BBC Radio 3's Composer of the Week (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0025dfh) is Luise Adolpha Le Beau. Much of the music being played during the week's five programmes is from commercial releases, but tomorrow there'll be a performance of her Concert Overture Op.23 and the episodes on Thursday and Friday will feature the first two movements of her Symphony in F major Op.41, an Allegro con fuoco and an Adagio . These orchestral pieces are played by the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Geoffrey Patterson. The series will be available on catch-up for a four weeks or so.
Hi Mark: might you be recording the movements of her Symphony?
Not this week as I'll not be at home but, if no one else has, then I'll record the two Symphony movements next week.
Thanks, Mark. Very good of you.
Mark
Tks for uploading her Overture. Much appreciated. I already have her PC on a CD and (IIRC) I really enjoyed that but otherwise the cupboard seems somewhat bare of her orchestral works.
Best wishes
Richard
Mark,
Is this work to be broadcast her Op 41? If so, a score publisher I came across (https://furore-verlag.de/en/women-composer/luise-adolpha-le-beau/) says the whole work lasts about 60 mins, which suggests a full, 4-movement work for her Op 41.
With respect to the two forthcoming movements from her symphony, do we know if the orchestra is only performing two movements or if they were all performed (recorded?), of which only the first two are being broadcast?
Any early info much appreciated
Best wishes
Richard
I ask because if the whole work has ben performed then hopefully it was recorded at the same time (or else a recording is planned for a later date or a glorious recording opportunity was wasted - whichever!)
Mark,
PS Just noticed the original post confirms this is Op 41. Sorry I have taken 3 posts to convey what should have been in just 1. Getting a bit muddle-headed these days
Richard
Quote from: Richard Moss on Wednesday 04 December 2024, 11:10With respect to the two forthcoming movements from her symphony, do we know if the orchestra is only performing two movements or if they were all performed (recorded?), of which only the first two are being broadcast?
I have no idea, I'm afraid.
There appear to be 3 extracts from her Symphony Op. 41: the Allegro con fuoco on Thursday and the Adagio, plus something uninformatively called "excerpt" on Friday. It would be helpful to know precisely what this "excerpt" is but it is hopeless these days to expect scholarly discipline from Radio 3.
Quite so. I assumed that it was just a repeat of part of one of those two movements to close the episode and series, so I didn't mention it. I'll record it of course, just to be on the safe side.
Many thanks for uploading the Concert Overture, Mark.
I wonder if this is a rehearsal. It maybe me, but I find the usually excellent BBCSSO sounding a bit amateurish in this performance. The opening discord (lasting a full 3 seconds - 0.27 to 0.29) surely isn't what the score indicates? And, throughout it sounds as if the orchestra is uncertain what comes next. Nonetheless, it comes across as an accomplished and enjoyable work.
Quote from: Gareth Vaughan on Wednesday 04 December 2024, 11:53plus something uninformatively called "excerpt" on Friday.
The third part is the scherzo and finale movements. So the entire symphony is broadcasted
Quote from: Mark Thomas on Monday 02 December 2024, 19:05Not this week as I'll not be at home but, if no one else has, then I'll record the two Symphony movements next week.
Mark, I've recorded the three latter movements broadcasted in the last episode, but I'm unable to play and record the fourth episode that contains the opening movement ("This content doesn't seem to be working")
PS: Now I have recorded the first movement successfully. Will upload soon.
Thank you very much (and thank you to Ilja too). That's great. How odd that the BBC didn't announce that they'd be playing the final two movements. Still, we should be grateful and I'm very much looking forward to hearing them all when I get home. What do friends think of the Symphony? I can't say I was over-impressed by the Concert Overture.
Hi All,
I caught a few moments of COtW on the way home from work a couple of times this week and I was very impressed. I shall have to make an effort to get to know her works better, thanks for uploading the Symphony, it sounded great.
Best regards,
Jonathan
For me, the issue with this symphony is that it just offers so little contrast, both dynamic and emotional. I took my time to listen to the whole thing this morning, but found myself having real problems concentrating on the music and not think about today's shopping. It just chugs merrily along without any real highs or lows, until it's suddenly over. Of course it's all competently done and quite pretty in places, but also feels eminently inconsequential. To be honest, Le Beau's piano concerto also suffers from this, albeit to a lesser degree. It's possible that her life in a rather rigid military bourgeois milieu may explain this tendency to "colour within the lines", as it were.
Thank yo tuatara442442 for the Beau symphony upload. Look forward to listening to it during the week.
Best wishes
Richard
Sounds pretty much like my impression of the Concert Overture, then. Thanks for the review, Ilja.
I hardly dare mention it, but we've been here before. So, is this a case of another female composer possibly being promoted above countless worthy (superior?) male composers? Why, for example, is the BBC promoting Le Beau above, say, Thieriot (to take a vastly superior composer)?
Surely it can't be a question of ticking boxes and meeting quotas? Can it?
Surely not!
While I don't think that the exploration of the music created by one half of humanity is by any means unnecessary, in this case we're noticing that the canon is still in the process of being compiled. Unfortunately I feel that Le Beau just doesn't measure up to female contemporaries such as Chaminade, Munktell, Kralik or Netzel (to sum up a random assemblage): people whose music shows individuality and more than a little daring, even if it doesn't always land. It's all too restrained, safe and non-committal, and the good ideas are flushed away because of a lack of true exploration. There is something deep down, but it just doesn't come to fruition. In that way, it feels like much Spohr's less inspired works (and there's a lot of that) to me. And it doesn't sound much more advanced, to be honest.
Quote from: Ilja on Sunday 08 December 2024, 19:10the music created by one half of humanity
I understand the point you're making, but the reality is that, in respect of the composers we cover here at UC, the music composed by women must amount to a very small percentage of the total.
I am curious what CotW holds in 2025, though. Later this month has two brief choral works by Vitols/Wihtol among other things, anyway...
Quote from: Alan Howe on Sunday 08 December 2024, 19:16Quote from: Ilja on Sunday 08 December 2024, 19:10the music created by one half of humanity
I understand the point you're making, but the reality is that, in respect of the composers we cover here at UC, the music composed by women must amount to a very small percentage of the total.
That's true, and we need to acknowledge that the reason for that is mainly due to social circumstances of the time, which hindered that half of humanity to fulfill their artistic potential. In addition, 19th-century female composers usually came from privileged backgrounds, and as a result their work tended to be of a rather conservative nature (although there are exceptions; e.g., Chaminade). So not only is there not a lot of music, let alone in "big" orchestral genres, it is often not very artistically advanced. The third complication is that for a long time, the few female composers that received any attention did so because of their relationship to more famous male counterparts: I'm referring to Clara Schumann and Fanny Mendelssohn in particular.*
What we can do here, I feel, is give this music an honest review and try, through the modest means we have, to push those composers whose talent deserves it. And while low in terms of numbers, they are there - see the ones I mentioned above. Personally, I feel that Kralik's symphony (not received with much enthusiasm here, but all of you are just plain wrong) can compete with anything written at the time, Charlotte Sohy's piano music is sensational, and Cécile Chaminade was an incredible talent.
*While Clara Schumann's piano concerto is not bad at all, it's also nothing special compared with what must have been hundreds of roughly contemporary German concertos.
It's not a great roster, though, is it? Let's just be honest - and, as Ilja says, let's simply welcome what's good among the compositions by female composers.
Unfortunately Le Beau's music isn't it, though.
No, quite.
Quote from: Alan Howe on Sunday 08 December 2024, 19:16I understand the point you're making, but the reality is that, in respect of the composers we cover here at UC, the music composed by women must amount to a very small percentage of the total.
Isn't this a reason to pay special attention to it? I'd say that the gender balance among members of this forum is just about as lopsided as the gender balance among the composers we are dealing with. Which makes it easy to believe that there may very well be some subconscious old fashioned prejudice in play.
As to the specific case of Luise Le Beau: I agree with the judgement here, based not on the symphony but on several other pieces I have listened to.
I have heard music that got big praise on this forum that turned out just as dull as this symphony when I checked it out (Moszkowski for example). Yes, we should not promote someone's music because of a composers gender or background. But we should also be cautious about not doing the opposite.
Solid point. (and that's from someone who adores the Moszkowski symphony and counts the minutes until Toccata release it)
To return to le Beau's Symphony, it was hardly worth the effort. Very small beer indeed - not because it's by a woman, but because it just doesn't stand up. As a 25-minute symphony it's dwarfed by Bizet's in C major, to name just one of comparable length.
I remain as resolutely gender-blind as possible. It's the music that matters.
The best way to test such a commendable intention, IMHO, would be to do a blindfold test.
A bit like "Innocent Ear".