Lebrecht: The Definitive CDs
Premise Checker
http://www.scena.org/columns/lebrecht/040901-NL-definitivecds.html
By Norman Lebrecht, 4,9,1
_________________________________________________________________
I once met a lady who had seen Starlight Express, a show vacant of
intellectual content, 120 times. Her dedication did not surprise me. I
know people who own 80 recordings of the Symphonie Fantastique and,
feeling deprived of a perfect performance, buy another on the day of
release.
After a century of classical recording, we suffer the
twin frustrations of too much and too little. Enter any classical
store or website and you will be overwhelmed by repetition - the same
works, done over and over again. Yet there is nothing to suggest
which might be the right one for you, let alone the elusive best. Too
many records, too little to help anyone choose.
Abundance has been the curse of classical recording ever since the
long-playing record made it possible in the 1950s for the civilised
person of average means to own the entire western musical canon and
still have shelf room for a few books. Why record one Beethoven
symphony, when you can sell the lot in a slim box? Then stereo arrived
and the industry went into overdrive.
A Columbia boss signing himself "God"' (his name was Goddard
Lieberson) gave Leonard Bernstein carte blanche to record anything he
liked. God also got Stravinsky to preside over the recording of every
note he ever wrote - 20 volumes of it. Herbert von Karajan convinced
two labels to let him record the Beethoven symphonies five times over.
Beethoven was a brand. Buy him in a box.
By the 1980, the record business was making more boxes than the match
industry. I recently cleared my Brahms shelf, unsentimentally throwing
out sets by Böhm, Haitink, Solti, Bernstein, Karajan (two boxes) and
Sawallisch - and that still left me with three indispensable cycles
(Furtwängler, Abbado, Jansons) plus six working copies of every single
symphony. Madness.
It had to end. At the start of 2004 I predicted that this would be the
industry's last year. Well, I was over-cautious. No need to wait for
Christmas: it's over now.
The closure signs are up in neon. Deutsche Grammophon, a label which
swore it would never sully its classical purity with pop crossover,
now has the operatic mezzo Anne-Sofie von Otter recording the songs of
Abba. EMI is retiring Peter Alward, its principled classical
vice-president, to make way for softer suits. The big signing on Sony
Classical is Vanessa-Mae, a pop fiddler who made her debut in a wet
swimsuit. The November cover of Gramophone, once the classical
collector's vade mecum, will feature Elvis Costello. There is barely a
new symphony or sonata to be heard this season from any of the six
major labels which command three-quarters of store space and classical
sales. Game over.
For those who crave the classical article, cottage labels will
continue to produce home-bakes and Naxos will stock supermarkets with
cheap reproductions for the forseeable future. Hyperion has just
issued the 11 symphonies and 15 string quartets of the esoteric Robert
Simpson. Harmonia Mundi is recording Paul Lewis, a professor at the
Royal Academy of Music, in the 32 Beethoven sonatas.
From a perspective of finality, it is possible to assess the cultural
impact of classical recording, which has been immense. The canon would
remain pretty much unknown to people like you and me had not producers
been on hand to capture great artists on the wing - often, the morning
after an inspired concert in a basement studio in Holborn with the
Central Line rumbling audibly by. From the moment in February 1902
when Enrico Caruso cut through the surface crackle in a Milan hotel
room, to the era which MTV convinced that music was nothing without
image, recording has been the most successful disseminator of culture
since Guttenberg.
Great orchestras could be heard in pit villages; western music
travelled east, and vice versa. A man in Tokyo could share impressions
of an opera with another in Tottenham, both holding the identical
object. I have spent nerdish hours and transatlantic phone bills
discussing, in all earnest, which version of Mahler's Das Lied von der
Erde, Klemperer's or Walter's, is closer to the intention of a
composer who never lived to conduct it himself. Nerdish? Absolutely,
but also necessary to achieve an informed analysis of the creative and
recreative processes. Never have so many understood what it is that
musicians do which makes us love and cry. Never were fans and stars so
conjoined in the making of art. Many, like me, learned music more from
records than from scores.
The supreme problem is to sift golden wheat from a mountain of
chaff. Over the coming months, I shall enumerate what I believe to be
the 100 most important classical recordings of all time, viewed from
the finishing line. Important, mind, not best. Best is a subjective
judgement, my taste against yours. Important is another matter. I
shall be picking discs (and your tips are most welcome) which have
become part of the culture and which, in some instances, changed the
world. Discs like Leonard Bernstein's of the Barber Adagio, a lament
for assassinated presidents; or Blow the Wind Southerly sung by
Kathleen Ferrier; or Gyorgy Ligeti's music stolen by Stanley Kubrik
for 2001 as the defining sound of space exploration; or Jacqueline du
Pre in the Elgar cello concerto, a fusion of artist and art.
I should also mention some of the horrors. Locked in a poison cabinet
I keep Edward Heath striving to conduct Elgar, Margaret Thatcher
reciting Aaron Copland's Lincoln Portrait and Bill Clinton playing the
Wolf (what else?) in Prokofiev's Peter. I have Placido Domingo
duetting with twango John Denver and Luciano Pavarotti with everyone
from Sinatra to Tracy Chapman. There are Football Classics from Naxos
and Kiri in rugby gear, a set of Mozart variations composed by DG's
president and a Faure Requiem sung by a Sony chief. These items are
locked away with the Karajan Four Seasons (as Venetian as a sauerkraut
pizza), Yo-Yo Ma's hillbilly album and Simon Rattle's unsyncopated
jazz - the inevitable detritus of a glorious history.
What makes one recording stand out as epochal and another just a chart
filler is not an empirical matter. It's rather like distinguishing
chick-lit from Chekhov: you have to try both to know the
difference. Early this year Warner issued a disc of Karita Mattila
singing Grieg and Sibelius, songs which sounded as if they had been
written for this soprano and no other. The epochal chill when I
heard the album was unmistakable. Even at the last, there are still
twitches of life. And much of what went before will last forever.
Nominate your top discs to norman....@standard.co.uk
_________________________________________________________________
J S Bach: Concerto for 2 violins and string ensemble
David and Igor Oistrakh, RPO/Eugene Goossens
DG, London, 1961
David Oistrakh (1908-74) was a legend
among violinists long before western audiences heard him. He won the
Ysaye competition in Brussels in 1937, but was then confined to the
Soviet Bloc until Stalin's death. His son Igor was tentatively let
out, playing Britain in 1954. When David followed, the likes of
Menuhin and Isaac Stern flung themselves at his feet.
Even under Khrushchev's relative liberalisation Oistrakh was seldom
allowed to travel with members of his family for fear they might
defect, but in 1961 he joined Igor in Wembley Town Hall to record the
Bach concerto for two violins, strings and continuo.
The performance transcends anything I have ever heard by way of
musical collaboration. It amounts to an idyllic cross-generational
dialogue which suggests that father and son can speak to one another
with respect, detachment and principled contradiction. The two
soloists are not always of one mind, and that is exactly how it should
be. This is a disc that I play in moments of grief and isolation. It
tells me that no man is an island, that understanding is but a
bow-stroke away, and that we can always find a way to touch the ones
we know and love the best.
Scott Kurtz
Simpson? They just issued the 11th Symphony of Simpson, but all the 25
others have been available for quite a long time now.
Premise Checker <che...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:Pine.NEB.4.61.04...@panix1.panix.com...
Dan Koren
I hate to disagree with Lebrecht here,
but the Bach Double with the Oistrakhs
pere et fils, good as it is, does not
come close to an Oistrakh & Szeryng
live performance I heard during the
1960's. I wonder if it was recorded.
dk
"Premise Checker" <che...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:Pine.NEB.4.61.04...@panix1.panix.com...
Peter T. Daniels
>
> Hyperion has just issued the 15 string quartets and 11 symphonies of Robert
> Simpson? They just issued the 11th Symphony of Simpson, but all the 25
> others have been available for quite a long time now.
Was it really necessary to reprint the entire pile of drivel?
I haven't seen the 11th anywhere yet. Does anything fill out the disk?
The 10th was rather meager in length, esp. as the others came in pairs.
--
Peter T. Daniels gram...@att.net
Scott Kurtz
something else.
Peter T. Daniels <gram...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:4140EC...@worldnet.att.net...
Scott Kurtz
coupled with the 1983 work "Variations on a Theme by Nielsen."
Scott Kurtz <kur...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:i480d.338299$OB3.3...@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
Peter Lemken
> I just went to the MDT website:
You should have visited newusers.infos to learn how to properly quote and
post articles that are pleasant to read instead.
Peter Lemken
Berlin
--
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in
a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly
used up, totally worn out and loudly proclaiming, 'Wow, what a ride!'
Ron Ackermann
excellent and the disk is reasonably well filled, about 55 minutes.
"Scott Kurtz" <kur...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message news:<E880d.338317$OB3....@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>...
Peter T. Daniels
>
> I have had this CD for about a week (from MDT). Both works are
> excellent and the disk is reasonably well filled, about 55 minutes.
What an odd notion of "reasonably."
Hungaroton reissued several Liszt choral albums on CD without adding to
their 45 minutes or so, yet charges full price for them. But that they
continue to produce _new_ Liszt albums at the same length, at full
price, is unconscionable.
Mr Clean
> I haven't seen the 11th anywhere yet. Does anything fill out the disk?
> The 10th was rather meager in length, esp. as the others came in
> pairs.
I wouldn't call 54 minutes of rather dense music "meager in length." Yes,
the total timing is a bit marginal, but one should bear in mind the
rehearsal and recording costs of difficult music like this.
BTW, I also think that this is a great pice of music, especially the mind-
boggling fourth movement.
Aaron Z
Michael Haslam
Do you apply the same valueformoney, musicbytheyard criteria to live
concerts, Peter? Sometimes less is more and, referring to the other
thread, I know people that would pay more to buy a CD of the Planets
Suite *without* a RVW filler.
MJHaslam
Peter T. Daniels
I have quite enough Planetses, thank you. The last ones I got were
Jeggie's with a Grainger piece as filler, and the Hyperion with
Mathews's Pluto addition.
I'm not aware of 45-minute concerts, except occasionally in Trinity
Church's summer series that nominally run from 1 to 2 on Thursday
afternoons, which are of course free.
Peter T. Daniels
Hyperion usually reaches close to 80 minutes per disk; didn't the
earlier disks of two symphonies each also entail rehearsal and recording
costs?
How is "total timing is a bit marginal" different from "meager in
length"? (Except for taking 2.5 times more syllables.)
Ron Ackermann
<gram...@worldnet.att.net> said:
When a company is willing to provide the music of a great composer that
no other label has touched, the legnth of the disk is, IMO, almost
irrelevent.. Hyperion has done us a service by providing all of the
symphonies and, I beleive, all of the string quartets of Robert
Simpson. I cannot quibble about over 50 minutes worth of great music.
John Harrington
> The supreme problem is to sift golden wheat from a mountain of
> chaff. Over the coming months, I shall enumerate what I believe to be
> the 100 most important classical recordings of all time, viewed from
> the finishing line.
What a boring, stupid, misguided, useless exercise.
J
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in news:2004091010243116807%
ronackermann@verizonnet:
And I will note once again my irritation at Erato for having issued, back
around 1990, the first two recordings (one in Russian, one in English) of
Shostakovich's "Rayok" (called "Learner's Manual" or something) conducted by
Rostropovich, a full-price CD lasting not even 34 minutes. They must have
known there would be Shostakovich nuts like me who *had* to have that CD.
They were undoubtedly too short-sighted to realize that this could lead to
long-standing resentment at such gouging, and in fact every time in the last
fourteen years that I've been tempted to buy an Erato CD, I have hesitated
for just that reason. Many times I've deliberately bought something else
instead. This is what comes of such gouging!
--
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
Take THAT, Daniel Lin, Mark Sadek, James Lin & Christopher Chung!
Allen
Michael Haslam wrote:
>
>
> Do you apply the same valueformoney, musicbytheyard criteria to live
> concerts, Peter? Sometimes less is more and, referring to the other
> thread, I know people that would pay more to buy a CD of the Planets
> Suite *without* a RVW filler.
>
> MJHaslam
I would be much more inclined to buy an RVW CD without a Planets filler,
and, by the, way, I'm not an RVW fan.
Allen
Peter T. Daniels
That's about the length of each of the two disks of Maxim S. playing
D.'s piano concertos. I forget the label.
vaneyes
> http://www.scena.org/columns/lebrecht/040901-NL-definitivecds.html
> By Norman Lebrecht, 4,9,1
>
>
> chaff. Over the coming months, I shall enumerate what I believe to be
> the 100 most important classical recordings of all time, viewed from
The thought of reading 100 Lebrecht columns....
Regards
Jaakko Mantyjarvi
Why would it be self-evident that Thursday afternoons are free?
--
Regards,
Jaakko Mäntyjärvi
Helsinki, Finland
"Nil significat nisi oscillat. Du vap. Du vap. Du vap."
Peter T. Daniels
Because I describe them from time to time every year. Call it
intertextuality.
John Harrington
<snip>
> And I will note once again my irritation at Erato for having issued, back
> around 1990, the first two recordings (one in Russian, one in English) of
> Shostakovich's "Rayok" (called "Learner's Manual" or something) conducted
by
> Rostropovich, a full-price CD lasting not even 34 minutes. They must have
> known there would be Shostakovich nuts like me who *had* to have that CD.
> They were undoubtedly too short-sighted to realize that this could lead to
> long-standing resentment at such gouging, and in fact every time in the
last
> fourteen years that I've been tempted to buy an Erato CD, I have hesitated
> for just that reason. Many times I've deliberately bought something else
> instead. This is what comes of such gouging!
These days, people would just buy the damn thing and release it in mp3 form
all over the 'net.
J
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in news:chslfh$q1p$1...@nyytiset.pp.htv.fi:
Perhaps that's when his wife has a nooner. ;--) (If the colloquialism is
too obscure, I'll be happy to explain privately.)
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in news:jFl0d.2812$xA1.2105
@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net:
If my copy of the Stravinsky "Original Jackets" release weren't already
packed, maybe I could do that with the little items that Sony stupidly
omitted from the big box.
Peter T. Daniels
>
> "John Harrington" <bear...@earthlink.net> appears to have caused the
> following letters to be typed in news:jFl0d.2812$xA1.2105
> @newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net:
>
> > "Matthew B. Tepper" <oy兀earthlink.net> wrote:
> ><snip>
> >> And I will note once again my irritation at Erato for having issued,
> >> back around 1990, the first two recordings (one in Russian, one in
> >> English) of Shostakovich's "Rayok" (called "Learner's Manual" or
> >> something) conducted by Rostropovich, a full-price CD lasting not even
> >> 34 minutes. They must have known there would be Shostakovich nuts like
> >> me who *had* to have that CD. They were undoubtedly too short-sighted
> >> to realize that this could lead to long-standing resentment at such
> >> gouging, and in fact every time in the last fourteen years that I've
> >> been tempted to buy an Erato CD, I have hesitated for just that reason.
> >> Many times I've deliberately bought something else instead. This is
> >> what comes of such gouging!
> >
> > These days, people would just buy the damn thing and release it in mp3
> > form all over the 'net.
>
> If my copy of the Stravinsky "Original Jackets" release weren't already
> packed, maybe I could do that with the little items that Sony stupidly
> omitted from the big box.
That series of "Original Jackets" was an astonishing ripoff. The
Bernstein and Gould recordings were of course available in many
rereleases, and the Stravinsky inanely replaced the Complete set with a
set that reproduced far from all his LPs. I managed to get every one of
the LPs just before they issued the 31-LP centennial set, so was too
late to find all the vols. of the Complete CD set.
(I think there's a Horowitz one, too, but have no idea what was in
Horowitz albums.)
Alex
Isn't the price important, not how much of the disk is filled? Suppose
all music came on DVD at CD prices? Would you expect about 6 CDs full of
filler? What if the disk could contain 10,000 CDs worth of data?
Alan Watkins
side. When classical music finally dies Norman is going to have to do
something else for a living.
What would that be do you think? Or as the Deputy Chief Sub Editor of
the London Evening Standard recently remarked: "I do not know if he
knows what he is talking about but it's dreadful crap to sub. I was
on the Guardian and had to make sense of Roy Hattersley's phoned in
columns but this is a lot, lot worse."
Kind regards,
Alan M. Watkins
Dana Hill
news:Xns9560506F229...@207.217.125.202...
> And I will note once again my irritation at Erato for having issued, back
> around 1990, the first two recordings (one in Russian, one in English) of
> Shostakovich's "Rayok" (called "Learner's Manual" or something) conducted
by
> Rostropovich, a full-price CD lasting not even 34 minutes. They must have
> known there would be Shostakovich nuts like me who *had* to have that CD.
> They were undoubtedly too short-sighted to realize that this could lead to
> long-standing resentment at such gouging, and in fact every time in the
last
> fourteen years that I've been tempted to buy an Erato CD, I have hesitated
> for just that reason. Many times I've deliberately bought something else
> instead. This is what comes of such gouging!
>
Perhaps I am not one to talk, since I buy almost everything used or from BRO
(mostly because I'm poor), but I am confused by your resentment. I might be
tempted to take such a spiteful stance against another sort of company, but
a good CD of "RealKlassik", as you might say, deserves to be purchased,
doesn't it? If anything I hope it lets the company know what we want.
Let's say you opted not to buy the ungenerous Shostakovich disc. The
company wouldn't have gotten the connection that you felt shortchanged.
They would have thought, "guess nobody likes Shostakovich." It just seems
like one of those circumstances in which even if you're right, you still end
up losing.
In any case, I think we all have a different mindset. I know I am surprised
to see a disc with less than 60 minutes of music, and not at all surprised
to see a disc of almost 80 minutes. But it's exceedingly rare to find a pop
CD with over 70 minutes of music.
--
Dana Hill
Gainesville, Florida
Photography: www.danajohnhill.com
Personal: www.danajohnhill.org
Peter T. Daniels
I don't know what your point is; Hyperion is a premium-priced label,
several dollars higher than the majors. Hungaroton is priced the same as
the majors.
Whereas Brilliant Classics managed to put out Barshai's Shostakovich for
about $3 a disk a few years ago. (And now they're in a much smaller box,
which is annoying.) Their first Barshai Mahlers just appeared -- 5 and
10 (his own solution). ($5 a disk now.)
Matthew B. Tepper
following letters to be typed in news:41421A...@worldnet.att.net:
I bought the Stravinsky Original Jackets because I was able to get it for a
good price on eBay, and because it was a representative example of the
repertoire that I wanted. I agree with you in every respect, however.
Owen Hartnett
wrote:
> I hate to disagree with Lebrecht here,
> but the Bach Double with the Oistrakhs
> pere et fils, good as it is, does not
> come close to an Oistrakh & Szeryng
> live performance I heard during the
> 1960's. I wonder if it was recorded.
>
>
>
> dk
>
>
> "Premise Checker" <che...@panix.com> wrote in message
> news:Pine.NEB.4.61.04...@panix1.panix.com...
> The Definitive CDs
> http://www.scena.org/columns/lebrecht/040901-NL-definitivecds.html
> By Norman Lebrecht, 4,9,1
> _________________________________________________________________
> It had to end. At the start of 2004 I predicted that this would be the
> industry's last year. Well, I was over-cautious. No need to wait for
> Christmas: it's over now.
If classical music is "over now," then what are they paying Lebrecht
for?
I'll know classical music is dead when Lebrecht is on the dole.
-Owen
Iain Neill Reid
>>
>> "Premise Checker" <che...@panix.com> wrote in message
>> news:Pine.NEB.4.61.04...@panix1.panix.com...
>> The Definitive CDs
>> http://www.scena.org/columns/lebrecht/040901-NL-definitivecds.html
>> By Norman Lebrecht, 4,9,1
>> _________________________________________________________________
>
>> It had to end. At the start of 2004 I predicted that this would be the
>> industry's last year. Well, I was over-cautious. No need to wait for
>> Christmas: it's over now.
>
>If classical music is "over now," then what are they paying Lebrecht
>for?
Well, he did say "the industry.." - but you could simply dispense wtih
the first half of that sentence and still have a valid question.
but he then goes on in that article to give a series of examples of
an industry which is clearly not over (Naxos - but they employ "hack"
musicians and have low standards (so he says), so they don't count;
Hyperion, but they record Simpson and other esoteric delights, so they
don't count etc.) - just changed.
He's basically decided to define "the industry" in an extremely
narrow fashion (the big, old guys) and will now proclaim its death
because they haven't adapted to the times
>
>I'll know classical music is dead when Lebrecht is on the dole.
More like the publishing business has seen the light
Neill Reid - i...@stsci.edu
>
>-Owen
Owen Hartnett
<i...@morales.stsci.edu> wrote:
> In article <100920042018453711%ow...@xids.xnet> Owen Hartnett
> <ow...@xids.xnet> writes:
>
>
> >>
> >> "Premise Checker" <che...@panix.com> wrote in message
> >> news:Pine.NEB.4.61.04...@panix1.panix.com...
> >> The Definitive CDs
> >> http://www.scena.org/columns/lebrecht/040901-NL-definitivecds.html
> >> By Norman Lebrecht, 4,9,1
> >> _________________________________________________________________
> >
> >> It had to end. At the start of 2004 I predicted that this would be the
> >> industry's last year. Well, I was over-cautious. No need to wait for
> >> Christmas: it's over now.
> >
> >If classical music is "over now," then what are they paying Lebrecht
> >for?
>
> Well, he did say "the industry.." - but you could simply dispense wtih
> the first half of that sentence and still have a valid question.
>
> but he then goes on in that article to give a series of examples of
> an industry which is clearly not over (Naxos - but they employ "hack"
> musicians and have low standards (so he says), so they don't count;
> Hyperion, but they record Simpson and other esoteric delights, so they
> don't count etc.) - just changed.
> He's basically decided to define "the industry" in an extremely
> narrow fashion (the big, old guys) and will now proclaim its death
> because they haven't adapted to the times
So when he says "classical music is dead" he really means that Sarnov
no longer has Toscanini under contract.
-Owen