Messages

O ye, of little faith. 

Brahmsian?  Oh, heavens, no!

Well I agree with that for sure, Jim.  I admit to not knowing the music of Albeniz in depth; as a student, I used to play Triana and some of the Cantos de Espana (until I heard Alicia de Larrocha play them, which confronted me with my limitations as a pianist!) but I found this Concerto really interesting.  It's charming, of course but it doesn't have the depth and spirituality (nor the delicacy) of his Albeniz's later works.  The thematic passage-work in the first movement reminds me of no-one so much as the Chopin of the early concerted pieces (the Variations on La ci darem la mano, the Fantasia on Polish Airs and the op 14 Krakoviak Concert Rondo).  It's none the worse for that, of course, but if I'd listened to it blind I very much doubt whether I'd have guessed the composer.

At any rate, it seems to me that your Turner analogy is a bit hysterical (in two senses of that word.)  After all, Warenberg was neither defacing the original nor was he committing a crime.  Perhaps your queasiness has blurred your reasoning?

While sensitive to Alan's request that we revert to the topic, I feel I have to defend myself against the charge of hysteria!  To me the analogy works from the point of view of the fact that once I have listened to one of these hack arrangements I can never again hear the original without the damn re-working impinging on my conscious -- it taints the original for all time.  As a silly but powerful example, since having heard the recording of Reizenstein's 'Concerto Popolare' from one of the Hoffnung concerts, I have never been able to listen the Grieg piano concerto without imagining the interpolations from Tchaikovsky's 1st concerto which Reizenstein shoe-horned into his musical joke.  So that that extent, the 'Turner' that is the Grieg piano concerto has  been ruined for all time for me by Reizenstein.

I don't know about other members, but I instinctively feel extremely uncomfortable with such cut-and-shut jobs.  If I went into the National Gallery and painted my own boat on a Turner, I'd be arrested.  If Rachmaninov had wanted to write it as a concerto he would have done so. I haven't listened to this and as a matter of principle, I wouldn't.

Thanks, X. Trapnel -- a very thought-provoking observation.  I must mull that over...

I may be wrong here but didn't someone famous suggested Moszkowski was the best orchestrator of his time?

André Messager is supposed to have said something of the sort to Thomas Beecham when recommending that he study with Moszkowski and I'm sure I've read somewhere that Jules Massenet held a similar opinion. 

I think that The Pleasure Dome of Kubla Khan reveals Charles Tomlinson Griffes as an Unsung with credentials to be considered a great orchestrator -- an impressionist, to be sure but to my ear, more Debussy than Ravel.  Such a pity that he didn't live to fulfill his potential. 

I've just had an email from Em Marshall (guiding light of the English Music Festival) which announces that they are inviting music lovers to subscribe to their eleventh EM Records disc, of Violin Sonatas by Gurney & Elgar.  The description continues, "The 2011 Festival featured the World Première performance of an exciting new chamber work: the Sonata in E-flat major for Violin and Piano by Ivor Gurney. Dating from 1919, this work has shattering emotional intensity and heart-rending expressiveness..."  The link is http://www.englishmusicfestival.org.uk/emrecords/subscribe.html It sounds to me a most worthwhile enterprise.

this refocussing and simplifying of UC won't please everybody in every respect...

For what it's worth, Mark, it certainly pleases me.  I am very grateful to you and Alan for being prepared to continue with running the forum in its renewed (and, if I may say, improved) form and thanks also to Semloh for making up the moderating triumvirate. 

Agreed.  And the early, irresistibly gorgeous  Florez and Blanzeflor for baritone & orchestra.

The fellow who complained about Rachmaninoff's memorability was Schoenberg acolyte Eduard Steuermann.

Ah-ha, thanks, X. Trapnel.  I had a feeling it was someone connected to the 2nd Viennese School but I knew it wasn't Schoenberg, Berg or Webern.  I can't remember whether I ever knew it was actually Steuermann.  Old age,  ?

the point of most such comparisons seems not to extend beyond proving the old adage that they are by nature odious. Just imagine some hack trying to make something of a name for him/herself by describing some composer or other as "the French Elgar" or "the Swedish Granados"; dumb or what?...

Quite right. The tendency to categorize composers that way is lazy and silly: such comparisons are at best superficial and, at worst, downright misleading.  Moreover, they obscure from the casual reader of such piffle the fact that some of these composers have real individuality, if only one can be bothered to do them the courtesy of listening to their music.  No-one who had actually listened to any Medtner could possibly describe him as 'the Russian Brahms'.

Australia's Miriam Hyde - her two piano concertos ... are extremely Rachmaninov-ian, and quite lovely.  I cannot honestly say I recall very much about.

That hits the nail squarely on the head: what distinguishes Rachmaninov from all the pale imitators is that only someone with tin ears could hear the music of Rachmaninov and not recall very much about it.  I can't remember which modernist composer it was who irritatedly remarked that the trouble with Rachmaninov is that his music is so damned memorable.

Oh don't tempt me...

When you refer to your

Kenny Everett- administered archives

does that mean that this album is in the 'best possible taste' category?