underdiscussed classical composers I have dug: official ilm thread

we had this going on the sandbox and I was really enjoying it, also there was a Russian CD somebody recommended there that I'd like to hear the name of again so I can keep an eye out for it

went to the great Nice Price Books yesterday and grabbed a few things including this:

http://ondine.net/_cache/tmpl_plugin_thumbnail/3269de531812f8d494afd65676389c60.jpg

what I got for four bucks appears to be the CD & jewelcase from something that once had an external slipcase with liner notes; there are no real notes beyond the recording details on the back. The Martinu piece that opens this is really something, I know exactly nothing about him; in iTunes I find a set by the Martinu Quartet, but nothing by the composer himself. The piece, anyway, Memorial to Lidice, reminds me of Bartók - lots of intervals that're unfamiliar to me but aren't dissonant, just strange - like the challenges of going from continental classical to Russian but more exaggerated. It is a really wonderful piece of music.

http://i.imgur.com/eRTw5.jpg

speaking of whom, fuckin A. when I was a piano student (little kiddie years like 8 years old) I played a Bartók piece and I remember really liking it & saying so to my teacher and being somehow steered away from thinking he was really all that, but between the Concerto for Orchestra & Bluebeard's Castle which I got in the fall & am kinda nuts for, I'm thinking I oughta throw him into the Classical Composers Who Have Been Underexplored By Me file

I was playing some Janáček for the bf — he is just so underrated in pretty much every genre apart from opera. I suspect you'll enjoy his piano music quite a bit if you don't already know it.

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

I need to start buying instrumental music, particularly Bartok string quartets

One of my resolutions this year is to buy more classical music so I intend to watch this thread

yah bartok was first rate

id say in order of importance

quartets, especially 4-6
music for strings, percussion and celesta
first piano concerto
second violin concerto (my favourite, the midori/mehta version is sweet)
the miraculous mandarin
second piano concerto
violin sonata
piano sonata
en plein air (he wrote a lot of piano music, see the kocsis recordings, but these are probably 'most important'/'substantial')
four orchestral pieces
first violin concerto

now playing:

http://www.papageno.fr/media/poch_g/poch_5598.jpg

not that i know anything about carl maria von weber...

got a ton of german opera/light opera/singspiel/uhhhhh....stuff like that in at the store. thought i should do my duty and edumacate myself.

weber is pretty famous i think

kinda like webern, but less severe, thanks to the lack of an 'n' curtailing his surname

got the boulez bayreuther ring cycle on vinyl. comes with a huge book. might do that up too if my customers can handle it.

yeah, the lack of an n kinda freed him up.

i've listened to so much finnish and norwegian and swedish stuff over the last couple of years! courtesy of a collection that was heavy with it. really ended up liking a bunch of it. oh, and czech dudes too. zelenka, dusek, masek, tomasek, fibich, novak, suk, kapral, martinu. i definitely fuck with novak and suk.

nakh do you not rate Bluebeard's Castle? I think it kind of slays!

Lately in classical I've been listening to Schubert symphonies (esp. 4 and 5), Bach cantatas (esp. the Christmas cantata), and some Mozart string quartets. I guess these guys aren't exactly under-discussed. I heard a nice Haydn string quartet on the radio (WQXR is a good place to discover new classical tunes) - the Dm "Fifths" quartet.

didnt include bluebeard cuz u already mentioned it, but i haven't heard it for years in any case

you know the group that is underdiscussed, is choral composers

y'all need to get up on some Herbert Howells and Frank Martin immediately

I like Martin's Petite Symphonie Concertante quite a bit. Only choral piece I've heard by him is In Terra Pax, which sounded a little too Demille-ian to me.

I haven't yet heard that but seriously, his "Mass for Double Chorus" is arguably THE greatest a capella piece of the 20th Century

not that Bartok is that underdiscussed but this thread sent me to youtube hoping that someone had uploaded zoltan kodaly's performance of '138. Bagpipes' from Microkosmos, and while no one has, I did find this great clip of a 7 year old girl playing the hell out of it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdPsjGdrqbo&feature=related

i fucking love mikrokosmos, about twice a year i sit down and struggle my way through a piece or two with confusion and delight.

was the russian cd this one? http://www.allmusic.com/album/preludes-to-a-revolution-w126544/review

yah

this youtube channel is awesome for feinberg, roslavets et al

http://www.youtube.com/user/Hexameron

http://pixhost.me/avaxhome/fa/2b/000b2bfa_medium.jpeg

rip german romanticism

a cursory search reveals we have thread for leo srauss, levi-strauss, the execrable DSK and no less than three for neil 'the game' strauss, yet none for richard s so he surely qualifies as underdiscussed on ilm, if less so elsewhere

Never seen Franck mentioned on ILM so I'll mention that I listened to the Prelude, Chorale and Fugue for the first time in a while recently. Possibly my favorite late Romantic composer.

Only one mention of Panufnik and it's from 2002. This guy is great on most days, micropolytonal with gorgeous melodies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrSAFc6JzlU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qi_7-QGvYVU

He's got a piece called "Landscape" that takes the cake but I can't find video of it

that right there is really nice stuff

Never seen Franck mentioned on ILM

I love Cesar Franck.

The few recordings of his work that I've been able to find are all among my most listened to classical records. This album is wonderful.

'Psyche' is one of my all time favorites, as well:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_pjNKHf0Yc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsPvSfuVEs4

Even though he is most recognized for 'The Incredible Flutist', I really love Walter Piston's 'Three New England Sketches':
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aYhrqPisYA

Those Panufnik clips are great! I'll look for "Landscape."