Classical Music for Aficionados

There is no best Brandenburg as there is no best Art of the fugue...

But by far my prefered version is Hogwood ...

but beware dont judge by the first movement ...

This Ristenpart version was my best one because of the perfect tempo all along... On vinyl...

I loose it when i go digital thirty years ago...

😁

No version beat his tempi and dynamic...

My best is now Hogwood recording which instruments recording is better but dont beat Ristenpart dynamics... Ex Aequo in my mind....

Perfect description of Ristenpart for me 😊 :

The players (including Rampal, Andre, and Veyron-Lacoix) are superb and the tempos are sane. Their is energy in the music, demonstrating that one doesn’t need hyper caffeination to sound involved

Nowadays we have even more perfect audiophile recording but none i listened too had the integrated musical timing and dynamic of Hogwood and Ristenpart even if the sound could be  more beautifully recorded ... Playing together  with the same answering timings responses as in a spontaneous jazz dialogue is  a difficult art ... For me Ristenpart and Hogwood had it ...

My prefered version of Mozart Requiem is Hogwood for the same reason ...

I love the Hogwood Mozart Requiem, but it’s a curio because he refuses to use any notes that might have the taint of Sussmayr, so it sounds very truncated. I think that is being a bit extreme, since Sussmayr was an accomplished 18th century composer, had been a student of WAM, and was the choice of Frau Mozart to finish it off.

You are right about the "truncated aspect"...

Sussmeyer addition sound right ..

But to defend Hogwood choice, observe that it drive the orchestra and chorus and soloist as in an opera not as in a mass... This dramatic choice is the reason why in my mind this version is so enthralling and hypnotically efficient suggesting at the same times what lack in any other version : the childish fear of death and fear of the Grime reaper and the childish innocence and aspiration to death as a mother; the two contradictory emotions creating the drama ...

No other more liturgical interpretation touch it ...

It is like an operatic mass...Or a sacred Mysteries introduction as with "the enchanted flute "mysteries drama... Mozart was a serious freemason after all ...

Hogwood is a genius...

I’ve begun a project of listening to the Beethoven string quartets. So far I’ve listened to op. 18. Quartets. Beethoven’s genius is palpable in these works.  He devoured the classical style whole and spit out masterpieces that surpassed even Haydn and Mozart in invention. And this is to mention only one genre he worked with.

I am on the same opinion as you for sure...

Beethoven add something to the quatuor genre very few can rival if some can...

I like a lot  Robert Simpsons quatuors i begun to explore after i read his book about Bruckner...

 For Beethoven quatuor i like a lot Talich, but i must go with your advice i think :

Regarding the Op. 18 works, I prefer: 1) ensembles who play them big and bold, and not like embryonic Mozart; and 2) Vibrato, please.  I really dislike Quartets that eschew all vibrato (and coincidentally play at crazy speeds) and completely blow the expressive effects of the music.

  My longstanding favorites are the Hungarian Quartet (stereo version)) and the Cleveland Quartet.  Most of the more modern recordings I’ve heard are HIPP and therefore excluded by at least one of my criteria 

Thanks

for this article every audiophile must read...

😊

«Microsecond differences in the arrival time of a sound at the two ears (interaural time differences, ITDs) are the main cue for localizing low-frequency sounds in space. »

ITD PubMed

I quickly learned that the second part of the proposition just isn’t true as sub placement is very critical but I just use one sub in all my systems.

For sure you are right.

What is called room nodes is a pressure distribution zones grid...

When i used resonators in a room location matter  as the main  factor  as much as the mechanical tuning ...

i dont know about many subs...Or one...😊

My 2 rooms were around 1000 feet square and with my resonators i dont needed one even if for sure it would had improve the sound quality ...

A new Chopin Waltz discovered :

https://www.nytimes.com/video/arts/music/100000009784202/chopin-waltz-lang-lang.html?ogrp=dpl&smid=url-share

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kuAawWDggTU

It is why i put the youtube link...

The NYT  is trash ...