Messages

Quite right that we haven't packed our Bax on my greatest nearby composer. Don't neglect his tone poems, or rather musical tonics, which can transform the worst of days. For here is to be found all the shimmering colours of nature, haunting enchantment, wonder and pure delight. He offers a fast-flowing stream of lovely melodies gorgeously orchestrated with a restless, fresh-faced inventiveness that captures the listener's constant attention. November Woods (1917) is a fine example.

It is now, Mark

This is an excellent set, although the box is no good to me as I collected 7 individually and am missing 1. I find Lekeu best in the orchestral works.

Even though there's an obvious lack of choice with unsung recordings, let me declare my buying preference where there is one and other considerations don't prevail:

                                              it's for (genuinely) live recordings.

This is true for both sung & unsung. Why? Because I think, however misguided I may be, that studio renditions are more likely to be ubiquitous, synthetic, safe, unexciting. Live has a good chance of more risk in interpretation and tempo handling, and of commitment, spontaneity, creativity - of the performers being swept up and letting rip in the sheer thrill and delight of realising the music on the page within the authentic forum it was intended to be heard: communicating with a real live appreciative audience. Similarly, for me, there is nothing like personally hearing a live performance.

So I was wondering: is this is your experience too, for sung, unsung, or for both?

Oh dear, my Gades are Järvi's but crucially, I did manage to find where they are.

I miss being able to buy CDs by browsing through in shops, looking at the choice of recording. The high street market is now so reduced, HMV is a shambles, but a surprise may yet be found in say a charity shop. Yet most of that stock isn't even your Beethoven 5 or Schubert 8-9: it's compilation snippets from the most well-known works, outdoing even Classic FM. This is what music in our society has become.

The top works have been recorded over and over again, and whilst there's sometimes agreement on what's best, there's still considerable room for people liking rather different takes and disliking other people's preferences. Even so, within the array of top conductor/orchestra recordings, more often than not, any will be good. But an unsung work usually suffers a double marginalisation: lacking top performers and choice. I am well aware of my vulnerability to getting something which I turn out to really like ... and then getting something else by the same composer which I don't - without giving enough attention to whether I would have liked it had other musicians played it.

Have any unsung CDs been issued with two orchestras (or whatever) doing the same work with different interpretations, or is the idea too way out?

Ah yes, right then, East-Central Europe, hmmm - any1 gotta map?

[Cecil Coles]

Whilst not a 1914 work, "Behind the Lines" is appropriate for performance in 2014. But it's not the best from Cecil Coles and I'm not really sure how the movements relate musically or narratively, presumably because we have only two of the movements. The first has a nice waltz. The second finishes in a sombre chill. I'd end a concert with that.

Hmmm, a fraud exposed by the BBC. Can anyone supply a reliable source / link. You see, after all the BBC's lies and bias - from world news to music - I wouldn't even rely on them for the football results.

Let's spare a belated thought for those neglected victims of musical crime: unsung composers whose work was nicked by famous names.

Can we identify the owners of stolen musical material?

Which unsung composers have had their work stolen time and again?

Can we blow the great composers' sleight of hand in being deceptively derivative, by identifying which of their works make use of a tune, idea, or whatever that was sourced from an unsung composer?

Are we able to finger which major composers are repeat offenders with a whole string of similar offences needing to be taken into consideration?

Can we, maybe, identify whether the thief has simply lifted the stolen material or passed it off as original by altering it?

Read through the discussion so far and I think you'll already see some valuable insights and some core points but I'd like to encourage more members to contribute so that we do pool and capture all the rest of the deep knowledge and understanding that we hold individually.

The last comprehensive sharing we did was the site review, and it was also productive in resulting in the statement on How does Unsung Composers define "romantic music"? But in a sense that's inevitably the negative side: the necessary limiting of what we do here. Ideally what I'd like to end up with is something sitting alongside at the top of this site which also makes the case for unsung music – which can never be in the majority but perhaps we can help reduce its marginalisation by extending the influence of our thinking to those who deliver and consume music.

I sometimes feel that members aren't only concerned with securing just for themselves the means of hearing unsung music by the CDs we buy and the concerts we go to but are making a social/political intervention in the market by seeking to demonstrate support for unsung music as a viable product in the hope of generating more supply and boosting its popular appeal.  I think progress is being made by certain labels and musicians. (I am far less certain that's equally true of radio.)

So, it would be gr8 to hear from more of us and then maybe to see whether it could be an idea to use the material to write something up as a case for unsung music.

[Just what is unsung music?]

Just what is unsung music?
Can it be as simple as this: The vast amount of music makes it inevitable that a lot of it will be unsung?

So actually there is no difference in the musical content between the two categories of sung and unsung music. But is that really true? Surely quality must be clearly higher in the sung category? That's what the distinction is about. Maybe, but a key factor in getting into the sung category is the pull of a big name composer. We feel that had an unsung work by an under-recognised composer been instead part of the output of one of these big names then it would be popular. But that does little to explain highly popular works by those one-trick pony composers who are famous for nothing else – except possibly the view that the best of unsung music matches the quality of the best of sung music. Certainly, unsung compositions have not been well-championed by musicians and won't be a big draw in the concert hall or a big sell in the CD market, but that sounds like a rather circular definition.

If I'm at a loss to put my finger on whether there is anything different or distinctive about the music, I am also struggling on the question:

What is it about unsung music that is so appealing and attractive that we make it our focus?

What is it then that is the cause of our enthusiasm and preoccupation with unsung music? Obviously, it widens the range of our listening experience. It allows us to hear real gems ignored by the world. We are supporters of unsung works as a category for the simple reason that they are unsung. Can this be a little bit selfish and elitist in that we access and enjoy the music that others either reject or, more likely, never get a fair chance to hear and decide for themselves what value these works have? But again, that won't really do, because we'd love it for these works to become popular, to be available in multiple versions on CD by the top performers and the best of musicians and for concerts to be less dominated by long or short-term fashion. This suggests there are underlying social values: a kind of musical inclusive democracy which promotes equality and abhors discrimination.  Politically or socially, unsung music seems to be a cause some of us champion, even campaign for! Or perhaps rather we feel the world is too arbitrary in consigning certain works and composers into the unsung trash can.  But then again, we feel some works deserve to be unsung ... 

Rott Symphony CD (Hansjörg Albrecht/Munich SO/OehmsClassics, possibly from Toblach) expected late 2014. coupled with 'lieder cycle' - possibly suggesting all 8 performable songs, which would mean 4 premieres.

This one is dedicated to the Alan Howe Test (and, who knows, he may be quick to reply and even give us additional guidance).

The rules are to cite your favourite unsung work - yes, you are allowed just the one.

Then you say what it is that makes this your favourite unsung work by describing what it is in what you hear that you so love and explaining how it affects you when you play it.

Finally, do give what you feel is the best CD of this work and again, say what it is that you especially like compared with any alternative recordings.

But enough of my take. Please, what say you?

Pretty much spot on, Dave. Erik Tuxen, Thomas Jensen, certainly, but somehow I have never managed to remedy missing 1 of the 3 originals. I think those two I have do stand up well to later recordings.

Is Nielsen one of the truly great symphonists? Unquestionably. Is he still unsung? Here I dare argue with the master of categories, Alan Howe.

I would not expect many concert halls to put on the Nielsen cycle over a season (an easier proposition than doing the Mahler cycle), there is not seemingly a performing tradition commensurate with the quality of the symphonies, and too many top conductors and orchestras of yesterday and today haven't recorded any of them. I suspect that among classical music fans, Nielsen remains poorly explored territory and maybe even among those who rate him there are many (like me) who (unjustifiably) don't listen to his symphonies that often.