I would like to start a thread, similar to Orpheus’ jazz site, for lovers of classical music. I will list some of my favorite recordings, CDs as well as LP’s. While good sound is not a prime requisite, it will be a consideration. Classical music lovers please feel free to add to my lists. Discussion of musical and recording issues will be welcome.
I’ll start with a list of CDs. Records to follow in a later post.
Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique. Chesky — Royal Phil. Orch. Freccia, conductor. Mahler: Des Knaben Wunderhorn. Vanguard Classics — Vienna Festival Orch. Prohaska, conductor. Prokofiev: Scythian Suite et. al. DG — Chicago Symphony Abbado, conductor. Brahms: Symphony #1. Chesky — London Symph. Orch. Horenstein, conductor. Stravinsky: L’Histoire du Soldat. HDTT — Ars Nova. Mandell, conductor. Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances. Analogue Productions. — Dallas Symph Orch. Johanos, cond. Respighi: Roman Festivals et. al. Chesky — Royal Phil. Orch. Freccia, conductor.
All of the above happen to be great sounding recordings, but, as I said, sonics is not a prerequisite.
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 ...
My Nonesuch and Turnabout LP’s are still in excellent shape. As far as sound goes, with my new analog rig some, but not all, are audiophile quality. I use them to demonstrate the SQ of my set.
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.
I found digital copies of all the Ristenpart Bach recordings, a 6 CD set from France, via eBay, at about $15 per CD. A bit pricey, but I had bought a turntable and phono pre just so I could play treasured LPs that are unavailable digitally, and a substantial fraction of my lp collection are the aforementioned Ristenpart Bach recordings. I had bought a handful of other Nonesuch and Vox/Turnabout recordings that I now have been able to locate digital versions as well. Considering selling the analog rig as listening to these noisy, poorly pressed records is reminding me of why I got out of vinyl in the first place
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 have been listening to an oldie but goodie Brandenberg, Karl Ristenpart with the Chamber Orchestra of the Saar. It will sound anachronistic next to HIPP versions but I love it. 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
I've always liked Pinnock's Brandenbergs with the English Concert, although there are many fine ones out there. I like the energy they project in their performances. It's interesting to me how much the original instruments versions that now seem to predominate have made some of the old versions done in the 60s that I grew up with sound sluggish or too lush to me.
I was hoping to do just that and to hear what people had to say about the myriad of different Brandenburg Concertos out there. It’s like the three bears, this one is too fast, this one is too slow and this one is just right.
Just listened to Cafe Zimmerman and I kinda liked it.
The Janowski is a solid cycle. Pittsburgh is a great, and under rated orchestra, the interpretations are well shaped, and Pentatone is truly an audiophile label. If you are a Multichannel enthusiast, there really is no other MC Brahms cycle that comes close (I have 3 others-maser/Gewandhaus, Manze/Helsingborg, and Paavo Jarvi with the Bremen Chamber Orchestra on Blu Ray. The Jarvi is excellent but it's small band Brahms, much like Berglund/COE. You do miss some oomph in the bigger moments). If you don't care about multichannel, the Janowski is still a worthy set that sounds great in two channel.
I haven't hear Nelsons in Brahms. The reviews have been somewhat mixed. For the record my favorite cycles are
1) Kurt Sanderling/Dresden Staatkapele mine are on Japanese Blue Spec discs but they always seem to be in print somewhere.
2) Walter/Columbia SO (stereo-there are several Walter mono cycles which are even better performances) only a low energy Fourth keeps this from top rank
3) Klemperer/Philharmonia O.K., Klemperer could be granitic, but Brahms was definitely in his wheelhouse
4) Jurowski/Pittsburgh on Pentatone-the best Multichannel set
5) Karajan/Berlin P I give my nod to the seventies cycle, but there is a more exciting live Brahms cycle from the early seventies recorded in Paris in good FM stereo available from Norbeck,Peters, and Ford (norpete.com) that blows away the studio cycles. The more live Karajan I hear, the more I realize that he could have tremendous spontaneity)
I'd like to hear the Steinberg/Pittsburgh set that was just released by DG, I think it is mentioned a bit upthread
I am a new contributor to this classical forum, and am delighted that there is an Audiogon group that is focused on the much neglected classical repertoire by audiophiles. Certainly, there is no other branch of music can that can fully test the excellence of audio systems like classical!
I recently picked up the recent Brahms symphony cycle on CD at Tanglewood with Andris Nelsons and the superb Boston Symphony.
I have never heard Brahms interpreted quite like this, and my appreciation grows with every repeat hearing. Nelsons imparts a new fluidity to these great works - and nowhere is this more evident than in the relatively neglected 2nd Symphony. You will be captivated by this performance as well as the sumptuous sound quality of this relatively new release. It is time to experience the wondrous subtleties that unravel so perfectly under Nelsons’ direction.
Well here is something that, at minimum, you will find more 'modern'. A road less traveled for sure. Paalo Berglund and the COE. If you are tired of over orchestrated, bloated Brahms, performed by large orchestras, which is so abundant, perhaps you should give these a listen. I find them quite attractive. If you like what happens here then maybe you should give his Sibelius a listen as well.
The Brahms symphonies are each great, but I find few recording rise to the challenges of the music. Conductors including Karajan, Stokowski and more recently, Ivan Fisher, emote and editorialize too much. The Carlos Kleiber Brahms 4th, though, is astonishing, as is Furtwangler's WWII live recording of the 4th. The sound is not great in either, though. It's poor in the Furtwangler, as should be expected from the vintage. Abbado/Berlin, in better sound, is good, not great. Does anyone have any suggestions for Brahms symphony recordings in modern sound?
I listened to Jascha Horenstein conduct Brahms3 with the Southwestern German Orchestra. On a Pristine Audio restoration of a late mono era Vox recording. I’ve had the Vox for years though I haven’t played it that often. The Pristine enhancement is definitely worth it. One now perceives air around the instruments and a real soundstage. Solo woodwinds are more prominent, and what used to be a third tier sounding Orchestra now at least sounds second rate.
I admire JH, and collect many of his recordings, but his Brahms 3 isn’t really for me. It is definitely old school, autumnal Brahms, although extremely well done. It sounds deliberate and thoughtful, and not like the flabby mess that Giulini made at the end of his career, and less gimmicky than Bernstein’s outing with the VPO
I gotta tell ya' that it just doesn't matter to me if I understand what the words are in foreign language vocals. I just get into the exotic sounds the singers make. The foreign languages add to the the flavor of what I hear. I let the vocalists' artistic expression supply the meaning.
This interpretation with Klemperer and these two giant singers is out of this world ...
There exist only one other interpretation perhaps rivaling it...
But the best possible version dont exist...
It will be Wunderlich and Ferrier for me...
The luminous honey hue of Wunderlich voice with the never before heard deep somber subterranean voice of Ferrier here....( or Marian Anderson who is only rival)
I am in love with contraltos voices...I want to marry one... In my next life...
Have I mentioned the symphonies of Florence Price on this endless thread? Early 20th Century African American female composer. Featured on Idagio. Recordings on DG with the Philadelphia Orchestra. Like Dvorak, but just that tiny(!) bit more authentic. Utterly lovely and accessible.
I prefer Bernstein version to the two Celi version in Beethoven Egmont yes ... 😊😁
But the young version with Berlin has nothing to do with his mature notion of the musical time which he exhibit well with the Stuttgart version like you know for sure...
And yes someone can be a genius in intemporal Bruckner and less convincing in mundane incarnated warring Beethoven...
i prefer Furtwangler to almost all in Beethoven because his notion of musical time is at home with Beethoven like Celi concept of musical time is at home with Bruckner...
Bernstein is a so great genius because he can use any of these two way to create musical time appropriate to each composer... Like other great maestros geniuses with him...
Georgiev one day said that all maestros try to imitate the temporal musical direction of Furt. without succeeding completely , I think he is right...The way musical time is out of mundane measurable time and emerge from music itself without being objectively "measurable" at all is fascinating experience with Furt and sometimes with other maestro in some composer...
Celi is a singularity among maestros, because he impose more than any other his own concept of musical time, which is not the Furtwanglerian one, i described above and Celi impose it on every composer...Then we listen Celi fascinating or boring interpretation, it is only dependent on our ability to see what there is to see...
When we listen Celi there is no more time passing, nor the musical time in the Furtwangler sense, nor measurable mundane time, there is only a single moment of variable duration where eternity pour in an everlasting moment like water pouring in a glass andoverflowing or a moment of time elevating or stretching itself to eternity...What is miraculous in his Bruckner is the way Celi never lost intensity in this everlasting moment like in the Egmont case...Time is almost vanishing with him or become transparent so to speak, especially in his Bruckner at home interpretations ....it is a Buddhist notion of time and anyway Celi was buddhist pupil....
He is the only maestro obsessed by time in this sense.... He cannot be judged without be understood...He is fascinating if we understood him , boring if we dont try to understand him , more boring in Egmont for sure, not boring at all in any Bruckner... Unique...
Thank for your kind words...
i am not a musician at all...
I dont know music language by the way, i attempt to decipher it with my ears/brain/body thats all...
Thanks for your comments. First, my choice of the young Celi was in great part for the visual element in that clip. I agree that it could be said that the 1976 Stuttgard version is “more mature”. However, the question must asked whether in this case “maturity” (of time conception), better serves the music’s intent. I’m not so sure.
The music was composed as the overture to incidental music for a play (Goethe) celebrating the life and heroism of a Dutch count (Egmont) in his country’s struggle for liberty against imperialistic Spain; culminating with the count’s execution. The music was composed while the Napoleonic wars were raging. All a pretty dramatic backdrop, I would say. Perhaps partly due to the more distant and less present sound of the 1976 recording, and certainly no intention on my part to diminish the wisdom of maturity, but the 1976 has, for me, less of the drama and angst which I think the historical setting would demand. Examples: the introduction, intended to represent “The Prison” and the feeling that imprisonment might convey seems to be better served by the young Celi’s version which gives me a stronger feeling of drama and tension. For me, the sometimes excruciatingly long rests (silences) in the 1976 detract from the drama and urgency. Likewise, in this version the first statements by the woodwinds give the music an almost pastoral feeling; not what I would expect given the circumstances to be conveyed. What is it they say, “mellows with age”? Not so sure “mellowing” fits in the context of war, imprisonment and execution. Bernstein, for me, strikes a more convincing balance balance in this regard; hence my choice.
Thank you for the clip and for your thoughts, mahgister; always thought provoking.
His concept of musical time is between these two...
Bernstein is one of the great maestro for me with these two...And some other few...
But here frogman you pick the young Celi , a better example of his musical original time conception will be the Stuttgart 1976 more mature version of Coriolan....
😊😊
I did not say here which one i prefer, it is not my goal... 😊
I cannot vouch for all his performance but Celi interpretation was always about time not as a passing rythm , like the seasons, but more about one instant where everything is enclosed...
We sometimes must learn to listen something, and for sure all is not for everybody...
I already posted a piece of Indian Sarangi, one of the most fascinating instrument of India, and a poster say to me that it got on his nerve...😁😊
We cannot like eveything at the same times and sometimes our preference are right in a way....
Our taste are also a miror of our own ongoing evolution.... It takes me time to appreciate jazz for example... I never got it young.... But i loved Bach at first chords...Nothing is wrong and right, only an evolution...
But the "cult" about Celi come from this concept of time, no other Conductor explored his way...
Celi express and give to everything the density of eternity...
Eternity can be boring so to speak ... 😊
Anyway some composers are more suited for this maestro "suspended" stick than some other...
Bruckner’s interpretation for example are certainly stupendous...It is here i catch his art and unique vision...
The greatest examples in the way to use of time for me by conductors are Furtwangler and Celibidache...No one is able to imitate them perfectly though... They become myths...Or examplar of the art of conducting...Most maestros distributed themselves between these 2 ways to express time...
In Furtwangler: Music pass with his own beating time completely out of everyday time...
In Celibidache : Music dont pass, but surge directly from his timing eternal origin or source...
No one is right here or wrong , Celi. or Furt. only gods waiting for us to listen...
But we cannot got their specific way at the same time and the same day...
Our listening life is an evolution...
I never got the Celi cult. All I can say is that his Munich concert goers must of had strong bladders to make it through his glacial performances.
You must have a verified phone number and physical address in order to post in the Audiogon Forums. Please return to Audiogon.com and complete this step. If you have any questions please contact Support.
