2016 Rolling Classical Listening Thread

*often a little more faithful

Rolling Classical Thread 2016 Spotify Playlist
^ will update in early February

franco donatoni's pieces for small ensembles ("algo" is one in particular i can name w/o checking) make good use of guitar

http://www.moderecords.com/catalog/182clementi.html

Ending last year, and beginning this year, I've been on a Per Norgard deep dive. Not even sure I'd ever heard of him until I started this, but I can't believe that was even possible given how his music lines up so closely with stuff I already like. So far:

Voyage Into the Golden Screen - where he uses his "infinity series" in the second part of this to create a kind of ever-changing melodic line, harmonically based on the harmonic overtone series. It should sound overly simple and kind of boring, but it's hypnotic.

Symphony 2 - takes up where Voyage left off, and expands the piece. Like a meeting of minimalism, spectralism and serialism

Symphony 3 - Much grander in scale, and compositionally more involved (not just based on an automatic reading of the infinity series). Almost cinematic, but unfolds like a giant, lumbering god falling to earth, and whose golden guts spill over everything in a terrible/beautiful way

Gilgamesh - an opera. Compositionally doesn't seem as complex as the preceding pieces, and the constant use of the harmonic series gets a little stale. Also shares some vibe with Stockhausen's Stimmung (a piece that I also think should be about 10 mins long, before it becomes silly), but still is hard to really argue with these harmonies since they seem so intrinsically pretty to me.

Libra - almost like a song cycle, for choir, guitar and tenor soloist. This is one of my favorite Norgard pieces, and could almost see performing it myself if I had a choir to work with. Great melodies, more harmonic series-based chords, and the guitar is integrated into everything in a lovely way. This is a great example of how modern classical music can be both ambitious and immediately appealing

Singe die Garten - a choral piece that seems of the same cloth as Libra, but with piano instead of guitar. He used this melody in several other pieces (including the end of Symphony 3), and if I had to pick one piece that sums up this period of Norgard, it would be this one

All of the above pieces are from the late 60s and early 70s. After that, he changed styles a bit, dropping the overtone series as his harmonic basis, and moving into stuff that I hear as more typical of new music and contemporary classical. His string quartets 6-10 disc is a good representation of this, and I am still working through them (#10 seems closest to what my ears are ready for), and his symphonies 4-8 also engage in often highly dissonant, rhythmically agitated/disjointed styles. Where before he seemed like a son of Messiaen and Ligeti, here he has almost a Varese-like flair for violent progression. But like I say, still working through, and hoping my musical vocabulary can keep up.

Sund4r, thank you very much! I am at least familiar with Segovia already and have at least 4 LPs of his playing. Where I felt clueless was whether or not X guitarist beyond him was respectable or not in a blind search. I'll enjoy something if I enjoy it of course, but I'd rather seek out the respected or recommended performers by those who are in the know. That being said, thanks again for the recommendations! I'll attempt to seek them out now at work and will report back if I can and if something stands out.

This is my favorite discovery so far after diving in:

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

Evan, David Starobin is another player who has made a lot of recordings of works written for him specifically in addition to other guitar repertory. He owns Bridge Records so his discography is extensive.

Dominique-- yeah it took me ages to get round to trying Norgard too and when I did he had an immediate impact. I haven't spent enough time with him yet tbh and it sounds like Libra is one I don't have that I need to get asap

they don't have the magnus lindberg pieces i was listening to the other day on youtube, but if you've never checked him out you should. he does clarinet concertos and works for percussion and accordion and all kinds of things. hard to find on cd though. i can hear scott walker moaning over this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Asrb-9F5_ow

Thanks Scott!

Oops, misread. I meant thanks Jon!

i'm in the 17th century. was kinda uninspired by the Schutz i was listening to (double choir motets), but the Lully i'm playing (pieces de symphonie) is properly rousing what with all the fanfares and the like.

Np, Evan. I didn't know the Yupanqui piece, actually, so thanks for the link. A couple more recommendations:

For a young trio doing more contemporary American music, I like these guys. Last Light is a nice album. You can hear some of it here.

The Assad Brothers: this was a nice disc of Piazolla. Just really virtuosic, beautiful playing.

Also, for contemporary music, William Beauvais! Traces was an album I loved. (Full disclosure: I studied with him about a decade ago.)

Does anyone have any classical guitar recommendations?

http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/3/JPG_400/MI0003/185/MI0003185725.jpg?partner=allrovi.com

Does anyone have any classical guitar recommendations?

This is one I keep coming back to.
http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/3/JPG_400/MI0001/143/MI0001143905.jpg?partner=allrovi.com

Thanks, all! I can never get enough of it. I'll just have to devise a way to have it constantly be playing all day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCfhqh0u20c

I listened to a bit of the Mesirca/Casseus and it sounds right up my alley. (I see now that he was Marc Ribot's teacher!) I will definitely look for the whole album.

*Casseus was Ribot's teacher, not Mesirca.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chEH-zl0uHs

Mesirca plays Ribot

listening to Webern and i don't think it ever occurred to me that half the dramatic movie music scores i've ever listened to were based on his stuff. or it feels like it right now anyway. those strings!

Ok now THAT is a fresh take.

i'd never actually thought that before! but maybe i've just listened to a ton of old soundtracks since the last time i listened to webern.

webern i was playing was von karajan doing passacaglia/5 movements for string orchestra op.5/6 pieces for orchestra op.6/symphony op.20.

Jerry goldsmith definitely had a few Webern + modular synths moments in the late 60s

Leonard Rosenman in the "fantastic voyage" OST as well.

Mostly though I get the silver age soundtrack vibe from Bartok, Stravinsky and mid period Schoenberg. And Britten.

Mahlerian moments less common in film score than you would expect (there's an early Elmer Bernstein score for Drango that has a real mahlerian flavor...)

goldsmith's music to poltergeist linked to webern here:

https://books.google.com/books?id=NkJFKUEweskC&pg=PA38&lpg=PA38&dq=webern+jerry+goldsmith&source=bl&ots=EVKO7zS5bG&sig=zzkj3qJCCsPgoRUN0Sg74rLYuCo&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjmjYG_vLvKAhXCcT4KHUWJDtMQ6AEIHDAA#v=onepage&q=webern%20jerry%20goldsmith&f=false

now i wanna hear his Freud soundtrack:

"An utterly brilliant score, Freud gave Goldsmith the opportunity to psychologically probe the human mind. He merged his own musical style with the Vienna school of Berg, Webern and Schoenberg to produce an agitated and thoroughly captivating work."

stefan wolpe taught elmer bernstein composition and stefan wolpe was taught by...........you guessed it.

Freud is great great great. Varese Sarabande released the actual film score several years back (maybe still in print?) but there was also an LP in the 60s iirc.

Cues from Freud tracked into some scenes of Alien by Ridley Scott over goldsmith's objections (jerry of course wanted the stuff he wrote for Alien to be the music for Alien).

My webern with modular synths comment had jerry's Illustrated Man score in mind specif

both webern and bernard herrmann were huge Ives fans in the 30's. it was actually herrmann i was thinking of when listening today. stabby strings and general foreboding feeling. i think i need more webern in my life.

i like the Complete Webern remake boulez recorded for DG more than his complete Sony set. on the DG set he makes it gorgeous.

reading a review now of karajan doing berg and webern and they mention Psycho...

the disc where James Levine conducts sets of orch pieces by Schoenberg, Webern, and Berg is considered all-time by almost everyone

i'm always leery of von k. his aesthetic is too glutinous and blended for me.

i am really liking karajan for my beloved brahms these days cuz he gives him more bite than other people do. i don't like my brahms toothless!

I do like his brahms 1st a lot. I agree with you that orchestral brahms needs high impact. In the chamber music that can go too far though - I've heard the piano quintet as an all out assault and it's too much.

His shostakovich 10th is great too.

such a weird weird guy karajan.

enjoying leonard slatkin and st. lou symph doing barber right now. symphony no.1 and piano concerto. does not sound like movie music.

best hair though. karajan.

http://img2-ak.lst.fm/i/u/770x0/151d735b334244eaa491b860523ee78b.jpg

oh hell yeah you know he never ventured out his door without that thing sculpted to perfection.

We can't get started on conductor hair though, we'll be image bombing this thread all day.

xpost loool

youthful membership in the nazi party? Nevermind that now: pet my hawk

massively successful hairdo right here. though eschenbach is no slouch in the grooming department either.

http://mediad.publicbroadcasting.net/p/wrti/files/styles/medium/public/201502/KarajanEschenbach.jpg

herbert is almost ian mccullach-like in profile there

i know I'm middle aged bc I can't remember how to spell Echo singer's name anymore.

the more i think about it... all my favorite conductors were bald except Boulez and bernstein

beecham, monteux, ansermet, furtwangler, not a comb between them

[insert crack about knowing you're middle-aged bc you know who Echo & the Bunnymen are]

listening to the 1991 cd reissue of janos starker's famous mercury living presence album of schumann/lalo/saint-saens. man, does it ever sound great. it'll fill your room with awesomeness. viva compact disc!

i looooove the way those are recorded. His mercury cd of the bach cello suites is my favorite one to listen to.

(takes notes)

btw i just posted a huge post abt shostakovich to the star wars 7 spoilers thread

for baroque harpsichord, pancrace royer's stuff fucking kills. i'm not sure i'd describe it as "elegant" per se, but it's monstrously awesome. rameau does good harpsichord stuff too.