WAYLTL - Hammerklavier (Guy, Petri)
Lena
piano/Guy combination produces some very nice sounds here. Guy also
seems capable of bouts of sustained concentration. However, maybe not
sustained enough - for one thing, the spontaneity can lead to a fair
amount of premature excitement. I generally think his overall
movement plans haven't quite arrived yet... It could be unfair to
compare Guy with my "top" pianists in this area, but there are a
couple of other much-younger-than-dead pianists whose selected
Beethoven interpretations are interesting and really quite noteworthy,
compared to almost anyone.
In the HK, Guy's outer movements motor forward speedily, but the
phrases are smoothed out and a bit "standardized": notes and passages
aren't selected for emphasis, accents are dispensed with, and the
timing of phrases and pauses sounds generic. A smooth surface in the
HK may not be such a good idea. It's not simply that Guy is
unaggressive (even though one could easily argue for the importance of
some aggression in this work). I don't actually think that a lack of
spikes will damn a version of HK to the uninteresting pile - my main
problem with Guy is that he doesn't come close to pianists like Rosen,
Webster, Gilels in fitting the phrases into an overall conception.
Guy's slow movement OTOH did start off with promise. (Of course
that's the movement I didn't have time to hear...) But, on the
evidence of the outer movements, if I had to choose a HK played by a
novice (and maybe I'd even include nuns here), I'd go for Albulescu's
unadvertised but interesting effort with its unusually jagged first
movement.
So Guy's HK is OK, if not amazing. However, his Op. 109 sounds
actually almost uninsightful to me (sorry). A couple of examples: the
theme in iii is played quite "flatly", without a lot of inflection.
(It's not splashes of emotional involvement I'm looking for here, as
such, but more pronounced emphasis on significant notes, such as the
G#-Fx-G# in m. 12; this would provide all the emotion necessary.) The
pianism is fine, and also serves the interpretation in ways many
pianists can't match - to take an example, Guy makes the voices in the
culmination of iii heard in a very impressive way (usually something
gets submerged in the general ecstatic rumbling and peeping). But
though this is great, there's a bit of a "so what" about its, well,
greatness, because I find the culmination undermined by the way the
last variation is started off: too much happens dynamically too early.
This seems to be a bit of a Guy trait. Unfortunately here it kills
the gradual intensification written into this variation, and thus the
culmination of the whole movement.
In the more-sprightly-than-dead pianistic set, Mustonen's Op. 109 is I
think a high point (provided one can stand the guy; I certainly can).
Egon Petri: Hammerklavier
-------------------------
OK, I finally heard it and I have to apologize, I don't get it. To
me, Petri makes nothing of the first movement; every phrase sounds the
same as every other one. The music barely retains its sense. (Guy is
certainly a lot better.) Petri's first movement inspired a desire to
go listen to, perhaps, a benefit concert given by multiple 4-year-old
violinists of average talent and an overdeveloped liking for whisky.
That's to say, I'd rather not hear the rest of Petri's HK, I think.
Lena
Lena
cut off the beginning...
I've LTL a few other things too, but since rumors of high praise for
Guy reached me belatedly, I gave his Beethoven disc (the only one I
have by him) a fairly good rehearing. The Petri HK is well liked by
some but hard to find. I finally got to it (no thanks to me).
F-F Guy: Beethoven: Hammerklavier + Op.109
-------------------------------------------
My assessment of Guy's Beethoven used to be "OK, good. But that's it."
Which is not all that laudatory.
(Of course, this says nothing at all about Guy in other repertoire...)
Unfortunately, in the end I more or less had to agree with myself.
I.e. Guy's playing is good, but I'm not fully convinced by the
interpretations. The HK goes over better than Op. 109, but neither one
rises to the vicinity of favored versions.
Matthew B. Tepper
typed in news:6b33de45.03090...@posting.google.com:
> Egon Petri: Hammerklavier
> -------------------------
>
> OK, I finally heard it and I have to apologize, I don't get it. To me,
> Petri makes nothing of the first movement; every phrase sounds the same
> as every other one. The music barely retains its sense. (Guy is
> certainly a lot better.) Petri's first movement inspired a desire to
> go listen to, perhaps, a benefit concert given by multiple 4-year-old
> violinists of average talent and an overdeveloped liking for whisky.
> That's to say, I'd rather not hear the rest of Petri's HK, I think.
Columbia Special Products, Westminster, Pearl, or something else?
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
War is Peace. ** Freedom is Slavery. ** It's all Napster's fault!
David7Gable
Boris Godunov
Mahler Symphony no. 2
Mozart, last four string quartets
-david gable
Raymond Hall
news:20030908020603...@mb-m18.aol.com...
|
|
| Boris Godunov
| Mahler Symphony no. 2
| Mozart, last four string quartets
Franck's Les Béatitudes
Ginastera's piano concertos Nos 1 and 2
Bach's Secular cantatas (some of them)
Liszt's Faust and Dante symphonies
Regards,
# http://www.users.bigpond.com/hallraylily/index.html
See You Tamara (Ozzy Osbourne)
Ray, Taree, NSW
Eric Nagamine
Mahler Symphony No. 3 Abravanel
--
-----------
Aloha and Mahalo,
Eric Nagamine
http://home.hawaii.rr.com/mahlerb/broadcaststartpage.html
Dan Koren
news:6b33de45.03090...@posting.google.com...
You're getting it very well. The emperor was naked.
Petri never made anything of any music he played.
All the recordings I've heard of him are garbage,
pure and simple.
He simply pleased those people who had gone gaga
over him *BEFORE* they had actually heard him. In
this business self-suggestion and auto-hypnosis
work even better than when buying used cars.
Petri was just one of those "legendary" names who
started with a pre-made reputation just because he
was a tall fartist, had studied with Busoni, and
was an "intellectual". Anyone can figure out the
rest. He was merely a taller Brendel, and avant
la lettre to boot.
Look, even the Deacon does not think he was one
bit better than Mme. Haebler or Mme. Uchida.
dk
PS. Check http://pianoart.republika.pl/petri.html
for a vivid illustration of the illness known as
"delusional fan syndrome".
Stephen North
Scythian Suite - Gergiev
Prokofiev 6 - Mravinsky/Handley/Jarvi P/Saraste
Sibelius 3 - Sakari/Kamu/Vanska/Davis/Jarvi N
Rorem Songs - Naxos
Gilded Goldbergs - what a hoot
plus various Proms which range from ths sublime (Mort de Cleopatre -
Gergiev) to the ridiculous LVB PC 5 (Aimard/NDR SO/Eschenbach)
SN
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
>Petri was just one of those "legendary" names who
>started with a pre-made reputation just because he
>was a tall fartist, had studied with Busoni, and
>was an "intellectual". Anyone can figure out the
>rest. He was merely a taller Brendel, and avant
>la lettre to boot.
>
>Look, even the Deacon does not think he was one
>bit better than Mme. Haebler or Mme. Uchida.
If ever there was confirmation of your inability to recognize "great
pianists", the above paragraphs make the case perfectly.
Petri was a magnificent pianist with a complete grasp of the most
difficult repertoire. Sometime you should take Earl Wild aside and
listen to him on the subject. My own teacher studied with Petri and
echoed Earl's opinion.
At the end Petri became a little stiff and unyielding, but at his
best, in the 1930s he was definitely a pianist to be reckoned with.
Your comments above, incidentally, do NOT reflect my own view of this
pianist, as I have never shared my views of Petri with anyone, let
alone you.
TD
Sol L. Siegel
-Sol Siegel, Philadelphia, PA
--------------------
"I really liked it. Even the music was good." - Yogi Berra, after seeing
"Tosca"
--------------------
(Remove "dammspam" from the end of my e-mail address to respond.)
Matthew燘. Tepper
letters to be typed in news:20030908020603...@mb-m18.aol.com:
> Boris Godunov
> Mahler Symphony no. 2
> Mozart, last four string quartets
Any particular recordings?
I'm listening RIGHT NOW to Martha Argerich's EMI Prok 3 with Dutoit/OSM.
David7Gable
>> Mahler Symphony no. 2
>> Mozart, last four string quartets
>Any particular recordings?
Abbado/Berlin if only faute de mieux for B.G.; Boulez live w/the BBC SO for
Mahler; Fine Arts Quartet for K.575, K. 589, K. 590. These are by far the
best performances from this ensemble I've ever heard, by the way. Far more
distinctive than their Beethoven Op. 18, for example.
-david gable
Dan Koren
news:v3oolv8aphuhoint9...@4ax.com...
> On Mon, 08 Sep 2003 07:45:42 GMT, "Dan Koren" <dank...@yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>
> >Petri was just one of those "legendary" names who
> >started with a pre-made reputation just because he
> >was a tall fartist, had studied with Busoni, and
> >was an "intellectual". Anyone can figure out the
> >rest. He was merely a taller Brendel, and avant
> >la lettre to boot.
> >
> >Look, even the Deacon does not think he was one
> >bit better than Mme. Haebler or Mme. Uchida.
>
> If ever there was confirmation of your inability to
> recognize "great pianists", the above paragraphs make
> the case perfectly.
You're probably right. I have been utterly incapable
of recognizing great pianists -- such as Mme Haebler,
Mme Uchida, Brendull and Geza Panda and Moron Perahia
-- even after people pointed them out to me in gold
and brown.
> Petri was a magnificent pianist with a complete
> grasp of the most difficult repertoire.
Petri's "magnificence" probably had more to do
with his Busoni pedigree than with his playing.
> Sometime you should take Earl Wild aside and
> listen to him on the subject.
I'm perfectly satisfied with the verdict of my
own ears, and that of unbiased listeners such
as Lena. As you probably know, the memories of
pupils are the least reliable indicator of an
artist's worth, as they are often overawed by
and emotionally involved with their teachers.
"Delusional fan syndrome" as I like to call it.
Look at Mr. Jasiewicz for a perfect example.
> My own teacher studied with Petri and echoed
> Earl's opinion.
LOL!!! I suppose that explains why Petri did
not deserve a slot in the GGBB. It probably
explains also why you don't like color and
"tonal manipulation" in piano performance.
Rest assured the only color ever detected
in Petri's playing was dust gray.
> At the end Petri became a little stiff and
> unyielding,
Bullshit. Petri was stiff and unyielding from
the very beginning. It was his personality,
and it was also part of the Busoni tradition.
Show me a single Busoni pupil who was not of
exemplary stiffness, and I will show you the
other face of the Moon.
> but at his best,
?!?
> in the 1930s he was definitely a pianist to
> be reckoned with.
What does "reckon with" mean? You know, piano
playing is not just another kind of boxing.
> Your comments above, incidentally, do NOT
> reflect my own view of this pianist,
It would be indeed suprising, not to mention
miraculous, if *MY* comments reflected *YOUR*
views of anything. Or is this just a Freudian
slip highlighting your habit of giving other
people their opinions?
> as I have never shared my views of Petri
> with anyone, let alone you.
Interesting. Are you asking us to believe that
Tom Deacon (a person who appears to have more
opinions than he has grey cells) *NEVER* took
the chance to express his opinions about Petri?
Logic is getting curiouser and curiouser on the
Rideau Couloir.....
dk
Dan Koren
news:Xns93F04C4EB2A...@207.217.77.206...
> david...@aol.com (David7Gable) appears to have caused the following
> letters to be typed in news:20030908020603...@mb-m18.aol.com:
>
>
> Any particular recordings?
>
I happen to like Amadeus in these works.
Not one of my favorite string quartets in
general, but the last 4 Mozart quartets
suit them perfectly.
dk
Simon Roberts
[snip]
>Egon Petri: Hammerklavier
>-------------------------
>
>OK, I finally heard it and I have to apologize, I don't get it. To
>me, Petri makes nothing of the first movement; every phrase sounds the
>same as every other one. The music barely retains its sense. (Guy is
>certainly a lot better.) Petri's first movement inspired a desire to
>go listen to, perhaps, a benefit concert given by multiple 4-year-old
>violinists of average talent and an overdeveloped liking for whisky.
>That's to say, I'd rather not hear the rest of Petri's HK, I think.
That's pretty much my reaction to the Beethoven/Petri disc Pearl released not
that long ago - nothing of any consequence happened from one end to the other;
an extraordinarily blank experience: Beethoven for Puritans, perhaps.
Simon
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
>> Your comments, incidentally, do NOT
>> reflect my own view of this pianist,
>
>
>It would be indeed suprising, not to mention
>miraculous, if *MY* comments reflected *YOUR*
>views of anything. Or is this just a Freudian
>slip highlighting your habit of giving other
>people their opinions?
>
>
>> as I have never shared my views of Petri
>> with anyone, let alone you.
>
>
>Interesting. Are you asking us to believe that
>Tom Deacon (a person who appears to have more
>opinions than he has grey cells) *NEVER* took
>the chance to express his opinions about Petri?
Indeed! That is precisely what I am asking you to believe. Should your
researches come up with anything to the contrary, please do let me
know.
TD
Lena
> len...@yahoo.com (Lena) appears to have caused the following letters to be
> typed in news:6b33de45.03090...@posting.google.com:
>
> > Egon Petri: Hammerklavier
> > -------------------------
> >
> > OK, I finally heard it and I have to apologize, I don't get it.
> Columbia Special Products, Westminster, Pearl, or something else?
Sorry, I don't know. I heard it thanks to a friend. I'll let him
divulge if he sees this. (Well, I know it's from an LP...)
Lena
Dan Koren
news:bjig4...@drn.newsguy.com...
Calvinists or Lutherans?
dk
Dan Koren
> >> Boris Godunov
> >> Mahler Symphony no. 2
> >> Mozart, last four string quartets
>
> > Any particular recordings?
>
> Abbado/Berlin if only faute de mieux for B.G.;
?!? Whose faute, and why no mieux? ;-)
> Boulez live w/the BBC SO for Mahler;
Hhmmm.... Even ahead of Klemperer's two
recordings?
> Fine Arts Quartet for K.575, K.589,
> K.590. These are by far the best
> performances from this ensemble
> I've ever heard, by the way.
No argument: these are indeed the finest
recordings the FAQ has produced. However
I do not think they are the finest K575,
K589 or K590 on record.
> Far more distinctive than their Beethoven
> Op. 18, for example.
IIRC FAQ was by far the blandest of the
big name string quartets. Nothing they
recorded stood out in any way. Should
we say they were the Clara Haskil of
the string quartets?
dk
Lena
> Petri was a magnificent pianist with a complete grasp of the most
> difficult repertoire.
I don't see any reason to argue about taste, but I think this is a
rather unnecessary way of putting things...
To the extent one can say something objective about a composition like
the Hammerklavier (one can, of course), or - and this is much more
difficult - about the way a performer should bring the objective
features of a work out for a listener... well, OK, to that extent I
think Petri's possible grasp of the HK first movement is not evident
in his playing.
The HK/i hierarchical phrase structure is pretty complicated. IMO a
good performance attempts to delineate this in a more than
minimalistic way. However, Petri's dynamics and timing were so
uniformly applied that the relationship of one phrase to another
really doesn't get indicated. Of course, a listener can still hear
the score go by, and if he knows the piece, he can supply the rest for
himself. However, I find this kind of playing pretty unsatisfying...
(It's fine with me if you like Petri, though.)
Lena
Lena
>>Egon Petri: Hammerklavier
>>-------------------------
>>
>>OK, I finally heard it and I have to apologize, I don't get it.
[...]
>That's pretty much my reaction to the Beethoven/Petri disc Pearl
released not
>that long ago - nothing of any consequence happened from one end to
the other;
>an extraordinarily blank experience: Beethoven for Puritans, perhaps.
I kind of liked this maxim by Petri: "Music is so lovely when it's
left alone."... (found this in the piece Dan posted the URL to).
(It heftily reminds me of another saying which is by now quite famous.
:) )
Lena
Matthew B. Tepper (posts from uswest.net are forged)
typed in news:cejplvspl1raqph71...@4ax.com:
Perhaps Dan is assuming (as did I, before you told me otherwise, and I have
accepted your statement) that your omission of Petri from the GP20C series
suggested you valued him less than others who were included.
Again, I have accepted your remarks about that series in this newsgroup,
and I am not attempting to belabor the point.
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
War is Peace. ** Freedom is Slavery. ** It's all Napster's Fault!
deac...@yahoo.com
While it has been a long time since I listened to the Petri
Hammerklavier, I don't really think you "evoke the performance" in
what you write. That is the problem I have. Not that you don't like
it. Of course that is fine.
Phrases like: "dynamics and timing...uniformly applied", or "the
heriarchical phrase structure (of the Hammerklavier)" are not helpful
in the least.
What are you saying? He plays at the same tempo throughout? (quite
impossible to do, in fact) OR: He does not vary his dynamics
sufficiently for your taste? (Sorry: I have no ability to reduce the
hierarchical reference to common English) And if so, what about
Beethoven's taste?
I have no doubt that even Petri, a man renowned for his intelligence,
would have smiled at the use of such language.
As for me, I resist the temptation to smile, as I am sure you take all
this very seriously and would not appreciate a patronising put-down.
Suffice it to say, that if you want to "describe" your reactions to
music and to the performance of it, you will have to try to draw
clearer pictures of what exactly you are experiencing when you listen.
Personally I have no ability to relate to such abstract language.
Sorry if this sounds pompous or pretentious. It is not meant to.
Simply an expression of total incomprehension on my part.
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
uswest.net are forged)" <oyþ@earthlink.net> wrote:
>deac...@yahoo.com appears to have caused the following letters to be
>typed in news:cejplvspl1raqph71...@4ax.com:
>
>> On Mon, 08 Sep 2003 17:44:51 GMT, "Dan Koren" <dank...@yahoo.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>>> Your comments, incidentally, do NOT reflect my own view of this
>>>> pianist,
>>>
>>>
>>> It would be indeed suprising, not to mention miraculous, if *MY*
>>> comments reflected *YOUR* views of anything. Or is this just a Freudian
>>> slip highlighting your habit of giving other people their opinions?
>>>
>>>
>>>> as I have never shared my views of Petri with anyone, let alone you.
>>>
>>>
>>> Interesting. Are you asking us to believe that Tom Deacon (a person who
>>> appears to have more opinions than he has grey cells) *NEVER* took the
>>> chance to express his opinions about Petri?
>>
>> Indeed! That is precisely what I am asking you to believe. Should your
>> researches come up with anything to the contrary, please do let me know.
>
>Perhaps Dan is assuming (as did I, before you told me otherwise, and I have
>accepted your statement) that your omission of Petri from the GP20C series
>suggested you valued him less than others who were included.
>
>Again, I have accepted your remarks about that series in this newsgroup,
>and I am not attempting to belabor the point.
I doubt that I have posted any reference to individual pianists not
included in the GPE. To do so would do nothing but cast aspersions on
their playing, something I am not prepared to do, Matt.
In fact I admire Petri enormously. A case could have been made quite
easily to include him in the GPE. As for the reasons he is not there,
those I keep to myself, of course.
Now, if you ask about Claude Kahn, or Philippe Entremont, or a number
of truly NOT great pianists of the 20th C, I would adopt a different
position.
TD
Dan Koren
news:cejplvspl1raqph71...@4ax.com...
OK. Fine with me. I will take your statement at
face value. It just seemed so out of character
with everything we heard from you so far that I
thought I sensed an incongruency. This is not a
matter of any importance, and if you ever come
up with a sequel (Son of GGBB) I trust you will
correct this ommission, and perhaps Levy and a
few more.
dk
David7Gable
>
>
>?!? Whose faute, and why no mieux? ;-)
How should I know? I like Mitropoulos/Tozzi better, but it's heavily abridged,
in English, and not on CD. There aren't that many choices if you want your
Mussorgsky un-Rimsky-ized. Rostropovich is pretty dull, Semkov far duller and
erratic besides. (He couldn't maintain a tempo if his life depended on it.)
Semkov does have the inestimable benefit of Talvela as Boris. There are other
un-Rimsky-ized recordings, but I'm not sure I've heard them.
>> Boulez live w/the BBC SO for Mahler;
>
>
>Hhmmm.... Even ahead of Klemperer's two
>recordings?
I didn't express a preference for the recordings I listed. I simply said I had
listened to them. But I haven't been that impressed with the Klemperer Mahler
2nd's I've heard. (Aren't there more than two? Maybe I haven't heard the
right one.) I do like Kubelik/DGG and Bernstein's first recording very much.
But Boulez live is easily in the same league. Boulez's live Mahler 2 is by far
one of the best of his many Mahler performances (at least among those that I've
heard). A friend of mine with bejillion recordings of the 2nd describes it as
"the best performance from the entrance of the chorus to the end" he's ever
heard. If you ever hear it, you'll know why.
> However
>I do not think they [the Fine Arts Quartet's] are the finest K575,
>K589 or K590 on record.
What do you think are better than the FAQ's recordings of the above? I think
they're among the best string quartet recordings I've ever heard. Hardly
recognizable as stemming from the same ensemble that recorded Beethoven Op. 18.
-david gable
William Quentin (Bloom)
>Personally I have no ability to relate to such abstract language.
>
Duly noted.
>Sorry if this sounds pompous or pretentious. It is not meant to.
>Simply an expression of total incomprehension on my part.
>
It sounds as if the problem is yours rather than Lena's.
-Billy
Bob Lombard
>Suffice it to say, that if you want to "describe" your reactions to
>music and to the performance of it, you will have to try to draw
>clearer pictures of what exactly you are experiencing when you listen.
>Personally I have no ability to relate to such abstract language.
>
Aside from the fact that, in the passages you have problems with, Lena
wasn'r describing her reactions to music and the performance of it -
she was describing the performance - I respect your honesty in
admitting your lack of ability "to relate to such abstract language".
Especially poignant in that the language ain't all that abstract.
bl
Steve Emerson
"Matthew燘. Tepper" <oy兀earthlink.net> wrote:
> len...@yahoo.com (Lena) appears to have caused the following letters to be
> typed in news:6b33de45.03090...@posting.google.com:
>
> > Egon Petri: Hammerklavier
> Columbia Special Products, Westminster, Pearl, or something else?
Are these all separate recordings?
I found the one I know disappointing. It's an LP transfer supplied by a kind
RMCR pianophile. If there are multiple recordings, I have no idea which it is.
Track timings of this transfer:
10:18
2:48
14:12
11:16
MBT, if you can discern which this is, is there one you like better?
SE.
Lena
>While it has been a long time since I listened to the Petri
>Hammerklavier, I don't really think you "evoke the performance" in
>what you write. That is the problem I have.
Sorry, but I wasn't trying to evoke it...
>Phrases like: "dynamics and timing...uniformly applied", or "the
>heriarchical phrase structure (of the Hammerklavier)" are not helpful
>in the least. [...]
>Personally I have no ability to relate to such abstract language.
OK, but I think it's the only way to discuss some things.
I'm not sure it's worth going into here, but the term "hierarchical
phrase structure" is not at all ambiguous, actually. In Classical era
music (and elsewhere too), small phrases fit together into larger
ones, which form yet larger ones. This forms a hierarchy of phrases.
(There's a small example at the end, if you're interested.) Some
composers essentially build entire segments, like sonata form
expositions, this way (and, maybe overextending the term phrase a
little, entire movements...). Beethoven's expositions are often
complicated examples of this (the HK is not an exception).
It's pretty well known that performers do convey phrase hierarchies in
their playing. They, for example, vary the amount of rubato at phrase
junctions (more slowing down at ends of larger phrase groups). They
also calibrate dynamics over a larger set of phrases (for example, the
loudest noise is reserved for the biggest climax, not for a
'subsidiary' one). This is not very hard to understand (or verify),
really...
What Petri did in the HK/i was use more or less the same dynamic range
for each little phrase. This makes the music sound like a succession
of small train carriages, with the larger-scale structure in it not as
evident. What someone like Rosen does in the HK is the opposite: if
you listen carefully, you can notice that Rosen's dynamics, though not
particularly huge in range, vary with a lot of precision by exactly
where he is in the piece. (Rosen's ability to outline long segments
of a piece this way really is quite good.)
>Suffice it to say, that if you want to "describe" your reactions to
>music and to the performance of it, you will have to try to draw
>clearer pictures of what exactly you are experiencing when you listen.
I'm not always interested in describing my experiences. This time
I was interested in describing what Petri does...
Of course I'm not saying you shouldn't like Petri for whatever reason.
Lena
PS. I don't know if we should do this here, but a simple example of a
phrase hierarchy: a "period" consisting of an antecedent-consequent
phrase pair. For example, Mozart piano sonata K. 331/i, first 8 bars
split into antecedent phrase (mm. 1-4) and consequent (mm. 5-8).
These two 4-bar phrases further consist of 2-bar subphrases. The
consequent phrase mimics the antecedent, i.e. is similar in structure,
but has a different cadence at the end. -- There are many other ways of
building phrase structure. A more complicated example:
the first 20 measures of Mozart's symphony #40. (I can't believe you don't
know all this...)
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
Oh, you may be pushing the boat out too far, perhaps.
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
If she intends to communicate her ideas, they had best be phrased in
an intelligible language.
If you, with your superior intellect, have managed to derive something
from them, I can only bow my head in recognition.
TD
Steve Emerson
wrote:
> What are you saying? He plays at the same tempo throughout? (quite
> impossible to do, in fact) OR: He does not vary his dynamics
> sufficiently for your taste? (Sorry: I have no ability to reduce the
> hierarchical reference to common English)
Then I will do it. In a hierarchical arrangement, some things are more
important than others.
SE.
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
Perhaps not for you. But for a simple soul like myself, who likes
clear ideas clearly expressed, it ranks as "abstract". In other words,
incomprehensible. It reminds me of some indigestible text-book on
music designed expressly for the purpose of alienating any potential
music lovers from the enjoyment of serious music. e.g. the
Hammerklavier sonata by Beethoven.
TD
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
As I thought.
Musicological mumbo-jumbo.
>What Petri did in the HK/i was use more or less the same dynamic range
>for each little phrase. This makes the music sound like a succession
>of small train carriages, with the larger-scale structure in it not as
>evident. What someone like Rosen does in the HK is the opposite: if
>you listen carefully, you can notice that Rosen's dynamics, though not
>particularly huge in range, vary with a lot of precision by exactly
>where he is in the piece. (Rosen's ability to outline long segments
>of a piece this way really is quite good.)
You might not only LISTEN to Rosen, you might also follow his example
in print. He is one of the clearest thinkers in music. If you don't
understand what he is saying, you don't understand English.
>>Suffice it to say, that if you want to "describe" your reactions to
>>music and to the performance of it, you will have to try to draw
>>clearer pictures of what exactly you are experiencing when you listen.
>
>I'm not always interested in describing my experiences. This time
>I was interested in describing what Petri does...
Not quite. You were describing YOUR experience of Petri.
It is not mine, although I must say it has been a while since I
listened to this particular performance. But monochromatic - is that
the word you were looking for, perhaps, as in "one word fits the bill"
- is not one of the adjectives I would have used.
>Of course I'm not saying you shouldn't like Petri for whatever reason.
Of course not. I am not confusing you with the blinkered thinking of
Dan Koren, for example. No, just trying to encourage you to think and
write in words which mean something to the average person.
If you thought you were speaking to your students, or your
intellectual peers, you were wrong.
>
>PS. I don't know if we should do this here, but a simple example of a
>phrase hierarchy: a "period" consisting of an antecedent-consequent
>phrase pair. For example, Mozart piano sonata K. 331/i, first 8 bars
>split into antecedent phrase (mm. 1-4) and consequent (mm. 5-8).
>These two 4-bar phrases further consist of 2-bar subphrases. The
>consequent phrase mimics the antecedent, i.e. is similar in structure,
>but has a different cadence at the end. -- There are many other ways of
>building phrase structure. A more complicated example:
>the first 20 measures of Mozart's symphony #40. (I can't believe you don't
>know all this...)
If it takes so many words to express the notion, it seems to me that
even Mozart would have done more than smile at it.
TD
Dan Koren
>
> >> Boulez live w/the BBC SO for Mahler;
> >
> >
> >Hhmmm.... Even ahead of Klemperer's two
> >recordings?
>
> I didn't express a preference for the recordings I listed. I simply said
I had
> listened to them. But I haven't been that impressed with the Klemperer
Mahler
> 2nd's I've heard. (Aren't there more than two? Maybe I haven't heard the
> right one.) I do like Kubelik/DGG and Bernstein's first recording very
much.
> But Boulez live is easily in the same league. Boulez's live Mahler 2 is
by far
> one of the best of his many Mahler performances (at least among those that
I've
> heard). A friend of mine with bejillion recordings of the 2nd describes
it as
> "the best performance from the entrance of the chorus to the end" he's
ever
> heard. If you ever hear it, you'll know why.
I heard it. By the time it gets to the entrance of
the chorus, the opportunity has been wasted. This
symphony simply does not work (for me) if one does
not get the opening right. And no one gets it
better than Klemp.
> > However I do not think they [the Fine Arts Quartet's]
> > are the finest K575, K589 or K590 on record.
>
> What do you think are better than the FAQ's recordings
> of the above?
I do not dislike FAQ in these works. I simply like
Amadeus better. This is rather unusual for me, as I
do not like Amadeus in general.
dk
Lawrence Chalmers
Simon Roberts
>
>>>Egon Petri: Hammerklavier
>>>-------------------------
>>>
>>>OK, I finally heard it and I have to apologize, I don't get it.
>[...]
>
>>That's pretty much my reaction to the Beethoven/Petri disc Pearl
>released not
>>that long ago - nothing of any consequence happened from one end to
>the other;
>>an extraordinarily blank experience: Beethoven for Puritans, perhaps.
>
>I kind of liked this maxim by Petri: "Music is so lovely when it's
>left alone."...
Too bad he didn't!
Simon
deac...@yahoo.com
In other words, monochromatic? Bland? Homogeneous?
With the use of such colourful (or the absence of such) words, one has
the impression, then, that Petri resembles an ungifted student quite
unable to use the piano's ability to create different intensity of
sound. Almost machine-like in its homogenous perfection.
Is that more accurate?
If so, it is an inaccurate picture of Petri as I know his playing.
Interesting what happens when you strip all the pseudo-intellectual
mumbo-jumbo from the words, isn't it Steve?
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
Well, if one is to believe Lena (Horne?), it is precisely what he did.
Of course he didn't. You're quite right, Simon.
TD
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in
I have the CSP and the Westminster, which latter I prefer; but since
they're both LPs, they are in storage, I can't look up the timings. The
Pearl I have not yet heard.
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
War is Peace. ** Freedom is Slavery. ** It's all Napster's fault!
Bob Lombard
It turns out that music is a more efficient way to express music than
words are. This is a revelation? It is certainly possible that Mozart
'would have done more than smile at' your dilemma; he was famously
noted for his s.o.h. That it was often scatological is possibly
irrelevant here.
Lena, Mr. Deacon worked in the business end of the music industry;
within that cul-de-sac he was more of a Gelb than a Gould. In a
previous incarnation he rejected the Rachmaninov/Horowitz offer to
record the former's 2-piano music because he figured it wouldn't sell.
Well, maybe not a previous incarnation; could be another instance of
great minds thinking alike.
bl
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
>Lena, Mr. Deacon worked in the business end of the music industry;
>within that cul-de-sac he was more of a Gelb than a Gould. In a
>previous incarnation he rejected the Rachmaninov/Horowitz offer to
>record the former's 2-piano music because he figured it wouldn't sell.
>bl
You must have me confused with someone else.
I have never had the slightest dealings with Horowitz, except as a
listener, that is.
TD
Matthew B. Tepper
typed in news:lddqlv4v4b4qnk0l7...@4ax.com:
Interestingly enough, Peter Gelb's earlier career appears to have been as a
Horowitz sycophant.
It was Charles O'Connell who denied the request from Rachmaninoff to record
lots of substantial repertoire (including Beethoven piano sonatas) for RCA.
If anybody cancelled ostensible plans for a two-piano recording with
Horowitz, t'was he.
David7Gable
>'would have done more than smile at' your dilemma; he was famously
>noted for his s.o.h. That it was often scatological is possibly
>irrelevant here.
Yes, even to setting a scatological poem as a canon. On the other hand, he
taught composition, and in doing so mostly discussed phrase structure, as is
the case with all late 18th-century composition manuals. (All of his notes for
teaching an Englishman named Thomas Attwood have been preserved.)
-david gable
Dan Koren
news:gbcqlvsmvpnm48j81...@4ax.com...
>
> Lena, Mr. Deacon worked in the business end of the music
> industry; within that cul-de-sac he was more of a Gelb
> than a Gould. In a previous incarnation he rejected the
> Rachmaninov/Horowitz offer to record the former's 2-piano
> music because he figured it wouldn't sell.
Right you are. It would have sold better if the composer
had been the latter! ;-)
> Well, maybe not a previous incarnation; could be another
> instance of great minds thinking alike.
Wasn't that actually "great minds think dislike"?
dk
Steve Emerson
"Matthew燘. Tepper" <oy兀earthlink.net> wrote:
> > 10:18
> > 2:48
> > 14:12
> > 11:16
> >
> > MBT, if you can discern which [Petri Hammerklavier] this is, is there one
> > you like better?
>
> I have the CSP and the Westminster, which latter I prefer; but since
> they're both LPs, they are in storage, I can't look up the timings. The
> Pearl I have not yet heard.
Thanks. I consulted my e-mail and what I have is the Westminster. I believe
this is the one Lena was speaking of.
SE.
Wayne Reimer
Over the weekend, it was:
Bacewicz piano music played by Ewa Kupiec (who also did a really good
Szymanowski Sym. Con.)
Liszt at the Opera - 1 of Howard's Hyperion - some fun stuff I didn't know.
Various Hungarian pieces (Liszt, Dohnanyi, Kodaly, Bartok, Weiner, Kurtag,
Szollosy) by Frankl on ASV. Interesting program and the playing is certainly
okay.
A CRI disc of Paul Cooper's piano music. Never heard anything by him before.
I enjoyed it, even if it seems to over-reach its level of inspiration and seems
a little to self-important, it's still well-made and has some claim to being
distinctive.
d'Albert piano music on a Hyperion disc, played by Piers Lane. Some
interesting things.
Elgar Violin Sonata and Piano Quintet by people in the Nash Ensemble on
Hyperion. Haven't decided yet on this, but suspect I'll grow to love it.
And a big big dose of Robert Simpson. String quartets 3, 6, 10, 11, 12, 14,
15, String Trio, String Quintet, Quintet for Clarinet, Bass Clarinet, and
Strings. A huge "thank you" to Hyperion for the Simpson series. I keep hoping
that one of these days his music will become the fashion for a few seasons, and
lots of performances will transpire, and lots of devoted fans will be made.
I'm certain that there are quite a few music lovers of the more serious sort
out there who would be quite taken with his Beethoven-meets-Nielsen way of
putting music together if only they ever had the chance to hear it. Oh, well,
I'm glad I've had the chance to hear it, anyway. And still to go is the 10th
Symphony.
Yeah, I got in a shipment from BRO, is what this is all about. One more thing
left after the Simpson Sym. 10 - Poulenc songs. Saving the dessert for last.
wr
Matthew燘. Tepper
letters to be typed in
> And a big big dose of Robert Simpson. String quartets 3, 6, 10, 11, 12,
> 14, 15, String Trio, String Quintet, Quintet for Clarinet, Bass Clarinet,
> and Strings. A huge "thank you" to Hyperion for the Simpson series. I
> keep hoping that one of these days his music will become the fashion for
> a few seasons, and lots of performances will transpire, and lots of
> devoted fans will be made. I'm certain that there are quite a few music
> lovers of the more serious sort out there who would be quite taken with
> his Beethoven-meets-Nielsen way of putting music together if only they
> ever had the chance to hear it. Oh, well, I'm glad I've had the chance
> to hear it, anyway. And still to go is the 10th Symphony.
Funny thing about that; I was just listening to the Symphony #3 (Jascha
Horenstein) and Clarinet Quintet (Aeolians et al) that other day.
David M. Cook
wrote:
>> his Beethoven-meets-Nielsen way of putting music together if only they
>> ever had the chance to hear it. Oh, well, I'm glad I've had the chance
>> to hear it, anyway. And still to go is the 10th Symphony.
> Funny thing about that; I was just listening to the Symphony #3 (Jascha
> Horenstein) and Clarinet Quintet (Aeolians et al) that other day.
And the Symphony No 6 was the last thing in my CD player. Excellent work.
The Beethoven-meets-Nielsen comparison is quite apt, but I also hear a bit
of Malcom Arnold, too.
Dave Cook
Henk van Tuijl
<deac...@yahoo.com> schreef in bericht
news:g15qlvciqcqh0tojr...@4ax.com...
> In other words, monochromatic? Bland? Homogeneous?
>
> With the use of such colourful (or the absence of such) words, one has
> the impression, then, that Petri resembles an ungifted student quite
> unable to use the piano's ability to create different intensity of
> sound. Almost machine-like in its homogenous perfection.
Hmm, I cannot see why the use of words
like monochromatic, bland and
homogeneous would be informative.
They are at best descriptions of
very personal impressions.
On the other hand, Lena's description
of Petri's phrasing in the
Hammerklavier _is_ informative. It
can be falsified.
The question remains, of course,
whether it would change my like or
dislike of Petri's Hammerklavier if
Lena's description turned out to be
correct - or not.
I doubt it. In that sense _all_
talk about art is mumbo jumbo -
even Rosen's.
Henk
Dan Koren
news:3f5d932f$0$58709$e4fe...@news.xs4all.nl...
>
> <deac...@yahoo.com> schreef in bericht
> news:g15qlvciqcqh0tojr...@4ax.com...
>
> > In other words, monochromatic? Bland? Homogeneous?
> >
> > With the use of such colourful (or the absence of such) words, one has
> > the impression, then, that Petri resembles an ungifted student quite
> > unable to use the piano's ability to create different intensity of
> > sound. Almost machine-like in its homogenous perfection.
>
> Hmm, I cannot see why the use of words
> like monochromatic, bland and
> homogeneous would be informative.
> They are at best descriptions of
> very personal impressions.
But so are words like sweet, bitter
and spicy. Do you also find them
uninformative? Or to put this
differently -- does use of a term
that implies a degree renders that
term 'uninformative'? Methinks not.
Incidentally, the examples you chose
are not similar. 'Monochromatic' is a
term with an unambiguous technical
definition, that is often used as a
metaphor. 'Bland' and 'homogeneous'
are terms which imply a degree.
> On the other hand, Lena's description
> of Petri's phrasing in the Hammerklavier
> _is_ informative. It can be falsified.
Lena writes very clearly. She writes a
lot better than the Deacon. I suspect
she may have been born and raised in a
non-English speaking culture.
> The question remains, of course,
> whether it would change my like or
> dislike of Petri's Hammerklavier if
> Lena's description turned out to be
> correct - or not.
>
> I doubt it. In that sense _all_
> talk about art is mumbo jumbo -
Correction. All talk about art *IS*
mumbo jumbo -- unless it is itself
*ART*, as with Bernard Shaw ;-)
> even Rosen's.
Rosen's in particular ;-)
He writes better than most pianists.
On the other hand, many pianists can
barely speak, let alone write, and he
plays no better than some who cannot
write at all ;-)
dk
deac...@yahoo.com
<oy兀earthlink.net> wrote:
>deac...@yahoo.com appears to have caused the following letters to be
>typed in news:lddqlv4v4b4qnk0l7...@4ax.com:
>
>> On Tue, 09 Sep 2003 01:48:58 GMT, Bob Lombard <thor...@adelphia.net>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Lena, Mr. Deacon worked in the business end of the music industry;
>>> within that cul-de-sac he was more of a Gelb than a Gould. In a
>>> previous incarnation he rejected the Rachmaninov/Horowitz offer to
>>> record the former's 2-piano music because he figured it wouldn't sell.
>>
>>>bl
>>
>> You must have me confused with someone else.
>>
>> I have never had the slightest dealings with Horowitz, except as a
>> listener, that is.
>
>Interestingly enough, Peter Gelb's earlier career appears to have been as a
>Horowitz sycophant.
>
>It was Charles O'Connell who denied the request from Rachmaninoff to record
>lots of substantial repertoire (including Beethoven piano sonatas) for RCA.
>If anybody cancelled ostensible plans for a two-piano recording with
>Horowitz, t'was he.
Whatever job these people had, I doubt highly that it ever had
anything to do with reissuing old recordings. Which was my point.
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
Yes, all is futile! Everything withers and dies.
Why so philosophical, Henk?
TD
Henk van Tuijl
<deac...@yahoo.com> schreef in bericht
news:q7grlvcb5log1vvii...@4ax.com...
> >On the other hand, Lena's description
> >of Petri's phrasing in the
> >Hammerklavier _is_ informative. It
> >can be falsified.
> >
> >The question remains, of course,
> >whether it would change my like or
> >dislike of Petri's Hammerklavier if
> >Lena's description turned out to be
> >correct - or not.
> >
> >I doubt it. In that sense _all_
> >talk about art is mumbo jumbo -
> >even Rosen's.
> Yes, all is futile! Everything withers and dies.
>
> Why so philosophical, Henk?
There is little wisdom in the belief
that all is futile.
However, IMHO there is wisdom in the
belief that there are no necessary
truths in aesthetics.
The adagium "de gustibus ..." is not
the end but the beginning of art.
Lena's hierarchy is very useful as a
description of Petri's phrasing in
the Hammerklavier.
Such a description does not "prove"
anything. It cannot prove that it
is nonsense to like or dislike
Petri's Hammerklavier.
In this sense even rational
discussions about music - and art in
general - are futile. The outcome is
never a law.
Although these discussions about art
are mumbo jumbo, in a sense, they
make interesting reading even when
the authors sometimes mix aesthetics
and ethics.
Henk
Henk van Tuijl
"Dan Koren" <dank...@yahoo.com> schreef in bericht
news:3f5d...@news.meer.net...
> "Henk van Tuijl" <hvt...@xs4all.nl> wrote in message
> news:3f5d932f$0$58709$e4fe...@news.xs4all.nl...
> > Hmm, I cannot see why the use of words
> > like monochromatic, bland and
> > homogeneous would be informative.
> > They are at best descriptions of
> > very personal impressions.
>
> But so are words like sweet, bitter
> and spicy. Do you also find them
> uninformative? Or to put this
> differently -- does use of a term
> that implies a degree renders that
> term 'uninformative'? Methinks not.
Loudness in Lena's "hierarchy" does not
merely refer to levels (or degrees) of
sound but to one of the ways musical
phrases relate to each other.
I miss the context of Tom's
monochromatic, bland and homogeneous.
> Incidentally, the examples you chose
> are not similar. 'Monochromatic' is a
> term with an unambiguous technical
> definition, that is often used as a
> metaphor. 'Bland' and 'homogeneous'
> are terms which imply a degree.
<g>
I cannot even trust Tom to chose "similar"
adjectives ...
> > On the other hand, Lena's description
> > of Petri's phrasing in the Hammerklavier
> > _is_ informative. It can be falsified.
>
> Lena writes very clearly. She writes a
> lot better than the Deacon. I suspect
> she may have been born and raised in a
> non-English speaking culture.
Your logic escapes me but I am sensitive
to your rhetoric.
Henk
Edward Jasiewicz
about the merits of various pianists, I still find him ranting on
about my relationship with Eunice Norton when I stroll into this
group from time to time...]
Even sadder, Dan, is that you've a pianist this time who was
chosen as one of the four greatest interpreters of this sonata by
ARG critic Allen Linkowski (Guy, Schnabel, Norton, and Brendel).
So much for my delusion- or would you like to state for the
record that you now think it is a shared delusion? This isn't my
opinion, granted - I think Guy and Brendel's interpretations are
just about worthless to anyone interested in actually
*experiencing* the Hammerklavier. But at the very least, it
certainly doesn't serve your point well if you're trying to
portray me as some sort of misguided, hero-worshipping fanatic.
Nothing could be further from the truth regarding my
understanding of Norton's musicianship. However, if it makes you
feel better to imagine me this way, then please do continue with
your fantasy. (I can see now that you clearly need to take this
angle; how else can you handle all the frustration coming from
having such a limited, bottom-up grasp of music that is
apparently completely based on your amusingly and overly proud
comprehension of the dismissible, [merely] physical stance of
good intrumentalism on a keyboard...if even that.)
I also clearly am not basing my estimation of Norton's worth
based on "memories," as you wrote, for how could I then start a
recording company by releasing "memories" on disc?? (D'oh!) And
incidentally, you should know that the notoriety of most
celebrated artists tends to spring from such sources of the
advocacy and energetic promotion of their progeny (or, what in
this case you would toss out as some kind of cultural perversity,
just as I'm sure you would've tossed out the entire WTC had it
fallen into your sad little comprehensibly inartistic clutches
back before Bach actually published his work...). This should not
be confused with such silly things as "fans," which by the way is
exactly where your sad little long-distance and overly emotional
response to Richter falls into category, seemingly encompassing
the truly embarrassing manner of fawning over an artist,
irregardless of the times he did not even play well.
I think you need to get a life, Dan, preferably one where you do
the least damage by not constantly and ridiculously broadcasting
your condensed spectrum of pseudo-musical values to the public.
-Ed
"Dan Koren" <dank...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:3f5c...@news.meer.net...
...
> I'm perfectly satisfied with the verdict of my
> own ears, and that of unbiased listeners such
> as Lena. As you probably know, the memories of
> pupils are the least reliable indicator of an
> artist's worth, as they are often overawed by
> and emotionally involved with their teachers.
>
> "Delusional fan syndrome" as I like to call it.
> Look at Mr. Jasiewicz for a perfect example.
...
deac...@yahoo.com
<hvt...@xs4all.nl> wrote:
>Lena's hierarchy is very useful as a
>description of Petri's phrasing in
>the Hammerklavier.
>Such a description does not "prove"
>anything. It cannot prove that it
>is nonsense to like or dislike
>Petri's Hammerklavier.
>
>In this sense even rational
>discussions about music - and art in
>general - are futile. The outcome is
>never a law.
>
>Although these discussions about art
>are mumbo jumbo, in a sense, they
>make interesting reading even when
>the authors sometimes mix aesthetics
>and ethics.
>
>Henk
Well I find it singularly unhelpful and quite unintuitive.
But, to each his own.
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
It would be wonderful if I had been able to select something useful.
The adjectives I did come up with were sort of "pis-aller", trying to
make the best of a bad situation. Perhaps, though, you have some
better ideas, to which I would be completely open.
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
You honour Mr. Koren far too much by answering his flippant throwaway
remark in such a post, Ed.
I wasn't aware that Koren "fawned" over Richter. That would, indeed,
be a very sad spectacle, some West Coast computer nerd drooling at the
very thought of yet another blessed note from Slava, cooing with
delight at each an every repeat, prostrate at the simple idea of the
discovery of another version of the interminable Schubert B flat
sonata!
Knowing Richter, I do believe that he would have sent this fawning
beast packing at first sight.
But back to the Hammerklavier. I heard Richter perform this work twice
in the concert hall, both times in France. In one performance his
intensity was so great that the pianist got lost in the fugue.
Understandable, as this is a very tough fugue. The chin jutted out
just that much more, the hands churned in neutral, pounding out notes
furiously for several seconds, and then, with the gears nicely meshing
again, he continued to the end. He was so furious with himself, that
after the performance he raced back onto the stage for an encore: the
fugue again, and this time he got it right. That night he remained in
the hall until 4:00 AM playing this damned fugue again and again, just
to prove that he could do it.
The impression one gets is of someone slightly off his rocker, so to
speak. Just a little fey!
Later in the 1970s, he determined to use the music for all his
performances, which led in many ways to a decline in the level of his
performances. Just never quite as "possessed" as they were when it was
just him and the piano, minus the decorative presence of the score and
the page-turner and the candelabra. (shades of the great Liberace!)
TD
Bob Lombard
[re Richter]
>Later in the 1970s, he determined to use the music for all his
>performances, which led in many ways to a decline in the level of his
>performances. Just never quite as "possessed" as they were when it was
>just him and the piano, minus the decorative presence of the score and
>the page-turner and the candelabra. (shades of the great Liberace!)
>
>TD
What a strange take on motive. I would assume that you are unfamiliar
with the effects of aging on brain function (I know some of them
firsthand), but I suspect that you are/were aware of them - and have
forgotten. Retirement is more than just a reward for your life's work,
Tom. And nowadays you can bring a CD player with you to the chimney
corner. Or arrange to get reminders about what is supposed to happen
next. That's basically the choice - reminders or the chimney corner.
bl (witness for the senile)
David7Gable
Writing about the arts is no more (and no less) mumbo jumbo than writing about
nuclear physics. Reviewers tend to express value judgements, but judgement is
not the only or even the principal function of criticism: explanation and
understanding are more important functions. What matters when the reviewer
expresses his opinion is not the judgement but the evidence he marshalls in
support of it. The fact is, you can notice and explain aspects of artworks
just as surely as you can notice and explain aspects of nature. Not that it's
easy to do or often done well.
The paintings of Ingres have very smooth glassy surfaces and there is virtually
no trace of brushwork on the surface. In a Monet painting you can generally
see every single brushstroke, every daub, and his surfaces are bumpy and
textured. As a result the objects Monet depicts are suggested rather than
clearly delineated as they are in Ingres, emerging through a blur. The two
approaches result from the painters' desires to capture different aspects of
reality, from different aesthetics. You can see this in the pictures, and you
can discuss it. Pursuing a gross but important distinction will take you very
far into the universes of these painters and into the changes that
impressionism wrought on French painting.
To talk about something you need words for it, and in any enterprise of
explanation a vocabulary grows up around the phenomenon explained.
Correspondingly, you must be conversant with at least some of that vocabulary
in order to understand explanations made using that vocabulary, and that's as
true of the arts as of nuclear physics. A friend of mine and I were
discussing Boulez's Répons in front of a friend of my friend. Improvising on
the spot as one does in conversation, one of us referred to "this junk" or
"this stuff" coming back transformed later in the piece, and my friend's friend
was amused by our use of less than exalted "technical" vocabulary. Is that
what music analysis is--is this what you guys do?--he wanted to know. My
friend and I immediately answered Yes. We both knew what IN THE MUSIC we meant
by the word "stuff" or "junk," and the use of a word enabled us to discuss an
aspect of the piece. Obviously, it's possible to develop a more precise and
therefore more useful vocabulary.
One of the great shibboleths in dicussing the arts is the extreme subjectivity
supposedly characteristic of reactions to art works. But artworks are not like
Rorschach blots; we're not intended to read into them whatever we want. Much
of what we apprehend is shared by everybody who looks or listens. We all know
where the climax of the Liebestod is, and we all experience it at the exact
same moment. This shared experience extends to the character of artworks.
Either you can tell that the second movement of Beethoven's 8th is a jolly
piece or you cannot be said to have experienced the piece. Similarly, nobody
thinks the last movement of Mahler's 9th is a jolly piece.
-david gable
Lena
> > > like monochromatic, bland and
> > > homogeneous would be informative.
> > > They are at best descriptions of
> > > very personal impressions.
> >
> > But so are words like sweet, bitter
> > and spicy. Do you also find them
> > uninformative? Or to put this
> > differently -- does use of a term
> > that implies a degree renders that
> > term 'uninformative'? Methinks not.
FWIW, sorry to barge in... Actually I at least think all those words
are informative... But so are other types of descriptions. -- Though
of course Bob is right. Music is a lot more efficient way of
discussing music.
Re Petri:
The word "bland" (for example) does describe Petri. But Solomon,
Rosen, and Petri could maybe all be called "bland" in the HK (by
somebody at least) - they aren't hugely aggressive, and neither do
they possess a very large dynamic range. However, there's a big
difference between Solomon's and Rosen's HK on one hand, and Petri's
on the other.
I suggest to Tom Deacon that it would be more useful if he skipped the
personal insults and listened to Petri instead. :) It really should be
possible to calmly discuss (and even agree on) the actual features of
the playing. (Although I must say I'm getting extremely bored with
and by Petri by now... :) )
If anyone wants to try to see what Petri does, they might listen (with
a score) to Petri's use of forte and piano in the exposition and the
development section, up to maybe bar 170 or so. (For a smaller
section, try this part of the development only.) There are musical
"events" - of varying importance - that Petri doesn't highlight
dynamically. (Or otherwise, but let's not go there.)
Otherwise:
I propose we start a new newsgroup for discussing all the truly
fascinating subjects, like me and my writing style. :)
Last - I kind of wish Tom Deacon and everyone else would restrain
themselves a little with the unprovoked personal insults.
Or, well, if restraint is unthinkable, would it be at all possible to
make gratuitous insults of a little higher quality? :):)
Lena
David7Gable
>[Rosen] writes better than most pianists.
>
>On the other hand, many pianists can
>barely speak, let alone write, and he
>plays no better than some who cannot
>write at all ;-)
Dan comes perilously close to Rosen's own position here. "What I write about
would be apparent in anybody's performance."
Rosen has suffered from the assumption that his performances are designed to
illustrate some academic thesis, and as a result he has been branded an
"intellectual" pianist, "intellectual" being the most damning epithet that
could ever be applied to anybody in the arts, of course. But Rosen does not
play to illustrate a thesis, and the relationship of performance to "thesis" is
in fact the other way around. Performance doesn't follow thesis. Thesis
follows performance. It's because a musician immerses himself in a piece that
he notices things about it.
-david gable
Avery Earle
Franck & transcription of, Paley, Naxos (*)
Busoni, etc, Paul Jacobs, Arbiter
"Big Band Soul", Gene Harris, Concord
(*) The Paley above, Angela Hewitt's Bach transcriptions CD,
and a disk from the Nimbus "Grand Piano" series have got me
wanting to hear a lot more of Harold Bauer --- what's good?
--
Is there then no more? / All this to love and rapture's due; / Must we
not pay a debt to pleasure too? -- Rochester
Lena
It is? - OK! :)
Lena
Edward Jasiewicz
regarding Dan's posts - it's so futile to engage in a discussion
with him about anything artistic. Just this one time, though, I
thought I'd pounce on the little shit - he so beautifully fell
into a trap of advocacy versus fanaticism.
On the other hand, I have to be extra careful not to let others'
blind enthusiasm affect my appreciation of Richter's successes. I
feel that when he succeeded, he usually played with heartfelt
interest and great chemistry - my favorite kind of musical
success. But when he fails, boy does he fail! I've come to expect
about a 50/50 average from him, unless he's in the wrong
repertoire (which I won't dare suggest here!), in which case he
usually fails completely, at that.
It is distressing to hear about Richter's behavior during that
concert of the Hammerklavier, too. I've learned that [not only
regarding sessions but also every time a musician sounds even one
note] that such awareness of mistakes (i.e., presence, number of,
etc.) depletes the musical saturation (i.e. extent of feeling
abandoned to the musical vision...) respectively to the same
extent - from the lapse in concentration, that is, not the
interruption of the mistake. (You see, I have just about no
regard for so-called musical professionalism.) Especially with a
piece as serious as the Hammerklavier, to allow such a lapse in
the unfolding of the music to affect the progress is as good as
stopping altogether. There's only one chance to play it and have
it be *the* occasion it was meant to be for the moment (and as
each moment in the music relies of the previous, except for the
beginning, which relies on silence...), and playing it again for
an encore is so absurd and embarrassing I can't even believe it.
First of all, there are far worse failings that can happen than
missing notes - such as missing the music! And especially with
the fugue of this sonata, I can't believe he would have the nerve
to play it again in public on the same occasion! Honestly, this
over-sensitivity to mistakes is such a childish, ego-ridden
failing of so many pianists (sad that it is a concept that is
constantly entrenched in the training of so many pianists from
such a young age, too); I remember hearing about Argerich's more
youthful thinking process of mistake-avoidance (where she would
imagine herself dropping dead if she missed even one note...) and
losing so respect for her as an artist. Secondly, to play
something again is to risk not playing it as well. This is a
common occurrence with musicians who play the same piece or
movement twice in a concert - the second time for the encore, for
example - after it was a hit the first time. There's nothing
worse than the polite applause that ekes out when the music fails
to work quite as well as it may have the first time around...
Schnabel's famous comment is good to remember here: "I may play
it better, but I'll never play it as well again!" (And if Richter
was in such an abusive habit of playing pieces again and again
and again after concerts for rehearsal purposes, then that
explains his shaky batting average with the things that count,
too.)
Regarding using the music for performances, I feel convinced it
doesn't have to affect a performance at all if the musician's
concentration, practice (as in, it is hard to get used to using
the music if you are used to playing something from memory...),
and plan for the piece is up to it. Problem is most pianists
aren't sufficiently well-thought-out to begin with (in terms of a
plan for freedoms and restrictions, et al; i.e., work that is
best done away from the keyboard!), so their quasi-improvisatory
success is even less likely to occur this way.
One last thing, I have to admit having some weird, overly-holy
feelings myself about the Schubert Sonata in B-flat. I'm sorry,
Tom, but I think it's just THAT great a piece... (But, I surely
don't want every recording of it that's out there, too.)
regards,
Ed
<deac...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1oaslvsheemtr87i5...@4ax.com...
Edward Jasiewicz
"Lena" <len...@yahoo.com> wrote in > Last - I kind of wish Tom
Deacon and everyone else would restrain
> themselves a little with the unprovoked personal insults.
>
> Or, well, if restraint is unthinkable, would it be at all
possible to
> make gratuitous insults of a little higher quality? :):)
...uh, so why not be brave, Lena, and just address that comment
to Dan himself, clearly the largest perpetrator of ugly little
frogs here.
-Ed
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
>On Tue, 09 Sep 2003 15:43:54 -0400, deac...@yahoo.com wrote:
Perhaps you are losing a few grey cells as well as I.
Never did I mention Richter's "motive" for using a score.
It is, of course, obvious and yes, we all suffer the loss of memory.
But some don't. I don't need to mention those, as I am sure you know
their names.
The thing is, whereas with Curzon and Myra Hess it didn't have an
injurious effect on their playing, with Richter, it did. Alas.
Fortunately I heard him many, many times before the memory thing took
hold and the intensity of his playing began to suffer.
TD
David7Gable
Ed advised Lena:
>...uh, so why not be brave, Lena, and just address that comment
>to Dan himself, clearly the largest perpetrator of ugly little
>frogs here.
In this thread????? Why Dan's not even in the running. With your three posts
you've managed to beat out even Tom Deacon, who in his very short time at rmcr
has managed to raise the hackles of more regular contributors than debates over
the recent war in Iraq. (And not because the regulars have a monolithic
viewpoint from which Mr. Deacon dissents.)
-david gable
deac...@yahoo.com
It is amusing that whenever criticism of someone's ideas or the
expression of those ideas occurs, those whose ideas are being
criticized feel "personally wounded".
I did not insult you personally. I could have, but chose not to. Why,
anyway, as I don't know you at all. You haven't insulted me, nor do
you have any reason to, I think.
So, relax. There were no personal insults. Just legitimate criticism
of your expression of ideas, which, to my mind, at least, was
unsuccessful. You didn't express what you wanted to say clearly,
succinctly.
Over and out.
And incidentally I agree that a lengthy discussion of Petri's
Hammerklavier is unwarranted. I haven't thought about it for decades
and don't really see the reason for it now. But you started it.
TD
Bob Lombard
[...]
>Performance doesn't follow thesis. Thesis
>follows performance. It's because a musician immerses himself in a piece that
>he notices things about it.
>
Sounds right - for a musician. But for a musicologist? Rosen was/is
both - so which takes precedence? Can Rosen himself know which
discipline is working on him? My (admittedly unbacked-by-facts)
impression is that his interpretations gradually shifted orientation
from musician toward musicologist throughout his career. Fewer
agogics, drier, more detail oriented. I'm not talking about 'youthful
enthusiasm' progressing toward 'mature understanding', or 'mellowing
out'.
bl
Larry Rinkel
"David7Gable" <david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20030909175619...@mb-m02.aol.com...
>
> Writing about the arts is no more (and no less) mumbo jumbo than writing
about
is the extreme subjectivity
> supposedly characteristic of reactions to art works. But artworks are not
like
> Rorschach blots; we're not intended to read into them whatever we want.
Much
> of what we apprehend is shared by everybody who looks or listens. We all
know
> where the climax of the Liebestod is, and we all experience it at the
exact
> same moment. This shared experience extends to the character of artworks.
> Either you can tell that the second movement of Beethoven's 8th is a jolly
> piece or you cannot be said to have experienced the piece.
I rather enjoy the musicological mumbo-jumbo myself, so long as it's applied
with a light enough hand and seems to relate to my experience of a musical
work as I hear or play it. When the m-j is well done, it makes me feel that
I am somehow closer to the composer's mind, so that I understand a little
better the choices he's made in the act of composition.
David says that "either you can tell that the second movement of Beethoven's
8th is a jolly piece or you cannot be said to have experienced the piece."
Actually I would not have used the word "jolly" myself for this piece, but
perhaps instead "droll," as I think its humor is a bit more sly than "jolly"
implies. Verbal descriptions of musical moods are at best inexact. But of
course either "jolly" or "droll" is more in keeping with LvB 8 than either
word is in keeping with Mahler 9.
What makes LvB 8:ii droll is hard to say. Perhaps it has to do with its
staccato wind chords, its sudden explosive changes in dynamics, and so
forth, though these features can be found in many other pieces no one would
call jolly or droll. One point I have noticed in myself and other listeners
is how humorous the return of the main theme is at the start of the
recapitulation, exactly halfway through the piece, and especially where the
cellos and basses answer the violins (at bars 42-43, if you have a score).
But perhaps here is where the mumbo-jumbo can help a little, if one knows
the vocabulary. In a striking paragraph from his "Beethoven," Donald Tovey
describes a passage from the F minor quartet, first movement, where he
claims that "the highest power of Beethoven's imagination is shown at points
where an exact recapitulation would be ineffective." Tovey goes on to
describe a passage in the exposition where Beethoven uses a striking,
unusual harmonic change, but says that doing so in the recapitulation would
have lost all the "colour value" of the original moment. Instead, Beethoven
uses the "ordinary supertonic," as "the one thing that can inspire terror at
this juncture."
The mood of Op. 93:ii couldn't be different from the savage violence of Op.
95:i, but the compositional design is not so far off. As the main theme is
initially presented following those chirping wind chords, it starts in the
first violins with a simple I-V-I progression in Bb major. Cellos and basses
then answer it, shifting the tonality immediately to G minor, the relative
minor, and forcing the violins to continue in that key momentarily. Maybe
that's humorous or maybe not, but in its subtle way a shift of tonality so
early in a piece is not what we'd normally expect, and shortly after
Beethoven sets its back on track in Bb again. The droll jollity, however,
surfaces most obviously when the recapitulation starts, showing the highest
power of Beethoven's imagination at a point where an exact recapitulation
would be ineffective. It's just here where I've seen people chuckle at
Beethoven's cleverness, for instead of repeating the shift to G minor, which
would have lost all its color value by this point, Beethoven has his lower
strings simply climb up a Bb major scale - the ordinary tonic, in this case,
being the one thing that can inspire jollity at this juncture.
In other words, I think different listeners hear this moment in the same
way. Some listeners just explain it differently, and others enjoy it without
feeling a need to explain at all.
Ian Pace
> personal insults and listened to Petri instead. :) It really should be
> possible to calmly discuss (and even agree on) the actual features of
> the playing. (Although I must say I'm getting extremely bored with
> and by Petri by now... :) )
<more snip - all very interesting, just trying to save space!>
> Otherwise:
>
> I propose we start a new newsgroup for discussing all the truly
> fascinating subjects, like me and my writing style. :)
>
> Last - I kind of wish Tom Deacon and everyone else would restrain
> themselves a little with the unprovoked personal insults.
>
> Or, well, if restraint is unthinkable, would it be at all possible to
> make gratuitous insults of a little higher quality? :):)
>
> Lena
The highly combatative, aggressive, and personalized nature of many
threads here seems unnecessary, petty, and certainly I can't see how
it has any knock-on musical benefit. Does anyone consider if this
might play a part in making this an almost all-male forum? (present
company excepted, of course, I wondered if you had any thoughts on
this, Lena? - profoundest apologies if that sounds patronizing in any
sense).
My copy of the LP of Petri's Hammerklavier lies in a pile of vinyls
waiting to be moved (with everything else) - haven't listened to it
for a long long time, will give it another go-over when everything's
installed in the new place. For what it's worth, I'm keen on Rosen,
Badura-Skoda and Brendel's second recording of this piece. Very
interested to hear Gulda's - is that available on CD? I've heard he
comes closest to realizing Beethoven's metronome marks (except for
Schnabel, but that recording has plenty of other problems). Having
played it at these tempos a few years ago, I know that Beethoven's
marking for the first movement feels VERY fast indeed, especially on a
modern instrument, but its proximity to that of the last movement
suggests a certain symmetry to the work which I haven't often heard (a
classical symmetry as opposed to a romantic linear development, as
most players do in their build-up to a type of Lisztian finale taken
not so far off the MM).
As far as the other general points go, there does seem to be a tacitly
accepted notion that a performer should bring out, even emphasize, the
long-range harmonic and other formal properties of a piece of music.
I'm not wholly convinced of the validity of this ideal, telegraphing
of harmonic changes, modulations, thematic developments, etc., can
amount to a type of 'playing by numbers', underlining of those things
discovered by analysis (even of a relatively elementary nature), which
I often feel unnecessary and a distraction from the (sometimes
disjunct) aspects of the music that are supplied by other parameters.
I'm in no sense trying to argue a 'let the music speak for itself'
position; but these harmonic factors do have an obvious presence in
some sense or other anyhow, are signposts always necessary?
On a small-scale level, obviously relative stresses and
counter-stresses given to individual notes in line with their
melodic/harmonic/rhythmic/ornamental placing are a vital part of any
musical diction, but on a macroscopic level, but often in Beethoven
and Schumann in particular, the notation can be subtlely and
fascinatingly at cross-purposes with some obviously 'musical' ideals.
There are some interesting details pointed out in Rosen's recent book
on the Beethoven Sonatas that relate to this, e.g. Beethoven's
practice of re-articulating a theme in different ways upon different
appearances, whereby the stresses would change though the melodic and
harmonic properties remain constant.
The 'Schenkerian' model of interpretation, whereby the long-range
harmonic structure and closure is articulated as clearly as possible,
seems very questionable to me. Schenker's methods stressed the
organic unity of a work, and consequently its rhetorical closure,
overriding dialectical factors which are by no means totally
'resolved' by the end of a piece (very true in Beethoven). Harmony is
above all seen as exceeding all other determinants in importance, but
one should remember that pre-Berlioz a lot of schools of composition
still viewed harmony as an outgrowth of counterpoint. I bring up
Schenker not just because he is cited by some performers as a means of
understanding and making manifest the long-range coherence and
containability of a work of music, but also because many valued
performances seem to follow these ideals whether consciously as a
result of Schenker's ideas or not. If one can find some worth in
Adorno's contrary notion of a musical work as a dialectical
force-field whose ultimately enigmatic, fragmentary and un-closed
nature contributes to its visionary and critical edge, then perhaps
such performance ideals have only a partial applicability?
Best,
Ian
Ian Pace
Couldn't agree more, and therein also lies the key to why Rosen's
writing is so brilliant, lucid and penetrating. I wonder if the huge
stigma attached to the word 'intellectual' is so prominent outside of
the Anglo-Saxon countries, though? From the
non-British/American/Canadian/etc contributors to here, any thoughts?
Best,
Ian
Steve Emerson
wrote:
> On Mon, 08 Sep 2003 14:30:26 -0700, Steve Emerson
> <eme...@nospamsonic.net> wrote:
>
> >In article <a5nplvohv4jt1k91c...@4ax.com>, deac...@yahoo.com
> >wrote:
> >
> >> What are you saying? He plays at the same tempo throughout? (quite
> >> impossible to do, in fact) OR: He does not vary his dynamics
> >> sufficiently for your taste? (Sorry: I have no ability to reduce the
> >> hierarchical reference to common English)
> >
> >Then I will do it. In a hierarchical arrangement, some things are more
> >important than others.
> >
> >SE.
>
> In other words, monochromatic? Bland? Homogeneous?
>
> With the use of such colourful (or the absence of such) words, one has
> the impression, then, that Petri resembles an ungifted student quite
> unable to use the piano's ability to create different intensity of
> sound. Almost machine-like in its homogenous perfection.
>
> Is that more accurate?
I don't think so: no. More accurate than what? You've merely replaced a fairly
specific term (hierarchy) with several that are vague. (Where did perfection
come from anyway?)
Lena already offered a lucid explanation as to the pianist's means of creating
such a hierarchy. Better than yours, actually. So there's no point in my going
on further about the term.
> If so, it is an inaccurate picture of Petri as I know his playing.
OK. The topic here, though, is his Westminster recording of Hammerklavier i.
I guess "monochromatic" is right. More oppressive though are the lack of
dynamic range and excessive regularity of tempi (fast parts too slow, slower
parts too fast).
The results: no building, no climaxes, not enough contrast, not enough
differentiation.
And, OK, sure: that makes it homogenous.
SE.
David7Gable
>perhaps instead "droll,"
But I only meant to lump the piece into a gross category of affect, like
"happy" versus "sad." And while I do believe we all experience the second
movement of Beethoven's 8th as having a fairly specific affect, agreeing on
precisely the word to describe it would be a problem. "Music is not too vague
but too precise to be put in words," as Mendelssohn said. But there are whole
classes of words nobody would resort to to describe 8/ii: melancholy, dreamy,
sad, wistful, tragic . . .
>What makes LvB 8:ii droll is hard to say.
Yes it is. But that's not evidence against its jollity or drollery.
>When the [mumbo-jumbo] is well done, it makes me feel that
>I am somehow closer to the composer's mind, so that I understand a little
>better the choices he's made in the act of composition.
In one sense, I'm not sure we get any closer to the composing mind. But we can
get closer to the "mind" of the work itself, so to speak, what makes it tick
and how. Whether a given effect or relationship occurred to the composer in a
dream, as a conscious rational choice, as an inspired decision made in the heat
of the moment while composing, as a result of something unconscious, as the
result of a pre-compositional plan . . . not even the composer is apt to
remember.
-david gable
Dan Koren
news:5rp7b.135251$3o3.9...@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
> [How sad that after so many years since first debating with Dan
> about the merits of various pianists, I still find him ranting on
> about my relationship with Eunice Norton when I stroll into this
> group from time to time...]
Quite the contrary. I have nothing to say (good or bad)
about your relationship with your teacher. You deserve
all the credit for cherishing the memory of your teacher
and making her work known to the world. As I said many
times, this is all very laudable.
At the same time you ought to realize that what you and
other Norton students think of her is probably highly
influenced by your experiences as her students. Nothing
wrong with that either, as long as you're aware of it
and admit it.
That does not make Norton any better/greater a pianist
than she was. As you probably know, a lot of teachers
are/were better as teachers than as performing artists,
and Norton was probably no exception.
> Even sadder, Dan, is that you've a pianist this time
I'm sick and tired of your condescension.
> who was chosen as one of the four greatest interpreters
> of this sonata by ARG critic Allen Linkowski (Guy, Schnabel,
> Norton, and Brendel).
I don't give a shit about Linkowski or the ARG -- which
isn't even good enough for the use suggested by Reger. I
don't take my opinions from others -- I mint them my own.
As to Mr. Linkowski's choices, they speak for themselves.
BTW is Mr. Linkowski also a former Norton student?
> So much for my delusion- or would you like to state for
> the record that you now think it is a shared delusion?
Delusions are often shared, nothing new here. The music
business is filled with mass delusions -- in fact it is
based on the ability of the critics, the press and the
reviewers to manipulate opinions and create delusions
en masse. This is precisely what makes the most money
and the easiest.
> This isn't my opinion, granted - I think Guy and Brendel's
> interpretations are just about worthless to anyone interested
> in actually *experiencing* the Hammerklavier.
Well, one needs a real hammer for that. Recordings just
won't do. Smash your own piano.
> But at the very least, it certainly doesn't serve your point
> well if you're trying to portray me as some sort of misguided,
> hero-worshipping fanatic.
The history of your posts on r.m.c.r speaks for itself.
Everyone is free to post what one likes on this newsgroup
-- at least until further notice. I'll do mine and you'll
do yours as we each like.
Capisce?
dk
Dan Koren
Ed and Tom,
I wish you a happy marriage.
You were obviously made for each other.
dk
"Edward Jasiewicz" <eajas...@att.net> wrote in message
news:aqs7b.132635$0v4.9...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
Dan Koren
news:6b33de45.03090...@posting.google.com...
>
> Otherwise:
>
> I propose we start a new newsgroup for discussing all the
> truly fascinating subjects, like me and my writing style. :)
Of course. How would you like to call it? ;-)
> Last - I kind of wish Tom Deacon and everyone else would
> restrain themselves a little with the unprovoked personal
> insults.
>
> Or, well, if restraint is unthinkable,
Restraint is indeed unthinkable on this
planet. Do you have a better one? Like
the little prince? ;-)
> would it be at all possible to make
> gratuitous insults of a little higher
> quality? :):)
That would be difficult indeed. We'd
need to bring back from their graves
GB Shaw, Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain.
In the meanwhile, we'll have to do
with whatever meager humor Tom and
others are capable of.
dk
David7Gable
You can't have any ideas about a specific piece until after you've heard it,
and there's no better way to get to know it really well than learning it in
order to perform it. (Of course, you do come to a piece by Beethoven you've
never heard with previous knowledge of Beethoven and knowledge of all kinds of
other things, too. Innocence is very easily lost.) Moreover, Rosen was never
trained as a musicologist, never earned a college or graduate degree in the
discipline, never took a single music course at Princeton, and his writings are
in many ways remote from most musicology. He's very much an exception. And he
must have had the kind of inquiring mind that he has from about age 3.
>My (admittedly unbacked-by-facts)
>impression is that his interpretations gradually shifted orientation
>from musician toward musicologist throughout his career. Fewer
>agogics, drier, more detail oriented. I'm not talking about 'youthful
>enthusiasm' progressing toward 'mature understanding', or 'mellowing
>out'.
I don't hear this at all. I do see something happening to his fingers in the
mid-70's, from which point there is a gradual loss of fluency so that he
increasingly relies on force of will to get the sound out: call it banging, to
use the most negative word for it. Also, his 1970 Hammerklavier and Op. 110
are a little freer, a little more prone to a very old fashioned kind of rubato
than his early 60's Epic recording, which is a little stricter and spikier.
-david gable
Dan Koren
Ed,
You can always buy my silence.
Just promise to never mention
Norton again! ;-)
dk
Dan Koren
The regulars have paleolithic views.
Mr. Deacon has neolithic views.
Case closed.
dk
Dan Koren
news:45pslvgo8bu8iqcnm...@4ax.com...
So all the stuff you haven't thought about for
decades (if ever) is not worth discussing?
How interesting....
dk
Dan Koren
>
> Writing about the arts is no more (and no less)
> mumbo jumbo than writing about nuclear physics.
Beginning to wonder how much do *YOU* know about
physics. Please don't tell me you're a physicist.
'cause if you do, I will return my degree to my
alma mater.
dk
David7Gable
I've mangled the Mendelssohn quotation: "What music expresses is not too vague
but too precise a thought to put in words."
-david gable
Matthew燘. Tepper
letters to be typed in news:bjlfr6$jq8$1...@whinge.psych.mun.ca:
> Franck & transcription of, Paley, Naxos (*)
> Busoni, etc, Paul Jacobs, Arbiter
> "Big Band Soul", Gene Harris, Concord
>
> (*) The Paley above, Angela Hewitt's Bach transcriptions CD,
> and a disk from the Nimbus "Grand Piano" series have got me
> wanting to hear a lot more of Harold Bauer --- what's good?
That delicious Arensky Waltz for Two Pianos, with Ossip Gabrilowitsch.
Also, the Brahms Quintet with the Flonzaley Quartet.
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
War is Peace. ** Freedom is Slavery. ** It's all Napster's fault!
Larry Rinkel
> >When the [mumbo-jumbo] is well done, it makes me feel that
> >I am somehow closer to the composer's mind, so that I understand a little
> >better the choices he's made in the act of composition.
>
> In one sense, I'm not sure we get any closer to the composing mind. But
we can
> get closer to the "mind" of the work itself, so to speak, what makes it
tick
> and how. Whether a given effect or relationship occurred to the composer
in a
> dream, as a conscious rational choice, as an inspired decision made in the
heat
> of the moment while composing, as a result of something unconscious, as
the
> result of a pre-compositional plan . . . not even the composer is apt to
> remember.
>
I was not speaking so much of the process of composition, which is generally
unknowable and irrelevant. I was startled to read one day that the Prologue
was the last section Berg composed for Lulu. So what if the composition of
the Diabellis was interrupted for several years, and the current first
variation was an afterthought. And sometimes the most spontaneous-sounding
themes emerge from the most arduous sketching, as is the case with Op.
127:ii.
But when I say the composing mind, I'm thinking more along your lines than
may seem ("the choices made in the act of composition" - meaning the design
of the work, not the chronological process of its composition), as I hope my
discussion of Op. 93 has made clear. There is at least the illusion of a
guiding intelligence to the design of the musical work - what you call the
"mind" of the work, and something analogous to what Wayne Booth in "The
Rhetoric of Fiction" refers to as the author's "second self," or the
"implied author": "The 'implied author' chooses, consciously or
unconsciously, what we read; we infer him as an ideal, literary, created
version of the real man; he is the sum of his own choices."
So perhaps we can also speak of the "implied composer."
Edward Jasiewicz
>
> Ed advised Lena:
>
> >...uh, so why not be brave, Lena, and just address that
comment
> >to Dan himself, clearly the largest perpetrator of ugly little
> >frogs here.
>
>
> In this thread?????
As a rule. (And clearly, yes, in this thread. Or do you think
someone's randomly slandering your character as being
questionable, nay, ridiculous is being decent? Please!)
I'm very kind to Mr. Koren considering the junk that comes from
his mouth. Especially about music.
ex.
"I'm perfectly satisfied with the verdict of my
own ears, and that of unbiased listeners such
as Lena. As you probably know, the memories of
pupils are the least reliable indicator of an
artist's worth, as they are often overawed by
and emotionally involved with their teachers.
"Delusional fan syndrome" as I like to call it.
Look at Mr. Jasiewicz for a perfect example."
What arrogance! The rude idiot deserves far worse.
> Why Dan's not even in the running.
I beg to differ. You are kidding yourself if you don't get Dan's
role in inspiring my comments.
> With your three posts
> you've managed to beat out even Tom Deacon, who in his very
short time at rmcr
> has managed to raise the hackles of more regular contributors
than debates over
> the recent war in Iraq. (And not because the regulars have a
monolithic
> viewpoint from which Mr. Deacon dissents.)
Who cares. I've never had cause to argue with Tom Deacon, and I
have't participated in or even vaguely followed any thread where
I'd characterize him as you have. You are gossiping, david. This
doesn't seem up to *your* normal standards.
Dan Koren is obviously a musical simpleton. Read the rest of this
thread and see for yourself. Your defense of him is absurd.
regards,
Ed
Samir Golescu
> "I'm perfectly satisfied with the verdict of my
> own ears, and that of unbiased listeners such
> as Lena. As you probably know, the memories of
> pupils are the least reliable indicator of an
> artist's worth, as they are often overawed by
> and emotionally involved with their teachers.
>
For whatever reasons, some postings don't make it to my mailbox. Thanks
for quoting this. I might have missed it otherwise and it was worth
reading.
regards,
SG
Edward Jasiewicz
-e
"Samir Golescu" <gol...@uiuc.edu> wrote in message
news:Pine.GSO.4.31.030910...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu...
...
Samir Golescu
> ...and now we hear from Tweedledee.
Very sorry to disappoint -- but I wasn't actually agreeing with your
comments. I was only thanking you for quoting Dan. I will play your
Tweedledee gladly, when I'll read something meaningful.
regards,
SG
David7Gable
>physics.
I know less than nothing about physics, but two of my grad school roommates
were physicists, and one of my best friends is an Indian string theorist. He
tried to explain string theory to me once without much success. My failure to
understand him, however, didn't make me assume that what he said was mumbo
jumbo, but I'm not in a position to swear that it wasn't.
-david gable
David7Gable
>unknowable and irrelevant.
I know.
>But when I say the composing mind, I'm thinking more along your lines than
>may seem
I know.
>There is at least the illusion of a
>guiding intelligence to the design of the musical work - what you call the
>"mind" of the work
And not even an illusion. I just felt like insisting that the "guiding
intelligence" was not simply reducible to the conscious rational mind of the
composer. It's not even reducible to the entire conscious and unconscious mind
of the composer, since the tradition does a lot of back seat driving.
-david gable
Henk van Tuijl
"David7Gable" <david...@aol.com> schreef in bericht
news:20030909175619...@mb-m02.aol.com...
> One of the great shibboleths in dicussing the arts is the extreme
subjectivity
> supposedly characteristic of reactions to art works. But artworks are not
like
> Rorschach blots; we're not intended to read into them whatever we want.
Much
> of what we apprehend is shared by everybody who looks or listens. We all
know
> where the climax of the Liebestod is, and we all experience it at the
exact
> same moment. This shared experience extends to the character of artworks.
> Either you can tell that the second movement of Beethoven's 8th is a jolly
> piece or you cannot be said to have experienced the piece. Similarly,
nobody
> thinks the last movement of Mahler's 9th is a jolly piece.
If I understand you correctly the second
movement of Beethoven's 8th is jolly
because we experience it as jolly -
whether this experience is personal or
shared.
This would make jolliness a subjective
or intersubjective phenomenon. A
description would either be
autobiographical or common sensical.
It could also be that the second
movement of Beethoven's 8th reveals to
us what it is to hear a jolly piece
- in the same way as art learned the
inhabitants of Athens what it is to be
an Athenian. A description would be an
explanation of what it is for someone
to hear a jolly piece.
The difference with extreme
subjectivity is the revelatory character
of art itself.
If we accept this position, we cannot
let others impose upon us the judgment
as a self-evident and necessary reality
that the second movement of Beethoven's
8th is a jolly piece.
Nor can we let others impose upon us
what the jolliness of the second
movement of Beethoven's 8th is - and
how it should be "revealed" to us by a
performer.
Henk
Dan Koren
> Writing about the arts is no more (and no less) mumbo jumbo than writing about
> not the only or even the principal function of criticism: explanation and
> understanding are more important functions. What matters when the reviewer
> expresses his opinion is not the judgement but the evidence he marshalls in
> support of it. The fact is, you can notice and explain aspects of artworks
> just as surely as you can notice and explain aspects of nature. Not that it's
> easy to do or often done well.
>
> The paintings of Ingres have very smooth glassy surfaces and there is virtually
> no trace of brushwork on the surface. In a Monet painting you can generally
> see every single brushstroke, every daub, and his surfaces are bumpy and
> textured. As a result the objects Monet depicts are suggested rather than
> clearly delineated as they are in Ingres, emerging through a blur. The two
> approaches result from the painters' desires to capture different aspects of
> reality, from different aesthetics. You can see this in the pictures, and you
> can discuss it. Pursuing a gross but important distinction will take you very
> far into the universes of these painters and into the changes that
> impressionism wrought on French painting.
>
> To talk about something you need words for it, and in any enterprise of
> explanation a vocabulary grows up around the phenomenon explained.
> Correspondingly, you must be conversant with at least some of that vocabulary
> in order to understand explanations made using that vocabulary, and that's as
> true of the arts as of nuclear physics. A friend of mine and I were
> discussing Boulez's Répons in front of a friend of my friend. Improvising on
> the spot as one does in conversation, one of us referred to "this junk" or
> "this stuff" coming back transformed later in the piece, and my friend's friend
> was amused by our use of less than exalted "technical" vocabulary. Is that
> what music analysis is--is this what you guys do?--he wanted to know. My
> friend and I immediately answered Yes. We both knew what IN THE MUSIC we meant
> by the word "stuff" or "junk," and the use of a word enabled us to discuss an
> aspect of the piece. Obviously, it's possible to develop a more precise and
> therefore more useful vocabulary.
>
> One of the great shibboleths in dicussing the arts is the extreme subjectivity
> supposedly characteristic of reactions to art works. But artworks are not like
> Rorschach blots; we're not intended to read into them whatever we want. Much
> of what we apprehend is shared by everybody who looks or listens. We all know
> where the climax of the Liebestod is, and we all experience it at the exact
> same moment. This shared experience extends to the character of artworks.
> Either you can tell that the second movement of Beethoven's 8th is a jolly
> piece or you cannot be said to have experienced the piece. Similarly, nobody
> thinks the last movement of Mahler's 9th is a jolly piece.
>
Methinks you've read too much French structuralism without
really digesting it. It is now time for Pepto-Bismol.
dk
deac...@yahoo.com
<eme...@nospamsonic.net> wrote:
Hey, Steve. You're making progress. So far, you have agreed with TWO
of my adjectives. Not a perfect score, but I wouldn't want to
discourage your continuing efforts to catch up to the meaning of
simple words.
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
>I don't give a shit about Linkowski or the ARG -- which
>isn't even good enough for the use suggested by Reger. I
>don't take my opinions from others -- I mint them my own.
Yes. And they are made of 100% copper! Worth a penny, nothing more.
>The history of your posts on r.m.c.r speaks for itself.
Indeed! For all to see and read.
>Capisce?
Oh, SOOOOOO cool, Dan. Might even think you were Italiano. You wish!
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
>"Edward Jasiewicz" <eajas...@att.net> wrote in message
Norton!
I am all in favour of allowing you to continue to reveal yourself.
TD
deac...@yahoo.com
wrote:
>"David7Gable" <david...@aol.com> wrote in message
The Alabama College of Physical Studies already has lots of degrees
they are willing to sell.
Perhaps you can try ebay, Dan.
TD