Bach violin concertos
Sweet William
One set by Lara St. John and the other by Hilary Hahn. Though the
marketing of young women based on their looks is probably a negative in
the long run for these young ladies, I found both sets of the concertos
to be terrific.
The Hahn versions with the L.A. Chamber Orchestra are smooth full-bodied
recordings that would do Karajan proud. The St. John versions are much
more daring at times. For instance, the third movement of the A minor
concerto has a real bite to it in places that I have not heard anywhere.
In either case, I would easily choose them over vibrato-less authentic
instrument performances. I also personally found them to easily surpass
the "mainstream" performances from 20 or 30 years ago, both in sound and
interpretation, such as Issac Stern/NY Phil. or Szerng/ASMF (both somewhat
lacking in vitality compared with these young ladies).
Both Hahn and St. John have a freshness and energy that deserve a look, as
off putting as the marketing schemes may be!
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be typed in news:Xns99C6E4C10A...@38.119.71.17:
This post (which makes some interesting points) was filtered out of
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Steven Bornfeld
I'm missing the entire thread. :-(
Steve
Bob Lombard
news:13gv3no...@corp.supernews.com...
-------------
The filtering processes that news servers use (along with much else in life)
is a mystery to me. I'm guessing that "sharp.com" has attracted their
attention.
Regarding the subject marketing ploy, I regard Hahn as moderately pretty,
but too slender to be 'risible'; St. John is another matter. As the OP says,
they play the violin very well, so perhaps their looks is superfluous?
bl
John Thomas
"Bob Lombard" <thorste...@vermontel.net> wrote:
> Regarding the subject marketing ploy, I regard Hahn as moderately pretty,
> but too slender to be 'risible'; St. John is another matter. As the OP says,
> they play the violin very well, so perhaps their looks is superfluous?
>
> bl
I just noticed a new recording of the complete Bach S & P's by St. John
(walking on the beach in evening gown cover) at Borders this morning.
Could she possibly be good enough to produce a competitive set of these?
--
jwt
MIFrost
>
>
> I just noticed a new recording of the complete Bach S & P's by St. John
> (walking on the beach in evening gown cover) at Borders this morning.
> Could she possibly be good enough to produce a competitive set of these?
>
Not to be a total jerk about this but ... I rarely will look at any
"full-priced" disc or set anymore and everything that Ms. St. John
puts out is always top dollar and never discounted. Wonderful as she
is, and I agree she plays wonderfully, what I've heard from her, she's
just priced herself out of the market for my CD dollar.
MIFrost
Bob Lombard
news:abrasax365-459F0...@c-61-68-245-199.per.connect.net.au...
----------
Good enough, I dunno. I would expect her to produce a well-played,
*distinctive* set, maybe closer to Mela Tannenbaum than Joseph Suk in
interpretation. Anyone heard the recording?
bl
Simon Roberts
>
>Over the last year, I have bought two sets of the Bach violin concertos.
> One set by Lara St. John and the other by Hilary Hahn. Though the
>marketing of young women based on their looks is probably a negative in
>the long run for these young ladies, I found both sets of the concertos
>to be terrific.
>
>The Hahn versions with the L.A. Chamber Orchestra are smooth full-bodied
>recordings that would do Karajan proud. The St. John versions are much
>more daring at times. For instance, the third movement of the A minor
>concerto has a real bite to it in places that I have not heard anywhere.
>
>In either case, I would easily choose them over vibrato-less authentic
>instrument performances. I also personally found them to easily surpass
>the "mainstream" performances from 20 or 30 years ago, both in sound and
>interpretation, such as Issac Stern/NY Phil. or Szerng/ASMF (both somewhat
>lacking in vitality compared with these young ladies).
>
>Both Hahn and St. John have a freshness and energy that deserve a look, as
>off putting as the marketing schemes may be!
I don't like Hahn's nearly as much as you do, but I agree re St. John's;
probably my favorite recording of these works (Daniel Hope's recent recording
may be the runner-up). But while it may not be full-blown HIP, can't you hear
influences from the period-instrument movement in St John's?
Simon
John Thomas
MIFrost <sfr...@nycap.rr.com> wrote:
It's $17 for the New $27.95 2CD set from a couple of Amazon
Marketplace sellers; is that cheap enough or are you waiting for BRO?
--
jwt
Sweet William
news:feoep...@drn.newsguy.com:
>>Over the last year, I have bought two sets of the Bach violin
>>concertos.
> I don't like Hahn's nearly as much as you do, but I agree re St.
> John's; probably my favorite recording of these works (Daniel Hope's
> recent recording may be the runner-up). But while it may not be
> full-blown HIP, can't you hear influences from the period-instrument
> movement in St John's?
>
> Simon
>
St. John's recording is defintely a thinner sound, which makes her able
to play the concertos more nimbly. The gigue in the A minor concerto is
quite lively perhaps because of that thinner sound. I think St. John's
is my favorite too between the two, and both are better than anything
else in my collection.
Digression: I also happened to hear Viktoria Mullova and the "Mullova
ensemble" on public radio this morning play another Bach concerto, the
for oboe and violin (BWV 1060), from a 1996 recording. It was a little
too acerbic sounding for me - and is probalby as close as I can imagine
getting to an HIP performance, without being advertised as one. I do
quite like Mullova's solo Bach partitas that were released awhile ago on
Philips.
Dana John Hill
>> Sweet William <s...@sharp.com> appears to have caused the following letters
>> to be typed in news:Xns99C6E4C10A...@38.119.71.17:
>>
>>> Over the last year, I have bought two sets of the Bach violin concertos.
>>> One set by Lara St. John and the other by Hilary Hahn. Though the
>>> marketing of young women based on their looks is probably a negative in
>>> the long run for these young ladies, I found both sets of the concertos
>>> to be terrific.
>>> The Hahn versions with the L.A. Chamber Orchestra are smooth full-bodied
>>> recordings that would do Karajan proud. The St. John versions are much
>>> more daring at times. For instance, the third movement of the A minor
>>> concerto has a real bite to it in places that I have not heard anywhere.
>>>
>>> In either case, I would easily choose them over vibrato-less authentic
>>> instrument performances. I also personally found them to easily surpass
>>> the "mainstream" performances from 20 or 30 years ago, both in sound and
>>> interpretation, such as Issac Stern/NY Phil. or Szerng/ASMF (both
>>> somewhat lacking in vitality compared with these young ladies).
>>> Both Hahn and St. John have a freshness and energy that deserve a look,
>>> as off putting as the marketing schemes may be!
>>
>> Earthlink's newsfeed, but retained on Newsguy's. I wonder why? It's
>> certainly entirely on-topic and is not spam.
>>
>
>
> I'm missing the entire thread. :-(
>
It's all here in Giganews
--
Dana John Hill
Gainesville, Florida
Dana John Hill
news:Xns99C6E4C10A...@38.119.71.17...
> Over the last year, I have bought two sets of the Bach violin concertos.
> One set by Lara St. John and the other by Hilary Hahn. Though the
> marketing of young women based on their looks is probably a negative in
> the long run for these young ladies, I found both sets of the concertos
> to be terrific.
>
> The Hahn versions with the L.A. Chamber Orchestra are smooth full-bodied
> recordings that would do Karajan proud. The St. John versions are much
> more daring at times. For instance, the third movement of the A minor
> concerto has a real bite to it in places that I have not heard anywhere.
>
> In either case, I would easily choose them over vibrato-less authentic
> instrument performances. I also personally found them to easily surpass
> the "mainstream" performances from 20 or 30 years ago, both in sound and
> interpretation, such as Issac Stern/NY Phil. or Szerng/ASMF (both somewhat
> lacking in vitality compared with these young ladies).
>
> Both Hahn and St. John have a freshness and energy that deserve a look, as
> off putting as the marketing schemes may be!
>
Thanks for the review. I've heard neither of these, but they sound right up
my alley. I have soured on HIP for the most part, particularly the
"vibrato-less" sound you mention, and am leaning much more toward
"full-bodied" performances these days. A concert I attended a year or so
ago with Gil Shaham and the ASMF performing a Mozart concerto (and more:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/danajohnhill/1563564366/) totally changed my
mind about how I wanted to hear music. It was Mozart with muscle, and I
loved it.
Norman M. Schwartz
>>>
>>>> Over the last year, I have bought two sets of the Bach violin
>>>> concertos.
>>>> One set by Lara St. John and the other by Hilary Hahn. Though the
>>>> marketing of young women based on their looks is probably a negative in
>>>> the long run for these young ladies, I found both sets of the concertos
>>>> to be terrific.
>>>> The Hahn versions with the L.A. Chamber Orchestra are smooth
>>>> full-bodied
>>>> recordings that would do Karajan proud. The St. John versions are much
>>>> more daring at times. For instance, the third movement of the A minor
>>>> concerto has a real bite to it in places that I have not heard
>>>> anywhere.
>>>>
>>>> In either case, I would easily choose them over vibrato-less authentic
>>>> instrument performances. I also personally found them to easily
>>>> surpass the "mainstream" performances from 20 or 30 years ago, both in
>>>> sound and interpretation, such as Issac Stern/NY Phil. or Szerng/ASMF
>>>> (both somewhat lacking in vitality compared with these young ladies).
>>>> Both Hahn and St. John have a freshness and energy that deserve a look,
>>>> as off putting as the marketing schemes may be!
The above remided me that the Vol.10 No. 1 issue of the BBC Music magazine
also has a very fine HIPish recording of BWV 1041 and 1042 by a fine looking
young lady, Alina Ibragimova with the BBC Scottish S. O./Nicholas Kraemer.
I-brag-im-ova, what a great name. :-)
stewie3128
> Simon Roberts <s...@comcast.net> wrote innews:feoep...@drn.newsguy.com:
With Laura St. John, I hear an able violinist playing. With Hilary
Hahn, it doesn't really occur to me that someone's playing an
instrument, I simply hear the music.
santiago538
A few years back I went to my local Borders to get Manze's recording
of the Bach VCs after reading such high praise as I found on RMCR.
There was Hahn's recording on the listening station and I gave it a
listen--the whole album as it was *really* good.
I did buy the Manze, but have only listened to it once since that
time. I did not enjoy it nearly as much as Hahn, but still it was half
the price, and I'll be damned if I spend $18 and up for a single CD.
Simon Roberts
I just bought a copy of this from J&R, where it was c. $22 (not on sale); i.e.,
it's mid-price. Aside from shoes, in the cover art she's fully dressed.
Simon
Matthew Silverstein
> I just bought a copy of this from J&R, where it was c. $22 (not on sale);
> i.e., it's mid-price. Aside from shoes, in the cover art she's fully
> dressed.
Please let us know what you think when you've heard it. The snippets at
Amazon sounded promising.
Matty
MIFrost
>
>
> A few years back I went to my local Borders to get Manze's recording
> of the Bach VCs after reading such high praise as I found on RMCR.
> There was Hahn's recording on the listening station and I gave it a
> listen--the whole album as it was *really* good.
>
> I did buy the Manze, but have only listened to it once since that
> time. I did not enjoy it nearly as much as Hahn, but still it was half
> the price, and I'll be damned if I spend $18 and up for a single CD.
And the Manze is my favorite of all the ones I have, though admittedly
I don't have either Hahn or St. John.
MIFrost
santiago538
My problem withe the Manze is there seems to be only two interpretive
approaches for the entire disc, one for fast movements and one for
slow: one allegro sounds exactly like another and ther is very little
variation within. Of course the execution is outstanding, but that
alone is not enough to hold my interest.
Al Eisner
> My problem withe the Manze is there seems to be only two interpretive
> approaches for the entire disc, one for fast movements and one for
> slow: one allegro sounds exactly like another and ther is very little
> variation within. Of course the execution is outstanding, but that
> alone is not enough to hold my interest.
The most compelling performance of a Bach Violin Concerto I've ever
heard was Manze in concert performing the A minor. (In fact, the pre-
concert speaker suggested as much.) While I very much like the Manze
recording (all things considered, I haven't heard another I prefer),
the slow movements don't sing as much as I'd like. But in concert
he displayed a degree of lyricism and flexibility (especially in the
slow movement), while maintaining clarity and momentum, that I've rarely
if ever encountered in these works. It was certainly more than a step
beyond what he does on the CD.
In a Q&A session after one of his SF concerts (I don't recall if it was
this one) he said that he created each live performance to match the
circumstances (audience, hall(?), etc.), referring in particular to
choice of decorations, but probably more. In contrast, I think he
implied that for a studio recording he felt more constrained --
perhaps toward an "average" approach, although I may be reading too
much into his remarks. In fact, his comments about live performance
were quite revealing, but he had some difficulty clearly dealing with
the recording question.
--
Al Eisner
San Mateo Co., CA