As a Schoenberg fan, have you heard her version of his VC? Thoughts?
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Eva_Yojimbo — 9 years ago(August 09, 2016 09:38 AM)
perhaps their stated dislike of Wagner was an artist's typical way of distancing themselves from their influences in order to make their work seem completely sui generis.
Most likely yes; though it makes you wonder why you rarely had this with other composers like Beethoven, who was openly idolized by those influenced by him. I think with Wagner perhaps many composers saw certain value in parts of his worklike the ambiguous motivic fragments, evolving tonality, etc.but didn't particularly like Wagner's particular usage of them. Neither Sibelius or Debussy, of course, focused on opera, and even Debussy's masterpiece in the form, Pelleas et Melisande, is so different than Wagner's works that one can perhaps see quite clearly what Debussy thought was worthwhile AND worthless in Wagner.
warriorspirit
: if the penis is used as a pencil holder we'll incur a cost. -
Edward_de_Vere — 9 years ago(August 09, 2016 11:43 AM)
Most likely yes; though it makes you wonder why you rarely had this with other composers like Beethoven, who was openly idolized by those influenced by him. I think with Wagner perhaps many composers saw certain value in parts of his worklike the ambiguous motivic fragments, evolving tonality, etc.but didn't particularly like Wagner's particular usage of them. Neither Sibelius or Debussy, of course, focused on opera, and even Debussy's masterpiece in the form, Pelleas et Melisande, is so different than Wagner's works that one can perhaps see quite clearly what Debussy thought was worthwhile AND worthless in Wagner.
Perhaps they were turned off by the pretentious concept of
Gesamtkunstwerk
, i.e. Wagner's claim that music, drama, and the visual arts were of equal importance in his operas. This claim is easily refuted: people listen to musical excerpts and orchestral arrangements of the works, while nobody in his right mind would bother with non-musical, spoken word stage plays of the libretti. -
Eva_Yojimbo — 9 years ago(August 09, 2016 12:41 PM)
Very possibly, though it wasn't unusual for composers (or other artists) for their theories to support whatever it was they did well to begin with. Wagner's imagination seemed uniquely tuned towards the combination of drama, imagery, and music, so he wrote about that the be the ideal (rather than just HIS ideal), and I can understand many objecting to that.
warriorspirit
: if the penis is used as a pencil holder we'll incur a cost. -
Edward_de_Vere — 9 years ago(August 05, 2016 09:33 AM)
I love the [Beethoven] 5th, but least of all for the first movement. I think the transition between 3rd & 4th movements is one of the greatest things he ever wrote, or that anyone ever wrote.
Certainly one of the best moments in music. However, taken as a whole I don't think the 5th measures up to the 3d or 7th.
Sibelius? Hmm, a mystery to me. I like the 2nd, but it's one of the view Sibelius pieces I know (nothing beats his violin concerto imo) that have definite themes to latch on to. I keep trying others, but if the music were a painting, it would be a wonderful landscape with nothing in the foreground. Lots of ice, mist & harsh beauty, but nothing to focus on
Although he's stylistically completely different and inhabits a very different sound world, what you say about Sibelius applies almost equally well, or rather even more so Debussy's compositions: fragmentary motifs and dense harmonies with few themes to focus on and very little sense of direction.
However, I like the nebulous quality of Debussy's harmonies just as I like the harsh, stark cross-rhythms, block chords, and syncopation in Sibelius' symphonies.
Ah, women are much the better species in all regardsexcept composing, painting, conducting, playing the piano, playing the violin, jazz piano
Not to mention mathematics, the physical sciences, and engineering. -
fud-slush — 9 years ago(August 09, 2016 07:04 AM)
Ooh yes, the 7th for me. Usually I think Beethoven's at his best when in minor mode, but it's impossible to dilute the joy of the 7th. I'm surprised however by the number of recordings with too-slow a last movement. The classic Kleiber recording suffers from it & I just can't get into it unless it sizzles along speedilysurprisingly, Karajan's 63 recording does this very well, as does Harnoncourt's.
Is there not a sense of direction & harmonic progression in La Mer or Prelude L'Apres? I'd say Jeux was pretty aimless & maybe a couple of piano pieces, though obviously his exploration of the whole-tone scale suggests he was intent on creating an unfocused harmonic language in some works, whereas Sibelius' lack of focus occurs within a more regular language.
Ha, yes, but maybe not world leadersthe triumvirate of Clinton, May & Merkel could be a force for good in the worldhope so. -
fontinau — 9 years ago(August 09, 2016 08:15 AM)
Ha, yes, but maybe not world leadersthe triumvirate of Clinton, May & Merkel could be a force for good in the world
Triple vomit. But there have been a considerable number of great female world leaders - your own Bess 1.0, Cate the Great, Maria Theresa (best Habsburg ever) & of course Elizabeth Warren would be the best president since FDR if only she could be bothered to try for the job. -
fontinau — 9 years ago(August 11, 2016 12:34 PM)
Clinton, and May insofar as the UK matters, both mean a continuation of the dysfunctional neoliberal status quo where the rich have all the money and therefore the world's producers can't sell their products because the consumers are too poor (as you can perhaps guess, if I were British, I'd be a Corbyn supporter); Clinton also wants to escalate America's existing wars, and proxy wars with Russia, and start some new ones if possible; and she'll almost certainly pass the TPP, assuming Obama doesn't manage to pass it while he's still in office; Merkel makes Clinton and May look sane in economic terms as she continues to drain the Eurozone's blood to feed Germany, plus the brilliant idea of importing almost a million young men from some of the most strongly patriarchal societies in the world into a sexually liberal, moderately feminist democracy.
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fud-slush — 9 years ago(August 17, 2016 08:12 AM)
Thanks for that.
Really, you'd be a Corbyn supporter? What's to support!? He seems like nothing more than an aged lefty student union rep to me. He's a useless 'leader' too, with as much chance of winning a General Election as Clinton, Merkel & May have of going transgender -
fontinau — 9 years ago(August 17, 2016 06:09 PM)
He seems like nothing more than an aged lefty student union rep to me.
I agree, and almost as bad, his favorite poet is Ben Okri. It's just that all the other available options are so much worse.
He's a useless 'leader' too, with as much chance of winning a General Election as Clinton, Merkel & May have of going transgender
Maybe, but on the other hand, he IS the leader of mainstream party, which is better than the left has managed recently in any other major country outside of Latin America (unless I'm forgetting somebody). After the Tories have had some time to prove they still don't know how to fix the economy and maybe also mismanage Brexit, who knows what might be possible? -
Eva_Yojimbo — 9 years ago(August 09, 2016 09:42 AM)
I'm surprised however by the number of recordings with too-slow a last movement. The classic Kleiber recording suffers from it & I just can't get into it unless it sizzles along speedilysurprisingly, Karajan's 63 recording does this very well, as does Harnoncourt's.
Kleiber has an even better recording than the famous one: a live one from Bayreuth from 1982:
https://www.amazon.com/Beethoven-Symphonie-No-Ludwig-Van/dp/B000E9X6JE/
It is, by a good distance, the most fiery, passionate, rhythmically precise reading of that work I've heard of. Not as refined as his famous one, probably because of the orchestras, but it's the recording that finally made me love (rather than just appreciate) that symphony. I don't recall the tempo of the last movement, but I don't recall that performance being too slow anywhere.
warriorspirit
: if the penis is used as a pencil holder we'll incur a cost. -
SapphEyeR — 9 years ago(August 28, 2016 06:50 PM)
Ah, women are much the better species in all regardsexcept composing, painting, conducting, playing the piano, playing the violin, jazz piano
Not to mention mathematics, the physical sciences, and engineering.
Hey, how about that! So it's OK to say things like this on the Classical Music board now and not be called a sexist piece of beep by the P. C. Police? Times have changed.
All I ever spoke of was composing, not playing an instrument, engineering, and the rest, for which I got eviscerated. I guess I didn't say it charmingly enough. -
Eva_Yojimbo — 9 years ago(August 05, 2016 09:05 AM)
I think I'd like Mahler 2 more than I do (which is a lot) if there wasn't so much effing 'joining god in the heavens' to it.
There's very little mention of God in the lyrics, surprisingly given the subject matter. I think there's only one explicit mention in the entirety of the last movement; a few more in the one preceding it.
warriorspirit
: if the penis is used as a pencil holder we'll incur a cost. -
Jill-McBain — 9 years ago(August 05, 2016 01:09 PM)
It is the very piece that made symphony what it is and also put it on the same level of sublimity and sophisticatedness as opera. I am not surprised.
'Ne cherchez plus mon coeur, les bêtes l'ont mangé.'
Baudelaire -
fontinau — 9 years ago(August 05, 2016 11:17 PM)
At the risk of sounding like a philistine, where's Dvorak's 9th?!
Good point. Fairly recently, somebody asked me to guess the most played works by American orchestras today. I guessed either Beethoven 5 or 7 (don't remember which) and the New World Symphony. I was wright about the Beethoven - 7 was right on top, followed by 5 - but not even close on Dvorak. Maybe people are burning out on him? -
Edward_de_Vere — 9 years ago(August 09, 2016 07:05 AM)
Mahler's 3rd? Nice music movement by movement, but I feel not as convincing as a collective whole. Mahler's Symphonies 4-6 are the zenith of his symphonic output, in my opinion.
Having three Mahler symphonies out of ten on the list is a little excessive to begin with. One of his works (in my opinion the 5th or 6th) should be in the top 10, but you aren't going to convince me that three of the ten greatest symphonies ever written were Mahler's, particularly not the 3d.