07-07-2013, 08:57 AM (Edited 07-07-2013, 09:50 AM by LONDONER.)
Wade Wrote:I do disagree a bit about the inclusion of The Rite of Spring. I think it's somewhat intimidating. But at the end of the day, this is our opinion of what what would strike a beginner best, no?
The Carnival of Animals is a great inclusion. I've never listened to that version. I have the 1990 recording of the Czechoslovak Radio Symphony Orchestra with Marian Lapsansky and Peter Topoczer on piano, and it is played very straight. I now feel compelled to check out the Capucon version.
I hesitated about "The Rite of Spring" but it is such a radical piece even today, that it would be a pity to miss out what is undoubtedly one of the great pieces of music of the 20th century. I am a great enthusiast of the version by Valery Gergiev with the Kirov Orchestra. That dramatic pause before the final chord is way OTT!
About the "Carnival of the Animals, actually I've just found this (maddenly incomplete) version and it is pretty good and funny. Ignore the pointless introduction by Roger Moor. Skip forward to 34 seconds.:
If you don't pay the very moderate fee for a subscription then you will have to put up with the adverts but you can find almost anything on Spotify. It's a good place to try out new music before you commit to buying a CD.
About the "Carnival of the Animals, ctually I've just found this (maddenly incomplete) version and it is pretty good and funny. Ignore the pointless introduction by Roger Moor. Skip forward to 34 seconds.:
That's fantastic. Much more interesting and entertaining than the clean version I'm used to. Reminds of the scene in The Music Man where Marian and her mother are arguing while the little girl is practicing her song terribly and Marian keeps having to walk over to the piano and play the last note.
Wade Wrote:That's fantastic. Much more interesting and entertaining than the clean version I'm used to. Reminds of the scene in The Music Man where Marian and her mother are arguing while the little girl is practicing her song terribly and Marian keeps having to walk over to the piano and play the last note.
This is now it should not be played. Completely humourless:
07-07-2013, 10:21 AM (Edited 07-07-2013, 01:00 PM by LONDONER.)
SolemnBoy Wrote:As someone who recently has become a huge fan of music and who wants to have basic experience from all genres, could someone help me out on where to even start with Classical music? I have no idea where to "jump in" so to speak. Help? :c
Like I said I've got Beethoven and Chopin reasonably covered, other than that I'm a complete noob.
I am on fire today! How could any of us have forgotten "Carmen" (full of memorable and ultra humable tunes) and if SB you don't want the whole opera you can get the orchestral suite:
To this I will add: Debussy "La Mer". The illustration for this is horrific, the orchestral playing is magnificent:
Ravel: "Daphnis & Chloe"(One of the most gorgeous ballet scores of the 20th century)
Holst: "The Planets"
Rachmaninov: Piano concert number 2:
Rachmaninov: Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini: (How could anyone not like this ultra melodic concerto?)
Mendesshon: Symphony no. 4 (Italian) Full of brilliant, sunny, youthfulness.
Mendelsshon: Octet (A work of genius written when he was just the tender age of seventeen!)
Manuel de Falla: "Nights in the Gardens of Spain" Deep and sensual
François Poulenc: Piano concertos 1 and 2 (Another gay composers whose music is full of wit and is very easy to listen to)
Haydn: Almost any of his 101 symphonies. My particular favourite: (Just listen to the elegance of the first movement and the sheer wit and joie de vivre of the last)
The Proms start in London this Friday the 12th. For those who don't know what the Proms are, they comprise the biggest musical festival in the world lasting from the 12th July rigjht through to the 7th September. It was originally initiated by Sir Henry Wood and promoted classical music. This year they have no less that two "Dr Who" concerts and on the 29th July they have a black group called "Naturally 7" singing among other things, George Harrison's "While My Guitar Gently Weeps"and Phil Collins' "In The Air Tonight". The on the 10th August there is what is described as an "Urban Classic Prom" in which the BBC Symphony Orchestra rubs shoulders with rap, R&B, and soul.
What's your opinion about the inclusion of these more polular forms of music in what is in majority, a festival of classical music.
Incidentally, on the 19th of July there is a concert in which the young Canadian/Polish pianist who I mentioned in my first post, will be playing a Mozart concerto.
Shakespeare wrote, "The man that hath no music in himself, nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils. The motions of his spirit are dull as night, and his affections dark as Erebus. Let no such man be trusted." and Vaughn Williams used it in his serenade to music
Elgar is also a good introduction, any of the short pieces are good. The Enigma Variations is a good introductory piece, long enough to get into but, being a set of variations, you never lose track of where you are (cf the symphonies, which in my view are in need of a good editor).
Debussy has been mentioned, try the string quartet and the one by Ravel; hard to believe they were written completely independently in an age where there wasn't a media that made ideas so pervasive as today.
And just for fun try this (or bits of it),
It's massive, virtually incomprehensible, modern and almost erotic in it's sheer sensuality. Messiaen pretty much ploughed his own furrow in 20th century music but to my ear produced stuff that for all it's modernity is much more musical and accessible than the formalism of the serialists who are difficult indeed (if it needs 'splainin' it ain't music!).
At the end- 5:02 - 32' Bombarde =
[SIZE="2"]Carillon de Westminster - á mon ami Henry Willis, Facteur d'orgues á Londres
"Andante con moto in D major and 9/8 time. The best-known piece of this collection is based on the -Big Ben- theme of the chimes of Westminster in London. The music begins pianissimo and the theme is presented on a continuous and almost imperceptible crescendo in one voice after another. This produces a subdivision into four parts: first the theme is heard in the middle voice, then in the top voice, the third time in B flat major in the pedal, and finally back in the home key in the upper voice. The accompaniment is built on motives that underline the carillon idea. With the last entry of the theme the full organ is brought into play, whereupon the piece is brought to a close as a grandiose carillon-toccata." (Ben van Oosten)[/SIZE]
Sagittarius
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