What are you listening to and WHY might anyone be interested? (Vol.IX)

I just can't get enough (as the Mode would say) of this terrific double LP of 70s French electronica.

didn't come to a point were I like it.

The one before still outperforme this one easy. IMHO

I love Alkan's piano music.

A must listen to lovers of classical piano music.

Arrived today, cleaned & on its first play...

Tremendous energy. Raw and gives any system and real workout.

MDS 

One from the vinyl vault. Little known but excellent British Blues LP with a great line up. A British Blues Supergroup. 

On CD:-

On CD:-

Roy Harper - Death of God

Tramps follow up LP from 1974. Same line up with the addition of sax. 

Disc 4

Class. 

I had not heard of this one before, Tony.

Is this the 'glass-half-empty' counterpart to the Steve Miller Band's "Brave New World"?

2 x LP Decca 2011 : )

 Very good, Joe!  No idea  as the only album I have by Steve Miller is the excellent " The Joker".
Grave  still sounds very late 60's blues/folk british sound although released early 70's. Worth a listen though. Not keen on their later stuff.

Tony

Thanks Debs for the inspiration.

This one will see me off for the night. Nighty night everyone  and stay safe

Sergei Rachmaninov:  Vladimir Ashkenazy (Piano), Zsolt-Tihamér Vistonay (Violin), Mats Lidström (Cello)

Trio élégiaque No. 1 in G minor for piano, violin and cello

Trio élégiaque No. 2 in D minor for piano, violin and cello

Vocalise, Op. 34: no 14, 

Dream, Op. 38: no 5, 

I looked forward to this recording very much as I have a passion for piano trios.  Virtually every Russian piano trio is about death, or at least about the reality of suffering.  The first movement of the D-minor trio, and this movement alone, is really the centre of music for me.  I can live off of it alone until the end of time.  Playing those low D octaves in the beginning (and returning throughout) is simply cathartic for me.  Listening - only somewhat - but playing - can cause me to nearly break down.  One hears a funeral march.  In black & white, on a grey/foggy day, I only imagine a horse drawn coffin and maybe a handful of people walking behind and nearing the country church/cemetary.  

Alternatively, the repeated circular motif (starting with the low D octave) reminds me of the motion of an arm and hammer driving in the nails into a coffin.  Of course, the movement is replete with a contrasting visions of surreal divine beauty and ecstasy.  I say all this to only extend my view that I find this work quite emotional (and visual), however, I don't quite hear the effect (within taste and not overdone!) quite as much as I'd wish for.  Certainly the playing is fine and more than competent but just lacking any desire to push a storyline or vision or dialogue of any sort.  My only other comment would be that I find the usual Decca recording quality or outcome rather perplexing in regards to the piano.  I'm not a technically minded person in that I can't usually say the sound is this way because...a)....b)....c).... reasons etc.  In my layman's language I just feel like the piano is "filtered" as it just seems it lacks in capability any dynamic range?

Fred Hersch: Songs Without Words

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uclVmHgak1k

A 3-CD set, Songs Without Words, includes a disc of Hersch's original compositions, a disc of interpretations of pieces by a variety of noted jazz composers, and a disc devoted to the music of Cole Porter. All three discs are primarily solo piano albums interspersed with duo, trio, and quintet performances.

Frédéric Chopin:  Rafal Blechacz (Piano)

2 Polonaises, Op. 26

2 Polonaises, Op. 40

Polonaise in F sharp minor, Op. 44

Polonaise in A flat major, Op. 53

Polonaise-fantaisie in A flat major, Op. 61

I want to like this album but I think the problem with myself is that being so intimately familiar with certain music often, eventually, becomes a let down since others will never exactly follow my own strong views. Emotional vision / interpretation is where I find the most difficult differences to resolve between us.  My personal subjective opinion is that music should breath and flex somewhat.  Technically, Blechacz is perfect.   Metronomically, Blechacz is also perfect.  This amounts to just a different philosophy of things and doesn't garner total praise from me.  Where I feel occasionally a need to push or pull to allow the point to be made Blechacz tends to plough right on through and this in general tends to leave me cold.  One doesn't speak in a monotonous, stiff, inflexible way but if one did it would not be that inviting to a listener.  It is interesting to inflect, pause, change to meter once in a while etc.  In classical music though there is a trend lately for the younger crowd to simply play quickly and unemotionally.  I simply prefer a little more grand old character - especially with Chopin's Polonaisen.  Not as bad an album as I sometimes might imply - I'm simply very picky.

I fear there is no hope for me as I slowly become more and more like the resident cantankerous old man around here?

Beatles Beat. On Odeon vinyl, blue label.

Not sure when it was pressed, but it has A-1 and B-1 matrix #s.