What are you listening to now?

[Preston]

OK, I have heard this recording before, and honestly, I think the tempo ruins it. Compare it to Koopman's:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1rUz0GM-NM

That may be a bit fast, but I think that is far nearer than mark.

Thanks. Though, I love the slower tempo for this piece. Also, in the Richter version, the strings sound much more expressive and flow together so much better, so smoothly, to my ears. The Richter has much more use of legato. Which, while I have not read the score, seems quite fitting to this piece.

Also, I have a serious soft spot for slow and more sustained music or feelings! So, that is probably a key reason why I like the Richter, .

[Zevy]

LVB Violin Concerto Bernstein/NYP/Stern. Oldie but goodie!

[Chris]

Also, in the Richter version, the strings sound much more expressive and flow together so much better, so smoothly, to my ears. The Richter has much more use of legato. Which, while I have not read the score, seems quite fitting to this piece.

Koopman is also using period instruments, while Richter is not.

[Peter]

In a way I can understand the recording companies' dilemma - so many people download stuff from the internet nowadays for free and this is one of the consequences: lack of investment in works being recorded. All businesses want a return on their investments, just as Beethoven's publishers once did. Also, diminishing audiences for serious art music which is, of itself, catastrophic enough. I've wondered to myself, whilst reading Solomon on Beethoven, how many more generations before none of this music is heard at all. It may become 'niche', like Shakespeare - the stuff of academia and the cogniscenti. Again, schools have a lot of answer for!! When I've discussed this in the past with colleagues and friends I've had the usual cultural relativist response: you have no right to suggest that popular culture isn't just as valuable as the music you like. WHAT CAN ONE DO?

Yes I'm afraid the dumb-downers are winning - they'd probably not have it that 5th century Athens was a cultural highpoint or the Florentine Renaissance - all is of equal merit to these people (the majority now) and therefore Beethoven no more significant than Madonna!

[Chris]

In a way I can understand the recording companies' dilemma - so many people download stuff from the internet nowadays for free and this is one of the consequences: lack of investment in works being recorded. All businesses want a return on their investments, just as Beethoven's publishers once did.

Yes, and I am thankful that men like Gardiner and Koopman found a way to complete their projects despite support being dropped out from under them part-way through.

Hey, Happy St. Patrick's Day, everyone! We should all celebrate by listening to some of Beethoven's arrangements of Irish folksongs. I will have to take a break from the Bach cantatas and do this tonight!

[Roehre]

Today:

Dvorak:
Celloconcerto[no.1]in A B.10 (1865)(Burghauser-version)
Celloconcerto[no.2]in b opus 104

Stravinsky:
The Rake's Progress: 1st Act

[Sorrano]

Last night:

Piano concertos Nos. 1 and 2 by Beethoven.

[Michael]

Beethoven A minor quartet, played by the Guarneri.

[Roehre]

Today listened "only" the 2nd and 3rd acts of Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress

[Roehre]

At the moment I am listening to Mozart's piano sonata, K 547a. This sonata seems to be rarely recorded or performed, skipped on most complete recordings of his piano sonatas, since it is an arrangement of other music.

As far as I am aware this Sonata movement in F KV547a (Also known as App.135) is a spurious work (allegedly composed around 1788), of which Mozart's authorship is highly uncertain (See a.o. the Vorwort (by Plath & Rehm) to the Neue Mozart Ausgabe IX:25-1 [although KV547a is published in volume NMA IX:26]).

Or has new material/article escaped my attention?

Nevertheless I like the piece, whoever may be its composer.

[Roehre]

Today:

Busoni:
Lustspielouvertüre opus 38

Badings:
3 Chansons bretonnes

Alban Berg:
Piano music:
III.Sonate in E-flat major (Fragment, 1907)
IV. Sonate in d minor (Fragment, 1908)
V. Sonate in g minor (Fragment, 1908)
Sonata opus 1 (1908)
12 Variations on an original theme in C major(1907)
14 variations on an original theme in f minor (1908)
4 Klavierstücke (1907/'09)

Scelsi:
Uaxactun - la légende de la Cité Maya

[Chris]

As far as I am aware this Sonata movement in F KV547a (Also known as App.135) is a spurious work (allegedly composed around 1788), of which Mozart's authorship is highly uncertain (See a.o. the Vorwort (by Plath & Rehm) to the Neue Mozart Ausgabe IX:25-1 [although KV547a is published in volume NMA IX:26]).

Or has new material/article escaped my attention?

Nevertheless I like the piece, whoever may be its composer.

There was a suggestion that they were authentic drafts by Mozart that he changed/reused later. I don't know if that is a more or less recent thought than someone else arranging them, though.

[Peter]

Bruckner 7th symphony and some of Poulenc's sacred music which is very fine.

[Sorrano]

Currently, I am listening to Wagner's Die Feen. It's too bad that some of these rarer works tend to slip through the cracks.

Roehre, you must have one fantastic music library. I am envious!

[Roehre]

Today:

Britten:
4 Sea Interludes and Passacaglia from Peter Grimes opus 33

Sibelius:
En Saga opus 9

Berlioz:
Te Deum opus 22
Symphonie ... opus 15

Rihm:
String quartet no.5