, that might simply have not been possible at the time. As far as I can tell (using this and this as a reference), the first studio recording of (the complete) Parsifal was Solti's from 1972. I don't know if any of the numerous earlier live recordings were actually released & readily available at the time Kubrick made his film. Of course, excerpts may have been recorded commercially before the full opera, but perhaps even if he had wanted to use it, Kubrick might simply not have had a recording of it that he could have used (legally or illegally…)

 

(As a child of the 80s who kind of grew up with Karajan's massive catalogue, delving into the earlier days of classical music recording history is endlessly fascinating)

[Chen G. 3,941]

7 minutes ago, Marian Schedenig said:

Whatever the merits, that might simply have not been possible at the time.

 

Oh sure. I'm just saying, I think the visuals lend themselves to that. I mean, talk about something that sounds grand and numinous!

 

Kubrick did consider other pieces of music and had cut some footage to them very succesfully: I think a portion of the film - possibly some Stargate stuff - was at one point scored with a part of Mahler's Third.

[karelm 2,902]

5 hours ago, Loert said:

 

This one never fails to give me the chills:

 

 

I've never heard that Strauss performance before. What I find interesting is how "detaché" the trumpets play the CGC motif. Somehow sounds more mechanical than the more legato interpretation in modern recordings. Like a message from another world!

Interestingly, they sloppily slur the 16th note ta-daaaaa's after the CGC "nature" motif.  Isn't it surprisingly sloppy or am I just too picky?  To me, those should be clearly articulated as well.  Ta-daaaa not taadadaddaaaa!  This performance can be better.  I'm starting to think the music is better than any performance of it.   One thing I get confused about, HvK made two DG recordings of this work, right?  So this is the earlier one and he made a second later one?  Or is this the later one because I thought one was 1980's digital.  So, was 1974 his earliest or is there an earlier one?

4 hours ago, Chen G. said:

 

This may sound like blasphemy, but I always though the Dresden Amen from Parsifal would have been a hell of a substitute for Also Sprach Zarathustra in 2001. The Verwandlungsmusik would have also been great for some passages.

A fantastic opera but not a great fit IMO.  2001's primary story was about the transition of man to super-man by way of the monolith.  That's a perfect parallel of Also Sprach Zarathustra's story...it just so happens the music fits even more so!  

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

I'm used to it, but I've always liked that little grace note.

 

The 1970s were Karajan's peak for Strauss, to me. The 80s recordings are slightly less engaging and early digital recordings with somewhat muddier sound than the pristine analogue 70s versions.

 

It's always hard to tell which was the "first" recording with Karajan, because he recorded so many works multiple times that even not all of the studio recordings are a permanent part of the available catalogue, but over the years, there have been new releases of live recordings that never were available before. Discover Karajan is a good resource for finding recordings (and performances), and lists 14 (!) Zarathustra recordings from 1959 to 1987 - the first three with the Wiener Philharmoniker, and the rest with the Berliner. Some of them are only a few months apart, so I expect at least some of those are live recordings from the archives.

[karelm 2,902]

12 hours ago, Marian Schedenig said:

I'm used to it, but I've always liked that little grace note.

 

The 1970s were Karajan's peak for Strauss, to me. The 80s recordings are slightly less engaging and early digital recordings with somewhat muddier sound than the pristine analogue 70s versions.

 

It's always hard to tell which was the "first" recording with Karajan, because he recorded so many works multiple times that even not all of the studio recordings are a permanent part of the available catalogue, but over the years, there have been new releases of live recordings that never were available before. Discover Karajan is a good resource for finding recordings (and performances), and lists 14 (!) Zarathustra recordings from 1959 to 1987 - the first three with the Wiener Philharmoniker, and the rest with the Berliner. Some of them are only a few months apart, so I expect at least some of those are live recordings from the archives.

Wow fascinating!  And based on Michael Grigorowitsch's post with Andris Nelsons, it's crazy just how radically different an interpretation is by the same conductor not that far apart.  Just compare his Boston version with CBSO with Gewandhausorchester by the same conductor within a few year period.  Very different interpretations!  Additionally, there are concert performances that might have glitches but are superior interpretations.  

[Chen G. 3,941]

6 hours ago, karelm said:

2001's primary story was about the transition of man to super-man by way of the monolith.  That's a perfect parallel of Also Sprach Zarathustra's story

 

That's true, I'm sure Kubrick chose it for that.

 

But, I mean...

 

 

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

On 29/08/2022 at 8:34 PM, Marian Schedenig said:

As for 2001:ASO, wasn't the version in the film actually a Karajan recording? I think they put the Böhm on the album just for copyright reasons (because as with the Ligeti (iirc), Kubelik didn't bother acquiring the necessary rights), but sneakily left the Karajan in the film - or was it the other way round?

 

According to IMDb:

Quote

The end music credits do not list a conductor and orchestra for "Also Sprach Zarathustra." Stanley Kubrick wanted the Herbert von Karajan / Wiener Philharmoniker (Vienna Philharmonic) version on British Decca for the film's soundtrack, but Decca executives did not want the company's recording supposedly cheapened by association with the movie, and so it gave permission on the condition that the conductor and orchestra were not named. After the movie's successful release, Decca tried to rectify its blunder by re-releasing the recording with an "As-Heard-in-'2001'" flag printed on the album cover. John Culshaw recounts the incident in the book "Putting the Record Straight" (1981). In Decca's haste to rush the re-release the recording, the album was issued with a disfiguring pitch waver at the end of each side. In the meantime, MGM released the official soundtrack album with Karl Böhm's Berliner Philharmoniker (Berlin Philharmonic) "Also Sprach Zarathustra" discreetly substituting for von Karajan's version. The always publicity-minded von Karajan, by then permanent conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic, was furious with Decca. Rhino/Atlantic Records' current CD release of the soundtrack purports to restore the von Karajan recording to its proper place.

 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

shout out yer favorite schubert sonata, mine's 959

 

 

[Chen G. 3,941]

2 hours ago, Marian Schedenig said:

 

According to IMDb:

 

This is interesting, since 2001 wasn’t a success until quite a few years’ worth of reruns in the theater.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Say what now? 2001 was an immediate sensation, one of the biggest hits of 1968.  A movie every person who wanted to be seen as intelligent had to have an opinion about.

[Raiders of the SoundtrArk 2,429]

Here's a quick question: does anyone here knows what would be the best recording of Fauré's Requiem? I want to really get into it but would prefer to start with its best recording

[Disco Stu 15,495]

This is so freakin' great.  I don't care if it makes me a hipster or something, Caroline Shaw RULES.  Can't wait for this new album.

 

 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Shaw really getting to flex her orchestral muscles with this piece, "The Observatory," composed for the LA Phil, premiered at the Hollywood Bowl in 2019

 

[Tom Guernsey 2,277]

Following up on the post of Orb and Sceptre in the RIP thread... Great piece, although I always marginally preferred Crown Imperial (for her father's coronation), but both are great. Having said that, I highly recommend the Johannesburg Festival Overture, which is great fun. Gotta love a Walton ceremonial work.

 

Looking through the late Queen's coronation Wikipedia entry (but of course there's one), I saw that Bax wrote a Coronation March but can't seem to find a recent recording of it. Chandos did an extensive survey of Bax's music (complete symphonies and at least 9 volumes of orchestral works but I cannot see that it's included in any of these or any other recent recordings (searching on Presto) which seems surprising. Can anyone recommend a decent recent(ish) recording of it? I like Bax and would be curious to hear his take on this kind of music. Surprising that it's not more available, Walton and Elgar's ceremonial works have plentiful recordings.

 

It made me realise that I should delve into the Chandos Bax series, I have the symphonies and a few other works on Naxos, plus some of the Chandos albums but should round out the collection.

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

Revisiting some Nyman favourites today after not having listened to anything by him for quite a while, and boy is the double concerto for saxophone and cello a gorgeous piece of music:

 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

On 02/12/2019 at 9:39 PM, Disco Stu said:

I’ve returned so frequently to Fauré’s 6th Nocturne this year, this piece has begun to feel as natural as breathing to me.  This deserves to be as famous as the contemporaneous music of people like Satie and Debussy. 
 

 

 

He's right y'know

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Wow, the Emerson String Quartet is disbanding.  What a legendary run!  These guys were instrumental in turning me on to the chamber music of Schubert, Bartok, and many others.

 

https://twitter.com/EmersonQuartet/status/1569721337199083520

 

In terms of lesser known stuff they championed, I highly recommend their recording of Ned Rorem's String Quartet No. 4

 

 

[bollemanneke 3,334]

The Beethoven symphonies by Adam Fischer with the Danish Chamber Orchestra. This is a mind-boggling set so far and I'm seriously considering buying it physically. It's just so different, not your 150th mliion normal performance of these works. He goes out of his way to make all the accompaniments clearly audible, zero vibrato in the strings which makes the rapid movements sound like folk music etc. I smiled all the way through the 2nd and fifth. The 7th will be heaven on earth.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Fischer is very polarizing I think.  You either like his approach or it rubs you the wrong way.

[bollemanneke 3,334]

I can see that. I think he's actually going to make me like Haydn. There's little point in re-recordings unless you're doing what he's doing I think.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

All of my favorite Haydn works are chamber music anyway.

[Tom Guernsey 2,277]

1 hour ago, bollemanneke said:

The Beethoven symphonies by Adam Fischer with the Danish Chamber Orchestra. This is a mind-boggling set so far and I'm seriously considering buying it physically. It's just so different, not your 150th mliion normal performance of these works. He goes out of his way to make all the accompaniments clearly audible, zero vibrato in the strings which makes the rapid movements sound like folk music etc. I smiled all the way through the 2nd and fifth. The 7th will be heaven on earth.

Is this the set on Naxos? I was contemplating it but kinda feel I have more than enough Beethoven cycles. On the other hand, sounds interesting and if it’s Naxos it’ll be a bargain. He has a new Brahms one out too if I remember correctly.

[bollemanneke 3,334]

Yup, it's on Naxos. Trust me, this is no ordinary cycle. It's unique.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

12 minutes ago, Tom Guernsey said:

He has a new Brahms one out too if I remember correctly.

 

Quite controversial that Brahms set is too

[Tom Guernsey 2,277]

15 hours ago, bollemanneke said:

Yup, it's on Naxos. Trust me, this is no ordinary cycle. It's unique.

I will probably pick up both cycles (each for less than the cost of a standard expanded edition... classical really is such a bargain, we are spoiled!). I have his Bartok and Kodaly albums and they are terrific so I'm definitely happy to give him the benefit of the doubt in something a little older. I always liked James Horner's score to the movie where they can't find his brother, Searching for Bobby Fischer (sorry).

 

It would only actually be my fourth complete Beethoven cycle, I honestly thought I had more and I think my fifth complete Brahms cycle where I didn't realise I had so many; having struggled a bit to get into Brahms originally, I actually find myself returning to his symphonies more than Beethoven. The cycle that did it for me was James Levine and the Chicago Symphony, with those performances, it just clicked somehow.

 

 

[bollemanneke 3,334]

I don't even have a complete Beethoven cycle yet. I have 5 and 7 by Karajan 77, Zander and Gardiner, 9 by Zander and Gardiner and 5 and 6 by Goodman/Hugett.

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Schoenberg in Hollywood.

 

A classic, important album from 90s.  None of this is going to place him among my favorite composers (although I enjoy these pieces quite a bit), but it's a piece of Schoenberg's story that desperately needed telling at the time.

 

[karelm 2,902]

Coincidentally, here is another John Mauceri recording.

 

First of all, I think very highly of Puccini's last, unfinished opera, Turandot.  This recording with Pavarotti and Zubin Mehta/LPO is superb!

 

but many feel the ending by F. Alfano abridged by Toscanini to not live up to the rest of the opera.  Here is John Mauceri's thrilling conclusion using the original finale F. Alfano composed and I love it!

 

 

[BB-8 3,458]

I wasn't expecting to get hooked by JJ Raff - but there is some wonderful material hidden in is orchestral works and also in his concertos:

 

[Loert 2,509]

2 hours ago, BB-8 said:

I wasn't expecting to get hooked by JJ Raff - but there is some wonderful material hidden in is orchestral works and also in his concertos:

 

His 3rd Symphony is a masterpiece.

 

On 23/09/2022 at 3:15 PM, karelm said:

First of all, I think very highly of Puccini's last, unfinished opera, Turandot.  This recording with Pavarotti and Zubin Mehta/LPO is superb!

 

but many feel the ending by F. Alfano abridged by Toscanini to not live up to the rest of the opera.  Here is John Mauceri's thrilling conclusion using the original finale F. Alfano composed and I love it!

 

I have my own "highlights" suite of Turandot which joins those two together. Though part of me thinks that the phrase at 18:20 really isn't needed, and that it should follow the original meter. (4 + 2 + 4 etc.)

[Disco Stu 15,495]

Interesting story about how the Cleveland Orchestra has taken ownership of the manuscript score for Mahler's 2nd symphony.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/27/arts/music/mahler-resurrection-symphony-manuscript-cleveland-orchestra.html

 

The manuscript was purchased, at the time anonymously, for $5.6 million in 2016.  That purchaser is now revealed to be Herbert Kloiber, an Austrian media mogul and a godson of Herbert von Karajan.  Interesting that he donated it to Cleveland and not to the VPO or some such.

 

Quote

When Gustav Mahler took the New York Philharmonic to Cleveland for a concert in December 1910, he drove the critic Miriam Russell, of The Plain Dealer, to paroxysms of prose:

 

"Little Mahler with the big brain.
Little Mahler with the mighty force.
Little Mahler with the great musical imagination."

 

That, however, was to be his sole appearance there; by the following spring, he was dead.

 

An important piece of Mahleriana will nevertheless now reside in Ohio for good. The Cleveland Orchestra announced today that it has received the manuscript of Mahler’s Second Symphony as a gift. And in doing so, it revealed the identity of the mystery buyer who paid $5.6 million for that autograph score in 2016: Herbert G. Kloiber, an Austrian media mogul.

 

“He’s very much in the family,” André Gremillet, the orchestra’s president and chief executive, said of Kloiber, who is a trustee and chairs its European advisory board. “Given his deep knowledge and love of music, the fact that it’s coming from him has special meaning to us. It’s not just any collector who bought the score.”

 

Kloiber, 74, who built his Tele München Group into a major European media company before selling it to the investment firm KKR in 2019, said that his decision to buy the Mahler manuscript had reflected a lifelong interest in music, as well as a friendship.

 

The godson of the conductor Herbert von Karajan, Kloiber ran the production company Unitel, which made several renowned films of performances, before founding Clasart Classic in 1976. Clasart distributes Met in HD broadcasts internationally, and has made visual recordings of the Clevelanders playing Bruckner and Brahms with their music director, Franz Welser-Möst.

 

It was through his business dealings that Kloiber became acquainted with Gilbert Kaplan, the Mahler devotee who had bought the 232-page manuscript in 1984 from the foundation of Willem Mengelberg, a Dutch conductor who had received it from the composer’s widow, Alma. Kaplan, a financial publisher with no musical training, was obsessed with the “Resurrection,” as the work is known, and controversially conducted it with leading orchestras, recording it twice.

 

“We had both sold a piece of our companies to Capital Cities, the owner of the ABC network, so every year we gathered in Phoenix, Arizona, at the Biltmore Hotel for a corporate retreat,” Kloiber said. “Whilst everybody else was doing horse routes or playing golf, we were sitting at the bar talking about Gustav Mahler, and his particular inclination to the Second Symphony.”

 

When Kaplan died in 2016, he left the manuscript to his widow with the intention that it be sold. Kloiber’s winning bid at Sotheby’s that November set a record for a manuscript score at auction. The acquisition was anonymous, but not entirely a secret.

 

“We agreed to have a coffee in Vienna,” Welser-Möst said, recalling a meeting from a few years ago with Kloiber, a friend. “I knew he had bought it, but that was it. He showed up with a black briefcase. We sat down for coffee — you know, chatty, chatty — and it was like in one of those spy films. He pushed the briefcase underneath the table and said, ‘Have a look at it.’”

 

For Welser-Möst, who occupied Mahler’s post of general music director at the Vienna State Opera from 2010 to 2014, examining the pristinely preserved manuscript — unaltered, unbound and marked in blue crayon with the composer’s own edits — was an emotional experience, not to mention a nerve-racking one. The clarity of Mahler’s handwriting convinced him, he said, that his scores ought to be followed to the letter.

 

“When I opened the score in our apartment in Vienna, I got really teary,” Welser-Möst said. “How close can you get to a masterpiece, whatever it is? You can’t get any closer than that, and to have that intimate moment just for myself, not being in a museum and pushing other people to the side to get a glimpse of it, that was really a very special moment in my life.”

 

He hid the manuscript under his bed, then returned it three days later.

 

Kloiber, who admires the Cleveland Orchestra’s commitment to its youth programs and has been a board member since 2010, told officials that he would give them the manuscript in 2019, after a Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra concert at St. Florian, the abbey near Linz, Austria, where Bruckner was organist.

 

“They are a lovely lot,” Kloiber said. “I like the way they are run and come on all these tours, and make a really big effort for the United States to be present on the European concert circuit.”

 

Selections from the manuscript will be displayed at Severance Hall in a free public showing on Wednesday, and for ticket holders at the orchestra’s season-opening performances of the “Resurrection” on Thursday and Friday. The score will then be housed nearby at the Cleveland Museum of Art, which is led by William M. Griswold, the former director of the Morgan Library & Museum in New York, where several of Mahler’s other manuscripts are held.

 

“It will be kept permanently at the museum,” Gremillet said. “We are still working on where it will be exhibited, but we want people to see that score. Certainly this is going to be a great source of pride for Cleveland as a whole, in addition to the Cleveland Orchestra.”

 

[Marian Schedenig 8,158]

G. Kaplan, eh?

 

[Disco Stu 15,495]

I've certainly never heard of this Gilbert Kaplan fellow.  It sounds like his story is pretty weird.

 

"Kaplan, a financial publisher with no musical training, was obsessed with the “Resurrection,” as the work is known, and controversially conducted it with leading orchestras, recording it twice."

 

What self-respecting orchestra allows an amateur to buy their way into leading them?  I would feel insulted if I were a musician in one of those.

 

Looks like the recordings were with the LSO and the VPO!

 

https://www.discogs.com/artist/1816847-Gilbert-Kaplan