Classical Music Thread

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Martinu knocks it out of the park with his Gilgamesh cantatas
This was recommended to me by the youtube algorithm and its pretty good no idea who the composer is or anything about him but ill check out the rest of his ouvre.
 
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JJLiautaud said:
Martinu knocks it out of the park with his Gilgamesh cantatas
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Pff, doesn't compare to the sumerian real deal - were you there for it in ~5000 B.C.?
Now you were, kinda... But for real, the cantatas are very nice, ty!
 
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~nogger~ said:
Pff, doesn't compare to the sumerian real deal - were you there for it in ~5000 B.C.?
Now you were, kinda... But for real, the cantatas are very nice, ty!
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In case you don't know I just linked the first part the other 2 are also bangers.
 
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Youtube occasionally knocks it out of the park with music recs:
Im moving from a strict TPD policy to a PPD policy
 
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JJLiautaud said:
The insistent sucking off of Wagner by the wagnersisters in /classical/ is very annoying he's good don't get me wrong one of the greats, but its sucks that half of the discussion is occupied by wagner fellating.
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I can acknowledge his influence on music history but I cannot make myself like his music. Listened to his late operas and I found them dull.

I read Eduard Hanslick's contemporary reviews of them and he really hits the mark on why I don't like them. They all have that declamatory style that plagued late Romantic opera. The singers don't actually sing and most of the time just speak in some kind of intonated talking. The actual music making role is taken over by the orchestra.

Music-wise, new themes come in too quickly. Old ones aren't repeated and are discarded before they're properly developed so good melodies are rare. Frequent modulations also make the experience a bit disorienting. Even Nietzsche (former Wagnerite) called Wagner out on it.
 
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JJLiautaud said:
The insistent sucking off of Wagner by the wagnersisters in /classical/ is very annoying he's good don't get me wrong one of the greats, but its sucks that half of the discussion is occupied by wagner fellating.
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Honestly, I expected more. I recently got into his actual operas and I find them lame tbh. I was mislead with the symphonic excerps everyone has on repeat since those bangers hit and I feel it's all a little bit oversold. I think I'll stick to german operettas.
 
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Lowlife Adventures said:
I can acknowledge his influence on music history but I cannot make myself like his music. Listened to his late operas and I found them dull.
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I like his overtures Tannhauser Overture is a classic same with the Rheingold Overture, but yeah most of his music while good can be a bit much, doesn't help that finding good performances of his operas.
 
I have two recordings of Thomas Dausgaard conducting Zemlinsky's beautiful tone poem Die Seejungfrau ("The Mermaid"). The first I got was the newer Dacapo recording (2006, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, live recording) did not leave a strong impression on me, but when I put on the older Chandos recording (1998, Danish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, studio recording) I was rapt in attention. There is no big fault in the newer, live recording, but the older studio recording wins out because it was painted with a finer brush, all the tiny details are in focus. This allows the listener to immerse himself in the endless variety of sea music: from sunlit waves to raging storms, from the groaning depths to the church bells on the shore.


The Dacapo recording is more dynamic, which suits the grander Second Movement

For the third movement I must return to the Chandos.

It is easy to mistake Die Seejungfrau as proto-Mahler (the "Mermaid" theme, 2:20 in the first video I posted, does sound like Mahler's love music), but Zemlinsky is his own thing: instead of themes, he deals with sound painting more akin to Debussy. The tiny details that the Chandos brought clear are really the connective tissue of the piece. If these are not brought to the fore, it leaves the listener with just isolated passages of lyricism and drama, and the piece suffers for that.
 
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Unpopular opinion that I'll die for: Tchaikovsky cannot write a good variation. Both the Rococo Variations and the massive second movement of his Piano Trio bore me. Now I'm listening to Tchaikovsky's Orchestral Suite No. 3, which ends with another long set (20 minutes) of variations.


I hardly recognize it as a set of variations, the theme being so unpromising and indistinct. Still, the movement ends with a brilliant, rousing polonaise (39 minutes onwards) that I don't mind listening over and over. When it comes to polonaises, Tchaikovsky never put a wrong foot.
 
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Space Police said:
What about the Concerto in D Major?
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Just like the Roccoo Variations, the Third Movement variation are not really variations as such, but same theme played at different speeds and with different modulations.

The whole Violin Concerto is something that I enjoy occasionally, once every six months perhaps, otherwise I risk getting earworms.
 
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Soi Woh Jak said:
This is my kind of thread, I cant stop listening to Air on G String.
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A truly beautiful rendition with the harpsichord standing out, as it should.

ISRC: USX9P1102439
Hard to find online but here is the same recording on a different release.
 
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