Classical Corner Classical Music Corner (thread #49)

I love Jacobs' Debussy. I have the Images/Estampes and also the Preludes. I don't have much to compare them to, but I was impressed with these.

 

It's strange. I had the LP (on Odyssey) back in the 70's. I had a decent system back then (Pioneer/Large Advent). I recall being shocked by how good it sounded.

And PCM meant nothing to me at the time.

I was comparing it to other Odyssey releases of Rampal, so maybe that explains it.

 

yes.i enjoy the music,but part of the appeal of collecting LPs is the pleasure I take in them as objects & artifacts.i also enjoy researching them & finding out as much as I can about their origins & their various reissues.

 

Well, I keep hearing odd little resonances, beats (when one closely related frequency interferes with another, something you learn about in piano tuning), that don't seem natural to me, so I assume they are artifacts of this primitive digital recording apparatus. This is just my intuitive interpretation of what I'm hearing.

 

Was playing:

Ludwig van Beethoven – Violin Sonatas No.8 Op.30/3, No.9 Op.47 "Kreutzer", No.10 Op.96
— Jascha Heifetz and Emmanuel Bay or Brooks Smith, piano (RCA Red Seal / Sony)

 

Frederic Chopin – Piano Sonata No.2 Op.35 "Funeral March", No.3 Op.58, Nocturne Op.9/1
Felix Mendelssohn – Songs Without Words, Op.67/5
Robert Schumann – Romance Op.28/2
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart – Piano Sonata K570 - II Adagio
— William Kapell (RCA Red Seal – Sony Classical)

 

Conductor Vasily Petrenko suggested that "a cute girl on a podium means that musicians think about other things." Marin Alsop was conducting the last concert of this year's Proms. There was almost a hate campaign against Petrenko, who accidentally is married to a (female) conductor... Also it seems that his words were taken out of the context. The Independent thinks that there's still a lot of misogyny in music world. No suprise.

I think the situation with conductors is pretty much the same as it was with soloists some forty-fifty years ago. It's only a matter of time we get first stunning - and I mean real stunning - recordings with cute girls or mature ladies on podium. Marin Alsop and few others have already made - I've been told - reliable, up-to-date records. Now it's time for a next step. And then the world will be slightly better place.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-e...-baton-on-to-our-female-maestros-8807322.html

 

As a fellow you-know-who fan, I found Sibelius and Mahler very satisfying entry points.

 

Very first digital audio recording I heard. Sounds ghastly to these ears. Not the playing or the music, mind you. But all the sparkly little shards of broken glass Rampal's blowing out of a metal tube.

 

Now playing the following CD for a second listen ...

 

Some things are their own justification. There are plenty of competent but mediocre male conductors, musicians etc and women should be able to compete on the merits without having to be the next Heifetz or Curzon etc. Actually there are an increasing number of women in the orchestra although Petrenko apparently hasn't noticed. Quite frankly I wouldn't expect any great change for the better or worse in the level of conducting or orchestral playing because of gender.

 

Now playing the following CD from my Tchaikovsky collection. The CD was probably purchased in the late 80's ...

 

Meritocracy should be the rule and not quota.

 

Marriner generally sounds worse to me on the second listen. I do enjoy his recordings up to around 1970 though. YMMV.

 

I've got this. I need to dig it out. Thanks for giving my old cortex a nudge.

 

Now playing the following CD from my piano collection ...

 

Listening to this coupling (on CD, from the RCA Living Stereo box, not the pictured SACD), and I'm really enjoying it. I don't know much about Schubert, but I'm intrigued.

 

I have listened to this SACD only once on my redbook CDP. I should play it on my universal player this weekend to hear the SACD layer for the first time.

 

Do you have a three-channel set up? I'm considering rigging up another speaker (which I have) and amp (which I don't) to my stereo set up to see what the brouhaha is about the 3-channel sound is on these SACDs.

 

Angel S-37109. recorded 9/75 at Southampton Guildhall. producer: John Willan. engineer: Stuart Eltham. these are excellent
recordings of some of my favorite Shostakovich. as a bonus Ms. Ortiz plays 'Three Fantastic Dances', written when Shostakovich was 16.

 

A great disc. Munch really surprised me with that one.

 

The Living Stereo Box (the 60 disc set) is redbook only.

 

Our local Rasputin's still has a copy of the SACD, last I looked. Add it to my six or seven other versions. The Roy Goodman/Hanover Band recording has been on my playlist for the past few months, a wonderfully colorful take on this perfect "Walking Music."

 

Now enjoying some of Richter's Debussy.

Here's a review: http://www.classicstoday.com/review/review-3096/

 

Just curious about reactions of those who are taking the Jonathan Biss Beethoven sonatas class. So far, I've been greatly enjoying it, and while I already knew some of the material, I've also been covering a lot of new ground. My only regret is that an unforeseen schedule change at my work has left me scrabbling to find time for it.