What are you listening to right now?
Fri, Sep 7 2012, 5:29AM
#2
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Naupilus, the discography for Brahms' Violin Sonatas is really saturated with all kind of performances. Schumann's is getting slowly there too. Brahms' sonatas are very elusive, difficult to interpret and to get into them. Schumann's first is a fine work, the second an extremely difficult and dark one, while his third is considered (by violinists) as..."unplayable" and a "torture" to listen to!
The recordings you have as well as the one 33lp mentioned are true classics, including the Barenboim/Zukermann (which I appreciate enough).
Since the field is full of recordings, I wonder whether you really wish to get into more recordings for comparative listening. Both composers cannot be served that well with one or two recordings, since their works are quite...slippery, at least as for the interpretation. If you wish so, I can give you some additional alternatives.
Since you make a sort of comparative listening as for the composers of the period, I would like to suggest a great project of Capriccio, with a two set of two CDs each, named "The Circle of Robert Schumann" (Vol.1 & 2), with a very bright violinst named Gudrun Schaumann and a formidable pianist called Cristoph Hammer, performing on superb pianos of the period of the composer (Erard, etc.). Apart form all the works Schumann wrote for the medium (and some transcriptions), it contains works form Joachim, Brahms, some more unknown composers and his..."poor" wife Clara. A "must" for collectors and not only.
Parla
Fri, Sep 7 2012, 1:36PM
#3
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Hi Petra and 33lp!
Thank you very much for your kind words. Birds and music make deep sense — through centuries and epochs or styles — for the cream of composers! That's a point. As for Wilhelm Backhaus (1884-1969), I don't know the EMI set you speak about. W. B. was — just as Julius Katchen — a Decca house pianist; although many of his recordings are nowadays reissued by such labels as Orfeo, Ermitage, Audite, ICA Classics, Urania, etc. Mainly live recordings or some youth recordings reissued. He was largely underrated in France because of some peevish critics (Antoine Goléa, for example) who disliked what they called the "cold seriousness" of his playing, which, from my point of view, is totally false. Have a glance or an ear at his Schumann Fantasy op. 17 of 1936, etc. The fact is that W. B. was never better than when — live — he could share his artistic goals with a sympathetic audience. This was the case, as I remember, in Paris Théâtre des Champs Élysées, in february 1964, when he played a titanic Brahms op. 83 with the Berlin Philharmonic under the baton of H. von Karajan. He was already 80 at this time and managed to play the most difficult part of this concerto with an intensity and a technical perfection opening the door to the most poetic vision of this piece. Another miraculous testify : one of the encores given in Lugano (11 juni 1953), the Nocturne op. 27 n°2 by Chopin with — his usual trick — some improvised introductory measures, faint and moving echoes of the XIXth century practices. There should be also a lot of writing about my favourite pianists, cellists (is there no stylistic affinity beetwen W. Backhaus and Janos Starker, for example?), or violinist? But time is too short.... I used, some years ago, to write recordings critics for the Bulletin de la Société des Études Romantiques et Dix-Neuviémistes, but as I was obliged to buy thoses recordings by myself, the adventure stopped after five or six years. Best wishes for a sunny day enriched by musical treasures!
Sun, Sep 9 2012, 1:05AM
#4
RE: What are you listening to right now?
I've just been listening to (and watching) a Blu-ray of Mahler 9 played by the Lucerne Festival Orchestra under Claudio Abbado in 2010. A devastating performance of a great work. I first ventured into Mahler 20 years ago at university by buying a DG performance of his first conducted by Abbado and he remains my favourite composer to this day.
In his ninth you look into the soul of a man who knew he was going to die and put everything into his music. It is my favourite symphony by Mahler although I would not start with it. Save the best till last. It always intrigues me to think where his music would have gone if he had kept writing beyond his tenth, lived a long life and seen the 1940's.
Watch this performance conducted by Abbado and you'll be truly moved.
Thu, Sep 13 2012, 11:00PM
#5
RE: What are you listening to right now?
For Brahms, Suk & Katchen. Excellent No 1 from Johanna Martzy (Swiss Radio studio recording issued a few years ago by Coup d'Archet on both LP & CD).
Hi 33! I don't know Johanna Martzy. But it sounds interesting! I have some recordings with Josef Suk (which I enjoy) and have recently purchased some music with Katchen.
Best wishes,
Petra
Thu, Sep 13 2012, 11:03PM
#6
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Hi Petra and 33lp!
Thank you very much for your kind words. Birds and music make deep sense — through centuries and epochs or styles — for the cream of composers! That's a point. As for Wilhelm Backhaus (1884-1969), I don't know the EMI set you speak about. W. B. was — just as Julius Katchen — a Decca house pianist; although many of his recordings are nowadays reissued by such labels as Orfeo, Ermitage, Audite, ICA Classics, Urania, etc. Mainly live recordings or some youth recordings reissued. He was largely underrated in France because of some peevish critics (Antoine Goléa, for example) who disliked what they called the "cold seriousness" of his playing, which, from my point of view, is totally false. Have a glance or an ear at his Schumann Fantasy op. 17 of 1936, etc. The fact is that W. B. was never better than when — live — he could share his artistic goals with a sympathetic audience. This was the case, as I remember, in Paris Théâtre des Champs Élysées, in february 1964, when he played a titanic Brahms op. 83 with the Berlin Philharmonic under the baton of H. von Karajan. He was already 80 at this time and managed to play the most difficult part of this concerto with an intensity and a technical perfection opening the door to the most poetic vision of this piece. Another miraculous testify : one of the encores given in Lugano (11 juni 1953), the Nocturne op. 27 n°2 by Chopin with — his usual trick — some improvised introductory measures, faint and moving echoes of the XIXth century practices. There should be also a lot of writing about my favourite pianists, cellists (is there no stylistic affinity beetwen W. Backhaus and Janos Starker, for example?), or violinist? But time is too short.... I used, some years ago, to write recordings critics for the Bulletin de la Société des Études Romantiques et Dix-Neuviémistes, but as I was obliged to buy thoses recordings by myself, the adventure stopped after five or six years. Best wishes for a sunny day enriched by musical treasures!
Hi Alceste! Thank you very much for the historical background behind Backhaus and his struggles with popularity and your own (lucky you!) witnesses of him performing. :--)
Best wishes,
Petra
Mon, Sep 17 2012, 7:45PM
#7
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Hi Petra & Alceste. Backhaus was one of the true greats with surely one of the longest performing & recording careers. His Brahms 2 (Boehm/VPO) made when he was over 80 is one of the greatest of this monumental work and if I want to hear tough uncompromising Beethoven I'll turn to his Decca set of the sonatas made astonishingly when he was in his 70s & 80s still with complete technical control. Some of the first classical music I ever heard as a child was his 1933 recording of the Grieg with Barbirolli on 78s, the first classical recording my parents bought. Intriguingly Backhaus was professor of piano at the forerunner of the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester for a few years before the first world war when he was in his twenties.
Johanna Martzy (born in Romania musicallly educated in Budapest by Hubay) had in contrast quite a short career and appears to be one of those artists who have achieved a cult following in Japan, the only place, so far as I am aware, where EMI have issued on CD all the recordings she made for them. I have her 1954/5 UK recordings of the Brahms & Mendelssohn concertos on Testament CD but being mono the original LPs probably didn't stay long in the catalogue. There were rumours of problems with producer Walter Legge and her last EMI recordings (Schubert violin works) were made in Berlin. That was the end of her commercial recordings but she continued to perform in Europe & toured north & south America to great acclaim before withdrawing apparently in 1967 with late motherhood and a wealthy husband in Switzerland. She died in 1979 aged 54. I particularly like the Mendelssohn; very much "old School" style with full rich tone and distinctive slides between the notes.
She had a great enthusiast here in Glenn Armstrong who managed to borrow tapes of studio radio recordings from Switzerland and the Netherlands and set up his own label Coup d'Archet in the late 1990s to issue them on both LP & CD with transfers done by EMI at Abbey Road. I have 3 of the LPs including sonatas by Beethoven, Brahms, Ravel & Franck. The Franck is particularly good but her pianist sounds a bit unimaginative at times.
Wed, Sep 19 2012, 9:13AM
#8
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Good morning 33lp and Petra. Thank you very much for your kind and interesting comments. When I was on the way from Moulins to Limoges, early monday morning, I listened to a recording of Backhaus recital in Salzburg (july 1966, he was 82, Orfeo C 530001) and I was, once more, totally impressed by the sensitive vigour he was able to express in the conditions of a live performance. Wonderful Mozart Alla Turca and Beethoven Appassionata, not to speak of the final op. 111, all delivered with a special and very striking immediacy. On the way back, tuesday evening, I listened to another live Orfeo recording compiling two examples of Backhaus aesthetic principles under the baton of Karl Böhm . A Mozart Kv 595 Concerto, the last one, taped in August 1960, with delicate ornaments in the last movement (which were absent in the previous studio recording), and the famous Brahms B-Dur, op. 83, taped probably at the same time (18 August 1968) — but live! — than his last Decca studio recording you mentionned. Backhaus was already 84.... Obviously, there may be in this live recording, but very rarely, some points to discuss, but the freedom and the impressing strenght delivered in this interpretation are over all comments, deeply moving, all the more if we think of the contrast between the frail appearance of the pianist and the power of his playing. There was, in 1958, a very interestingly illustrated book about Backhaus in the serie "Les grands interprètes", Editions René Kister - Genève, but the truth is that, as W. B. used to say : "There's nothing to say about me. I have never said much and have written nothing — hardly even any letters. I've always just played the piano!", the meaning of his whole life is encompassed in the testifies of his piano playing, notably the recordings issued from 1908 (Grieg) to 1969, when he suffered a heart attack in a recital (Ossiach, Austria, 28 june 1969) and was obliged to interrupt for a break Beethoven Sonata n° 18 after the Minuetto. He went back further to the stage, after a pause, begging pardon from the audience, to whom he gave as a conclusion of the concert and of his artistic life Schubert Impromptu op. 142 n°2, and, above all, a philosophical testament of his art in Schumann Fantasiestücke op. 12 "Warum?"....
Johanna Martzy was a name for me, thank you so much for the data and details you give me. I'll have an ear to her recordings too.
I have many recordings of the Mendelssohn, among them one by Arthur Grumiaux, and one by the underrated Aaron Rosand, who said that he recorded this concerto with such illness and physical fever that he was obliged to sit; nevertheless the tape is excellent (as for me), notably the last movement although the Radio-Luxembourg Orchestra is surely not one of the great instrumental formations of the last century!....
Best wishes for a sunny day.
Alceste
Thu, Sep 20 2012, 7:54PM
#9
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Thanks Alceste for additional comments on Backhaus. I have a vague recollection of a talk by or interview with Aaron Rosand on the radio commenting how the great violinists of the past could be identified by their "slides" or portamento. I don't know many of his recordings although I have a splendid limited edition LP of him playing solo works. Like many excellent Vox artists they sadly didn't benefit from the finest orchestras to accompany them!
Thu, Sep 20 2012, 10:50PM
#10
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Good evening 33lp and thanks for your reply. It's nice indeed to share views and ideas about what we consider as an essential part of our lives. May be your recollection of Rosand interview is on the net too :
http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/sullivan/interviews/rosand.p...
http://www.aaronrosand.com/interview_audiocafe.html
That was a great pleasure to know that Ray Chen, the winner of the Queen Elisabeth de Belgique Competition (2009), had been studying with Aaron Rosand at the Curtis Institute... Rosand gave summer masterclasses in the Académie Internationale d'été du Cloître de Cimiez, in France (Nice) from 1964 until 1976 amongst other superb musicians (Jean-Pierre Rampal, Pierre Pierlot, Pierre Barbizet, etc.).
What a pity, indeed, that such wonderful artists as Aaron Rosand, the late Walter Klien, Friedrich Wührer, György Sandor, or the underrated Abbey Simon too (of whom I possess, as a gift, a personal live recording of the Rach 3 in Tokyo, dir. Akeo Watanabe), are now out of the memory and basic knowledge of our contemporaries. Best wishes.
Sat, Sep 22 2012, 1:54PM
#11
RE: What are you listening to right now?
I am listening to Monteverdi's Vespers on Harmonia Mundi vinyl LP. I mainly focus on early and baroque music. Here are my LP's. This interesting discussion leads me to further research...
Regards from Poland
Sun, Sep 23 2012, 1:36AM
#12
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Brahms' violin sonatas are sublime works of which I could never have enough versions. Parla, you are clearly a person of wide musical knowledge and sound judgement so I would appreciate your opinions of the recordings of them which I have
Zukerman/Barenboim Perlman/Barenboim Dumay/Pires, Suk/Katchen Perlman/Ashkenazy Kyung/Frankl ( one of her few EMI recordings, deleted and maddeningly difficult to get hold of, apparently), Capucon/Angelich Ferras/Barbizet, Tetzlaff/Vogt. To my enormous surprise, I have found this last one has become my favourite..it is a live German EMI recording from a music festival.
Sun, Sep 23 2012, 12:05PM
#13
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Hi, Brahms...
I do love and appreciate very much the Brahms Violin Sonatas, despite they are not my most favourite Chamber Music works of the composer (I love predominantly the Piano Quintet, the Clarinet Quintet, the Piano Quartets, the String Quintet in G and, of course, the String Quartets).
From the versions you have, all are quite good and they all have something to offer. My soft spot from them are the Dumay/Pires and Kyung/Frankl. I never bought the Tetzlaff/Vogt, but, at least the violinst is a superb and solid artist to completely rely upon.
If you really wish to extend your discography on these works, I would urge you to chase the following:
- From the "original" or "authentic" instruments quest, the only available version on instruments of the period with two very devoted artists: Ilia Korol (violin) & Natalia Grigorieva (on Fortepiano). They formed the duo "moderntimes 1800" and they record on Challenge Classics.
- From the SACD recordings, there are three: a) Arabella Steinbacher (I have seen her in Berlin: she is an excellent violinist; I hope soon she can become a brilliant one too) and Robert Kulek (solid pianist). The recording of Pentatone is spectacular and very detailed.
b) Spivakov and Ghindin on Capriccio. Brilliant recording and superb playing by Spivakov.
c) Peter Csaba and Jean-Francois Heiser on Praga Digitals (the best Chamber Music label). Still competitive and very brightly recorded. However, a bit difficult to get it.
From the "other" ones, there are so many yet to choose:
- The latest very good one is a Wigmore Hall Live recording with Anthony Marwood and Aleksandar Madzar. The British are crazy about it. Not necessarily the rest of Europe.
- At least one of the Anne-Sophie Mutter's recordings. Probably, the latest one, on DG, with his very good partner Lambert Orkis.
- From the other "well-known names", some (including me, to some extent) love very much the Znaider/Bronfman recording on RCA.
From the less known or younger generation artists, try the hidden gems of the two following recordings:
- Genevieve Laurenceau/Johan Farzot on Zigzag (Brilliant!).
- Antje Weithaas/Silke Avenhaus on Avi-music (very emotional performance in a warm acoustics recording).
Good hunting!
Parla
Wed, Oct 10 2012, 5:01PM
#14
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Brahms, and violin, coincidentally, though here at the Bong vicarage it's the Violin Concerto (with Herman Krebbers and the RCO under Haitink, on Philips Universo).
As this is the only recording of this work in my possession, I'd be interested to know how other members rate it. What alternatives should I consider to hear other good interpretations?
Thu, Oct 11 2012, 3:25PM
#15
RE: What are you listening to right now?
Brahms' Violin Concerto is the one of the three peaks of the repertory (the other are Beethoven's and Tchaikovsky's). So, practically every violinist has recorded it; the great ones even more than once. So, you can choose at will.
I could give you only indicative suggestions, to go a bit further from the only one recording you have.
From the big old and very great names, I strongly believe Oistrach is the one to go after. There are quite a few recordings with him, but the one with G. Szell and the Cleveland Orch. (on EMI), in a quite impressive transfer on SACD, is the one to have. There is, in this double set, the Double Concerto by Brahms with Rostropovich as well as Beethoven's Violin Concerto and the Triple one (with Richter, Rostropovich and BPO under Karajan). For a cheaper solution, there is a very good recording again with Oistrach under Kondrashin, from his years in Russia, in a new pressing from Regis (it contains also Dvorak's Concerto).
If you wish to go further in the past, Milstein under Steinberg and the Pittsburgh S.O., on EMI, is a great one. No much praise for the old recording.
From these great masters, Szeryng had a superb reading of the work under Haitink and the RCO (from early 70s), now on Newton.
Going a bit forward, I trust Mutter has this Concerto in her blood. I have seen her live and she was superb, in every way. I guess you may try her first recording of the work with Karajan and the BPO.
From the very recent ones, I enjoy pretty much the one on Pentatone, in brilliant SACD, with Julia Fischer under the late Kreizberg. Very impressive and utterly detailed reading and recording. Gil Shaham under Abbado and the BPO, on DG, is a very solid performance, in a very good and analytical recording.
Finally, for a more lean but brilliant performance, you may try either Christian Teztlaff (a great violinist of our time) under Dausgaard, on Virgin, or Thomas Zehetmair (another excellent soloist) with Northern Sinfonia, on Avie.
I hope you have something to explore, if you're that interested.
Parla
For Brahms, Suk & Katchen. Excellent No 1 from Johanna Martzy (Swiss Radio studio recording issued a few years ago by Coup d'Archet on both LP & CD).