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

Ralph Towner - Anthem

Solo jazz guitar music.

Eric Dolphy & Booker Little Remembered Live At Sweet Basil - CD-rip.

As It Is:  between storms, 150mm of rainfall in six hours:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LV5xp_6VKSI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiCnmPwZdF4

A+3 | WAV

(2012)

From Billy Gibbons to the Tops and their last studio album to date. 

ToddHarris posted:

excellent Schubert recital from Bonney/Parsons...

Todd,

I recently discovered this album from 1994 and I fully agree!

Over the last years I have collected some 800 Lieder on my NAS from Dietrich Fischer-Diskau (the 21 CD box), Matthias Goerne (the 12 CD box), Elly Ameling, Peter Schreier, Christopher Gerhaher, Olaf Bär, Christoph Prégardien and Gundula Janowitz. I selected these after listening to dozens and dozens of performers on Spotify - I can't get enough of Schubert Lieder! 

From the sopranos, Elly Ameling is gorgous (her recordings from the '70's), Gundula Janowitz is a bit slow, formal but etheric in beauty (e.g. Der König in Thule D367). Compared to these two stars Barbara stands out very well: a lovely, pleasing high voice, easy-going and engaged. As American she has worked very hard on her German pronounciation, it is almost flawless!  - Florestan, I guess you are German: what do you think?

Barbara sings a very nice "Gretchen am Spinnrade" (D118) a lovely  "Du bist die Ruh' (D776)" and a beautiful "Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt" (D877-4).The piano sound is excellent.

Overall a very good Schubert recital. Recommended!

A+3|WAV

(1971)

A change of tack with this old classic from Stephen Stills that I like to get out now and again. 

On CBS vinyl purchased in Dec1981:

Why? Had to be Miles and this hasn't been out for while.

steve

Bert posted:

ToddHarris posted:

excellent Schubert recital from Bonney/Parsons...

Todd,

I recently discovered this album from 1994 and I fully agree!

Over the last years I have collected some 800 Lieder on my NAS from Dietrich Fischer-Diskau (the 21 CD box), Matthias Goerne (the 12 CD box), Elly Ameling, Peter Schreier, Christopher Gerhaher, Olaf Bär, Christoph Prégardien and Gundula Janowitz. I selected these after listening to dozens and dozens of performers on Spotify - I can't get enough of Schubert Lieder! 

From the sopranos, Elly Ameling is gorgous (her recordings from the '70's), Gundula Janowitz is a bit slow, formal but etheric in beauty (e.g. Der König in Thule D367). Compared to these two stars Barbara stands out very well: a lovely, pleasing high voice, easy-going and engaged. As American she has worked very hard on her German pronounciation, it is almost flawless!  - Florestan, I guess you are German: what do you think?

Barbara sings a very nice "Gretchen am Spinnrade" (D118) a lovely  "Du bist die Ruh' (D776)" and a beautiful "Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt" (D877-4).The piano sound is excellent.

Overall a very good Schubert recital. Recommended!

That's some collection, Bert. I've not really listened to much lieder, but I do have some Mozart operas in which Ms Bonney sings rather beautifully. Ms Ameling is also exceptionally good in Debussy songs (with Frederica von Stade and others):

WAV CD rip. Having read the recent post on the Bach recommendations thread, I decided to have a listen to some Bach. I've loved the Cello Suites since I first heard them as a teenage student, and love this recording. Slava plays No. 1 wonderfully, the tempi help bring out the dance forms while the flow makes it a harmonious whole. The achievement of making a single instrument work sound like polyphony and counterpoint is hard to comprehend, but for me it pales behind the beauty of the composition. I can listen to this music with great joy at all times, on any level from enjoying the dance tunes to marvelling at the brilliance that makes it possible. 

Bert posted:

ToddHarris posted:

excellent Schubert recital from Bonney/Parsons...

Todd,

I recently discovered this album from 1994 and I fully agree!

Over the last years I have collected some 800 Lieder on my NAS from Dietrich Fischer-Diskau (the 21 CD box), Matthias Goerne (the 12 CD box), Elly Ameling, Peter Schreier, Christopher Gerhaher, Olaf Bär, Christoph Prégardien and Gundula Janowitz. I selected these after listening to dozens and dozens of performers on Spotify - I can't get enough of Schubert Lieder! 

From the sopranos, Elly Ameling is gorgous (her recordings from the '70's), Gundula Janowitz is a bit slow, formal but etheric in beauty (e.g. Der König in Thule D367). Compared to these two stars Barbara stands out very well: a lovely, pleasing high voice, easy-going and engaged. As American she has worked very hard on her German pronounciation, it is almost flawless!  - Florestan, I guess you are German: what do you think?

Barbara sings a very nice "Gretchen am Spinnrade" (D118) a lovely  "Du bist die Ruh' (D776)" and a beautiful "Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt" (D877-4).The piano sound is excellent.

Overall a very good Schubert recital. Recommended!

That's a fantastic collection, I have a great fondness for Fassbaender's recital with Johnson in his  Hyperion Schubert edition, both Tod und das Mädchen and Auf Dem Wasser zu Singen are    among my favourite Lieder performances.

Just out on Juno.

On Phillips vinyl with a totally different sleeve

Why? Couldn't think how else to follow Miles

steve

Kevin-W posted:

VladtheImpala posted:

 

There's much to like about Kate's music but "the most singular, most prodigiously talented woman in the history of popular music"?????

I'd say that Hounds Of Love is her one true masterwork.

Well, yes. Can you name a woman who has overseen her work and career with such single-mindedness? She is, and always has been, responsible for the way her records sound, and the way her videos and stage shows look.

Who else has created, and consistently expressed, a unique world out of her fecund imagination?

She is a breathtakingly original songwriter, a fantastic pianist; in her youth, a wonderfully expressive dancer; and on her day, a brilliant, intense and insightful lyric writer.

I mean, she wrote "The Man With The Child In His Eyes" aged 13. Thirteen! Can you name anyone else, male or female, who's written a song at such a tender age, so beyond their years?

I don't like everything she's done, and her work is often patchy, but I can't deny either the depth and breadth of her talent, or its extreme rarity.

Kevin-W,

It's difficult to answer your proposition without seeming to denigrate a very talented artist. But I'll try!

I had wanted to start by making a comparison with four of her contemporaries - Prince, Madonna, myself and Michael Jackson but you can probably see where that might be going...... In any case, my multi-media quadruple album jazz-rock odyssey, "Pigs In Space", has yet to find a stage suitable for a completely satisfactory performance.   

Joni Mitchell does what she wants when she wants to, produces herself and does the album artwork, writes her own songs (which at least to me have a deeper resonance than Kate's). She is also a subtle and talented guitarist, if not quite so sophisticated on piano. I prefer her voice to Kate's, which while capable of a beautiful warmth can sound shrill at times. A similar argument could be put forward for e.g. Rickie Lee Jones.

A more convincing case for an artist who shapes the way her music sounds and has been at the more cutting edge of contemporary music is Bjork. She also has a tremendous interest in the visuals that accompany her recorded and live music. And maybe slightly more bonkers than Kate.

Compositions at a young age? Mozart had written four operas by age 13 (though I've only heard two of them), five (?) symphonies, four piano concertos etc etc. Surely the greatest prodigy in music history. And he was near-virtuoso standard on violin and keyboard.

Frankly, I don't really care if she is a good dancer and I think her mime/choreography is Am Dram at best. And it's not as if she has had a chance to hone her performance skills across many tours, is it? Her most memorable video to me was her duet with Peter Gabriel on "Don't Give Up" where she barely moved!

As you say, on her day she is capable of (and has achieved) greatness and she holds a place of honour in my music collection.

Regards,

Vlad

Eoink posted:

Bert posted:

ToddHarris posted:

excellent Schubert recital from Bonney/Parsons...

Todd,

I recently discovered this album from 1994 and I fully agree!

Over the last years I have collected some 800 Lieder on my NAS from Dietrich Fischer-Diskau (the 21 CD box), Matthias Goerne (the 12 CD box), Elly Ameling, Peter Schreier, Christopher Gerhaher, Olaf Bär, Christoph Prégardien and Gundula Janowitz. I selected these after listening to dozens and dozens of performers on Spotify - I can't get enough of Schubert Lieder! 

From the sopranos, Elly Ameling is gorgous (her recordings from the '70's), Gundula Janowitz is a bit slow, formal but etheric in beauty (e.g. Der König in Thule D367). Compared to these two stars Barbara stands out very well: a lovely, pleasing high voice, easy-going and engaged. As American she has worked very hard on her German pronounciation, it is almost flawless!  - Florestan, I guess you are German: what do you think?

Barbara sings a very nice "Gretchen am Spinnrade" (D118) a lovely  "Du bist die Ruh' (D776)" and a beautiful "Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt" (D877-4).The piano sound is excellent.

Overall a very good Schubert recital. Recommended!

That's a fantastic collection, I have a great fondness for Fassbaender's recital with Johnson in his  Hyperion Schubert edition, both Tod und das Mädchen and Auf Dem Wasser zu Singen are    among my favourite Lieder performances.

Thanks Eoink! I have great admiration for Graham Johnson's collection of Schubert for Hyperion. He's an outstanding musician who understand the song structure and compositional techniques Schubert applied. When I really love a Schubert song, I go to Graham Johnson on Hyperion to comprehend what I'm hearing!

He wrote on Der König in Thule: 

 "The tune is extraordinarily simple, but mournfully and hypnotically beautiful, a timeless folksong collected fresh from the fields of Schubert's imagination. Like any work of art so simple in substance that it is an open-ended enigma, the song can be interpreted in many ways. In its original context Gretchen is artless and hums an old ballad, but who would now care to perform the ballad Erlkönig in the phlegmatic spirit of its original context of a ditty sung while mending nets on the seashore? Der König in Thule concentrates on a man's last and desperate link with love, an object of sentimental value which cannot be taken beyond the grave. The song is seen here as a heartrending commentary on constancy (exactly what Gretchen, were she only to know it, will fail to receive in her dealings with Faust), the bitter loneliness of bereavement, and the uselessness of wealth and power once love is no longer part of life."  

And on "Des Fischers Liebesglück" D933:

"Here, in the fullness of his powers, Schubert gives us a mere two pages, a type of Auf dem Wasser zu singen without the momentum, a strophic song certainly, but a masterpiece of hypnotic enchantment. The key is A minor, with the change to the major key jealously guarded for the end of each musical verse (which consists of two verses of poetry). The tiniest details (like a single mordant in the piano's introduction) are especially telling. There is just enough harmonic movement to suggest the sensuous movement of the boat in the water, but one is left uncertain as to whether or not the whole scenario is the most enjoyable of twilight fantasies on the fisherman's part. The vocal line is unique in Schubert, requiring of the singer not only great control of breath and heady excursions into the stratosphere, but a fine and daring sense of rubato. A full range of emotions from laid-back contentment to driven passion can be placed on the blueprint of this song—it is receptive to the performers' fantasy—and it is Schubert's triumph that this is so."

That's really beautifully written and clarifies a lot on the structure and meaning of these songs.

And it is amazing and incredible how Franz Schubert, a young bloke who passed away when he was just 31, wrote so many wonderful scores under these German poems. He had an extreme gift to put the right musical atmosphere and mood under the lyrics he received. I wonder if there are any songwriters who have written 600 melodies before their 31st year?

VladtheImpala posted:

That's some collection, Bert. I've not really listened to much lieder, but I do have some Mozart operas in which Ms Bonney sings rather beautifully. Ms Ameling is also exceptionally good in Debussy songs (with Frederica von Stade and others):

Thanks Vlad. I have not heard Elly Ameling singing Debussy, thanks for the tip!

Bert posted:

VladtheImpala posted:

That's some collection, Bert. I've not really listened to much lieder, but I do have some Mozart operas in which Ms Bonney sings rather beautifully. Ms Ameling is also exceptionally good in Debussy songs (with Frederica von Stade and others):

Thanks Vlad. I have not heard Elly Ameling singing Debussy, thanks for the tip!

At last! I now feel I've made a contribution to the forum. Thanks, Bert

Complete change from the Bach, WAV rip of a CD a friend of mine kindly bought me recently when we were charity shopping  (£1). Great fun, the Sisters were camp and OTT, but they make it work, some of the songs are darker than you'd expect.

Something to relax with after dinner.

Inspired by Bert, a WAV CD rip of Bostridge's Die Schöne Müllerin with Graham Johnson. BOstridge's light tone works wonderfully for me in this, capturing the young miller's vulnerability beautifully, with sensitive playing from Johnson. 

Pretenders - ¡Viva El Amor!

How  on earth have I overlooked this for so long?