Re: Brahms and Liszt

on Sun Jun 23, 2019 9:02 pm

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

Wonderful stuff!

on Tue Jun 25, 2019 2:46 pm

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

on Tue Jun 25, 2019 7:52 pm

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

I like the movement in this piece, thanks for sharing! I see he won the Archibald Prize in 1982. An interesting life he had until is death in 2014.

on Thu Jul 04, 2019 11:09 pm

on Thu Jul 11, 2019 1:12 pm

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. Very Happy

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

on Thu Jul 11, 2019 8:18 pm

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. Smile

on Fri Aug 02, 2019 10:38 am

Christer Danielsson is a name that means nothing to me. Yet the fourth movement ("Alla Marcia") of his Concertant Suite for tuba and four horns, which I heard yesterday on Dutch radio, is so familiar. Was it a theme tune from some past radio or TV programme? All I can find out about Danielsson is that he was Swedish and lived from 1942 to 1989.

on Sun Aug 04, 2019 10:34 am

"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)

on Sun Aug 04, 2019 8:07 pm

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)

Splendid stuff. I also love the watercolour painting!

on Sun Aug 04, 2019 8:22 pm

Cool Cool Water wrote:

Splendid stuff. I also love the watercolour painting!

Here you go:

://artuk.org/discover/artworks/calais-sands-at-low-water-poissards-collecting-bait-164495

on Mon Aug 05, 2019 11:46 am

I'd read about this Toccata (subtitled "O trenzinho do caipira") by Heitor Villa-Lobos before but heard it last week for the first time. "The Little Train of the Caipira" has quite a danceable rhythm! Villa-Lobos is full of surprises, to be sure.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bachianas_Brasileiras#Bachianas_Brasileiras_No._2

on Mon Aug 05, 2019 3:40 pm

Mr. K wrote:Here you go:

Thanks!

on Wed Aug 14, 2019 2:38 pm

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)