Spinning Today (Classical version)

[royzak]

Rimsky-Korsakov - Scheherazade. Beecham and the RPO. On a first label (white and gold)
What a great performance and recording this is from 1957 and less noisy than some of my recent lp purchases.

[sparrow]

I bought the Solti version of Wagners The Ring last week. I'm no opera fan but having listened to the first two discs of fifteen it is a very impressive work and I still have thirteen discs to go..I paid sixty quid for it so I had better ike it.

[jandl100]

I bought the Solti version of Wagners The Ring last week. I'm no opera fan but having listened to the first two discs of fifteen it is a very impressive work and I still have thirteen discs to go..I paid sixty quid for it so I had better ike it.

Ha ha !! - marvellous.

Talk about throwing yourself in at the deep end!

I hope it works for you - some folks seem to organize their whole lives around pilgrimages to Bayreuth to see and hear The Ring in its proper locale. Have you booked your tickets yet? Be quick - you have to get in years in advance!

[royzak]

Boulez - Pli selon Pli the Christine Schafer version this I presume will be the final one although he has been messing with it since 1957 this is 1989.
It is just beautiful music,despite his protestations about mathematics he seems to me a true romantic at heart,he can't help writing truly listenable music.
I have three versions of this piece,all conducted by him and all delicious.
my only problem is the comb over,as a bald person this I do not understand or trust.

[morris_minor]

This afternoon a long forgotten LP.

Beethoven 9th (bits of . . ), Rossini's Thieving Magpie and William Tell overture, a bit of Purcell, and some original compositions by Walter (Wendy) Carlos.

"O my brothers, Kubrick kopatted Clockwork and, with no appy polly loggy to anyone, he made it come to jeezny for the sinny. Then did all the chellovecks creech with radosty at him . . . . as the critics lubbilubbed in print and on TV to the genius of this dobby moodge, S.K."

From the days when synthesizers were bloody hard work, I give you . .

[jandl100]

Boulez ..... It is just beautiful music,despite his protestations about mathematics he seems to me a true romantic at heart,he can't help writing truly listenable music.

Hmm. Boulez What little I have heard has been a bit 'difficult'. ... with or without comb-over ... where would you suggest a new-comer to his music should start, Roy?

[jandl100]

Recently ....

Bach Goldberg Variations - Christianne Jaccottet playing harpsichord on an old but mint Concert Hall LP. I have the CD of this as well, the LP is so much better! Lovely performnace, too.

Bruch Violin Concerto #1 - Christian Ferras / Walter Susskind conducting on a MfP LP. Ferras is one of my fave violinists (his Sibelius concerto is head & shoulders above all others, imo). What a tragedy he topped himself in 1982 aged 49 after suffering all his life from depression.

Beethoven 3rd Symphony - Schmidt-Isserstedt / VPO on a Decca LP. Wow, this is how Beethoven should be played - magisterial, leonine - as if chiselled from granite! Great Decca recording from the 1960's Golden Years, too.

Beethoven Kreutzer violin sonata - Szeryng & Rubinstein - RCA mono LP. Picked this up yesterday in the Penarth Oxfam shop along with 19 other classical LPs. Average price, 59p. It's 52 years old and Mint for the most part! And what a performance!! Stunning - & I've never even heard of this recording before.

[Barry]

Been having a bit of a Beethoven 'fest' of late (or a bit of "Ludwig van" as he is referred to in the film 'Clockwork Orange', vide supra).

Over the last couple of days I have played all nine symphonies as performed by Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. (5 CD set. DGG Archiv 477 8643, 1994)

The Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique play period instruments, the same as would have been used in Beethoven's day and intruments for which he composed. I have found that, in general, period compositions always sound better when performed on instruments of that period. Whilst modern instruments are louder and more dynamic, performances of period works can often sound dull, pedestrian and lack excitment when they are used.

I have several versions of all of the Beethoven symphonies, and whilst this set is not necessarily the definative version, it certainly has excitement and is a joy to hear. A far cry from the late Karajan recordings with the Berlin Philharmonic.

Highly Recommended!

[jandl100]

I've got a single CD of Gardiner in symphonies 3 &5.

Yup, I agree they are fizzing with excitement and very nicely recorded. Very good indeed ... if I wanted yet another set it may well be Gardiner's.

[JJack]

Rimsky-Korsakov - Scheherazade. Beecham and the RPO. On a first label (white and gold)
What a great performance and recording this is from 1957 and less noisy than some of my recent lp purchases.

Found out that I had this on a compilation disc, will have to give it a listen tonight.

Was just listening to the Previn Rachmaninov 2nd, what a fantansic record.