What Classical Music Are You listening to Now? IV

[oliver sudden]

I was at a string quartet concert in London once upon a time when during what struck me as a relatively uninspiring piece, which sounded like it was looking for a silent movie chase scene to accompany, someone a few rows in front of me got up and shuffled silently out. Can’t blame them, I thought. Then they shuffled silently back again, soon to be joined by a couple of others. A bit more silent to-ing and fro-ing ensued, during which the seat neighbour of the first person was silently extricated from their seat, presumably to be given medical attention of some sort.

The music continued throughout and was a grimly perfect accompaniment.

[Roger Webb]

Perhaps the weirdest thing that happened during a performance was at a Welsh National Opera Götterdämmerung (I'm sure it was, but I hear in my mind the prelude to Tristan as I write this - someone'll put me right).

There had been protests outside the Hippodrome in Bristol throughout the Ring - it was sponsored by John Player (cigarette company!) - culminating on the 'Twilight' night with a group unfurling a banner with 'Götterdamagedlung' emblazoned on it, they chanted 'ruin your lungs with WNO'. A friend of mine who always distributed leaflets for the Bournemouth Symphony concerts countered by chanting 'ruin your liver with BSO' (local firm Harveys, a notable sherry importer sponsored that one!).

But nothing prepared us for what happened when we got in side the theatre - the lights dimmed, the expectant hum abated and the prelude started (to the Norn scene....but still I hear Tristan prelude!?). As the music played a figure on hands and knees crawled down the central isle of the stalls, followed by another, and another....it was difficult to see what was going on, but they were Hell's Angels, they crawled right to the low wall of the pit, and then over it between the leader and an absolutely transfixed Richard Armstrong, who stared in disbelief....but kept conducting, and the orchestra kept playing! The chain of leather Jacketted 'Angels' (I couldn't see which 'chapter'!) - looking more like a train of snails climbed on through the orchestra and left to the door where the musicians normally enter the pit.

The rest of the performance went off without a hitch!

[Stanfordian]

Béla Bartók
Violin Concerto No. 1
Violin Concerto No. 2
Renaud Capuçon (violin)
London Symphony Orchestra / François-Xavier Roth
Recorded 2017 Jerwood Hall, LSO St. Lukes, London & 2027 LSO Music Education Centre, London
Erato, CD

Mieczysław Karłowicz
Violin Concerto in A major, Op. 8
A Sorrowful Tale 'Preludes to Eternity', Op. 13
Lithuanian Rhapsody, Op. 11
Bartłomiej Nizioł (violin)
Szczecin Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra / Łukasz Borowicz
Recorded 2016, Szczecin Philharmonic Hall, Poland
Dux, CD

[smittims]

Ernst Krenek: Symphonic Elegy (on the death of Anton Webern). The strings of the New York Philharmonic, Dimitri Mitropoulos.

I think this is one of the finest works for string orchestra since 1945 (not that there are many of the first rank). At any rate it is a profound and moving piece of about 15 minutes. It's on YouTube.

[Stanfordian]

Umberto Giordano
'Siberia' three act opera (1903, rev. 1927)
Stephana – Sonya Yoncheva (soprano)
Vassili – Giorgi Sturua (tenor)
Gléby – George Petean (baritone)
Nikona – Caterina Piva (mezzo-soprano)
Prince Alexis – Giorgio Misseri (tenor)
Orchestra e Coro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino / Gianandrea Noseda
Recorded Live 2021, Teatro del Maggio, Florence
Dynamic, CD

[smittims]

Beethoven : Symphony no.9. The Vienna Philharmonic orchestra, Karl Bohm.

This is not the famous 1971 recording which appeared in a complete set, but a 1981 digital recording billed as Bohm's last. Not surprisingly, it's on the slow side, but I found it very profound and satisfying. The soloists are Jessye Norman, Brigitte Fassbaender, Placido Domingo and Walter Berry.

[HighlandDougie]

Haydn: Symphonies No 88 in G Major/Symphony No 100 in G Major "Military"

Columbia Symphony Orchestra/Bruno Walter (from Bruno Walter conducts Mozart& Haydn - the Remastered Stereo Recordings)

A small box set currently on offer in France. Walter clearly loves the music but Haydn interpretation of a very different era to which I cannot see myself ever wishing to return. The largo of No 88 is quite a bit slower than Furtwängler - the nearest comparison I have to hand of 'big-band' Haydn - and is, to ears used to Sigiswald Kuijken et al, grotesquely ponderous. But the remastered recordings sound great and the orchestra (LA-based) plays stylishly. And it was very cheap.

[Pulcinella]

Haydn
Symphony 31 (Hornsignal)

Vienna Chamber Orchestra
Ernst Märtzendorfer

Streamed from the complete symphony set mentioned on the Haydn thread.

[oliver sudden]

Haydn: Symphonies No 88 in G Major/Symphony No 100 in G Major "Military"

Columbia Symphony Orchestra/Bruno Walter (from Bruno Walter conducts Mozart& Haydn - the Remastered Stereo Recordings)

A small box set currently on offer in France. Walter clearly loves the music but Haydn interpretation of a very different era to which I cannot see myself ever wishing to return. The largo of No 88 is quite a bit slower than Furtwängler - the nearest comparison I have to hand of 'big-band' Haydn - and is, to ears used to Sigiswald Kuijken et al, grotesquely ponderous. But the remastered recordings sound great and the orchestra (LA-based) plays stylishly. And it was very cheap.

Amusingly enough (for me anyway), Kuijken’s Largo in 88 is also slower than Furtwängler! But Walter is indeed slower again. Kuijken keeps it beautifully poised I think, right on the edge of falling into ‘in 6’. (Bruggen, for example, I find too flowing for a Largo.)

[Petrushka]

Shostakovich: Symphony No 15
Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks
Bernard Haitink

Recorded live on February 5 & 6 2015 BR Klassik

This is Haitink's third recording of this Symphony and, like the other two, is very impressive indeed in both performance and sound.

In my view, this is the finest symphony composed during my lifetime (71 years) and I have more versions of it than any other work written in the same period, 16 at present.

[smittims]

That could be new thread: I like Shost 15 very much and I well recall being pleased when it appeared, that he had written an orchestra-only symphony for a change. I had difficulty at first with his vocal ones. I expect you have a copy of the first performance conducted by Maxim Dmitrievitch. Isak Glikman said that at one point between the movements Shostakovitch turned to him and said 'the boy is doing well', and indeed, it was, I think, one of the best 'first performances' I've heard. Another very fine early peformance was at the Proms by our own Natoinal Youth Orchestra, which may even have been the British premiere. It was televised.

If Ihad to name the finest symphony composed in my lifetime a short list would include Shost 15 but also Shost 10, VW9, Tippett 2 and possibly Brian 10 or 16. Lutuslawski's second and Penderecki's first are also candidates but the list is no longer short!

I've just been listening to Simpson's fourth ; I don't think quite so highly of it as I did fifty years ago but the finale is I think one of the very best finales of any symphony.

[Stanfordian]

Malcolm Arnold
Symphony No. 3, Op. 63
Symphony No. 4, Op. 71
LSO / Richard Hickox
Recorded 1993 All Saints' Church, Tooting, London
Chandos, CD

Benjamin Britten – ‘The Sacred Choral Music’
CD 1
Hymn to St Cecilia, Op. 27 (1942)
A Wedding Anthem, Op. 46 (1949)
Whoso dwelleth (1937)
Te Deum in C (1934)
Jubilate Deo in E flat (1934)
Hymn to St Peter, Op. 56a (1955)
A Ceremony of Carols, Op. 28 (1942)
CD 2
Rejoice in the Lamb, Op. 30 (1943)
Festival Te Deum, Op. 32 (1944)
Venite exult emus (1961)
Jubilate Deo in C (1961)
A Hymn to the Virgin (1930)
Missa Brevis in D, Op. 63 (1959)
Hymn of St Columba (1962)
A.M.D.G (Ad majorem Dei gloriam) (1939)
Antiphon, Op. 56b (1956)
Choir of New College Oxford / Edward Higginbottom
Recorded 2011/12 Chapel of New College, Oxford
Novum, 2 CDs

[Petrushka]

That could be new thread: I like Shost 15 very much and I well recall being pleased when it appeared, that he had written an orchestra-only symphony for a change. I had difficulty at first with his vocal ones. I expect you have a copy of the first performance conducted by Maxim Dmitrievitch. Isak Glikman said that at one point between the movements Shostakovitch turned to him and said 'the boy is doing well', and indeed, it was, I think, one of the best 'first performances' I've heard. Another very fine early peformance was at the Proms by our own Natoinal Youth Orchestra, which may even have been the British premiere. It was televised.

The UK premiere of the Shostakovich Symphony No 15 was on November 20 1972 played by the New Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Maxim Shostakovich. I vividly remember listening to the live broadcast on Radio 3. The National Youth Orchestra Prom took place on August 23 1973 conducted by Sir Charles Groves and I well remember the TV broadcast.

I don't have a recording of the first performance (January 8 1972) and didn't know it was around. Has anyone more information about this please?

A kind Forum member (I forget who, sorry) sent me a recording of the Maxim Shostakovich Melodiya LP but it got lost in a change of computer. I believe it appeared in a boxed set which was available for about 10 minutes before it disappeared and I was too slow!

[richardfinegold]

The Haitink/Concertgebou 15th was my first and it’s still the one that reach for. The next was Lopez-Corbos and Cincinnati on Telarc, paired with the First, an interesting pairing.
Other recordings obtained were integral to complete sets: Barshai, Petrenko, Kitaenko. The latter is actually quite good, in SACD with Cologne-Gurzenich, and the multichannel sound increased the oomph of the Wagner quotations. And I have streamed a few though not any that I particularly recall. And I heard a memorable CSO concert led by Solti, shortly before his death, pairing it with the Shostakovich orchestration of Mussorgsky Songs and Dances of Death. I bought the CD made from those concerts but it never had the same magic as the concert

[smittims]

I was sure I had seen the shost 15 premiere on YouTube but I cannot now find it there! Sorry to send you on a wild goose chase/ I have a very old crumbly reel-to-reel tape . I'm not sure if it will plaly any more. When the warm weather comes I will get my dad's old r-t-r tape recorder working (it won't go in the winter as it is lubricated by some sort of solidified gunk which seizes up at low temperatire) and see if I can play it.