February 2014 - Classical Music

Bach, J.S.

• Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen (Rejoice, you hearts)
• Ein Herz, das seinen Jesum lebend Weiß (A heart that knows its Jesus)
• Nimm, was dein ist, und gehe hin (Take what is yours and go your way)
• Leichtgesinnte Flattergeister (Careless muddled spirits)

Beethoven

• Piano Concertos 1 & 2
• String Quartet No.16
• The Creatures of Prometheus 

Brahms - Violin Concerto
Debussy - Piano Trio
Elgar - String Quartet
Faure

• Fantasie for Piano and Orchestra
• Cello Sonata No.1
• Mirages 

Holmboe

• Symphonies 2-6 and 8-13
• Chamber Symphony No.1
• Sinfonias 2 & 3
• Epitaph
• Epilog
• Liber Canticorum, Book I 

Mahler - Symphony No.5
Mahler - Kindertotenlieder
Mendelssohn - Cello Sonatas 1 & 2
Mendelssohn - Piano Trio No.1
Poulenc

• Les Soirées de Nazelles
• Suite Francaise (piano version)
• Feuillets d'album (Album leaves)
• Villageoises
• Presto in B flat
• Two intermezzi
• Humoresque
• Badinage 

Rachmaninov

• The Bells
• 13 Preludes, op.32
• Etudes-Tableaux, op.33

Ravel

• Piano Trio
• Violin Sonata No.1 (posthumous)
• Valses nobles et sentimentales
• Le Tombeau de Couperin
• Prelude for piano
• A la maniere de...

Schubert - Piano Sonatas in A minor, E flat and B, D.537, 568 and 575
Schumann

• 3 Romances
• selections from Myrthen
• Kerner Lieder, op.35

Shostakovich - Piano Trio No.1
Simpson - Symphony No.6 
Vivaldi

• Clarae stellae, scintillate (Bright stars, shine)
• Nulla in mundo pax sincera (There is no unblemished peace in the world)
• Vestro principi divino

A large and varied list, although with a bit of a focus on the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It includes a number of new purchases - the Brahms, Debussy, Elgar and Shostakovich, this recording of the Faure cello sonata, the Holmboe Liber Canticorum, the Ravel trio and violin sonata and most of the Beethoven. All of these are samples from discs or sets of discs that will probably take me a few months to work through completely.

No sooner had I reached the end of my (roughly) chronological journey through my library of Beethoven's opuses, which took me two years and one day to complete, that I started listening to new purchases that filled some gaps. The first two piano concertos and 'The Creatures of Prometheus' are all fairly enjoyable, although I don't know that any of them are especially outstanding by Beethoven's standards. 'Prometheus' is certainly full of dance in a style that's a bit surprising if you're used to think of Beethoven as a rather serious composer.

The piano trio was purchased just in time to slot into my chronological journey through Ravel's works, but I had to go backwards in time to slot in the first violin sonata - the one that wasn't published until 1975 along with other youthful works. It was well worth the trip. However, my favourite Ravel at this point is still the solo piano music I've known for much longer, particularly the larger works like Valses nobles et sentimentales and Le Tombeau de Couperin. It's a source of personal irritation that they seem to be much better known in their orchestral guises than in the original piano, because to me Ravel is one of the greatest writers for the piano in history.

It's perhaps my chronological journey through Rachmaninov's works, though, that has really hit its stride at the moment. Both the op.32 preludes and op.33 etudes-tableaux seem to me to have a greater depth than earlier piano works, and the choral symphony The Bells was one of the composer's own favourites.

February 2014 - Popular Music

Tori Amos - Abnormally Attracted to Sin
Beyonce - Beyonce
Janelle Monae - Metropolis Suites I to V

Okay, well that settles it. I am indeed going to talk about Janelle Monae. An amazing vocalist. An absolute ball of energy (who I think I'd quite like to see perform live). And I think she must have a positively encyclopaedic knowledge of music from the last several decades.

The reason I say that is because she slips in and out of musical genres constantly in these suites/albums, sometimes in the same song. The nearly 9-minute epic 'BebopbyeYa' sounds like jazz, then it's Latin, then it's classical. She does Stevie Wonder funk, she does disco, she does Prince (with Prince), she does folk, she does power ballads, she does psychedelia. It doesn't end up sounding like pastiche, either. The results are consistently convincing. The only track that I don't find convincing is 'Make the Bus', the only track that Monae wasn't involved in writing and where she's turned, for some inexplicable reason, into a guest star on her own album.

One of the exciting things is that it's clear Monae isn't stumbling onto these sounds without intent. The liner notes of The ArchAndroid and The Electric Lady have references to what each song is 'inspired by'. While many of these references are obscure or cryptic, careful listening makes them many of them decodable... and you can hear the references. After you know that 'Tightrope' is inspired by (among other things) James Brown's cape, listening to the song makes that James Brown DNA so obvious, you wonder why you didn't explicitly notice it before.

What we have here is a musical omnivore, with the capacity to understand what she's hearing well enough to then use it for her own ends. Those ends seem to consist of creating a dense web of interconnecting ideas, with lyrics that create an allegory about forbidden love between a human and a robot. Sometimes it sounds like it's referencing same-sex relationships. Other times it's about African-American empowerment.

But first and foremost it's a wild musical ride with a great singer, backed up it must be said by an equally great guitarist in Kellindo Parker. I'm generally a piano-biased person and no great fan of guitar solos, but time and again this guy creates something really outstanding when he's called upon.

I'm not going to declare that Janelle Monae has now leapt into my pantheon of truly great artists. What I am going to say is that she is incredibly dynamic and interesting, and that I sincerely hope she has a very long career and continues to generate music that pushes my musical boundaries. Because I'm certainly eager to hear what comes next - starting with 2 more 'suites' to accompany the 5 that I have selected the above videos to represent.