Brahms and Liszt

Mr. K wrote:On today's BBC Radio 3's "Sounds of the Earth" feature, they played this brief work by Anatoly Lyadov. Of The Enchanted Lake (Volshebnoye ozero, 1909), which he based on Lake Ilmen in the Novgorod region, Lyadov wrote that it is “purely picturesque, with bountiful stars over the mysteries in the depths! But most importantly it is uninhabited, without entreaties and complaints; only nature—cold, malevolent, but fantastic as a fairy tale.” [Source]



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoly_Lyadov

Mr. K wrote:I used to have this Australian colleague who left NL for that country when her husband died. She took all their CDs but gave us this vast collection of LPs, including a mass of stuff by Aussie composers I'd never heard of. (I still have to get round to giving everything a listen.)

I don't know off-hand whether Peter Sculthorpe is among them. During last Sunday's "Sounds of the Earth" feature on BBC Radio 3 they played "Dune Dreaming", the fifth movement of his orchestral work Great Sandy Island. Curiously it doesn't feature in the list of works on his wiki page.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Sculthorpe

Mr. K wrote:I know very little of Samuel Barber besides his celebrated Adagio for Strings, so I was delighted to learn that the work for violin and orchestra I heard this morning was by him. They only played the first movement of his Concerto for Violin and Orchestra (in this version) but I'll treat you to the whole thing.  



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violin_Concerto_(Barber)

Enjoyed that. Very sweet and calm.

Mr. K wrote:"Stunning, stunning, stunning. Have just heard the BBC proms concert and want to hear it again and again. The dissonances are uplifting. I find the whole thing inspiring. (I am a writer.) Thanks for uploading it."
 
Thus YT commenter Nick Ashton-Jones earlier this morning. He was describing the early (1915) version of Sibelius's Symphony No. 5 as performed at last night's Proms. I heard it too. I've never warmed to this work in its final (1919) version and now I know why. It had been sanitized, admittedly by its composer, but such operations are not always for the good. (Think of Zappa's later meddlings with albums that were fine as they were.) This is indeed stunning. Long may it be performed!
 

 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._5_(Sibelius)

Cool Cool Water wrote:

Splendid stuff. I also love the watercolour painting!

Mr. K wrote:Here you go: 

Mr. K wrote:Heard this great symphony by Anton Bruckner on the car radio the other day. Oddly, I had trouble identifying its composer, maybe because Herr B departs somewhat from his standard matrix and fingerprints in the Sixth. This belies the rather cruel notion harboured by some that Bruckner didn't write nine symphonies but wrote one symphony nine times!         
 

 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._6_(Bruckner)

Cool Cool Water wrote:

Mr. K wrote:I really like the use of original manuscripts in these videos. 

Mr. K wrote:I heard this same version on Dutch radio this morning and loved the repetition and open-endedness of it. Also, that solo--it's hard to make out what's playing it! Most curious--I'll have to think about it some more. (I'd never heard of the composer before.)



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osvaldo_Golijov

Splendid stuff. The video was interesting as well.

Mr. K wrote:I've always loved Holst's big choral work The Hymn of Jesus. (For some reason it reminds me of illustrations by William Blake.) It's one of many reasons why Gustav H was much more than The Planets. Sorry about the four-page description!  



http://www.gustavholst.info/journal/article-001.php?chapter=1

Mr. K wrote:The French composer Albéric Magnard has left us little in the way of music. One big reason for this is that invading German soldiers torched his house in September 1914 after Magnard shot and killed one of their number. He himself probably died in the conflagration. He had published little in his lifetime and all his unpublished manuscripts were consumed by the flames. (But see the wiki.) 

One day I shall investigate all four of his symphonies--I remember being impressed on hearing #1 in 1972. In fact the brooding introduction to #3 struck a chord (no pun intended) and brought #1 to mind again. Highly original music from a potentially great composer whose life was cruelly cut short.      



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albéric_Magnard