Exposed Fifths

Lady Viola

2006-07-01T09:45:00.000+10:00

The Viola is the little cinderella of the classical world. In terms of instruments, it is outsung by the brighter violin, and when it comes to gloom and depth, the cello has that market all cornered. So when there is music for the Lady Viola, a concerto perhaps, as by Walton, or a complete expose for solo instrument, as here by Lillian Fuchs, we should be excited.

No relation to the great Johann Fux of counterpoint theory, Lilian Fuchs (1903-1991) was a violist of fine pedigree, and was quite unusual in her performance technique by using a Dodd bow, a bow shorter than normal, and one that Lillian claimed gave her greater control. Certainly in the sporting arena, a shorter backlift is often associated with reduced errors and greater "punch", so I'll go with her here.

There's no greater impetus to creative activity than meeting an unmet need, and there is an extreme dearth of music for solo viola. This vacuum is almost entirely due to one JS Bach, amongst whose prolific legacy count 6 cello suites, and 6 sonatas/partitas for violin. Few have been daring enough to go where Bach never stepped, so the Viola Repertoire remained empty. Well, Lillian has done her best to emulate Paganini is writing dashing and musically viable studies for her instrument. On these two discs are 3 Collections of Etudes, and a Sonata Pastorale. Performer is Jeanne Mallow. Listen here.

Piano and Memory

2006-07-01T08:54:00.000+10:00

Hugh has a very nice piece today on learning the Rackmaninov Third Concerto. It's all about the mental feats, and training the memory in certain ways. There's the sharp focus on difficult passages and refining the fingerwork, working on the glue between sections, and then the drift out, the wide lens shot, where the music flows from beginning to end. It sounds as though the neurons and synapses are getting a full workout in someone's brain, and I'm much happier here typing away, than struggling with hundreds of thousands of notes.

Gieseking would be so proud of Hugh. A pianist's agony here.

Naxos Refresh

2006-06-30T15:46:00.000+10:00

For those who haven't dropped in in the last couple of days, the Naxos webpage has had a bit of a redesign. Well not a bit, it's more like a radical makeover. They've dumped the widescreen format that was in vogue for a few years, and gone for a sleek, almost minimal look. It's certainly much quicker to navigate, and loads in a snap compared to the old site.

Being a baroque man, I can certainly appreciate functionality, but there seems to be something stripped back about the new naxos page. Maybe its the drab silver design, or maybe I just miss that fire red of old, the jury's out on this one.

Go for a greek island visit here.

The Hyperion Experience

2006-06-29T06:58:00.000+10:00

One of the more admirable independents in the game, Hyperion Records has compiled a curious catalogue of 1400 discs over 25 years. They have recorded the little known works of major composers, and the major works of little known composers. Among their list of artists there is Angela Hewitt, who has a valid claim for being the Bach Interpreter of our Times, and Leslie Howard, who undertook the insane project of recording the complete Liszt, that's a block of 94 discs to add to the end of your shelf. And from a piano perspective, another important artist is Marc-Andre Hanelin, an advocate of Alkan, and other impossible to play works of the Romantic age, like Godowsky's combined Chopin etudes.

It's an impressive catalogue, and their openness to the Renaissance era is especially warming. Hyperion have assembled all their sample tracks into one easy to access page, and there are over 700 complete files here. Most of their selections are under 5 minutes, but its quite a gift to the online world. Open your ears here.

Piano Picture of the Day

2006-06-29T06:53:00.000+10:00

lots of wood in this one ...

Classical Music is dead?

2006-06-28T07:55:00.000+10:00

I wonder is Classical Music really is dead? An arcane hobby of a dedicated few, kept functional by government grants and longtime bequests, an industry bred by high school lessons and University studies. An Art that cannot sustain itself any longer, parasitic on others. Sure the passion is there, I can see it in the dozen or so blogs dedicated to Classical, and they have a devoted audience of maybe a hundred, but we are talking about a worldwide entity here, and the numbers are so miniscule. We might as well be Students of Euclid, reading and rereading his divine Books of Geometry. Such is the marginal and pleasantly tolerated nature of our Pasttime.

Parents still see reason to give their offspring music lessons, and if you come from a middle class family of Asian background, the gentle prod will be towards the violin or piano. Guitar seems the first real preference of children - it's complete, they see others playing it, and it's easy to carry round. And so a whole industry of Music Teachers with Tertiary Degrees finds their employment.

Orchestras survive off public grants, and so employ more Graduates. The major labels seem to have done with Classical Music, I think they recognise a carcass when its rotting at their feet. No more new recordings, just rereleases. Naxos get by with utilising an army of Soviet bred musicians - themselves an ideal product of their State Development programs. Nowhere can Classical Music stand on its own feet, a Proud Tradition facing the world square on.

Alex Kelly

2006-06-27T07:38:00.000+10:00

As a performer and composer, Alex Kelly offers up an interesting and energetic viewpoint. His cello playing is vibrant, and teaming up here with Keith Kirchoff on piano they form a formidable duo. Here is an extract from the Rackmaninov Cello Sonata. Potent stuff. Here.

Truly Awful

2006-06-27T06:54:00.000+10:00

Twentieth Century music can be truly awful. Witness this extract from Bartok's Sonata for 2 Pianos plus Percussion. Now, the piano itself is a striking instrument, it has closer relations with the harpsichord than any other keyboard instrument. So you start with a banging sound, add more banging sounds in the way of gongs, xylophones, and timpani, have no harmony apart from seconds, and you have something that's quite removed from normal conceptions of music.

The Twentieth Century Path broke down somewhere - some say Stravinsky, others Webern, I'll put my hand up and say Bartok was the one who destroyed the public faith. Press play, then go listen to some soothing Wolfgang.

Richter, Gieseking, et al

2006-06-26T07:17:00.000+10:00

When this collection was first announced, it was touted as the Largest Compilation ever assembled for CD. 100 little pocket volumes, containing a disc in the front cover, and one in the back, divided by a sheaf of professionally written notes translated into three languages. Great Pianists of the Twentieth Century was an unprecedented collaboration between the major labels, drawing upon literally the entire history of phonologically recorded music - the earliest track is from 1912, Paderewksi playing Liszt's la campanella. All in all 72 pianists were selected for the title of Great, some of these receiving two volumes to celebrate their renown, and a handful getting three double discs, that's easily more than 6 hours of piano ecstasy.

Peter Gutmann, not to be confused with Robert Gutman, the biographer of Mozart and Wagner, has assembled some notes and thoughts on these volumes. They don't cover the entire complete boxed set release, but give you a through sampling of the riches that were amassed. It truly is one of the great Projects undertaken in recorded music, and these notes serve as a faithful guide. Thank you Peter! Here.

2 Pianos, 8 Hands

2006-06-25T12:57:00.000+10:00

All I can say is that the 19c loved their piano, and their whole conception of music revolved around it. Transcriptions of quartets, symphonies, and operas were regularly produced for piano 4 hands, and more music must have been performed in this medium than any other, all numbers being counted. Well, we go one up in this release, not just music on 2 pianos for that extra sound, but a full 8 hands!

The Tchaikovsky Capriccio Italien is of little note, seeming to rely entirely on effects, the music itself is quite sparse, Glazunov takes up half the disc with two nature pieces, the Forest, and the Sea, but worth getting for itself is the Balakirev, and an arrangement of his symphonic poem Tamara.

Have a listen here,

Piano Picture of the Day

2006-06-25T12:47:00.000+10:00

I've read about these curved keyboards, but have never actually seen one. I guess its handy for music where you have to be at both ends of the piano at once.

Anyone played one of these?

Winter Journey

2006-06-24T07:24:00.000+10:00

It's cold and chilly where I am, so there's no more appropriate music than Schubert's Winterreise, or Winter Journey. A 24 part song cycle famously described as 24 shades of grey, it's one man's look back on life and things done, and a look forward to death and the end. It's sad, cold, chilly, blistering, and nails in the heart stuff. It feels so me.

As Schubert neared the end his music becomes extraordinarily deep and insightful. There is this ability to step outside of his own sphere, and observe the life around him. It is the godlike sight with all the human feeling and pain. It is the Winterreise.

Here is a 50 minute radio presentation from the Connection. It features lots of archive material, and has some great observations from the guests and callers. Here.

Composing the Old Fashioned Way

2006-06-23T16:45:00.000+10:00

Greg Stephanich finds in his latest post that the Technology Fascists might just have taken over. As Guthry wrote in an excellent post on Machine Music, we are entering the age where music is constructed and performed entirely on the laptop screen in front of us. Some might see this as the Composer being returned to his rightful place on the Throne, utter Master of all Elements before him - from the actual notes, specifying accents, the gait of the music, the Sound World is completely his.

Poor old Greg just wanted to transfer his musical conceptions from mind to paper, and have some adjutant transcribe it, send it off to the publisher, and dress himself up for First Performance Night. No more!

And much as I like the software that Greg has been using, the scribe Sibelius, I too find that it is merely a way of generating a midi score - not the means or the assistant in the Composing Process. Automatic chord completion? What sort of world of Musical Dependency are these people trying to conceive?

Lucid thinking, here.

Infectious Tunes

2006-06-23T16:15:00.000+10:00

Can't get that song out of your head? An endless loop? Well, cognitive theorists have proposed that this might be a case of brain itch, and certain neural circuits being tapped into. Of course, anything that stays in the mind is of great interest to advertisers and pop song shapers, so they have a keen interest in investigating such issues. It's a whole field called Consumer Psychology, and regardless of google ads and contextual advertising, anything that can make anything else seem more enticing and desirable is going to make for a better campaign.

Back to the tunes, and the music that will never die, apparently Wolfgang had his neural circuits wired up in such a way that musical patterns sought a natural completion. His kids found that, in a story I haven't come across before, they could annoy their dad by half playing tunes and scales and waiting for the great Mozart to rush off and complete the sequence by whistling, or banging out the notes on the nearest pianoforte. Sounds apocryphal, but the whole study of the brain, and its various modules, and how they interact, function independently, subconsciously, and relay information, and generally construct the phenomena we know as The Mind, is of great interest.

It's a BBC report from 3 years ago, but its as novel today as then. Scratch here.

Rondo alla Guitar

2006-06-23T16:07:00.000+10:00

Mozart would be so proud of our youth. Here's his most infamous Rondo alla Turka as debased and distorted for electric guitar. Nice little snippet.

Play.

Monteverdi Continued

2006-06-22T07:19:00.000+10:00

Continuing on the tangent of Claudio Monteverdi, is a ten minute radio presentation by Jan Swafford, author of those penetrating biographies of Brahms and Charles Ives. It's a basic overview of Claudio's life, where he had musical posts, what triggered certain waves of compositions, and quotes from first hand documentation that presents us with a sliver of his volatile character. The musical excerpts are most enlightening, here is someone playing with form and colour not long after the passing of Palestrina. From the strict 4 part Mass to the dancing rhythms of the Vespers of 1610 is a bold advance indeed. And whether Monteverdi was the pioneer that forged his way into the New World suppleness and invention of the Baroque, or whether he was merely one who saw before the others the path that music would lead, you can investigate for yourself.

A neat little intro into the Life and Works of Claudio Monteverdi. Courtesy of NPR and their Performance Today series of broadcasts. Here.

Cello Journey 10

2006-06-21T19:05:00.000+10:00

Luke Stanley is back with another episode of Cello Journey. Another piece by Popper, and another duo performance with his friend Ross Inglis. These guys are basically web pioneers, the first Internet Classical Performers. YouTube has opened the world of video to a democratic process, and Luke has taken his opportunity. There is so much joy in his performances, and this rendition of Village Song continues an unbroken record.

Press play, then drop into Cello Journey for more clips, and say a big hello to Luke. Here.

Musical Epiphany

2006-06-21T06:58:00.000+10:00

Sometimes in life, its worthwhile just to stop and ponder how you got to where you are. What job you do, where you live, what music you listen to - what were the forces that shaped who you are? There's a certain element of sympathetic resonance in all this - after all, there are many things that cross our path that aren't incorporated into our thinking and behaviour - you have to be open to the influences in the first place. But the triggers, the chance events - a song heard, a conversation spoken, a movie seen - these instigators of change are so often Pure Serendipity, fate rolling the dice in our favour.

Yesterday I chased up an insightful comment regards Monteverdi and his musical development, and I ended up at a blog entry called 'Musical Journeys". This post from a Norwegian expat living in Australia is the story of how he ended up with his current musical tastes, which seem focused purely on the Italian Master Monteverdi. He even reads academic works on the Vespers! It's a great journey starting with Satie in his youth, moving on to Garbarek (who!) and clumps of jazz, then having the great Musical Epiphany of Monteverdi. His tale will have you reminiscing on your own journey through the realm of music, and applauding Alexander for this delightful piece of writing.

Venture into past thoughts here.

Naxos in June

2006-06-20T09:11:00.000+10:00

Naxos continue to pump out the releases, and this month ain't no different. The only label to be continually exploring new territory, and at an astonishing rate too, its an utter music lovers delight when the first of the month rolls around. Some of the stuff I've partaken of in the month of June - Buxtehude Organ Works hits Vol 5, Vivaldi gets a 3rd disk of Bassoon Concertos, a loud disk of Stokowski Transcriptions taken from Bach, Handel, and Purcell, and Villa Lobos gets surprising continued treatment of his piano music, which now makes a 5th volume. There's a new cycle of Dowland Lute Music, not of interest as I already have a complete box of him, but well worth listening for those who haven't discovered the joys of paced Lute writing. Korngold gets homage with a reconstructed movie soundtrack - Captain Blood - and you wonder why his reputation has fallen through the floor, and there's Strauss with his Alpine Symphony, a composer whom I'm starting to warm to. A disk of Meynaud Chamber Music which I wrote about in an earlier post, plus another half dozen plus discs I haven't even sampled. It's a musical treasury.

Disc of the month goes to Monteverdi and a recording of his 5th Book of Madrigals. The more I hear of this Italian Note Weaver, the more inclined I am to give him a chair at My Table of Musical Masters. Novelties and Passion, and Variety, the hallmarks of a questing mind, give it a listen here.

Piano Picture of the Day

2006-06-20T08:19:00.000+10:00

Piano Picture of the Day is a rather mind boggling thread that has been running for more than a year now. Some of the outrageous things I've seen here - pianos on fire, pianos being moved by moped, pets playing piano, plus your usual exotic paint jobs and extravagant casings. It all gets a bit too much at times, and I find myself having to shut my eyes ... only to save the next crazy picture for use as background wallpaper.

Pianos taken to extreme levels, here.

Not for Human Dance

2006-06-19T07:03:00.000+10:00

I seem to have run into a bit of a modernist thread, with Ligeti dying, and Tubin Preludes, and Trumpet Playing Robots, and I'll add just one more post before moving back to my usual Baroque adoring self. Not that there's anything particularly wrong with 20th and 21st Century Music, it's just that this Spirit prizes a sense of order and balance, and while its good to venture into the unknown periodically, there's something about the human that finds the comforts of home, I don't know, safe. It's the returning beacon where familiarity and safety lies, much like I'm listening to the Well Tempered right now.

Today marks the 80th anniversary of the first performance of George Bad Boy Antheil's ballet mecanique. Excuse me for not inserting the appropriate accent markings, but I'm a lazy English user, and have become much too inured to the standard US keyboard layout. Onto the ballet, and the story goes that Antheil was commissioned to write the music for a film of the same name, ballet mecanique. Only Antheil took too long, and they screened the film, silent, in 1924. Two years later, the music was ready, but there must have been a gross miscommunication in the meantime. The film was 16 minutes long, Antheil's music ran for more than half an hour! The artists, naturally, fell out, and Antheil went on to premiere the music ballet mecanique by itself in 1926 in Paris.

Like Stravinsky's sacre du printemps two decades earlier, Parisians aren't shy in demonstrating their dissatisfaction when they don't get what they expect, and they weren't happy with ballet mecanique. On stage, there were 2 grand pianos, 4 bass drums, 3 xylophones, 3 aeroplane propellers, bells, sirens, and 16 player pianos. It was a hell-raising racket. The crowd rioted.

Ballet Mecanique has since been reconstructed, and a performance authentic to the original was undertaken in 1999. It has also been recorded. Intrigued? Click here.

Tubin - 7 Preludes

2006-06-18T09:24:00.000+10:00

Besides composing a remarkable 10 symphonies, the Estonian Composer Eduard Tubin (1905-1982) also contributed his share to Twentieth Century piano literature. He numbers 2 Sonatas, a handful of suites, and numerous Preludes amongst the black and white. BIS Records have done a pretty good survey of Tubin's works, including the complete symphonies, complete trios, and the violin concerto. I think most artists would be grateful to have such a loyal advocate, even if they can only watch on from above.

One of the stunning releases is a 3-CD set of Tubin's complete solo piano music. It's worth a check in when you can find the time, but until then, I've managed to locate a complete performance of the 7 Preludes. Composed in 1976, they make use of all the modern techniques of Tone Rows, and Percussive Effects, and Pentatonic Themes, but you can just listen to the playing if you don''t know what all that means.

Courtesy of an Estonian Music Academy I won't even try to reproduce the name of, and served up live via webJay. Here.

Blog on Bach

2006-06-17T18:15:00.000+10:00

Heads up, there's a new blog in town, and if the vibes are correct, he's going to be giving the scene a bit of a shakeup. "Blog on Bach" aims to focus in on the music itself, and avoid a lot of the personal chatter that passes for music writing. Add in a bit of history and basic music theory, and we have the makings of a True Classical Music Blog.

The layout is elegant too - a clean Wordpress template with generously rounded corners, a simple, easy colour scheme, and above all, a thoroughly readable text format with an excellent commenting system. It's won me over, and if you can appreciate the subtle beauty in detail, you will be too.

Drop in on Blog on Bach, here.

Scarlatti Sonata 391

2006-06-17T14:36:00.000+10:00

Scarlatti has been a perennial favourite of piano finger benders since he first composed K1. 555 sonatas on, and people like Horowitz and Kirkpatrick have been breaking their knuckles trying to master his full length keyboard theatrics. Now the guitarists have discovered how much fun this 3rd composer from the year 1685 can be, and making their own contribution to the world of Tendonitis Research.

Fabio Zanon works out his fingers and facial expressions in this performance of K391. Enjoy.

Press the big play button.

Brahms Quartet 1

2006-06-17T14:02:00.000+10:00

Winners of the 2006 Fischoff National Chamber Competition, the Opus Quartet present a movement from their performance of the Brahms Quartet no 1. It's the fourth movement, one full of fire and flare when it gets going, but sluggish elsewhere. There's a 20 second intro screen, so be patient, but the playing is pretty superb.

Press play.

Trumpet Robot

2006-06-17T13:46:00.000+10:00

Umm, I don't really know what to say about this one. Other than, I think someone needs to learn the difference between horizontal and vertical, and maybe the owner should take a few lessons in handheld camcorder steadiness.

Excuse me while I indulge in amusing videos.

Press play.

An Opera House Dissected

2006-06-16T14:56:00.000+10:00

I don't know if it's physically possible to take apart an Opera House, but Guthry from the Crunch has made a pretty good attempt to do so. Compiled from sources on the ground, and adding his own expert opinion, Guthry gives us a breakdown of Toronto's new Opera House, the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts. My arse, that's a long name, and as I've mentioned previously, it's going to be acquiring a nickname in no time. The Crunch gives us his view from a listener's perspective, and as always, Guthry is concerned primarily with the aural experience, the immersive event you might jargon it. Add to that a bit of bitter invective against the encroaching era of branding, and you have a very nice piece of informative reading. Get the low down here.

Ligeti Remembered

2006-06-16T09:06:00.000+10:00

The blokes over at ionarts do it the way it was meant to be done, and while they might have been overtaken by the more nimble and prolific Blogcritics, their sense of the visual and the adherence to the core principles of the arts remains strong and undiluted. And all this from a site run out of the blogger interface, it feels like a glossy magazine on screen, beautiful layout.

The latest posting from Jens Laurson is a retrospective on the recently deceased composer Ligeti. Focusing on the works summarises the man more effectively than the maudlin posts doing the rounds in the blogosphere at the moment. The "I met Ligeti once" and "Ligeti wrote me a letter" type anecdotes seem more self-glorification than genuine grief. But hey, if I had met Ligeti I might be telling a different story.

Umm, I seem to be getting a bit bitter. Time for some sleep, but you can read this fine post here.

Piano Talk

2006-06-16T08:13:00.000+10:00

The Web can be a bit of a lonely place if you don't connect. And the Classical Music community suffers more from this than other groups, people from all different backgrounds, showing a relatively conservative outlook, however liberal we may be in person, and not then quickest adopters of tech in the world. If you're into cars, or fashion, or even guns, I'm sure you won't have any problems finding mates to share your interest. But until only quite recently, the Classical Fan has been struggling to connect.

One of the oldest, and still thriving, communities is the Piano Forums at Piano World. Here's where piano makers, piano tuners, piano players, and just plain music lovers can go off into their separate rooms and start and contribute to threads of discussion. It's a well regulated, and dare I say it, a well tempered place. Drop in for a chat here.

Hugh Sung

2006-06-16T07:29:00.000+10:00

For those who haven't heard of him, Hugh Sung is a pianist with a strong technological bent. In fact, his whole blog revolves around the theme of "music meets tech", with an especial emphasis on the Tablet PC or Slate, as pictured on the left. Basically, Hugh sees this as the next evolution of the computer - laptops are so passe. You have all your sheet music stored on a clipboard sized device, just hit the screen or a button to turn pages, and with a wifi connection you can do all your email and websearching by writing with a stylus on the screen. Simple, intuitive, and powerful, it's the ultimate tool.

The Hugh Sung Weblog is a bit confronting at first. You ask yourself, is this a blog? There's maps, and handwriting, and little banners and buttons to press, all a bit of a step up for an arch-minimalist like me. But there's lot to discover, as Hugh has his own unique take on things. Here.

Grieg - the Piano Sonata

2006-06-15T07:55:00.000+10:00

Today marks the birthday of Norway's national composer, Edvard Grieg. Best known for his Piano Concerto, his 10 Books of Lyric Pieces, and the side music for Peer Gynt, Grieg seemed to struggle for that larger output that would put him up with the Masters. Early on, he tested his hand with a Symphony, a String Quartet, and some chance Chamber Sonatas, but the old established forms of the previous era didn't seem to fit this wild-haired man from the North. He would find his medium in short, rhapsodic works, pieces more akin to powerful poetry rather than the long, dense musical arguments of the Teutonic Brahms. Grieg, however, did manage to complete a Piano Sonata, it dates from the 20 year man with just one lung.

Courtesy of the piano society, and pianist Erik Helling. Live stream here.

Warner Classics Closes

2006-06-14T07:53:00.000+10:00

Norman Lebrecht is at his best when he's analysing facts and things rather than people and personalities. His sharp mind is eminently suited to following the threads and implications rather than the vagaries and ambiguities of human beings. That's why his "Who Killed Classical Music" which followed the money trail of re-released CD's and Superstar Performers was so much more convincing than his "Maestro Myth", which was just a series of unrelated Conductor bios, full of innuendo and gossip, but adding nothing constructive.

And so we turn to Lebrecht's latest essay, which is his dissection of the news that Warner Classics has been shut down by its parent company, AOL Time Warner Inc, the largest media conglomerate the world has ever seen. For those not familiar with the label, Warner Classics included under its broad umbrella the french operation Erato, the german Teldec, and Apex, a UK budget line. These served as the distribution points for their stable of ground-breaking artists, which included the blistering Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the exciting Endelion String Quartet, and eccentric finnish conductor Sakari Oramo. All can now eat cake.

Lebrecht points out that Warner Classics has been generating profits for 5 years running, no mean feat in a world of orchestral blowouts and arts funding fiascos. Why shut it down then? Lebrecht attributes this to an engrained hatred of the arts at the corporate level. As Guthry has mentioned, its not just money, some of the greatest philanthropists have been the greatest robber-barons, it's more a sense of the stockmarket, and gains that can be made with no effort, and no risk. Totally forgetting, of course, that Innovation is the means that offers the greatest possible market extension and profit generation. As well as satisfying the higher mind and being noble.

That's my personal rant for the day, you read more outrage from Lebrecht here.

Ligeti is dead

2006-06-13T18:20:00.000+10:00

The death of composer Gyorgy Ligeti earlier today seems to have shaken the Classical Community to the core. Viewed as one of the 20th Century's Greats, he had half a century of compositions behind him, of which the Symphonic Poem for 100 Metronomes seems the most curious and experimental. Then there is also Lux Aeterna, of 2001 fame, and the 3 Momumental Books of Piano Etudes, massively polyrhythmic, and full of Virtuosic outbursts. A nice entry point for those totally unfamiliar with Ligeti's works.

Sequenza 21 is a forum for Modern Composers. and they, of course, have tracked this event closely. Read the comments on this page to see what they're thinking. Here.

How to Use 70 Minutes Wisely

2006-06-13T14:57:00.000+10:00

waterfall has one of the most Raunchy Titles for a music post I've ever come across. "70 Short Minutes to Ecstasy", and I've left out the exclamation marks, purports to be an account of practicing Liszt at the piano, and it seems genuine enough, but I have to wonder what sort of fiction writing waterfall is doing in her spare time.

In all earnestness, I think this post captures the raw rapture that musicians get overwhelmed by when the music flows beautifully and grandly. Just as the experience of listening has very little overlap with studying the score, so producing Music Itself is a universe away from just playing CDs.

For mature audiences only, here.

Well Tempered - John Lewis Grant

2006-06-13T13:50:00.000+10:00

I'm relatively new to the ease of webJay, and now that I've found it, I'm hooked. It's basically a way of creating playlists of music files already on the web, and then enabling live streaming. Sort of like creating your own custom music station, or just a way of bookmarking new files you've found.

First webJay playlist here is John Lewis Grant's Well Tempered. It's a crafted soundscape, using midi codes to manipulate sampled piano sounds. The piano here is a Bosendorfer, and reflects the wide timbres of the real instrument.

Enjoy the Well Tempered here.

Sweet Vocalise

2006-06-12T18:55:00.000+10:00

Luke Stanley returns for another Episode of Cello Journey. For this 9th installment he teams up with a pianist buddy, Ross Inglis, for a piece by Rackmaninov, the Vocalise. It's a rather indescribable piece, part song, part lamentation, all built around a haunting ever-present figuration.

Just hit the big Play Button to get it rolling, and it you enjoyed this vid, you can find the other Cello Journeys at Luke's site, here.

Best CD's of 2005

2006-06-12T14:45:00.000+10:00

Well, I'm about 6 months late, and this list isn't even mine! Courtesy of ionarts, they list their 10 best New Releases, as well as the 10 best Reissues. I'm pleased to report that the Baroque era won first place in both categories - with Tharaud's Bach Recital picking up best new recording, and the "Scarlatti Cube" of 34 CD's and 555 Sonatas awarded best reissue. Now, that's one I'm going to have to save up for.

There's a miscellany of Barenboim, and Franck, and Verdi, and the Maxwell-Davies Naxos Quartets is a surprise selection. I'm not the biggest fan of Uchida or the Takacs Quartet, but they get double mentions. Full marks to the Pollini Schumann though, good taste.

Nicely presented, the Best Recordings of 2005, here.

Bach Gavotte

2006-06-12T10:31:00.000+10:00

Ah, there's nothing like Bach to warm the heart on a cold winter's morning. And nothing like his spritely violin music to get you jigging and jumping.

Esther Kim brings us the Gavotte and Rondo from the third Partita. The exaggerated pauses between variations is little offputting, cutting the flow of music, but otherwise fantastic, visually attractive playing.

Hit the play button.

Opera at the Four Seasons

2006-06-12T09:44:00.000+10:00

Toronto has a new Opera House! Called the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, we'll just call it the Four Seasons, it is the new home of the Canadian Opera Company. Naming rights were bought for $20 million out of a total budget of $150 million, so I think they may have sold out a little cheaply. Opening night is Sep 12, with the Ring Cycle kicking off proceedings, and giving the place a full workout in terms of logistics and acoustics.

Get more details here.

Online Metronome

2006-06-11T08:42:00.000+10:00

I seem to have a peculiar eye for the weird and the useless, and none more so than this - an online Metronome. Hey, you can set it to a standard Largo, or Andante, or pump up the beat with a 144 Allegro. Heck, you can even tune yourself with a Concert Pitch A. I even had fun changing all the dialfaces, and the "fire" setting just rocks. I guess you just set your laptop up at the old grand, read PDF music, and use the Online Metronome. Yeah, right.

God gave us feet for a reason. Find out why here.

Don Juan - Strauss

2006-06-11T06:41:00.000+10:00

To acknowledge Richard Strauss's birthday today, I'll dedicate a post to his first great public success - Don Juan. Recognised immediately as an innovation, its swirling colours, bold brass, and unfamiliar instrumental solos, all pitched against a literary storyline, Don Juan marked the arrival of the Tone Poem by an ambitious 24 year old composer. It followed closely on the tradition of the Symphonic Poem as conceived by Liszt, and if you really want to follow the thread back, it surely ends up in Beethoven's hands, with his unique Pastoral Symphony, showing again his all-pervasive influence on the Romantic Era, much as Bach would dominate the 20th Century.

Don Juan initiated a chain of imaginative conceptions, and Strauss could count Till Eulenspiegel, Also Sprach Zarathrustra, Don Quixote, and Ein Heldenleben, amongst his works at the end of his career. All have entered the public sphere, and worked their way into popular consciousness via film art, whether it be the original form, as in 2001: Space Odyssey, or secondarily through film composers like Korngold or John Williams, whose scores cannot be seen as anything other than Tone Poems, and they themselves have no problem admitting their roots.

I've managed to find a live performance of this seminal work, Don Juan, conducted by Mengelberg in December 1940. Live stream via webJay - here.

Piano Musings

2006-06-11T04:13:00.000+10:00

Piano Musings is a neat little site that understands its strengths, and sticks to them. Its full of little nuggets of wisdom about sitting down at the keyboard, using chords, and letting the dream of music flow through your hands. A rather scary thought for most classical musicians, as improvisation is a bygone ideal these days. Always remember - Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart were all reknowned impromptu performers, the music constantly lived and sought expression.

A beautiful site, here.

Classical Almanac

2006-06-10T15:58:00.000+10:00

History is what connects us to every other human being that has ever lived, and even simple stories can hold us entranced. Those little anecdotes of Bach or Beethoven as they conducted their daily lives - I'm thinking here of Bach's punchup with an unruly bassoonist - is what reminds us that these Classical Geniuses actually had human form, and had to deal with human things. Reading biographies is often the best way to approach a new or unfamiliar composer, as it provides the backdrop and the narrative to their musical work. For example, I've managed to get a better grasp of Schumann by reading Ostwald's bio, and the psychoanalysis certainly helped!

The work I'm trying to get round to in this post is "ClassicAlmanac". It's a free, online reference source that let's you pick the month and the day, and then returns a list of musically significant events. Just to pick one item, today in 1904 the London Symphony Orchestra had its first performance under Hans Richter, something I didn't know quite off hand.

Learn minutiae and trivia here.

Meynaud - Chamber Music

2006-06-10T14:18:00.000+10:00

Some of these pieces have a very baroque feel, which I like very much. This is surprising as Meynaud was born in 1950, and is as modern as composers come. Perhaps I was swayed by the treble recorder, or perhaps the rigorous Chaconne, or maybe I'm just happy, who knows. The Cello Sonata inspired by Faust is most inventive, and sustains an argument over nine short movements. One note to prospective composers though, timpani and double bass don't work too well in Chamber Form - character here is the key.

Worth a drop in, here.

Exposed Fifths - Welcome

2006-06-10T12:46:00.000+10:00

Well, I'm back. For those who have read me before, thanks for returning, and for new readers, a big welcome. My theme here is Classical Music, as filtered through the lens of a passionate devotee. I aim to provide links to the best material out there on the web, and act as a forum for classical discussion. It will be provocative, innovative, and at times a little strange, but I'm sure you'll enjoy the ride.

Welcome to Exposed Fifths!