October 2012 - Classical Music

Bach, J.S.

• Jesus nahm zu sich die Zwölfe (Jesus called to Himself the Twelve)
• Du wahrer Gott und Davids Sohn (Thou true God and David's Son)
• Ein ungefärbt Gemüte (An open mind)
• Die Elenden sollen essen (The miserable shall eat)
• Die Himmel erzählen die Ehre Gottes (The heavens declare the glory of God)

Barber

• Songs, opuses 2 and 10
• Dover Beach
• Overture to The School for Scandal
• Cello Sonata
• Adagio for Strings

Beethoven

• Symphonies 3 and 4
• Piano Sonata No.23
• Triple Concerto

Bridge

• Berceuse (instrumental piece - orchestral version)
• Berceuse (song)
• The Hag
• Valse Intermezzo à cordes
• Chant d'espérance (Song of Hope)
• Serenade (orchestral version)
• Mid of the Night
• Adoration
• Norse Legend (orchestral version)
• Two Songs of Robert Bridges

Dvorak - String Quartets 1, 5, 8 and 12
Faure

• Piano Quartets 1 and 2
• Songs, opuses 18, 23, 27, 39 and 43
• Poème d'un jour
• Trois Romances sans paroles
• Ballade for piano
• Impromptus 1 to 3
• Barcarolles 1 to 4
• Nocturnes 1 to 5
• Valse-caprices 1 and 2
• Mazurka
• Elegie for cello and piano

Haydn - Piano Trio No.31
Holmboe

• String Quartets 4, 5, 10 and 16
• Symphony No.11
• Chamber Symphony No.2, 'Elegy'

Janacek

• String Quartet No.1, 'Kreutzer Sonata'
• On an Overgrown Path
• In the Mists
• A Recollection
• Variations for Zdenka

Liszt

• Ce qu'on entend sur la montagne (What one hears on the mountain)
• Tasso: Lamento e Trionfo (Tasso: Lament and Triumph)
• Prometheus
• Hungaria

Poulenc

• Trois Mouvements perpétuels
• Valse for Album des Six
• Pastourelle from L'Éventail de Jeanne (piano version)
• Two Novelettes
• Improvisations 1 to 10
• Les Soirées de Nazelles
• Novelette on a theme of Falla

Tcherepnin, A. - Piano Trio

I did mention the word 'avalanche' a little while back, right?...

Let's see.  The Bach is me still working through the box set I bought in March. Nearly at the end, now, and chronologically we're actually getting to a really interesting point: 1723,the start of Bach's tenure in Leipzig, where he wrote an... well, an avalanche of new music for performance in church.  This month, I listened to the pieces that got him the job, and the first pieces performed when he started. This is truly landmark stuff.

The new Holmboe continues with some more string quartets and Chamber Symphony No.2 which I know I liked.  Scarcely 'chamber' in terms of how it sounds.  For the string quartets... yes, it's getting a little tricky to remember which was which.  I do think I particularly liked No.5, but it's probably going to take a few goes before I know things like that for sure.

With Faure, as I mentioned last month, I went for the full-on experience, intermixing the new songs with all the instrumental music I already owned.  This month it meant I went from the 1st piano quartet, op.15 through to the 2nd piano quartet, op.45 - both marvellous works.  In between there was a strong focus on the amazing string of piano works that Faure produced from roughly 1881 to 1886.  There are just so many moments where a little turn of melody, or a harmonic shift, will give me a little buzz of pleasure.

Now, the songs!  The things I'm supposed to be listening to! The lighter songs (of which there are quite a few in this bunch) are never less than charming, but the one that really hit me was the more serious Les berceaux (The cradles). It's utterly beautiful, and I kept wanting to replay it even when I was 'supposed' to have moved on to later works.

The Bridge, Dvorak, Janacek, Liszt and Poulenc are all brand new (last month's Janacek and Poulenc weren't, and it was coincidence that I dusted off my existing recordings of those composers) and from box sets of at least 5 CDs, so there's plenty more to listen to.  With Bridge, I've decided to go chronological, which means I'm listening to his early works. And very nice they are too, but I'm effectively setting myself up to hear the deepening and darkening of his style which will apparently kick in once I'm past World War I (the pieces here are from 1901 to 1906).  With Poulenc, I'm not being chronological but taking all these piano miniatures more or less as they come on disc.

For my big new box of Dvorak's string quartets I'm jumping around, partly because of what I've read about the early quartets being somewhat long-winded.  And it's true that, while the earlier quartets are still nice, the musical material is more interesting and/or better handled in the later works.

I also had some warning about the quality of Liszt's symphonic poems, and it definitely does seem as if he gets a bit bombastic sometimes. But in general, the more I listened to these works the more I heard the structure and direction of the music, and got enjoyment out of the listening.

The most interesting find from these new boxes so far is probably the Janacek piano music, which really did repay repeated listening as I heard more of the strange subtleties and irregularities that give his work its distinctive sound.  The piece that grabbed me instantly was the 10th number from On an Overgrown Path, which is called The barn owl has not flown away!  There is something extraordinary about the fluttering figure that permeates this piece - and particularly something extraordinary about the performance of it by Paul Crossley, because I've sampled a couple of other versions online without it having quite the same impact.

My Beethoven listening took in the Eroica symphony (a name, unlike many others, given by the composer) and the 'Appassionata' piano sonata.  Both of them are every bit as amazing and extraordinary as the 'Waldstein' sonata I raved about last month, and prove it was no fluke.  As great as many of the earlier Beethoven works are, what sets these ones apart is the different world of sound.  There is more force and drama than before.

Having set myself up some kind of plan to listen to those 9 composers, I then suddenly got the urge to throw Samuel Barber into the mix. I hadn't listened to the famous Adagio for Strings for 2 or 3 years, but it's lost none of the beauty that made it an immediate 'hit' back when it was first performed on radio in 1938.  And there's much to enjoy in the other works as well.

This is one vast post, and it's basically me saying time and time again "ooh, this was good... and that was nice".  But in some ways that's the point (and I might just throw in now, that Tcherepnin piano trio is not something I enjoy and the only reason it will get replayed from time to time is that it's mercifully short). I'm trying to hunt down the GOOD stuff to add to my collection.  Despite the size of the recent purchases, I'm not just randomly adding whatever I can lay my hands on.  The 6 box sets in my latest purchase (one of which hasn't been heard yet) were whittled down from a selection of more than 100 that were available in a sale.  These were top choices, and I'd be disappointed if I wasn't getting rewards from them.

October 2012 - Popular Music

Tori Amos

• The Beekeeper
• Garlands (from The Beekeeper DVD)
• Gold Dust

Bryan Duncan - Mercy
Eskimo Joe - A Song Is A City
Patty Griffin - 1000 Kisses
Patty Griffin - Children Running Through
Missy Higgins - The Sound of White
Joni Mitchell - The Hissing of Summer Lawns
Tears for Fears - Raoul and the Kings of Spain

I finally completed the Joni Mitchell marathon, finishing with probably my favourite album.  I don't think it had the same impact as the equivalent Tori Amos listening exercise, simply because it was so much more spread out.  However, as well as listening to Hissing I did go back and listen to all the songs again, on shuffle, over the course of several days.

It certainly was interesting to hear the major shifts in Mitchell's voice, as well as the changes in style.  Another surprise was that some songs that I'm not very fond of seemed to work better when taken out of their usual album context.  One that particularly struck me was 'Lead Balloon' from Taming the Tiger, which frankly I usually think of as going down like a lead balloon.  For whatever reason, when it came on late in the shuffle I quite enjoyed it.

Bryan Duncan's Mercy has long been one of my favourite albums, and pretty close to my number one choice from the Christian contemporary music scene.  It's just that, until now, I've never owned a copy of it.  I can't even recall what brought it to mind during October, but after many years of thinking "I really ought to get that on CD", I snapped, logged onto eBay, and bought the first good-looking copy I found.

And it didn't let my memories down.  As far as I can gather, it was the biggest success of Bryan Duncan's career (the internet isn't so great at researching slightly obscure artists that were mostly operating in earlier decades), and as much as anything I think that's down to the darkness of the album.  Now, before anyone rushes out thinking they're going to get something seriously gloomy, I am talking in relative terms.  Duncan's music is naturally bright, sometimes even jokey.  But Mercy is the album where there's an added edge to the music, and to the subject matter. There are at least two songs that are about people having faced the tragedy of death - the tender 'You Don't Leave Me Lonely', and the utterly blazing 'Faithful to You' which is one of those rare songs that has such power that I can feel the need to play it several times in a row.  Like right now...

 And even the lighter moments on this album are mature and measured.  I certainly find it to be a satisfying listen, and I expect it will appear in the lists on this blog fairly regularly from now on.