Classical Music - March 2017

Bach, J.S.

• Am Abend aber desselbigen Sabbats (On the evening, however, of the same Sabbath)
• Wer mich liebet, der wird mein Wort halten (II) (He who loves me will obey my commands)
• Bisher habt ihr nichts gebeten (Until now you have asked for nothing in My name)
• Ihr werdet weinen und heulen (You shall weep and wail)
• Es ist euch gut, dass ich hingehe (It is good for you that I leave)
• English Suite No.6

Barber

• Capricorn Concerto
• Toccata Festiva
• Third Essay for Orchestra

Beethoven

• Symphony No.5
• Piano Trio in E flat, op.70/2
• Cello Sonata No.3
• Mass in C

Brahms

• Symphonies 1 to 3
• Double Concerto
• Intermezzos, op.116/4 & 117/1 (orch. Klegel)

Bridge

• String Quartet No.3
• Piano Trio No.2
• Sir Roger de Coverley - string quartet version
• Two Old English Songs - string quartet version

Debussy - Images, Books 1 & 2
Dvorak

• Poetic Tone Pictures
• 8 Humoresques
• Dumka and furiant for piano 

Faure

• Piano Quartet No.2
• Barcarolles 2 to 4
• Poème d'un jour
• Songs, opp. 18, 23, 27, 39, 43, 46, 51, 87

Haydn - Symphonies 24, 28 to 31
Holmboe

• Symphony No.11
• String Quartets 19 and 20
• Ballata

Mahler - Symphony No.1
Medtner - Three Pieces, op.31
Medtner - Etude in C minor
Nielsen - Cupid and the Poet: Overture
Rachmaninov - Etudes-tableaux, op.33
Rachmaninov - 14 Songs, op.34
Schubert - String Quintet
Schumann - Violin Sonata No.1
Schumann - Requiem for Mignon
Sibelius

• The Bard
• Humoresques for violin and orchestra
• Two Serious Melodies for violin and orchestra
• Five pieces for violin and piano, op.81

Smetana - From Bohemia's Woods and Fields
Smetana - Tábor
Villa-Lobos - Choros No.8
Villa-Lobos - Bachianas Brasileiras Nos. 3 and 4 (orchestral version)

A lot of this still represents working through new acquisitions, mostly several months after the actual purchase.

I made relatively good progress with the Bach cantatas (a number of years after purchase). I can't claim to have much memory of individual pieces, but the impression remains a good one, of music that is well worth getting to know better.

I also spent some time getting to know Brahms' symphonies better - a rather easier task with only 4 works that fit on a couple of CDs! But the rewards here were considerable. I think perhaps the 3rd symphony is my favourite, but they're all of high quality and I love the differences in emotional character between each one.

But the thing I simply much talk about here is the Schubert String Quintet. And it's worth specifying the album I've been listening to:

This is the same album that I'd already enjoyed so much for the Schoenberg (which is a sextet). The Schubert - music that I didn't previously know - is if anything even better. It's utterly magical music and is played with such perfectly controlled passion. And, despite the cover image, there's no sense of one "star" and the other players accompanying.

Obviously there's something to be said for the proposition that I ought to get know the recordings better, but... right now I feel as if this has already become one of my desert island discs, one of the very best things in my classical collection.

So there.

Popular Music - March 2017

Terribly sorry, I've been away...

Tori Amos -Under the Pink
James Blake - Overgrown
Mariah Carey - Emotions
Paul Dempsey - Everything is True
FKA twigs - EP1
Wendy Matthews - Emigre
Janelle Monae - The Electric Lady
Damien Rice - 9

...though that doesn't explain all of the delay, it does explain a chunk of it.

So another month, another smallish dose of pop music (and almost all of it was listened to in a period of just 3 days in the middle of the month). The most notable thing here is that I made a conscious effort to listen to a couple of things that I hadn't heard in a long while: one album each of Mariah Carey and Damien Rice.

And in both cases my reaction was much the same. Yes, there are some okay things here, they're not terrible, but I also remember why I don't reach for this music on a regular basis.

The Damien Rice album is the more interesting case because I don't really know it very well. I didn't buy it, but not long after I received it as a present I made a conscious decision not to spend time getting to know it. All sorts of things about it felt like a continuation of his previous album, O, only lesser. And I didn't really like O a lot either, despite a number of friends raving about it.

My fundamental problem with Rice's music is a feeling that it's constantly striking the same rather dour and miserable emotional tone, in a way that seems to suggest the listener is supposed to be impressed by how emotional it all is. Maybe I'm being deeply unfair here, but that's the impression I got: less genuine outpouring a la early Tori Amos, more artificial moping because it generates the right response in a certain kind of audience.

This many months after the re-listen I don't actually remember that much about the particular songs and whether any of them made a better impression after a gap of many years. So I guess I'll have to re-listen again.