Classical Corner Classical Music Corner (thread #58)

Listening to Knappertsbusch conducting the VPO in Bruckner's 4th via Spotify.

 

Indeed, I have a 6-CD EMI set featuring all the major recordings by Du Pre ...

 

Parsifal, from the 1962 Bayreuth Festival should be at the top of the list. It's on Philips (or maybe it's on Decca by now, but do not confuse with the 1951 version which has always been on Decca and is of course in mono). As far as I know all CD issues of the '62 are the same mastering; as with the Solti Ring the analog masters are judged to be no longer in usable condition. Still, perfectly listenable, I find, and a classic recording.

 

I can't claim that every RVW score has won me over, but he has a pretty fair batting average with me, including a few real favorites (in particular, the Tallis Fantasia), and what's more in the world of frequently neurotic, cantankerous, "difficult" men who wrote classical music, he seems to have been a genuinely decent human being with a wry sense of humor.

If you enjoy fantasy literature--I did more before it more or less swallowed the entire "science fiction" genre whole--you might want to chase down Barry Malzberg's short story "Concerto Accademico." It concerns a local orchestra rehearsing one of the Vaughan Williams syms. under the yoke of a pompous wannabe conductor; during the proceedings, a dragon comes to call. It's really quite a lovely little age-rediscovering-youth story, and it's even dedicated to Sir Adrian Boult. The collection in which I read it was called Dragon Fantastic; whether it's been anthologized elsewhere I don't know.

 

Delius is like a very diffuse Debussy. His music requires a very committed conductor to put over. Beecham was the best by far for that. To me it is pleasant background music. His operas are conceptually interesting but are very inconsistent section to section and completely nondramatic.

As for English composers, I have a few LPs of Purcell, Dowland, V Williams and Elgar. V Williams is the best of them IMO but I listen less and less to him. The only symphony I now have is the 9th mainly because Stokowski conducted it. The Tallis is a major masterpiece. Flos Campi, some of the choral works and Lark Ascending are pleasantly interesting. John Dunstable (1385-1453 ) might have been the greatest English composer but much of his music is presumably lost and it is in a style not likely to regain wide popularity.


Edit: How could I forget Holst? I have 4 different Planets LPs.

 

I have the Holst and RVW EMI boxes and enjoy a lot of the music in both. I'll probably never listen to the RVW operas again.

 

I have this 6-CD box which is still in its shrinkwrap ...

 

I think you'll like Delius fine. He's got an impressionist quality, sort of a blend of Vaughan Williams and Debussy, if that's not a sacrilege to say. Curiously, the first time I heard his music is in a 1940s film: Alfred Hitchcock's The Saboteur . There's a fragment of Delius's tone poem, Night on the River played by the genial blind man who shelters Barry Kane in his woodland cabin. He even refers to Delius and his single similarity to him as they are both blind.

 

That's the one I have.

 

This box should confirm for me if Holst was a one-trick pony of a composer ...

 

I have heard it but I need to have another listen, which will be quite soon.

Also have Sol Gabetta performance of it.

 

I think the version by Jacqueline Du Pre may be the definitive version ...

 

Speaking of Delius, his works for violin are quite interesting.

 

NP:

 

I assume you mean the version with Sir John Barbirolli and the London Symphony Orchestra - she recorded it more than once.

 

(LP EMI Germany 1C 065 92 064) beneath the heralded (and rightly so) offering by Du Pre+Barbirolli+LSO just mentioned by Hans, subject recording features another worthwhile perspective.....

 

He had at least three other good tricks: the two suites for wind band and the St. Paul's Suite for string orchestra are enjoyable lighter fare. Beyond that I'm not familiar with much that he wrote.

 

You are right!

 

This reminds me of Mussorgsky! LOL

 

Du Pre studied with Rostropovich one summer during the cold war and the master cellist later commented that she would be the only cellist of her generation who could possibly surpass him in terms of virtuosity.

 

Is she an important artist on Hanssler? Most of my Hanssler recordings are the Bach Cantatas by Helmut Rilling ...

 

Now listening to: Bartók: Music for strings, Percussion and Celesta - Pierre Boulez/BBC Symphony Orchestra; Concerto for Orchestra - Pierre Boulez/New York Philharmonic Orchestra - Pierre Boulez Conducts Bartók - 4 CDs, Sony; dics 1



[edited to correct a spelling error]

 

I have the Concerto for Orchestra and Miraculous Mandarin on SACD. At some point I need to try playing it in surround, as the jacket photo suggests that Boulez had the orchestra on all 4 sides.

 

Knappertsbusch's Wagner Parsifal from Bayreuth in 1962 on Philips - long, a benchmark performance - is , in genuine stereo.