Topics

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/9267899--saint-saens-piano-works-paraphrases-and-transcriptons-vol-1
https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/9267900--camille-saint-saens-piano-works-paraphrases-and-transcriptons-vol-2

In a fantastic recording too. By my estimation, almost two hours of the four and half hours of music is music/arrangements I don't have (and 50+ minutes of what remains is the Bach transcriptions).

https://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=GP859

Never heard of this guy, but the blurb waxes poetic about him.

Anyway, this is some great stuff. Melodic late 19th century character pieces....I  can never get enough of those heh.

So this is quite the long-shot but I don't want to have to go digging up email addresses or something...

So, back in 2011 the 'Johann Strauss Society of New York' compiled work lists of the Strauss family members (the three Johanns, Josef, Eduard). At some point the website, straussusa.org, became defunct.
Strauss Jr's worklist still exists on Archive.org
https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20140824092122/http://www.straussusa.org/JSSNY/Opus%20lists/Johann%20Strauss,%20Jr..pdf -- but there's no trace of the others left.
Now there's worklist info for these guys on www.johann-strauss.org.uk as well as Wikipedia  and IMSLP in various states of helpfulness, but nothing as detailed or complete as Johann Jr's PDF here.
So....in I'm extremely interested in finding Josef's. If anyone just happens to have it, or perhaps even knows of who to contact to maybe procure it....would be great.

Past while I've noticed the forums have been quite slow for me. No idea if it's a universal thing and it's not glacial per se, but it's quite noticeable.

https://toccataclassics.com/product/nicolas-ruiz-espadero-piano-music-volume-one/

He was a friend of Gottschalk's from Cuba....

Only listened to a bit of the samples but I'll probably be getting this one.

FINALLY

https://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=GP626

Though looking back at my list, I was wrong about how much was missing. I actually could have sword there were a couple works with Op. numbers that weren't reductions....but I don't see any. Still missing some (at least according to Ratner) reductions such as Marche Heroique, Le Rouet d'Omphale, Marche Militaire Francaise, March du Couronnement, Serenade in Eb, Elegy No. 2 plus a huuuuge amount of early short works and a number of later ones (all with no Op. number).

And I don';t even have anything called 'Bagatelle' on my list. Huh.

Obviously Rossini isn't unsung but his piano music is. MDG just reissued the 8 CDs of his piano music performed by Stefan Irmer in a box set. Suffice it to say, I'm happy to FINALLY have all of this (despite not actually being complete)....so much great music that actually looks more forward than one might think in a lot of ways (some of it anticipates Satie, as noted in the notes).

And Irmer is by far the best in this -- the performances by Paolo Giacometti on Channel are on a tinny period piano ('authentic' maybe but not enjoyable) and Alessandro Marangoni on Naxos just drags....

So yeah.

So, another mystery of a piece here.

Track No. 8 from this disc: http://www.channelclassics.com/fischer-27708.html
So if anyone has this, do the liner notes discuss at all this piece?

This is a very mysterious piece. If you've ever seen the wind quartet transcriptions of the string sonatas (such as http://www.classicsonline.com/catalogue/product.aspx?pid=3341 and http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=62777 and http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=204255 -- you'll notice the last one shows the supposed correct title)
This piece is actually No. 6 from that collection. THAT collection was arranged by Friedrich Beer (score here http://imslp.org/wiki/6_Sonate_a_quattro_%28Rossini,_Gioacchino%29) but Beer added the piece in question as No. 3 had been left out of the original publication.

SO -- the biggest question is, where did it come from? Is it a Rossini original in this combination (unlikely)? Are they "from an opera" as the Naxos n]liner notes imply? I know it's unlikely anyone can help solve this but any info would be nice...

http://www.amazon.com/The-Flatterer-Piano-Cecile-Chaminade/dp/B00MHIKP12

Unfortunetly, there is only one piece -- Etude Romantique, Op. 132 -- that I know of no previous recording. Kinda disappointing given how many there are yet. Still, any more push to get her visible is a good thing.

Since I never got an answer on a previous thread and am tagging a couple recordings of this, I thought I'd bring the topic back up. To quote what I wrote before:

"Actually there's a bit of an oddity with this one, as it seems to have two seperate finales, one of which -- supposedly the 'correct' one -- is also known as the "Concerto-Rondo". Actually the whole thing is confusing and the linar notes of none of the three CDs the piece is on shed enough light that I can figure out where the heck the other finale came from."

Still really curious. To expand a bit, the recording on Archiv is the 'original' version (supposedly from manuscript with part on top of that, etc). A different manuscript was given to Jean-Max Clement in 1948 who orchestrated movements 2 and 3, and made a few cuts to all of it (including half of the the 'overture'-like intro).

But here's where it gets tricky, as noted above -- in the 'original' version, the final movement is completely different from the Clement. The original one is in fact a piece known as a standalone piece called the 'Concerto-Rondo' (supposedly slightly modified when published stand-alone acording to the Archiv recording) which is completely, as far as I can tell, musically unrelated to the finale of the Clement version outside the fact they are both rondos.
ANY light anyone could shed on this would be helpful...

So I just got the final disc in the eight disc survey of Sarasate's music by Tianwa Yang for Naxos -- I reommend every single one.

What's interesting about this one, all but one piece transcriptions of other composers (and said last piece an opera fantasy), is the inclusion of the last and longest piece, Raff's The Love Fairy, Op. 67 (Le Fee d'Amour).
Obviously this was recorded for violin and orchestra for Sterling, but this is Sarasate's transcription...
Now the online catalog (complied by our esteemed board owner) lists Raff as having made his own transcription. But I went and looked at the scores on IMSLP, one credited to the Raff (or more properly on the score itself with no arranger credit at all) and one to Sarasate. But....both scores look exactly the same. So I'm guessing that Raff in fact didn't make a piano reduction himself, but rather the one credited to him is in fact this same Sarasate one.
Well it's a great piece either way...

I was thinking, since a lot of people seem to toss requests, sometimes even vague ones, around the board, maybe there should be a dedicated thread. But I didn't want to start one myself for the sake of drawing attention to myself and have others thing me stepping out of line (considering the treading line that forum represents),
So I figure I'd toss the idea out, anyway.

Surprised noone's mentioned this one yet -- http://www.amazon.com/Azerbaijani-Piano-Concertos-Badalbeyli/dp/B005KNOE1S/

A folk-song based piano concerto by Amirov -- the samples sound wonderful, as do the most of the rest of it as well.

I absolutely love the piece that was supposedly posted by Fazil Say....bought it from eMusic a few years ago. Would love to hear this newer version...

....but the link is wrong.

This is sort of a "just out of curiosity". I'm wondering if Raff happened to ever use a bass clarinet in his scoring? Unfortunetly the otherwise fantastic catalog (both the online and PDF) at Raff.org does not go into specific instrumentation.
I ask this, beyond my simple love of the instrument, because I did a research paper on the use of instrument, and the earliest uses outside of opera included Liszt's symphonic poems Ce qu'on entend sur la montagne and Tasso. Both of these Raff had a large hand in (as well as the slightly later Mazeppa), but I have no idea how different the scoring would have been.

So, it's interesting -- if Raff DID have a hand in using the instrument in these works, then that, perhaps, just adds another slight notch of innovation into his work. But it also makes me wonder why he never used it for his own works.

(...well, outside the Wagner march Raff orchestrated, but that was originally for Wind Ensemble so it's nor overly surprising to see it there)

The site linked to download works (more than symphonies) by this composer actually links to a file host -- a pretty crappy one that forces time outs between multiple DLs and a wait of 60 seconds to DL stuff. More problematic, however, is that the majority of links don't exist on the host. It's claimed "Such file does not exist or it has been removed for infringement of copyrights.", which is pretty odd since these are linked from the so-called official website...

The Violin Concerto, Symphony #6, and first movement of The Knight in Tiger Skin were all I was able to get.

So, I'm doing a research paper on the history of the bass clarinet (and its notational issues), and the topic that brought up Hausegger's Nature Symphony made me for the hell of it scan the score, and I found a couple nice bass clarinet solos. It got me thinking -- what else? I'm always looking for good music with my favorite isntrument, so here's some unsungs I know of:

Nice solos:
-Funtek - Orchestration of Pictures at an Exhibition
-Griffes - The Pleasure Dome of Kuble Kahn
-Karlowicz - Lithuanian Rhapsody
-Lazzari - Effet de Nuit
-Tushmalov - Orchestration of Pictures at an Exhibition

The following supposedly have bass clarinet part, and I own recordings, but I don't have scores so would have to listen again to see if these count:
-Bantock: Fifne at The Fair
-Charpentier: Imprssions d'Italie
-Griffis: Bacchanale, Clouds
-Martucci; Tarentella, Op. 44 No. 6
-Stenhammer: Excelsior!


And I'm curious about the following which do appear to have good parts. Anyone know them?:
-Chadwick: Symphonic Sketches, Tam O'Shanter
-Converse: The Mystic Trumpet (Naxos disc got some great reviews and is cheap)
-Gilbert: Dance in The Place Congo
-Loeffler: A Pegan Poem (possibly nothing of note judging by the score)


So, anyone got any more input? Note I am kinda looking for stuff I can listen to, so no Il Fausto by Vivendi, please...

This is a bit weird. I seem to be getting logged off every time I come to the forum -- but not untill I actually click on one of the subforums.

So, let's say I decide to take the plunge and buy up all the discs to get most of the currently recorded works of Raff.
At the moment, I own:
-The Tudor symphonies box
-Shakespeare Overtures/Elegie/Festival Overture (Tudor)
-Suite for Piano and Orchestra/Overtures, etc  (Sterling)
-Works for Choir, Piano, and Orchestra (Sterling)

looking through Raff.org, it seems as if the following full discs would be needed:
-Works For Violin & Piano Vol. 1   CPO
-Works For Violin & Piano Vol. 2   CPO
-Works For Violin & Piano Vol. 3   CPO
-Works For Violin & Piano Vol. 4   CPO
-Piano Trios 1 & 4                 CPO
-Piano Trios 2 & 3                 CPO
-String Quartets 6 and 7         CPO
-Sonatillen, Morceaux De Salon               Tudor  (high prices at Amazon but available at Arkivmusic)
-Piano Concerto, Ode a printemps            Tudor  (high prices at Amazon but available at Arkivmusic)
-Cello Concerti                             Tudor
-Violin Concerto 1 & 2             Tudor
-Violin Concerto 1 and Suite     Sterling
-Sextet and Quintet                   MD&G
-Songs                                     Hungaroton
-Fantasie-Sonate and Piano Sonata            Cameo   (can't find this at all)

And these guys are upcoming:
-String Quartets 2 and 3   CPO
-Piano Quartets    Divox 
-Piano Music   (Major Label)

--There's also the piano suites discs, but apparently Raff.org will sell them directly somehow sometime soon?
--From what I can tell, the CPO is a better choice over the Arte Nova in the piano trios, especially as the latter commands prices higher than the two CPo combines. Out of curiosity, is the AN set in a thick case or two separate cases, or is a single 'two-fer' style?
--With the upcoming CPO, it looks like I'd still be missing string quartet 1...is this worth duplicating 7 for?
--CPO only had four volumes of violin and piano, right?
--Anything missing if I skip out on the Tudor violin and piano discs with the sonatas?


Again, mainly I'm concerned at the moment with getting the least amount of discs to get me the most different music (while not buying a clunker). As far as I can tell I'm not missing anything as far as all-Raff discs are concerned, right?

(There's no good forum here for this, but I figure since many people here probably have a lot of discs I could get some input. Apologies if it's misplaced)
I've finally decided that my CDs take too much space, and I'm looking to buy a large amount of cases to slim down the space they take up.
Anyone have anything they use? I'd much prefer a soft type case that won't break when dropped, etc. There are some out there....but I can't figure out if any of them hold the back insert and/or liner notes. But it seems finding thin-sized CD case is a furtile endevor, at least ones that can hold everything.
I asked elsewhere and did more searching (some helpful theads on SteveHoffman forum) and got the idea a lot of people use sleeves of some sort. Jazzloft, Bagsunlimited (it seems http://www.bagsunlimited.com/p-3317-cd-gatefold-sleeve-nbsp-40mil-polyethylene.aspx is the way to go, nothing else they have seems to hold both booklet and insert) and www.sleevetown.com are the main contenders -- the last one seems to have a few potential options, and gives out samples for a penny...though they also charge hefty shipping. Still, under $8 for 7 potential options isn't too bad.

It's kinda surprising there isn't more out there, and what there is is hard to find. Anyone with ideas?