What are you listening to now?

[Roehre]

Which orchestration do you prefer?

Both the Shostakovich and the Van Keulen orchestrations have their con and pros.

Shostakovich sounds as Shostakovich, and is set for a standard symphony orchestra with added percussion.

The Van Keulen is basically for winds, plus a cello, and IMO is nearer to the sound I personally expect to be Moussorgsky's orchestral colours. But apart from that single cello, I am missing some other (especially the lower) strings. An orchestration with violas, 'celli and 'basses ould have had more mussorgskian impact I imagine.

I love them both, and my recording with the Shostakovich version is with Vishnevskaya, the other with Holl, therefore in terms of vocal range quite literally worlds apart.

[Roehre]

Today:

Widmann:
Con Brio (2008)

Bruno Walter:
Symphony in d-minor (1906)

Klemperer:
Symphony [no.1] in two movements (1960)

Skrowacewski:
English horn concerto (1971)

[Roehre]

Today:

JSBach:
Cantate “Es ist euch gut, dass ich hingehe” BWV 108
Cantate “Wo gehest du?” BWV 166 (both meant for Cantate, the 3rd Sunday following Easter, which is today)


Klemperer:
Symphony no.2 (1968 version)
Symphony no.2 (1969 version, i.e. 1968 version with the two inner movements replaced by 2 thematically completely unrelated others)

[Roehre]

Today:

Bacewicz:
Concerto for Strings (1948)

Mozart:
Piano sonatas KV284, 311 and 576

Schnittke:
Moz-Art (2 violins, 1976)
Piano trio (1991)
Requiem of Reconciliation (1995): XII. Communio II

Kurtag:
Requiem of Reconciliation (1995): XIV. Epilog
Messages of the late Miss R.Y. Troussova opus 17 (1980)

[Peter]

Today:

JSBach:
Cantate “Es ist euch gut, dass ich hingehe” BWV 108
Cantate “Wo gehest du?” BWV 166 (both meant for Cantate, the 3rd Sunday following Easter, which is today)


Klemperer:
Symphony no.2 (1968 version)
Symphony no.2 (1969 version, i.e. 1968 version with the two inner movements replaced by 2 thematically completely unrelated others)

What do you think of the Klemperer symphonies?

Listening to Rachmaninov Vespers and Handel keyboard suites (Richter).

[Roehre]

What do you think of the Klemperer symphonies

Though definitely cerebrally composed it has got something of an own style, more Weill/Eisler than the expected Mahler or Richard Strauss.
Concise thematic blocks. In the 1st mvt of Sym 1 they seem at first hearing completely un-related, but before long the penny drops. The Finale (=2nd mvt) of Sym 1 a kind of free-tonal variations without a theme, until the Marseillaise turns up (in a poly-tonal veil, that is).

Sym 2 (both versions) opens with a broad mahlerian gesture which in the following 5 or so minutes completely falls apart, but all of it within the framework of a sonata allegro.
The middle movements in both versions are a lied-like slow movement (the 2nd version in the shape of a funeral march - bot not a mahlerian one) and a kind of scherzo.
The Finale of 2 (both versions) a kind of rondo-sonate, with some nice orchestral effects which wouldn't make Mahler being ashamed.

Not great music, but IMO very enjoyable, and far less the Kapellmeistermusik which you would expect IMO.

[Preston]

The conductor Otto Klemperer wrote symphonies?

[Preston]

Been listening to Beethoven's Piano Concerto #4, 2nd mov. I have been listening to it repeatedly because I have been trying to learn it. I am following the sheet music of a piano transcription from IMSLP. So far I have gotten almost 5 bars down. I know that is not much, though, for a person who cannot read music and cannot play piano well- I am proud.

While I was learning the first few bars I started thinking clearly that music like the 2nd mov. of the 4th piano concerto is not written any more. I think the reason why those thoughts started is because just from those few bars you can tell how genius it must be.

The reason I say that it is genius by just looking at a few bars is because, the first thing I noticed about it, was that Beethoven uses 3 E's as the opening chord and each note, excluding the lowest, an octave above the preceding note. Then he goes from the three E's to G-F#-G-E-B-quick D-C-C-C, etc. Yet, he uses the three different octaves and the same exact note and makes music, great music I imagine, until he finally ends on B and then the piano comes in. The piano sounds like it is playing off the opening stringed chords?

It just seemed to me that a lot of music is much less complex than what Beethoven wrote. Well I know that is the case, I mean he was if not the greatest musical mind to ever live, one of them.

Sorry for rambling, I am just so fascinated by the opening string section of the 2nd movement of the 4th Piano Concerto.

Is there a name for what Beethoven does with the same note of 3 different octaves? Is it some kind of form? Or is it just the feelings he wanted to express?

Any help understanding any aspect of the opening strings, which according to the score is called Tutti (what is tutti?), I would be most appreciative.

Thanks, .

[Roehre]

The conductor Otto Klemperer wrote symphonies?

Yes, as well as ballet music (of which his Merry Waltz is one movement), 2 symphonies (1960, 1968 rev '69), some eight string quartets (IIRC, I've got no.7 in my collection) .

But he was not the only one.
just to mention some (past and present): Bruno Walter, Willem Mengelberg, Furtwängler, Weingartner, Kubelik, Sallonen, Maazel.

And we shouldn't forget that Mahler in his own age was considered a brilliant conductor but a 2nd rate (if not worse) composer, and that Boulez has followed a double career as well, as e.g. have the pianists Wilhelm Kempff and Artur Schnabel, and not to forget one guy called Rachmaninov .

[Bonn1827]

Bach:
"Goldberg Variations" (Murray Perahia - his clicking fingernails are driving me mad)

[Sorrano]

Bach:
"Goldberg Variations" (Murray Perahia - his clicking fingernails are driving me mad)

Just keep him away from blackboards!

[Chris]

Any help understanding any aspect of the opening strings, which according to the score is called Tutti (what is tutti?), I would be most appreciative.

Tutti is Italian for "all" or "together." In a concerto it refers to parts for the orchestra as opposed to the soloist.

[Quijote]

Like the ice-cream "tutti frutti".

[Quijote]

LvB Piano Concerto N° 4 ("The Orpheus"*), Arthur Schoonderwoerd (on a Johann Fritz fortepiano, Vienna, 1805-1810), with the Cristofori orchestra. I think I prefer the Melvyn Tan with Norrington's London Classical Players, though the CD jacket notes on the Cristofori CD are more interesting, including Friedrich Schiller's poem Der Neue Orpheus.

[Quijote]

Ego operor ignoro super totus fructus in Terra, tamen ego puto ut Orpheus eram quasi "Cupiditas fructus", sic oro!