(November 26, 2016 at 6:52 pm)bennyboy Wrote:

(July 26, 2016 at 8:31 am)Alex K Wrote: The classical element mainly seems to be the repeating violin notes. I wouldn't call it classical music because I miss the structure, presentation of themes and their variation or something similar. The string part would probably fall in line with what is sometimes called minimalist music. Not to be confused with our Minimalist, who I strongly suspect hates minimalist music

This is semantics to a degree.  Many people think of any orchestral western art music as "classical," as in: "Oh, I like Mozart well enough, but this NEW classical music is quite boring."  Certainly, most of Bach cannot be considered classical: it is far too ornamented and showy: virtuosic harpsichord solos and the like (gasp!), and with a much more fluid tonality than Mozart.

And in particular, loads of counterpoint and/or basso continuo would place him clearly outside the viennese classical school.

But would you call the harpsichord solo in Brandenburg 5 (to name the prototypical example) more showy than a Mozart piano concerto? For the time, it was revolutionary, but once the concerto genre was established, was anything by Bach really showy by classical period standards?

Happy New Year, fellow music lovers!

For German classical music fans, this is the last year we have Sir Simon Rattle as the leader of the Berliner. While I think Petrenko is great, I'll sorely miss Rattle and his English style as well as selection of repertoire.
On that occasion, here's some nice singing by his wife





And his New Years Eve concert last year

Christian Thielemann was a hot contender for the position at the Berliner Phil, but probably was deemed too conservative and limited in his repertoire choices (though not abilities, I think he is considered one of if not the top German conductor right now). For the stuff he loves, Bruckner, Wagner, R. Strauss..., he's great, and his current orchestra has a great sound as well.

The local opera company announced their 2017-18 schedule.  Generally  blah but they are doing the Barber of Seville which I haven't seen in quite a few years.  We'll go to that.

OK well I've got into Bartok in a serious way now. Running out of music of his that I haven't heard yet. His string quartets sat in my collection for about a couple of years before I gave them a second listen after needing something else to listen to. It started to grow on me so I bought some of his orchestral pieces and now I'm hooked. It makes a change from Prokofiev and Rachmaninov.

I particularly love the second movement of his second Rhapsody






So I've started scouring my collection for other composers that I should probably try listening to again. I've actually gained a new appreciation for Berg but I only have his Violin concerto and find it a bit depressing. I'm considering buying all his works on 8 CDs.

Scouting around the web I came across Schnittke, whose influence was Shostakovich. I used to be a big fan of Shostakovich's music but eventually yearned for more tonally complex music. But I absolutely love this piece from Schnittke.





I've just bought his film music and downloading it now. If I like it he's done ten symphonies that I can buy. I've started listening to Khachaturian again but most of the stuff being sold on amazon is by the Naxos label and I don't like how they mix their recordings. It's always a bit muddy for me.

I'm listening to music throughout the working day so I'm going through it all rather quickly.

Need. Moar. Moosick!

(January 18, 2017 at 11:56 am)Minimalist Wrote: The local opera company announced their 2017-18 schedule.  Generally  blah but they are doing the Barber of Seville which I haven't seen in quite a few years.  We'll go to that.

figarofigarofigarofigaro

@Mathilda

Yeah the Violin concerto is not exactly upbeat, no surprise considering the story it tells. But I don't find it too depressing.

I'm still binge-watching/listening HIP Bach performances on youtube.

I think I'm on a quest to find really interesting and novel music because my new job is so boring. It helps alleviate the incessant monotony.

I find this quite inspiring





With Emanuelle Haim's musicians, you always get the impression that they really have a lively relationship to the music, they get the rock music spirit of those baroque works, and make you forget that the material is 300 years old. Especially when they mosh to it behind the stage

At 30:00 - 33:30 is something really special. It's sooo nice to see wit and humor in performance. Thanks for the nive link!

PS What ARE those lyrics!?