That's what Rob Cowan has been asking listeners to his 3 Breakfast programme on BBC Radio 3 this week. So please get in quickly with your choice, e-mailing it to 3breakfast@bbc.co.uk. I went for Lachner 5, with Lachner 8 and Rufinatscha 6 as 2nd and 3rd choices but, so far, he seems to have ignored my e-mail.
Cowen's 6th ;D ;D ;D
... probably Beethoven 9 or Mahler 6 *gets thrown out of forum after being made to walk the plank* (though Stenhammar 2 would be somewhere on a high list...) (on re-thinking and cheating by editing, and regretting that the question isn't about quartets - my two favorite works being for that medium - no, still too difficult... there are so many wonderful ones I would miss terribly - Wellesz 2, Myaskovsky 2, Sibelius 3 4 6 7, Brian 31, Mahler 4&9 too of course, to start or continue, in probably the wrong order, a too-long list. one? no wonder my cd-cases were always so large before I got an iPod. anyway. :) )
Alkan's for solo piano would get my vote!
Schumann's 2nd - or 3rd. Depends on my mood.
Mahler 7 and Bruckner 9. Of the unsungs, I'm still partial to Alfred Hill's Symhony #2 in Eb - The Joy of Life......
Maybe I'm a lightweight......
Jerry
Bruckner 5. No, wait! Dvorak 6!
OK. For unsungs, Rufinatscha 6 beyond a shadow of a doubt!
Beethoven 6, Schubert Unfinished.
Unsung : Dukas.
Raff's Lenore.
Draeseke 3. Because of its synthesis of progressive New German ideas and idiom with traditional notions of the symphony as the supreme musical form.
Sung: Brahms 1. Because of its utterly triumphant use of conservative ideas in an utterly fresh and inspiring way.
I trust, gentlemen, that you have all e-mailed 3breakfast@bbc.co.uk and registered your choices with Rob Cowan.
Havergal Brian's 'Gothic Symphony' with Boult or Schmidt conducting, (not the nasty Naxos!)
Well,life would have been allot duller without it!
Vaughan Wiliams: his 'London' or 'Fifth' with Barbirolli at the helm,but I'm afraid I can't decide which. They're both indispensable.
Berwald: Sinfonie Singuliere.
I am hard pressed on this topic, but I am particularly engulfed by Bruckner's 6th when I hear it. Of all symphonies, however, I have grown very weary of Tchaikovsky's 6th. Way overplayed, beat to death.
jksteven
Welcome, JK!
Just one? Well, Elgar 2nd it would have to be, with deep regrets to Mahler 7, Tchaikovsky Manfred, Bloch C sharp minor, Schmidt 4, Sibelius 7, Balakirev 1, Glazunov 4, Vaughan Williams 2, Bax 3, Rachmaninoff 2, Raff 3, and Kalinnikov 1.
Hadley's 2nd; Gade's 6th...
Sorry to be boring, guys, but for me it has to be Beethoven's 3rd - the "Eroica". It's virtually the first truly 'Romantic' symphony; it all starts from there (Romanticism in music, I mean) - and it's a work of pure and radiant genius. Never has the bare triad of E flat major been more melodically eloquent than in the opening bars. The whole work is truly heroic.
And after that it would have to be either Elgar's 1st or Vaughan-Williams' 2nd (the "London"), for similar reasons in that they seem to mark a real gear shift into the modern symphony, an attempt to address the disillusionment of the new century and make sense of the human condition. Whereas Beethoven's is a confident affirmation of optimism born out of aspiration and struggle, the two English men meet despair head on and turn it into a courageous realism.
not a boring answer at all, a very good one I say...
Another London symphony for me - Haydn 104.
DF
The Bantock Celtic Symphony for me.
then there's the parallel question for, say, piano concertos (not joking, esp. in regards a slightly earlier composer than we incline to talk about, Mozart, whose piano concertos- almost all of them- are on a much more even level of general inspiration, genius and excellence than his symphonies, where less than 6 are really lasting works...)
Sung: Beethoven 9
Unsung: Raff 1
Taneyev No. 2, Beethoven No. 5, top two of 1,000,000
Maybee this thread is the best place for my first posting in this forum.
My favourite unsung symphonies are: Draeseke's "Tragica", Taneyev's Fourth, Pfitzner's op. 36a, Hausegger's "Nature Symphony", Furtwängler's Second, Rubbra's First, Mennin's Seventh and the symphonies of Robert Simpson (especially No. 7 and 9)
Of sung symphonies there are the works of Beethoven (especially No. 2 and 3, and the first two movements of the Ninth) and Bruckner (especially No. 1 and 9, the latter my all time favourite piece of music), which I like most.
sung...Bruckner 7th and Schubert 9th "The great"
unsung...Rott symphony in E major...Bax 4th
...oh, and Georg Schumann's 1st Symphony. Glorious, Brahmsian music from a blossoming young composer. Utterly memorable and packed full of tunes and vigorous writing.
Sung: Tchaikovsky Manfred Symphony
Unsung: Glazunov No.6
Stjepan Sulek: Symphony No. 6
Hans Rott - Only one symphony available, Symphony in E Major. I CANNOT live without it.
Quote from: mahler10th on Thursday 20 October 2011, 19:14
Hans Rott - Only one symphony available, Symphony in E Major. I CANNOT live without it.
...and I thought ot would have been Mahler's 10th, mahler10th! ;D
I think the Bruno Walter Bruckner 9th might be my all time favorite. Altho all of Mahler would be hard to live without. Unsung would be one of Wetz's.....
Jerry
Any Beethoven, most Schubert (I've written a new orchestration for the 10th, and it figures there now as well, his themes are just impossibly beautiful), late Haydn (I love them all, but anything post-80 will brightens even the darkest of days), most Bruckner, Brahms'. For the unsung, Ries 4th, Kalliwoda's (do I have to pick one?), Czerny's 1st, Vorsicek's, Lachner's 5th, Gade's 1st.
And I still haven't heard Rufinatscha's :(
Sung: Mahler no.3, no.5, no.7 , Bruckner no.7 , Mendelsshon's Reformation sinfonie, Vaughn williams no.5 ,
Shostakovich no.11 , Rachmaninov no.2 , Copland no.3 ....Plus, Zemlinsky's Die seejungfrau (My favorite)
Unsung: Hans Rott Symphony in E Major , Franz Schmidt no.2 , Qunihiko Hashimoto no.1 , S.Gadzhibekov no.2 ,
Georg Schumann's symphony ( And his Handel Variation!) , Vermeulen no.1 , Meulemans no.7
Sulek no.2 , Braga-Santos no.4 , Perpessa Christus Symphony, and STRÄßER's no.2
Too much! ???
Atsuhi
Georg Schumann wrote two symphonies- which? There's a B minor early one and a later published one (F minor, opus 42, 1905).
Quote from: A.S on Friday 21 October 2011, 15:03
Sung: Mahler no.3, no.5, no.7 , Bruckner no.7 , Mendelsshon's Reformation sinfonie, Vaughn williams no.5 ,
Shostakovich no.11 , Rachmaninov no.2 , Copland no.3 ....Plus, Zemlinsky's Die seejungfrau (My favorite)
Unsung: Hans Rott Symphony in E Major , Franz Schmidt no.2 , Qunihiko Hashimoto no.1 , S.Gadzhibekov no.2 ,
Georg Schumann's symphony ( And his Handel Variation!) , Vermeulen no.1 , Meulemans no.7
Sulek no.3 , Perpessa Christus Symphony, and STRÄßER's no.2
Too much! ???
Atsuhi
Oops! reminds me to add the Scottisch (Mendelssohn) to my list. Yours isn't too much, imo :D
Could someone recommend a source for the Georg Schumann symphony in f? I don't see mention of a commercial recording on the Georg Schumann Gesellschaft site.
I know of no recording (well, yet at least). It was published by FEC Leuckart, Leipzig, around 1905, several large libraries have a copy of the complete score I think. (So unless someone's made a MIDI of the F minor, I'm guessing they probably mean the early B minor work. Wouldn't mind seeing a recording of the later one, of course.)
Georg Schumann's B minor Symphony has been broadcast and the recording is available from this site in this thread (http://www.unsungcomposers.com/forum/index.php/topic,1373.0.html).
Prokofiev 6th, Moeran 1st, Bax 6th, Sibelius 4 through 7, Klami 1st, Kokkonen 3 and 4, Shostakovich 4th, Walton 1st, Rubbra 6th, that's just off the top of my head.
Ahem - 'Which Symphony' is singular! >:(
Quote from: Alan Howe on Tuesday 08 November 2011, 21:05
Ahem - 'Which Symphony' is singular! >:(
I guess that means Berwald 3, then!
Prokofiev 6th
I forget which symphony I picked (Dvorak 6th?) but having just downloaded the Berwald 3 (which I hadn't heard for some years in its entirety) I may be having a "Singuliere" conversion experience!
so long as it has a substantial part with highlighted solo oboe and is conducted by Beecham.
...that'd be Bizet's Symphony in C, then? Perhaps?
The same. A work which the composer couldn't have known.
oh, I was just thinking of the "Singular" (symphony) connection. But, good point. (hence the reference to Beecham specifically of conductors.)
No, it's the Blodek. The trio of the scherzo is particularly reminiscent (to me) of trios from the minuets of early Schubert symphonies. The finale has some spots that recall the "chattering" finale of the Bizet.
Quote from: BFerrell on Tuesday 08 November 2011, 16:40
Prokofiev 6th, Moeran 1st, Bax 6th, Sibelius 4 through 7, Klami 1st, Kokkonen 3 and 4, Shostakovich 4th, Walton 1st, Rubbra 6th, that's just off the top of my head.
I am delighted to see another fan of Kokkonen on here ;D ;D (oh...and Rubbra OF COURSE :) :))
me too though I've only heard a few works of his (Kokkonen's).
Hard to choose just one. But Ok. Sung: Bruckner 7 Unsung: Kalliwoda 6. (For the Andante).
Even Kokkonen's 1st and 2nd Symphonies (after years of listening) now touch me deeply. Of course, "Last Temptations" is my favorite opera of all time!
Asahi mentioned two I love and didn;t even know anyone esle did: Vermeulen 1st and Perpessa "Christus Symphony." I am not alone! Mal
Beethoven Sixth
Braga Santos Fourth
Sibelius Fifth
Strauss Eine Alpensinfonie
Nice to see a plug for the early Bloch Symphony in C minor with its great valedictory ending and for Braga Santos Symphony No 4 too - a wonderful work in every sense.
For me:
Sung: Shostakovich Symphony 4, Bruckner Symphony 9, Vaughan Williams Symphony No 6 and the 1913 version of A London Symphony + Walton Symphony 1.
Unsung: Tubin Symphony 2 'Legendary', Lilburn Symphony 1, Miaskovsky Symphonies 6 and 15, Bax Symphony 3 and 5, Stanley Bate symphonies 3 and 4, Richard Arnell symphonies 3 and 5, Moeran's Symphony, Rubbra No 5, Eshpai No 5, Kinsella No 3, Lyatoshinsky No 3, Ivanovs No 11, Diamond No 3, Hanson No 3 and 4.
Quote from: vandermolen on Saturday 14 January 2012, 23:33
Unsung: Tubin Symphony 2 'Legendary', Lilburn Symphony 1, Miaskovsky Symphonies 6 and 15, Bax Symphony 3 and 5, Stanley Bate symphonies 3 and 4, Richard Arnell symphonies 3 and 5, Moeran's Symphony, Rubbra No 5, Eshpai No 5, Kinsella No 3, Lyatoshinsky No 3, Ivanovs No 11, Diamond No 3, Hanson No 3 and 4.
Ah, interesting to see a Lilburn symphony named in this context .... unusual, I think.
Anyone else prize the Lilburn symphonies?
I prize all of Lilburn's work. Except the electronic stuff. His music is so fresh and invigorating to me. If I feel really down aLilburn piece will always lift me up.
Sung: Vaughan Williams 3 5 6 8 9, Nielsen 3 4 5 6, Shosta 6 8 10, Bliss Colour, Rubbra 10, Martinů 5 6, Mahler 6 7, Bruckner 9, Tchaikovsky 6, Dvořák 1 9
Unsung: Tubin 4 6 8, Raid 1, Vasks 2, Holmboe 5 6 7 8 9 10, Brian 1 6 7 8 10 16, Berkeley 1 2, Cooke 1 3 5, Bate 3 4, Arnold 5 9, Simpson 9, Kinsella 3, Diamond 3, Barber 2, Still 1, Braga Santos 3 4, Guarnieri 2 3, Madetoja 3, Englund 4, Langgaard 4, Orthel 2, Vermeulen 2, Lilburn 2 - and so many more. ;)
Before this thread becomes an opportunity for further list-making, may I gently nudge forum members back towards the whole point of it - i.e. what symphony (SINGULAR >:() can you not live without? Thanks!
8) Singular? I only know about one: Franz Berwald 3, the Sinfonie singuliere. My own once-and-for-all choice would be Ralph Vaughan Williams' `War Requiem', A Pastoral Symphony
Quote from: Alan Howe on Sunday 15 January 2012, 09:39
Before this thread becomes an opportunity for further list-making, may I gently nudge forum members back towards the whole point of it - i.e. what symphony (SINGULAR >:() can you not live without? Thanks!
Even though your phrase "not live without" is not meant to be taken literally, I think you're asking the impossible, Alan, at least for me. It's like asking which member of my family would I save from death if I could only save one.... my mind just goes into a spin and I want to name them all! ;D
Too bad one can't re-consider the question as one of Pratchett's characters did (when asked what he would take out of a burning building) in the novel Maskerade...
The point of the thread is to surely to invite people to make a choice and give a reason. Much more interesting than mere lists.
Sung? Mahler's 2nd, easy. If heaven don't sound like that I don't want in. :D (More detailed answer? It does things to me that no other music can.)
Semi-sung?* The Vaughan Williams 8th - that battery of gamelan in the last movement never fails to send me. And the entire work as a whole is a masterpiece of convention defied, to me.
Unsung? The Lilburn 1st - I'll never forget the feeling I had on first listening to it.
*As an American, I get to claim Vaughan Williams as "unsung", I think - the continued neglect of all but a handful of his pieces by large American orchestras in my experience is absolutely inexcusable. In all my years of concert-going I've heard exactly ONE of the symphonies live. (The 6th, with Slatkin and the NSO some years back - it was paired with the Brahms Second Piano Concerto and something of William Schuman's.)
Although in general I prefer Bruckner's grand, imposing monumentality to Mahler there is no doubt in my mind that Mahler's 2nd and, in particular, the last two movements do represent music at its most transcendently beautiful :)
I cannot listen to the last movement without being profoundly moved. The last six minutes or so are among, if not at the very pinnacle of, my favourite passages in all music. Those fantastic key changes at "I shall live..." and again through the last three minutes never fail to have me come out in goose-bumps ;D ;D
I feel precisely the same sort of ecstatic emotion as Lenny Bernstein does here-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rECVyN5D60I&feature=share (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rECVyN5D60I&feature=share)
I couldn't have put what I feel about the close of Mahler's 2nd any better than Dundonnell has in his second paragraph. For all that I love so many unsungs and have flown the flag of Raff for forty years, if I could have only one piece of music to last me for the rest of my life it would be the finale of the Resurrection Symphony. I've heard it in concert five or six times and have cried at every one.
Quote from: Mark Thomas on Monday 23 January 2012, 15:59
I couldn't have put what I feel about the close of Mahler's 2nd any better than Dundonnell has in his second paragraph. For all that I love so many unsungs and have flown the flag of Raff for forty years, if I could have only one piece of music to last me for the rest of my life it would be the finale of the Resurrection Symphony. I've heard it in concert five or six times and have cried at every one.
I've only heard it live once, but I have several recordings. It's my go-to 9/11 piece...something about the words of the final movement, too.
I can trace the point at which I break down even farther than that - it's the chord under the final iteration of the word "Herz". Something about that...it feels to me as if
everything for which he has been striving over the past hour is finally bursting forth and breaking free, when the bottom drops out of the chord and out from under the chorus. It feels, for lack of a better term, as if the entire orchestra is hyperextended, and that it's finally touching what it's been seeking for so long. And after that, everyone is loosed from the mooring and continues onward and upward until the end.
To me, three composers have captured Heaven as it ought to be: Mahler, Vaughan Williams, and Boito. With all due respect to the others, only Mahler's is
really universal to me; Vaughan Williams' is peculiarly English and Boito's is full-throated Italian. But not worth any the less for it, naturally. ;D
Yes :) :)
Your middle paragraph sums it up very neatly ".....everything for which he has been striving over the past hour is finally bursting forth and breaking free...." :)
The greatest pieces of music, at least in my opinion, have a sense of direction and purpose. One is taken on a journey. That may be a journey of the intellect, of the mind, or it can be an emotional/spiritual journey. In the Mahler I have no doubt that it is the latter and that the closing pages are a spiritual release which is truly cathartic in the very fullest meaning of that word :)
i'm so glad to learn that I'm not the only one who is brought to tears by the Mahler 2nd finale. His 8th at the very end where the organ comes charging in also does that to me...... And even though i'm not he least bit Catholic, the closing pages of DREAM OF GERONTIUS grabs me even more than the Mahler.
Jerry
Quote from: Dundonnell on Monday 23 January 2012, 15:38
....Mahler's 2nd
....I feel precisely the same sort of ecstatic emotion as Lenny Bernstein does here-
Yes, indeed, Colin!
Bernstein is still my preferred conductor of Mahler - despite Solti, Haitink, Tennstedt, Morris, etc (all of which I have, and many more besides ;D)
As to a particular passage that moves me more than any other, it's in the 1st Symphony ... and I know that even seasoned musicians struggle to hold themselves in check during performances, at precisely the same point. Off hand I can't specify the precise point in the score - but I will do so later, just to see if others share that 'moment'!
:) :)
Quote from: jerfilm on Monday 23 January 2012, 19:22
And even though i'm not he least bit Catholic, the closing pages of DREAM OF GERONTIUS grabs me even more than the Mahler.
Jerry
I quite agree. I remember J.L. Pearson saying his aim in church architecture was 'to bring the people to their knees', and I think this is what 'Gerontius' does to people. The ending must be one of the most satisfying I know.
Sung: Schubert 9, because it's perfect.
Unsung: Schmidt 2. A piece that moves me so much it scares me.
I am definitely choosing Beethoven's symphony 9! i have bee a fan of his work and i do hope that i will get to play it on my own someday to, i have been so inspired by his music since i am a budding musician as well. i do like playing the piano and i have been learning to be good at it since i was a little kid although i don't think i am still that good at it, i am hoping to master his symphonies and get to play this one favorite of mine.
These have been interesting reads for me. Although I accept at face value those who offer a dozen or more in the "only" category, those who have gotten their response down to a single symphony suggest an implicit story - if untold - in their choices. Some of the untold stories leave me baffled. Bizet? Berwald?
For me I would have to choose Rachmaninov 3, in Ormandy's mono Columbia incarnation.
By 1955 - I was fourteen - I had come to know Brahms 2 and 4, the Schubert "Unfinished," Dvorak 9 - numbered 5 in those days, the Franck and Tchaikovsky 6.
One golden October day I bought myself a copy having just heard in a generic "music appreciation" class the same recording. I wanted my own, to hear it again. A thanks to long-gone Curtis York for playing it that afternoon.
It was unlike anything else I had experienced. It was if anything was possible, as if there were no limits to the expressive possibilities of sound, the opening of some sort of spiritual doorway, through which I passed in those days. A year later I was in pursuit of Scriabin, Mahler, Nielsen and Hanson, for example. And five-some decades later, here I am: Boleslaw Woytowicz and Oboukhov..
But the Rachmaninov has remained. The bare, tightly held - within a minor third! opening has latent within it all that of those days, and all that of the many days since, almost a wise, subtle, comforting friend.
As I said, with a story; and there you have mine - as well as I can put what is not told in words in words.
Best to all.
Thats an easy question: Vaughan Williams 5th my favourite piece of all. Mind you I couldn't be without any of his symphonies really.
Quote from: suffolkcoastal on Thursday 05 April 2012, 17:56
Thats an easy question: Vaughan Williams 5th my favourite piece of all. Mind you I couldn't be without any of his symphonies really.
My words too.
Quote from: shamokin88 on Thursday 05 April 2012, 15:25
These have been interesting reads for me. Although I accept at face value those who offer a dozen or more in the "only" category, those who have gotten their response down to a single symphony suggest an implicit story - if untold - in their choices. Some of the untold stories leave me baffled. Bizet? Berwald?
For me I would have to choose Rachmaninov 3, in Ormandy's mono Columbia incarnation.
By 1955 - I was fourteen - I had come to know Brahms 2 and 4, the Schubert "Unfinished," Dvorak 9 - numbered 5 in those days, the Franck and Tchaikovsky 6.
One golden October day I bought myself a copy having just heard in a generic "music appreciation" class the same recording. I wanted my own, to hear it again. A thanks to long-gone Curtis York for playing it that afternoon.
It was unlike anything else I had experienced. It was if anything was possible, as if there were no limits to the expressive possibilities of sound, the opening of some sort of spiritual doorway, through which I passed in those days. A year later I was in pursuit of Scriabin, Mahler, Nielsen and Hanson, for example. And five-some decades later, here I am: Boleslaw Woytowicz and Oboukhov..
But the Rachmaninov has remained. The bare, tightly held - within a minor third! opening has latent within it all that of those days, and all that of the many days since, almost a wise, subtle, comforting friend.
As I said, with a story; and there you have mine - as well as I can put what is not told in words in words.
Best to all.
That 2nd subject in the first movement is one of the greatest tunes...EVER!
Shostakovitch 10
Quote from: suffolkcoastal on Thursday 05 April 2012, 17:56
Thats an easy question: Vaughan Williams 5th my favourite piece of all. Mind you I couldn't be without any of his symphonies really.
The 4 and 5 are indeed beautiful but IMHO,the others are a mixed bag..
Sanctas Civitas is another work I could not live without..
Quote from: Mark Thomas on Monday 23 January 2012, 15:59
I couldn't have put what I feel about the close of Mahler's 2nd any better than Dundonnell has in his second paragraph. For all that I love so many unsungs and have flown the flag of Raff for forty years, if I could have only one piece of music to last me for the rest of my life it would be the finale of the Resurrection Symphony. I've heard it in concert five or six times and have cried at every one.
For me, the thing about the Mahler 2nd that I can also enjoy it fully when it's performed by B-category musicians - and there are not a lot of pieces that can be said of.
For me: Tchaikovsky's Fifth symphony, played by the Leningraders under Mravinsky. First classical record I owned, a present from my grandparents - and the window to a past life every time I play it.
Sung: Beethoven 8, Schumann 2, Mendelssohn 3, Brahms 3, Bruckner 6, Mahler 6, Taneyev 4, Parry 5, Vaughan Williams 2, Elgar 1, Rachmaninoff 3, and Sibelius 7.
Unsung: Staehle, Berlioz Harold in Italy, Rufinatscha 6, Franck, Biarent, d'Indy 2, Rangstrom 3, Magnard 4, Madetoja 1, Tchaikovsky Manfred, Lindblad 2, Lange-Muller 1, Atterberg 3, and Gaubert.
By "Stahl" do you mean Staehle?
Unless either Richard Stahl (1858-99) or Ernst Stahl (dates not known for certain- fl.1896?), or Berlin publisher Albert Stahl, was a symphonist?... Dutch Wikipedia article on Richard Stahl mentions musicals, marches, etc. but no symphonies. :)
Obviously Berwald No. 3 .... although lately I have started having a soft spot for Ries No. 5
Like everyone else, I want to make a list.
But if I had only two hours to live and wanted to go out on a high note, I'd ask to hear the final Furtwängler recording of Beethoven 9 OR a favorite recording of Bruckner 9 (currently Rattle).
If the selection were restricted to an unsung composer, my first thought would be either Draeseke 3 or Berger 2.
Kurt Atterberg's 2nd; I'm not absolutely sure that I could not live without it, but I prefer not to.
Just a quick note to posters: it would greatly improve the quality of this thread if friends were to refrain from making more lists and instead make one suggestion and tell us their reasons. Lists are of marginal interest (although, of course, they are easy to compile); it is fascinating, though, to read why somebody likes a particular work. Of course, then some thinking has to be done...
Well, he called it a "symphony," so Bax's Spring Fire? It was the very first classical recording that ever made me fall in love with music AND thus the first CD I ever bought, so it holds a special place in my heart. Without a doubt, it was Handley's way with "In the Forest Before Dawn" that led to the circa 11000 pieces in my collection now, 24 years later. (I don't think that's too bad for a Yankee living 50 miles from the nearest decent orchestra! lol)
I have the Elder with the Halle, btw. It's got better recorded sound than the old Chandos, to be sure--but it seems oddly flat against Handley's melancholy magic...
PS--I imagine Bax is "sung" to y'all over there. Over here, no one knows who he is :(
PPS--I'm glad I found your site. Very interesting reading (and listening) indeed!
Welcome, Ryan.
OK, I'll give a bit of back-up for Atterberg's 2nd. First, there are a number of symphonies that would easily outdo A2, but they are by sung, rather than
unsung composers. Second, it's recent discovery, so it's still fresh in my mind. Third, A2 is the finest symphony by a Swede (of those that I've heard);
I've tested Berwald, Alfven, Petterson, etc. but with little effect; so picking up A2 is a friendly gesture to our western neighbours :D Fourth, I wished to
recommend a well-crafted and genuinely entertaining late-romantic/"national romantic" piece to those who might not be familiar with it.
Bax's works are no doubt well represented on CD, but in concerts over here we don't get much beyond Tintagel (although that's an absolutely wonderful piece).
I agree about Atterberg: very listenable! I myself would choose the 8th. Its Adagio has a Sibelian melody that is hard to dislodge from the memory--and it builds to a passionate climax somewhat similar to the middle movement of Bax's 1st. I've also been listening to Madetoja's 2nd. Of course he's Finnish, but the more I listen, the more I like.
Quote from: Alan Howe on Friday 21 September 2012, 10:13
Bax's works are no doubt well represented on CD, but in concerts over here we don't get much beyond Tintagel (although that's an absolutely wonderful piece).
Really?!? Hmmm.... I would've thought that any country that can feature Brian's Gothic in its summer concert series would program Bax, as well! :D And I agree; Tintagel is one of those pieces to which I never tire of listening!
The programming of the Gothic was the exception, not the rule!
And to reinforce the point, if Bax's symphonies are rare events in British concert halls then performances of his extensive chamber works are (within my experience at least) once in a lifetime events. But, oops, the thread is about symphonies so having made the point I'll shut up!
Sung: Elgar 2 - but it has to be performed with the optional organ pedals at the climax of the finale. A major goose-bump moment! That's to say nothing of the very moving slow movement and the wildly manic Rondo [isn't this the most extraordinary movement?]
Unsung: Raff 3 "Im Walde" - it was an impulse buy of the d'Avalos version which hooked me deep into the Unsungs in the first place.
Very sorry to have had to dump Atterberg 6, Parry 3, Boughton 3, Braga Santos 4.... oh no, hang on - we aren't allowed lists ;D
Quote from: JollyRoger on Sunday 22 April 2012, 02:55
Quote from: suffolkcoastal on Thursday 05 April 2012, 17:56
Thats an easy question: Vaughan Williams 5th my favourite piece of all. Mind you I couldn't be without any of his symphonies really.
The 4 and 5 are indeed beautiful but IMHO,the others are a mixed bag..
Sanctas Civitas is another work I could not live without..
That's the first time I've ever heard VW4 described as 'beautiful' - I absolutely adore it but it's a fairly unorthodox kind of beauty!
Why Draeseke 3? Because its journey from darkness to light is so artistically delineated. The opening of movement 1 is the work of a master dramatist. To me it rivals the Ring in its level of inspiration. Yet the first movement as a whole hardly reminds one of Wagner at all. It is the work of a noticeably original master symphonist whose relationship to Brahms and Bruckner is as individual as Schubert's relationship to Beethoven. Above all, the finale of symphony 3 refuses to blink when confronting the complexities of the modern world. As with so many of the greatest symphonies, challenges posed in the impressive earlier movements are extended beyond anything one could reasonably expect. Bruckner's contrast of sacred and profane in the finale of his Symphony 3 is well known and cherishable. Draeseke's version of this antimony in his own symphony 3 is more subtle, more difficult to pull off. Yet Draeseke does it with, to me, more conviction and realism than my beloved Bruckner could apparently muster at the time of his "Wagner" symphony. That is a hint of why, were I required to choose, Draeseke 3 would share my final hours.
Well said.
Rachmaninoff Symphony No. 1. I first heard it on on vinyl, by Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra. Despite it being destroyed (then reconstructed from the orchestral parts) after it's dreadful first performance, I have always wondered what direction Rachmaninoff might have taken if this symphony had not been universally pilloried.
I love his later works as well, but feel he moved on to safer ground. Written at 21, the youthful fervour I find absolutely magical. Commentators find it uneven, but to me it is full of wonderful rhythms and melody.
Quote from: Alan Howe on Friday 14 September 2012, 23:16
By "Stahl" do you mean Staehle?
Sorry, yes, Staehle. I fixed it.
Ah yes, thanks!
Quote from: bulleid_pacific on Saturday 22 September 2012, 13:08
Quote from: JollyRoger on Sunday 22 April 2012, 02:55
Quote from: suffolkcoastal on Thursday 05 April 2012, 17:56
Thats an easy question: Vaughan Williams 5th my favourite piece of all. Mind you I couldn't be without any of his symphonies really.
The 4 and 5 are indeed beautiful but IMHO,the others are a mixed bag..
Sanctas Civitas is another work I could not live without..
That's the first time I've ever heard VW4 described as 'beautiful' - I absolutely adore it but it's a fairly unorthodox kind of beauty!
Thanks for the correction, I did not mean to mislead..The 4th is the most turbulent and dissonant of his symphonies. Very compelling, but certainly not beautiful..
Beauty comes in many forms, to repeat an often-used but no less accurate and true phrase. The concerns about plagiarism in the VW 4, now (from his student Peggy Glanville-Hicks) ... well, a different topic altogether, or two.
Out of all the hundreds (or even thousands) of works we each (i.e. all of us, this is not a royal 'we') have heard, many of which we have only recently been aware of through the marvellous efforts of those who bring us the jewels of UC, one work always pops to the top of my 'desert island' list - Brahms Symphony No. 3.
Not an unsung, not an extensive work, not a lot of angst etc behind it, but beautifully crafted, very deeply romantic and lushly orchestrated and one of the few pieces I stop what I'm doing and listen to - not just have it playing while I'm doing other jobs. If it was the last symphony I could ever hear, so be it.
Just a thought for today
Richard
I tend to agree. Prefer that to a high "E" - or to many other things, too (it'd tie with a few others. Used to hum a lot of the opening movement to myself just because, especially years ago.
In my honest opinion one of the most impassioned things I know from a supposedly (but not really) "cold"/"dry" composer.
I do feel these questions are rather silly. What - are you going to keel over and die if deprived of the nominated work? Similarly I'm irritated by magazine articles along the lines of "ten DVDs you MUST buy". Well, invariably I have bought none of them and feel none the worse off.
Quote from: Gauk on Monday 13 May 2013, 18:18
I do feel these questions are rather silly.
Well, nobody's forcing you to respond here...
In any case, I for one know I'd feel bereft without, say, Draeseke 3. Or either of Rufinatscha's last two symphonies. Or any of Raff 2-5. And if anyone picked up on my enthusiasm for these unsung masterpieces, then I'd feel extremely gratified...
Personally, I'm always interested in someone's enthusiastic advocacy of a piece of music, provided it comes complete with some reasons for their enthusiasm.
Then I would rather put it "what symphony means the most to you emotionally?", which is a precise question. There are very few things in life one cannot live without - food, shelter, etc.
That I entirely agree with.
The question, of course, is meant figuratively. Hence any objection to it on practical grounds is to miss the point entirely.
ok, now people're giving me impressions of a reverse Clockwork Orange setup (crossed with detail from the late Jack Chalker). You must hear Gade 7 once every 24 hours or this enzyme will fail to be uploaded into your cerebral cortex...
Hush, Eric.
Quoteany objection to it on practical grounds is to miss the point entirely.
I'll spring to Gauk's defence here, Alan. The point of the question in the topic's title is
obvious, of course, and not one to be missunderstood. There is though this modern tendency to over-inflate needs/wants/desires to absolute necessities: "Ten books you
must read before you die" etc. It's needless hyperbole, and that's the point that Gauk, and I, are making. Anyway, this has nothing to do with music generally or the question in the title of this topic, however John framed it, and I suggest that we move on, please.
Agreed. Needless - and mindless - hyperbole is everywhere in our society today. I just didn't think that applied to this rather interesting thread. What differentiates this thread from the hyperbolic listings all around us is interesting reasoning and argumentation. Let's return to that...
Quote from: eschiss1 on Tuesday 14 May 2013, 08:27
ok, now people're giving me impressions of a reverse Clockwork Orange setup (crossed with detail from the late Jack Chalker). You must hear Gade 7 once every 24 hours or this enzyme will fail to be uploaded into your cerebral cortex...
Hush, Eric.
Loved Web of the Chozen and the
Well of Souls series.
Maybe I
should give Gade 7 a whirl...
;)
Erm, yes. Meanwhile back on Planet Indispensable Symphony...