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Messages - Mark Thomas

#1
Composers & Music / Re: Paul Büttner
Saturday 23 March 2024, 15:04
I imagine Alan is referencing Tchaikovsky's presumably unconscious (but remarkably direct) copying of a theme from the slow movement of Raff's 10th Symphony in that of his own 5th Symphony a few years later.
#2
Thanks so much for this, Martin.
#3
The CD has the same discrepancies between the printed track times in the booklet and the actual ones, which are the same as the downloads. You're missing no music.
#4
I'm away from home now, without access to either recording, but from memory my impression was that the Leipzig performance has a tad more drive and immediacy. Of course, that may be down to the different acoustic and balance of performers.
#5
The recording and performance deliver a pretty impressive punch, conductor Gregor Meyer emphasising the dramatic vigour of the work. The baritone Andreas Wolf has a powerful and dynamic presence and soprano Marie Henriette Reinhold, with a much smaller part, is also excellent. Both are recorded a little forward of the choir but not excessively so and the chorus itself sings with gusto and finesse as the music demands. The purely orchestral passages come over very well, the fierier ones genuinely exciting, and the pace of the piece is absolutely spot on - Meyer doesn't hang around and that's what's almost always needed with Raff. I suppose I'm so familiar with the work from the old LP recording, a noble but flawed effort, and this is such a (literally) dramatic improvement, that at present I'm rather bowled over by it. In this performance it really does come over as the master work Raff hoped it would prove to be. 
#6
Yes, I'd say so, but I've always quite liked that idiom.
#7
A new CD featuring the estimable Oliver Triendl playing Rudolf Moser's Piano Concerto, coupled with various of Moser's orchestral works, is imminent from Hänssler - details and audio samples her. Moser is a new name to me but his idiom, although clearly 20th century, seems to be within UC's area of interest.
#8
Composers & Music / Re: what is this piece?
Sunday 10 March 2024, 13:15
Oh, well done, Colin!
#9
Composers & Music / Re: what is this piece?
Sunday 10 March 2024, 08:47
I tried to download it when this was first posted but, despite having a MediaFire account, I couldn't.
#10
That's setting the bar a bit low, though, Alan.
#11
I'd missed this. It's an attractive work, certainly, but an oddly unbalanced one if the whole piece is played in this performance. The first two movements are each a substantial 10 minutes long and then the final two appear to be played attacca and last no more than 6 minutes in total. 
#12
Composers & Music / Re: Johanna Senfter: Symphonies
Friday 08 March 2024, 14:26
Recordings of the broadcasts this week of the Symphony No.4 and Piano Concerto are now available in our Downloads Board here. The final movement of the Symphony wasn't broadcast (an odd decision) so I've added it from the poorer quality version of the same recording which is available on YouTube.
#13
People, including members here, have tried to explain to me the commercial logic for performers or labels doing this and it still makes no sense. Paid-for streaming platforms, yes, but YouTube?
#14
... and with that, let's focus on Raff and his oratorio, please.
#15
QuoteI do very much like the site and the administrators
Thanks for the thumbs up on both counts, Maury. Much appreciated.