Beyonce - Lemonade
Elbow - The Seldom Seen Kid
Incubus - A Crow Left of the Murder
Jars of Clay - If I Left the Zoo
Thom Yorke - The Eraser
Thom Yorke - Tomorrow's Modern Boxes
A surprisingly small collection. I think there were a few times where I started listening to something but didn't finish (damn work, getting in the way), so that's one explanation. There were also periods where particular classical obsessions dominated (such as streaming copious amounts of Vivaldi).
So there isn't really a lot to say here. There are still a couple of albums here that I'm getting to know, and others that I can depend on for enjoyment. I've still yet to sit down with the Elbow and Incubus albums in the way I normally would, and completely focus on them for at least one listen.
When I do I might have something to report!
Friday 8 July 2016
Monday 4 July 2016
Classical Music - May 2016
Beethoven
Chopin - Berceuse
Debussy
Haydn - Piano Trio in G minor, Hob XV:25
Holmboe
Mozart - Symphony No.30
Rachmaninov - Symphony No.1
Schumann - Nachtstücke
Schubert - String Quartet No.14
Shostakovich
Szymanowski - Roxana's Song (violin and piano version)
Szymanowski - Kurpish Song (violin and piano version)
Vine - Symphony No.3
The Holmboe survey covered a fairly short period this month, from 1987 to 1991. One reason for slowing down is that I don't feel I know this late Holmboe as well as some of the earlier periods. I have a mental impression of the evolution of his work up until around the late 1970s, but then it gets a bit hazy. Certainly the works after that are a bit starker, but what else can I say about them?
And with the Preludes in particular, I was spending time getting to know them as distinct individual pieces, because on a first hearing it's easy to hear all 10 as similar works with nearly identical instrumentation. But in fact the character and mood of them varies considerably.
I think the most interesting exploration during the month, though, was of Shostakovich. The symphonies in particular were great listening experiences. The 10th symphony I already knew, although I wouldn't say I know my existing recording (Previn and the London Symphony Orchestra) all that well. My new set (Petrenko and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra) certainly made me think it's a great work.
But then the 10th has a great reputation. More surprising was how much I enjoyed the 11th symphony, which sometimes gets criticised. Admittedly, I didn't think it was the best thing Shostakovich ever composed, but all of it was good and the final movement was superb. Even the 12th symphony, which has a distinctly bad reputation, seemed to me to be decent music on the whole.
I think reactions to Shostakovich are, more than for any other composer, wrapped up in political ideas and extra-musical associations. Some of these are legitimate things to take into account, whereas others strike me as fairly tenuous distractions. People are constantly telling listeners to look out for codes in Shostakovich's music instead of just letting the music to speak for itself. Yes, some of the music was undoubtedly written with political considerations in mind, but in the long term that's just a context. What's ultimately going to matter, when the Soviet Union period is a historical footnote, is whether the music itself makes people feel something. More often than not the answer is yes.
- String Quartet No.3
- String Trio No.4
- Violin Sonata No.1
- Piano Sonata No.8, 'Pathetique'
Chopin - Berceuse
Debussy
- Berceuse Heroique (piano and orchestral versions)
- La boîte à joujoux (piano version)
- Twelve Etudes for piano
- Page d'Album
Haydn - Piano Trio in G minor, Hob XV:25
Holmboe
- Symphony No.12
- Preludes 5 to 10 for chamber orchestra
- Intermezzo Concertante for tuba and orchestra
- Eco
- Sonatina for oboe and piano
- Trombone Sonata
- Reminiscences for solo violin
Mozart - Symphony No.30
Rachmaninov - Symphony No.1
Schumann - Nachtstücke
Schubert - String Quartet No.14
Shostakovich
- Symphonies 10 to 12
- String Quartets 5 to 8
- Cello Concerto No.1
Szymanowski - Roxana's Song (violin and piano version)
Szymanowski - Kurpish Song (violin and piano version)
Vine - Symphony No.3
The Holmboe survey covered a fairly short period this month, from 1987 to 1991. One reason for slowing down is that I don't feel I know this late Holmboe as well as some of the earlier periods. I have a mental impression of the evolution of his work up until around the late 1970s, but then it gets a bit hazy. Certainly the works after that are a bit starker, but what else can I say about them?
And with the Preludes in particular, I was spending time getting to know them as distinct individual pieces, because on a first hearing it's easy to hear all 10 as similar works with nearly identical instrumentation. But in fact the character and mood of them varies considerably.
I think the most interesting exploration during the month, though, was of Shostakovich. The symphonies in particular were great listening experiences. The 10th symphony I already knew, although I wouldn't say I know my existing recording (Previn and the London Symphony Orchestra) all that well. My new set (Petrenko and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra) certainly made me think it's a great work.
But then the 10th has a great reputation. More surprising was how much I enjoyed the 11th symphony, which sometimes gets criticised. Admittedly, I didn't think it was the best thing Shostakovich ever composed, but all of it was good and the final movement was superb. Even the 12th symphony, which has a distinctly bad reputation, seemed to me to be decent music on the whole.
I think reactions to Shostakovich are, more than for any other composer, wrapped up in political ideas and extra-musical associations. Some of these are legitimate things to take into account, whereas others strike me as fairly tenuous distractions. People are constantly telling listeners to look out for codes in Shostakovich's music instead of just letting the music to speak for itself. Yes, some of the music was undoubtedly written with political considerations in mind, but in the long term that's just a context. What's ultimately going to matter, when the Soviet Union period is a historical footnote, is whether the music itself makes people feel something. More often than not the answer is yes.
Saturday 2 July 2016
Popular Music - May 2016
Tori Amos - From the Choirgirl Hotel
Tori Amos - Night of Hunters
Beyonce - Lemonade
Toni Childs - House of Hope
Paul Dempsey - Everything is True
Francis Dunnery - Tall Blonde Helicopter
Radiohead
Rachael Yamagata - Chesapeake
Thom Yorke - Tomorrow's Modern Boxes
Goodness me, is that the time?
I set everything up so that I could be punctual with my posts about May, but then didn't follow through.
It was an exciting month in pop music for me. So many albums I was interested in appeared in such a short space of time, although the listening list doesn't quite convey that. Obviously I jumped on the Beyonce bandwagon. Because I'm still one of those people who likes to have a physical product I had to wait a little while, but I'm also not one of these people who gets in a state if they can't have something the moment it's announced.
Besides, it was definitely worth the wait. In some ways it's too soon to be certain how much I like Lemonade, but it certainly didn't take long to know that I was impressed with it. It's a bold album, taking all sorts of risks - musical risks with the diversity of styles, and big huge thematic risks. How much this is art imitating life is not something I'm going to speculate on, but the story laid out on the album is a vivid one (and it should be acknowledged that the work itself points to it being highly personal). It's very rare to have a pop album that has such a clear thematic arc, made even more explicit in the video version.
And the videos are worth talking about, because there's something different going on compared to Beyonce's previous album. On Lemonade, the spoken word is just as important as the sung, and many of the songs are interrupted. Where Beyonce played as a sequence of (very good) music videos, Lemonade plays more like a single film with music.
News of a new Radiohead album led me into a bout of reminding myself how much I liked the old ones, which was just as satisfying as I'd hoped. I did get to hear the new one online thanks to a BBC streaming of it. However, the wait for a physical copy was longer. At the time of writing, I still haven't bought it due to some personal circumstances that meant it wasn't convenient to rush out on the CD release date in June.
And then, in a less surprising move, Paul Dempsey released his 2nd solo album. So I decided it really was time to get to grips properly with his 1st one, which I only bought last December. It's slightly more melodic and slightly less forceful than his band work, but cut from similar cloth. And given how much I like Something for Kate, that's a good thing.
I did buy his new album very shortly after it came out. But, at the time of writing, I still haven't listened to it. It is sitting on the top of a pile, waiting for the moment when I can give it the genuine attention it deserves.
The moment is getting closer. But what's the rush?
Tori Amos - Night of Hunters
Beyonce - Lemonade
Toni Childs - House of Hope
Paul Dempsey - Everything is True
Francis Dunnery - Tall Blonde Helicopter
Radiohead
- The Bends
- Kid A
- Amnesiac
- Hail to The Thief
Rachael Yamagata - Chesapeake
Thom Yorke - Tomorrow's Modern Boxes
Goodness me, is that the time?
I set everything up so that I could be punctual with my posts about May, but then didn't follow through.
It was an exciting month in pop music for me. So many albums I was interested in appeared in such a short space of time, although the listening list doesn't quite convey that. Obviously I jumped on the Beyonce bandwagon. Because I'm still one of those people who likes to have a physical product I had to wait a little while, but I'm also not one of these people who gets in a state if they can't have something the moment it's announced.
Besides, it was definitely worth the wait. In some ways it's too soon to be certain how much I like Lemonade, but it certainly didn't take long to know that I was impressed with it. It's a bold album, taking all sorts of risks - musical risks with the diversity of styles, and big huge thematic risks. How much this is art imitating life is not something I'm going to speculate on, but the story laid out on the album is a vivid one (and it should be acknowledged that the work itself points to it being highly personal). It's very rare to have a pop album that has such a clear thematic arc, made even more explicit in the video version.
And the videos are worth talking about, because there's something different going on compared to Beyonce's previous album. On Lemonade, the spoken word is just as important as the sung, and many of the songs are interrupted. Where Beyonce played as a sequence of (very good) music videos, Lemonade plays more like a single film with music.
News of a new Radiohead album led me into a bout of reminding myself how much I liked the old ones, which was just as satisfying as I'd hoped. I did get to hear the new one online thanks to a BBC streaming of it. However, the wait for a physical copy was longer. At the time of writing, I still haven't bought it due to some personal circumstances that meant it wasn't convenient to rush out on the CD release date in June.
And then, in a less surprising move, Paul Dempsey released his 2nd solo album. So I decided it really was time to get to grips properly with his 1st one, which I only bought last December. It's slightly more melodic and slightly less forceful than his band work, but cut from similar cloth. And given how much I like Something for Kate, that's a good thing.
I did buy his new album very shortly after it came out. But, at the time of writing, I still haven't listened to it. It is sitting on the top of a pile, waiting for the moment when I can give it the genuine attention it deserves.
The moment is getting closer. But what's the rush?
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