Chopin! I have more than 500 piano solo CDs but no Chopin. I can NOT sense the "beauty" in his music. Not at all. |
Yu, I felt the same way about Chopin for years. My wife and daughter took up piano and began to work on Chopin night and day. It did not take long for me to grow to love his work. Curious, because most people find his music extremely beautiful at once.
Beethoven? Bach? Brahms? Schubert? Most definitely. Chopin and Liszt, I just did not get. Finally, this wonderful music clicked. |
Interesting comments about Chopin. I know several folks over the years that have told me they don't care for his music. I can't say I like EVERYTHING he composed but surely Yu, being a solo piano aficionado there must be something among his works that would appeal to you. Don't give up! |
Jimi Hendrix and any similar guitar style. It's like torture. |
Hi Brownsfan / Tubegroover,
Thank you for your suggestions.
For me,
Bach - spiritually simplicity (borrowed from Furtwangler)
Beethoven - emotionally humane
Brahms - solitarily loneliness
Schubert - lyrically subtlety
But I just simply can't capture the inner core of Chopin's music. Being a classical music lover for the past 30 years, more than a few times I seriously decided to understand Chopin's music and tried to listen to his music systematically. The results were very disappointing. Ironical as it is that I can even find something enlightening in Bruckner's music.
Whenever my daughter's piano teacher suggests Chopin's piece to her for practicing, he withdraws the idea at once as he realizes his student lives in a no-Chopin-but-everything-else residence.
Poor girl!
Happy Listening. |
Yu, Very insightful comments!
Everything Bach wrote was a prayer. He was a genius and a Lutheran, an inch wide and a mile deep. More focused and profound than simple, I would say.
Beethoven- He had a soul as large as Bach, and his early tutor was a Lutheran and disciple of Bach. But Beethoven did not share Bach's certainty, and instead asked divine questions in very human terms.
Brahms-Yes, after all this life long bachelor's motto was frei aber einsam. Free but alone.
Schubert's music at its best sings with a lyricism that would make even Mozart envious.
Bruckner= I always think of him as the Roman Catholic Bach. I would say the same of him as Bach. Everything Bruckner wrote was a prayer. The character of his music as compared to Bach reflects not only the difference in time but also the difference in theology. However, for a different Bruckner, please try Venzago's Bruckner 2. All I can say is wow! Mario Venzago is on to something.
Mozart-The singer of love and Mahler, the singer of nature, to quote Franz Welser-Most.
Now Chopin? Though I now love his music, it has not provided a window into his soul. For that reason, he will never be as dear to me as Bach or Bruckner, though his music brings me deep satisfaction. |
Billie Holiday--amateurish heroin-hazed delivery, very limited range (barely an octave)
Glenn Gould--Perfectionist manufactured music; too mechanical for my taste
Diva pop defined entirely by vocal gymnastics rather than singing
Leonard Bernstein--erratic tempos, sometimes so fast the orchestra could barely play it
I never picked up on metal except for Van Halen, and then only when fronted by DLR.
Maria Callas--hard, irritating voice
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Nickelback. A few songs are ok. |
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"Stariway to Heaven", "November Rain", "Pretty Woman", "American Pie" and Chevy altogether, all songs from Titanic including the movie(puke) and when Crhistmas comes, I use ear plugs not to listen to that cwap playin' at the department stores and groceries! It would've been a wonderful time of the year excluding songs LOL! |
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Coldplay...music for bedwetters... |
We got both kinds of music here....Country AND Western... |
Most pop music...and that includes rap. |
10-05-12: Phasecorrect
Coldplay...music for bedwetters... I forgot about them and Nickleback. Yucks. |
ZZ Top, Molly Hatchet and Lynard Skynard are examples of music only a high school drop out could enjoy. Throw in Kid Rock and you've got yourself the soundtrack for Deliverance II. |
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Easy with the elite attitude...Donjr...zz top runs circles around anything you can play.... |
Donjr-You forgot Blackfoot-Black Oak Arkansas-The Outlaws-Ozark Mountain Daredevils and the Marshall Tucker Band. |
I forgot to add ELO to my list. |
Phasecorrect. I'm not so sure about that. I recall the 1980 Deguello tour where it was reported in several magazines that the band was lipsynching their live shows. |
Billy Gibbons is a flat out monster. That particular flavor of Texas blues rock ain't for every taste, but that boy can play his ass off. |
That a boy Marty...u dont go to a zz top for the vocals...fwiw...the didnt lipsynch deguello tour...probably eliminator era...not prime zz anyway |
A friend of mine (the guitar tech for a pretty major act) recently saw ZZ Top and reported that they were lip synching. The Texas Blues as dance pop.
Like the a good bit of the records, tho (in smaller doses).
John |
That's hilarious Jdoris. True or not that lip synch rumor always bothered me because there was a point in my life I actually liked ZZ Top. Remember back then it was written in magazines so you really were taking a chance on your reputation by publishing information like that if it wasn't true. Regardless few bands have ever been accused of this and to still have this floating around 32 years later does not sit well with me even 30 years after I came to the conclusion that ZZ Top is not a good band. |
I like all classical and Flamenco tunes played on nylon string guitar except those from Esteban, Charo, and Roy Clark. |
Classic 70s Zz is solid boogie as it gets...they didnt age.well.after that... |
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Van Morrison makes me deathly ill...as does Al Stewart |
Elvis. I hate his music but the movies were fantastic. |
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Blues as dance pop
Not a bad definition of rock n roll. Maybe not a perfect definition, but not a bad one.
Marty |
I'm now officially without opinions on Kiss, but my failure to like them in middle school was a serious social handicap.
Another weird ZZ Top fact: Billy Gibbons guest starring on the TV show "Bones" as Angela's wayward father. I suspect him of lipsynching there, too!
John |
Well I'm not up on a lot of those initials. There's some one hit wonders that clearly haven't come to terms with their limitations. Lots of bands I only like one or two tunes by. C+W is horrible but I like a few classic Hank Williams tunes. Johnny Cash did a couple of good ones. Don't get the dislike for Fleetwood mac, Neil Young and the Eagles. Grunge rock and rap are pure you know what. I guess disco has it's utilitarian purpose. What I dislike the most is pretty well anything new and original since probably the early 90s. Lets face it, we've been there, done that. The only original harmonies that remain are the ones scribbled down 30 years ago and tossed into the trash accompanied by an expletive on it's way in. I remember the talk about the "end of days" regarding music way back then already. It is after all a finite mathematical calculation. But there's no despair. If one were to attempt to listen to every tune ever written just once, a life time would not suffice. And they've been plagiarizing each others' since the beginning. So why not just keep mixing and matching? |
