Classical - a start

The Pro Arte - Schnabel set is a from 1934 or '35 HMV 78 discs. Though not only for history enthusiasts it is limited by the recording somewhat in the transfers currently [or most recently] on CD. EMI have an excelent master transfer in the vault, which may re-appear one day and once again do justice to the music making.

My favourite would be the Decca recording with members of the VPO and Clifford Curzon, which should be available at a very nice price on Decca CD.

I leave it to others to add to the list. This work has been lucky with recordings! Few fail to bring joy to the heart!

ATB from George

Hello George,

Thanks, I'll look for a copy of this -

Trout

Cheers,
OW

A lovely contrasted coupling that will interest you in both the rural joy of the Trout and the more comopolitan angst of the Quartet in D minor!

Listen to the Trout first! The long run will, I might predict, be as great a love of the Quartet as the Quintet, though it is possibly less easy to approach the Quartet in the first instance.

Best wishes from George

OW, just a word of advice if you're starting out.

Any great piece of classical music will vary greatly, depending upon the interpretation of the players who perform it.

While I wholly concur with George's suggestion of the Curzon/Vienna players as an ideal introduction to the 'Trout', it's important that you realise that this is not the 'right' or 'only' way that this piece should be played. So I'd suggest to you that, if you intend to introduce yourself to classical music one piece at a time, you consider getting two or more interpretations of any work that you approach.

For example, if you get the Curzon 'Trout', consider getting a radically different interpretation, such as the Emil Gilels/Amadeus Qt recording available on DG Originals. I have, and love, both.

Others may come along with other suggestions for variants.

Good luck in any event.

Graham

Dear OW,

I totally agree with Graham,

Get to love the music and not to get hooked on one recording! For music you love, then two different recordings are preferable to one. Three for special favourites! Four is for mad nuts like me with Beethoven or Bach!

In the Trout I have Curzon, and Schnabel, and used to have the lovely old recording with Hebzibah Menuhin as well!

Best of luck with it, and don't be afraid to ask for more recommendations. Several of us here will glad help you with a starter pack as it were. Graham and I will not always send you to the same recording! But it is fair to say both recordings we might choose as a good starting point will be worth finding!

Best wishes from George

I had the Curzon version but found it a little bit heavy, the piano part over-emphatic. I prefer the fleet-footed approach of the Naxos CD with Jeno Jando and the Kodaly Quartet.
After some years of not playing the Curzon, I gave it away. I know that Curzon's is the usually recommended version but it's just not for me.
But I'll probably buy the Hagen Quartet/Schiff.
Regards,
Ken

quote:

Originally posted by GFFJ:
Dear OW,

Get to love the music and not to get hooked on one recording!

Best wishes from George

Very good George!

Thank you for your recommendations. Point taken re interpretations, found this with other music; Jazz, Blues ... even 'Popular' - an extreme case being The Beatles' 'She Loves You' and the cover by Ted Chippington. I am aware the majority will see the Chippington version as a nonsense, but to me it has a certain charm.

Cheers,
OW

quote:

For music you love, then two different recordings are preferable to one. Three for special favourites! Four is for mad nuts like me with Beethoven or Bach!

I've got 10+ recordings of the Beethoven quartets, symphonies and piano sonatas, and I must be headed that way with the Brahms symphonies too... I'm not even going to think about how many recordings I've got of the Bach sonatas and partitas for solo fiddle...!

I am barking!

EW

Dear EW,

I would not like to publicly admit how many recordings of some very favourite works I have and have had!

But really a recording is a very un-natural thing. Any concert is designed for the audience at that moment, never to be re-appraised as an exatly similar performance, but the business of recordings is odd. A fluff that would pass for nothing in the concert setting would in some cases be intolerable on many repeated listenings.

Another thing, which anyone can test, is to try and do any physical thing requiring great mental control exactly the same twice. That precision in repetition is the province of machines. A recording only really captures what the artists managed and approved for issue as a fair presentation of the aims at the time. No musician aims to keep exactly the same reading of the music over years. The view [usually] deepens with age, and so changes would be found if one compared live recordings by the same artists over the years, but the recording remains a snapshot of the day or days of the recording.

That is one of many reasons not to get hooked by a single recording of music designed for live performance!

It happened to me once when I was young, and I recoiled from it!

Menuhin's estimable recording of the set of Bach Brandenburg Concertos was, in my LP days, a staple of my listening!

I went to a concert and was disconcerted to find a different view of the music, and came home to check on the old records to see what was wrong. The problem was me! The music is far too special to take only one performance! Every performance has something even if one may not like every single different idea in every single different live or recorded rendition!

Nice to see you posting!

ATB from George

... I've just succumbed to a copy of this:



... I don't know how many recordings of the Elgar concerto I've got now, but it must be getting on for 10, if not more! Although the main reason for acquiring this is to hear the Sibelius, of course. I must have at least five recordings of the piece, although I can't quite get on with any of them. For some reason I gave away my beloved Haendel/Berglund recording many years ago, and I've pined for it ever since.

Anyway, I'm mad I know but I'm looking forward to having a listen to this. Make a change from all the Brahms, Haydn and Schumann chamber music I've been listening to of late!

EW

... I know this is horribly off-topic, but I've just taken delivery of the disc I mentioned above and I can tell anyone who's remotely interested that it is an absolute gem. The Sibelius is the profound marvel one would expect given the auspices of Ida Haendel with Simon Rattle in what was clearly a concert where it all gelled, but the Elgar too towers above recent versions. I downloaded the new Zneider/Davis from Amazon the other day, and it's OK I suppose - Davis's way with the orchestral score being of greater interest than Zneider's with the solo - but this leaves it for dead. These are live recordings and audiophools will not like a few tape drop-outs in the opening tutti of the Elgar, but they are performances that make Zneider, Ehnes, Graffin, Hahn, Shaham, Batiashvili et al. look daft, it's on quite another level.

EW

Dear EW!

You are costing me money here you know!

I should hate you, but I don't! Thanks for the thumb-nail review, which from you serves far better than a mag opinion could!

ATB from George

Thanks George, I'll take that as a complement!

By the way, if you or anyone else wishes to purchase this - or indeed anything else on Testament - buy from HMV not Amazon, there's a £15 difference!:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Violin...id=1267044456&sr=8-1

http://hmv.com/hmvweb/simpleSe...e%3A+Haendel%3A+Cbso

Thanks for the tip on the place to buy as well!

Of course what I said was meant kindly!

ATB from George

quote:

Originally posted by GFFJ:
Thanks for the tip

You got anything to recommend? I'm in acquisition mode at the moment! Hyperion have got vol 2 of the Müller-Schott/Hewitt Beethoven Cellos coming out next month, so that's a must...!

Email will follow tomorrow!

A few things have cropped up, but I expect you have them already!

ATB from George

quote:

Originally posted by Earwicker:
Hyperion have got vol 2 of the Müller-Schott/Hewitt Beethoven Cellos coming out next month, so that's a must...!

Well, I happened to find myself on Hyperion's website yesterday, and there it was, available for download, even though it isn't quite March yet!

If you're anything like me then you'll find multi-kiloword CD reviews next to unendurable so I'll keep it short and sweet: astounding. Such that the next best are still nowhere near. These are performances of such insight, musicality, joy, profundity and sophistication that I really cannot imagine anyone failing to be awed. Müller-Schott's technique is absolutely staggering, with an inexhaustible range of colours, immaculate intonation and incredible taste and judgment. Also interesting (and curious) to note that this is also some of the best Hewitt captured by microphone. Those who've been lucky enough to hear her live will know that in addition to having an incredibly nice bum, she is an utterly spellbinding pianist, yet for some reason her recordings often have something of the vanilla flavour about them. Hear her on this recording, and you'll finally get it. Frankly, next to this most other recordings of the Beethoven cello sonatas sound pretty amateurish.

Enough said. It's here, where you can download the album in FLAC or MP3 (which - are you listening, numpties at other record companies!? - makes a very useful saving over buying the CD), and have a listen to samples instead of reading some boring crap ABOUT the performance. You can actually download the C major sonata for £1.95!!!

http://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/al.asp?al=CDA67755



A marvel.