Posts

Showing posts from July, 2005

Critical Mass

Image
I'm a big fan of Marin Alsop . But last night her BBC Prom performance with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra playing her own sequence of the suites from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet was strangely unsatisfying. Tempi were pulled around, and rather than adding to the tension the wayward performance weakened it. When it finished I wanted some 'in your face' music making that was over the top, but which really worked. So as Marin Alsop was a pupil of Bernstein's I put on his 1971 recording of his own Mass , a work I don't listen to very often. Is Mass Bernstein's unrecognised masterpeice? Or is it a failed experiment in using the vernacular and exploiting street chic? (But wasn't the 'parody mass' a legitimate renaissance musical form which exploited contemporary music such as L'homme arme ?) My view used to be that Mass was simply a failed experiment, but I have to confess I am slowly moving towards the view that it may be a misunderstood m

Raindrops are falling on my chant

Image
In my rave review of Antony Pitts directing Tonus Peregrinus ' on Naxos in medieval choral music from the Notre Dame School I commented that I thought you could faintly hear rain falling as Rebecca Hickey gave a ravishing account of Perotin’s Beata viscera. I made contact with Antony after posting and asked him if I was correct. He is one of the switched-on musicians who understands the importance of music weblogs, and he came straight back with this helpful answer. Pliable (in haste) - indeed it is. Beata viscera was recorded on our last morning in Chancelade Abbey, before a mad dash to the airport, so we couldn't wait for the rain to stop... Antony So now there are three excellent reasons to buy this Naxos CD . First, because you get seventy minutes of the most gorgeous singing you will hear for a very long time. Secondly, because if you are an audiophile you can test the resolution of your gear, and impress your buddies, with the Perotin raindrops test. And thirdly, beca

San Francisco band's Proms debut, plus Shankar family celebration

Image
The BBC Proms season so far has been strong on new music, with premieres already from John Corigliano, Henri Dutilleux, and James MacMillan. Early music gets some welcome attention this coming week with the first visit of Nicholas McGegan's San Francisco based period ensemble Philharmonia Baroque Ensemble in a Rameau and Handel programme. Also on the 'don't miss' list is the Shankar family concert with father Ravi celebrating his 85th birthday. New music highlights include a rare chance to hear Luciano Berio's 55 minute protest song, Coro, and a UK premiere for Hans Abrahamsen. It's been a great Proms season so far, helped by the promenaders (almost) stopping their infuriating mannerism of applauding between movements, so don't miss this week's webcasts. Mainstream Highlights: Berloz, Romeo and Juliet complete; BBC Scottish Orchestra under their outstanding young conductor, Illan Volkov. Sunday 31st July, 18.30h Mahler , Ruckert-Lieder ; sung by Anne

Jerry Springer rebel grabs Gramophone accolade

Image
Back in January there was quite a rumpus when BBC Television screened Jerry Springer – The Opera by Stewart Lee (writer) and Richard Thomas (composer). Almost 50,000 people complained about the 8000 obscenities in the opera, and there were protests by a number of religious groups. Among the objectors was BBC Radio 3 producer Antony Pitts who resigned his job in protest about the alleged blasphemous content in the broadcast. Among the programmes Pitts worked on was the highly acclaimed, and cutting edge, Late Junction . But Antony Pitts didn’t disappear as a footnote in history. He has a flourishing career as a contemporary composer, and the new Hyperion recording of his choral work Seven Letters has been selected as Editor’s Choice in the August edition of the prestigious Gramophone magazine. And the story doesn't end there. The chamber choir, Tonus Peregrinus , that he founded and directs is gaining quite a reputation with its recordings of both new and medieval music. An

Masses of early music in summertime Cambridge

Image
Last night we were at a spell-binding performace of Christopher Tye's Missa Euge bone . Forget about MP3s, webcasts, CDs or vinyl, the only way to hear great music is live, and in as beautiful a setting as Trinity College Chapel in Cambridge, which dates from the same period as the music being performed. Christopher Tye is a local composer here in East Anglia, but our paths never crossed as he died in 1573. His posts included lay clerk at King's College in Cambridge, and later choir master at Ely Cathedral before taking Holy Orders. He was an almost exact contemporary of the much better known Thomas Tallis, but sadly few complete works of his have survived, and information on his life is incomplete to the extent that his exact dates are uncertain. The Missa Euge bone is set for six voices, and is full of the defining features of the period with its rich textures, imitation and polyphonic writing. But the innovative cadences distinguish it from the works of his contemporaries

Download doomsayer

Image
Now I appear to be the only person on the planet who doesn't consider the Beethoven MP3 project to have been a success. And here are my reasons. Just open this link , or this link for file sharing sites that are offering the Beethoven recordings. And if they have been taken down there are many, many other servers with these files which can be found in just a few minutes searching. It is almost impossible to open a newspaper or turn on the radio in the UK without coming across another self-congratulatory story about the success of the BBC Beethoven Symphony downloads. But I beg to differ about the success of this project. Creative artists, and that includes composers, musicians, producers, editors and arrangers as well as authors and artists, have only one currency - intellectual property. Beethoven's 9th Symphony is not a paper score, a plastic CD, or the bits and bytes of an MP3 file. It is the unique, original, and priceless, expression of a creative idea. Similarly Vassily

Corigliano, Dutilleux and Elgar headline Proms week

Image
After an impressive first week of the new Proms season which featured a moving Child of Our Time , and a stunning Walkure with Domingo et al the second week (starting 23rd July) has more riches. Highlights include Elgar's Dream of Gerontius , and premieres from Dutilleux and Corigliano (see illustration of John Corigliano by Carol Cleere ). Mainstream Highlights: Elgar, Dream of Gerontius ; Mark Elder conducts Halle orchestra and choir in a choral masterpiece. Sunday 24th July, 19.30h Beethoven and Tippett; Manchester Camerata under Douglas Boyd. Proms debut for an outstanding chamber orchestra which brought us the acclaimed Mahler-lite 4th symphony recording . Wednesday 27th July, 22.00h Prokofiev Symphony No. 5; an all Russian programme conducted by Russion-born Vassily Sinaisly. Friday 29th July, 19.30h New Music: Messaen and Adams; lunchtime recital of music for violin and piano. Monday 25th July, 13.00h Knussen and Glanert; Oliver Knussen conducts his own Whitman setti

Download the slippery slope......

Image
And so the download bandwagon rolls on. Latest on board is the Philharmonia Orchestra which has just launched a brand new online shop where the MP3 files on offer include. Strauss - Also Sprach Zarathustra with Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting - £1 ($1.80) Beethoven 'Emperor' Concerto with Emanuel Ax - £2 ($3.60) There are also downloadable programme notes. And if those outrageous prices are too expensive for you there is even a buy 4 for the price of 3 offer. Great to see the non-believers being tempted by more low cost classical downloads. But just remember folks, it is very difficult to turn sausages back into pigs. Many thanks to UK brass player David Read of the excellent blog Hot Brass for flagging this story up. Hot Brass has an excellent interview with Philharmonia Principal Trombone Byron Fulcher pictured above. If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to Size does matter

BBC Beethoven plays, and plays, and plays...

Image
The hysteria over the BBC Beethoven MP3 downloads continues as the BBC PR machine works overtime on the story. Beethoven now has so much street cred that the new BBC Director General Mark Thompson even quotes the inscription " From the heart...may it go again to the heart !" from the Missa Solemnis score in his first annual report. Which should at least raise a laugh from recently ousted DG Greg Dyke. And a page three Guardian story today screams.. "Beethoven (1.4m) beats Bono (20,000) in battle of the internet downloads." I may be naive (although I have worked for the BBC, a major record company, and a digital rights management consultancy), but the following facts seem clear: The cheapest set of Beethoven Symphonies available on Amazon.uk sells for £12.99 ($24 US) which is a pretty remarkable bargain for 5 CD's. The BBC offered the same content over the internet for no charge. Around 250,000 people (assuming the same people downloaded more than one symphony

Dresden 1945 - London 2005

Image
Richard Strauss wrote the first sketches for his Metamorphosen for 23 solo strings on the day the Munich Staatstheater was destroyed by Allied bombs in October 1943. He saw the work as a lament for German art and culture, and wrote: “The burning of the Munich Court Theater, where Tristan and Die Meistersinger received their first performances, where I first heard Freischütz seventy-three years ago, where my father sat at the first horn desk for forty-nine years—it was the greatest catastrophe of my life; there is no possible consolation, and, at my age, no hope.” 250 miles north of Munich lay another centre of German art and culture. Famed as ‘ Florence on the Elbe’ Dresden was world famous for its glorious eighteenth century Baroque architecture. Its famous residents included Carl Maria von Weber, Schumann, Wagner, Caspar David Friedrich and Ibsen. In February 1945 the war in Europe had just four months to run, and the Russian Army was less than a hundred miles from Dresden. The ci

Fairytales - an album beyond words

Image
I’m a great fan of Swedish jazz pianist Esbjorn Svensson who was a recent guest on the excellent BBC Radio 3’s programme Private Passions (hosted by Michael , son of composer Sir Lennox Berkeley ). Among Esbjorn Svensson’s eclectic choice of music was a CD by an artist that I had never heard of, which Svensson described as ‘ one of the best records I have ever heard .’ So I had to find out more. Radka Toneff (above) was a Norwegian jazz singer who died in 1982 at the tragically early age of 30. Her last studio recording was Fairytales with pianist Steve Dobrogosz. It is a mixture of standards (this is probably the last time an Elton John track will be recommended on an overgrown path !) and original compositions. The interpretations are quite straight, they remind me somewhat of Norma Winstone. But the singing (and piano accompaniment) are totally sublime. The producer was Norwegian bass legend Arild Andersen at an early stage of his career. Esbjorn Svensson is spot on. This

Mass haiku

Image
Too many words, too many words..... an editor once told me. And I know what he means. Haikus fascinate me with their brevity, and disciplined 5/7/5 three line, two part, construction. So as it's Sunday I thought I would write a haiku about Leonard Bernstein's Mass as a literary alternative to mangling something from the Bach 48 on the piano. I'm going down this overgrown path with considerable trepidation as I know there are some talented librettists and composers among my readers. But hey, you can only improve on this modest effort can't you? Mass was Lenny's way of doing radical chic - just a Simple Song Please add your Mass haikus in particular, or musical haikus in general using the comments feature at the bottom of this post. I'll try to put a post together sometime with the results if it grabs people. Normal service will be resumed tomorrow morning with too many words, too many words........ If you enjoyed this post take an overgrown path to Being and

Holy smoke - what a lot of downloads!

Image
The following story is on the BBC News website . I promise it is my last word about the BBC's extravagant claims for the number of MP3 files downloaded of their Beethoven symphonies. Vicar stunned by sermon surfers Thousands of people have downloaded a Suffolk vicar's sermons after he posted them on the internet last month. The Rev Leonard Payne, Vicar of St Nicholas' Church in Wrentham, said the response had been overwhelming after he posted them on the Apple iTune store. "We were stunned. Within a short period of time, over 2,000 people had downloaded one of them," he said. At one point demand for the sermons was so great they had to change servers, Mr Payne said. If you enjoyed this post take an overgrown path to The accidental pilgrim

Classic misunderstandings - Eastern tunings

Image
The 85 year old Ravi Shankar's music making at his Proms debut last night was fabulous. It reminded me of a little story that goes back a few years... The 1971 Concert for Bangladesh was the original superstars-saving-the-world event that predated Bob Geldof and all the others. Shankar and George Harrison put together the gig after Shankar, his musical mentor on the sitar, had alerted him to the plight of millions of starving and flood-afflicted Bengalis who were then locked in a short but bloody fight for independence from Pakistan. When Shankar came to start his set there was rapturous applause for the first sounds from his sitar. " If you appreciate the tuning so much, I hope you will like the playing even more " he told the audience in a deadpan voice. If you enjoyed this post take an overgrown path to Classic misunderstandings - Hildegard

Magnificent Mahler-lite from Manchester

Image
Orchestra controlled labels recording ‘risk averse’ subscription concerts are not the only way to keep classical recording alive in today’s tough market. There are still some great independent labels who understand that fundamental law of economics - profit is the return for risk. These labels are taking risks with innovative repertoire, and in the process they are making outstanding recordings. A new CD that has spent a lot of time in my player recently is the Manchester Camerata's recording of Erwin Stein's arrangement for chamber ensemble of Mahler's 4th Symphony. This performance is much more than a curiosity, it is a really useful study aid. Reductions and arrangements of orchestral works are a wonderful educational tool. They separate the individual strands within the music, and help the listener get much closer to the composer without resorting to a score. The arrangement was made for Arnold Schoenberg's Society for Private Musical Performances in 1921. Ste

Philly's profit share fillip

Image
The Philadelphia Orchestra , which was the subject of a recent post , announced a couple of months ago a new recording contract with the Finnish label Ondine . This ends a nine year recording drought for the world renowned orchestra. Although the story is not new, in the light of the debate about business models for classical recording it is worth reviewing briefly how the Philadelphia Orchestra put together its new deal . The new recording contract was only made possible by several innovative departures from conventional contracts. The most important is that the orchestra players are not taking an up-front fee, but instead are participating in a profit share. The profit share compromise was achieved in defiance of union policy. If recordings are loss making, they will be underwritten by funding from the orchestra's endowment set aside for recording activites. The recordings are to be made live at concerts with later 'patching' sessions if required. And artistic approval of

A Child of Our Time launches BBC Proms webcasts

Image
The BBC Proms start this Friday, 15th July, and there is a dazzling line-up of mainstream, new and early music over the summer. All the concerts are being broadcast live by BBC Radio 3 , and are available as live web casts . Many of them are also available for seven days after broadcast on the BBC Listen Again service but some aren’t. Check BBC listings for which are available via ‘listen again’ but as a rule of thumb high profile orchestras and artists are usually too expensive for the BBC to buy repeat broadcast rights. Each week on an overgrown path will be publishing a guide to highlights from the coming week’s programme. This is a personal, and fallible, selection. The full weeks programmes are available through this link . Concerts start dates are given in British Summer Time using 24 hour clock (19.00h = 7.00pm) Convert these timings to your local time zone using this link . Mainstream Highlights: Tippett , A Child of Our Time . Sir Roger Norrington conducting the BBC Sympho

Now Naxos downloads from library web sites

Image
See below an interesting development which introduces 'time limited' classical music downloads from library web sites. News story is from Playbillarts.com and doesn't seem to have spread outside the librarian community yet. Will it expand the market for classical music, or will it undermine the 'pay to listen' market further? Naxos Recordings to Be Made Available for Download Through Libraries "Thousands of classical recordings from the Naxos catalogue will be available for download through library web sites under a new program announced yesterday at the American Library Association conference in Chicago. The downloads will be provided by OverDrive, Inc., which already provides digital downloads of audio books and electronic books to libraries in New York, Cleveland, Phoenix, Salt Lake City, and elsewhere. Under the system, library patrons will be able to download digital music files at any time of day from the web site of their local library and play the f

New music feast at BBC Proms

Image
In London the show goes on despite last Thursday’s terrible atrocities. And the world’s biggest music festival, the BBC Promenade Concerts , starts next Friday (15th July) and runs through to 10th September. That is nine weeks of world class music making. The good news is that you can listen to all the concerts live over BBC Radio 3 webcasts , and most (but not all) the concerts will be available for seven days after broadcast on the BBC Listen Again service . Highlights include the opening Child of Our Time (15th July), Domingo in a concert Walkure (18th July), Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius (24th July), Berio’s Coro (2nd August), the Concertgebouw playing Lutoslawski and Brahms (2nd Sept), and Bruckner 8 with the Vienna Philharmonic (8th Sept). Choral fans are also in for a treat with Paul Hillier directing the Estonian Chamber Choir in Perotin and Part (17th August), and The Sixteen singing Tallis including Spem in alium (1st Sept). It is impossible to do justice to the vast range