Obscure and underplayed piano concertos
David Pugh
English composer (he may be partly French too) Dominic Muldowney.
Peter Donohoe played it at a Proms about 7-8 years ago.
Whilst I'm here a couple of piano concertos which don't get played nearly
enough are those by Britten and Tippett.
Britten's concerto somewhat evokes the Norfolk landscape (is it for
left hand only? - this is one concerto I've never played)
Tippett's, which is littered with perfect 4th's, I can only describe as
fragrant (well the first movement is). The second movement is Tippett's
version of the middle movement of Beethoven's 4th (Tippett is fond of
re-writing Beethoven - eg his 3rd symphony vs Ludwig's 9th). The last
movement is more upbeat almost jazzy in parts (Tippett likes to 'jam')
I heard John Ireland's piano concerto a long time ago and quite liked it.
Anyone have any opinions on it?
--
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David A. Pugh | Hot Dog, Jumping Frog, Albuquerque > PREFAB
pu...@math.ucla.edu | Best agree you and me we're only nightingales > SPROUT
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Todd Michel McComb
>A rather obscure piano concerto which I rather liked is by the
>English composer (he may be partly French too) Dominic Muldowney.
>Peter Donohoe played it at a Proms about 7-8 years ago.
>Whilst I'm here a couple of piano concertos which don't get played nearly
>enough are those by Britten and Tippett.
>I heard John Ireland's piano concerto a long time ago and quite liked it.
>Anyone have any opinions on it?
It has some nice tunes, but I have trouble with the emotional wallowing.
Another piano concerto that should be played more is Babbitt's. It's a
really nice piece -- if you can get past the serialism.
Hearing some of Sorabji's would be fun.
T. M. McComb
Rob Holzel
>Britten's concerto somewhat evokes the Norfolk landscape (is it for
>left hand only? - this is one concerto I've never played)
Britten's piano concerto is for both hands, however he also wrote a
more obscure piece for left hand only. It's in theme-and-variations
format and not titled as a "concerto," but sorry to say the exact
name escapes me at the moment. What I *can* say is that it's a
marvelous work. Leon Fleisher recorded it a couple of years ago with
the BSO, and I've heard that Sony Classical will be releasing the disc
in 1993. The only other recordings are a mono one that is the filler
for Britten's "Prince of the Pagodas" on London, and Donohoe's on
EMI with Rattle, as part of Rattle's 2-disc set of Britten orchestral
music.
All this, and I can't remember the title. Grrr.
You also mention Tippett's concerto. Like most of Tippett's music,
this one has yet to grow on me. It is appealing, however, in enough
ways that I've held onto it rather than dump it on the "used" market.
>I heard John Ireland's piano concerto a long time ago and quite liked it.
>Anyone have any opinions on it?
Well-meaning work, but essentially treacle. Warmed-over Rachmaninoff
which, like the Energizer Bunny, just keeps going and going, but takes
you nowhere. This *disc* did get farmed out to the used store. :-)
Rob
Brad Pierce
>David Pugh writes:
>
>>Britten's concerto somewhat evokes the Norfolk landscape (is it for
>>left hand only? - this is one concerto I've never played)
>
>Britten's piano concerto is for both hands, however he also wrote a
>more obscure piece for left hand only. It's in theme-and-variations
>format and not titled as a "concerto," but sorry to say the exact
>name escapes me at the moment. What I *can* say is that it's a
>marvelous work.
"telnet melvyl.ucop.edu" yields:
Author: Britten, Benjamin, 1913-1976.
Title: Diversions : for piano (left hand) and orchestra, op. 21 /
Benjamin Britten. London ; New York : Boosey & Hawkes, 1988,
c1941.
Description: 1 miniature score (118 p.) ; 26 cm.
Series: Hawkes pocket scores.
Publisher No.: B. & H. 17539 Boosey & Hawkes
HPS 1146 Boosey & Hawkes
Notes: Theme and 11 variations.
Includes preface.
Duration: 30:00.
Publisher's no.: HPS 1146.
Subjects: Variations (Piano with orchestra) -- Scores.
Greg Givler
>A rather obscure piano concerto which I rather liked is by the
>English composer (he may be partly French too) Dominic Muldowney.
>Peter Donohoe played it at a Proms about 7-8 years ago.
>
One of my favorites and difficult to find, is the Poulenc Piano
Concerto. I have it on disc, coupled with his Gloria, which is why
I bought the record years ago. Really nice stuff.
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> David A. Pugh | Hot Dog, Jumping Frog, Albuquerque > PREFAB
Greg
--
Greg Givler | "There are lies, damned lies, and statistics"
Commodore Product Assurance | - Mark Twain
giv...@cbmvax.commodore.com |
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Dennis Cook
(1892 - 196?) who taught at the Sydney Conservatorium.
It was written early in the 60's and has received hardly any
performances since -- I don't know of any recordings. It's basically
cast in the impressionistic mold, the piano part is expressive,
*and* most of the wind instruments (and the principals of the
string sections) get good solos... :-)
Any other of you net.australians out there heard it? (I believe there
*is* an ABC recording of his Double Piano Concerto)
regards,
--
Dennis Cook (den...@socs.uts.edu.AU)
And in the darkened underpass,
I thought my chance had come at last.
Peter O'Toole
Recently I've had a crush on the concerto by Massenet. He wrote it when he
was about 59. The structure of the 1st 2 movements seems a bit weak, but
the 2nd is very nice. The 3rd movement is delightful: you lot would probably
call it charming. The final bars are very entertaining.
Peter O'Toole,
Trinity College Dublin.
Robert Haskins
> A rather obscure piano concerto which I rather liked is by the
> English composer (he may be partly French too) Dominic Muldowney.
> Peter Donohoe played it at a Proms about 7-8 years ago.
You lucky dog! I'm very interested in Muldowney since I read an interview
with him in Paul Griffith's book (I think it was called _New Sounds, New
Personalities,_ or some such) published by Faber in 1986. Does anyone here
know his stuff and if there are any CDs available?
> Whilst I'm here a couple of piano concertos which don't get played nearly
> enough are those by Britten and Tippett.
Agree with you about the Tippett -- at least there's a CD now, though not
with superlative performers. I don't know the Britten.
Bob
David Tan,Box 219 Baker Lab,54810,2720402
when I'm in a certain mood, nothing does it quite like this one. It's very
Romantic and positively DRIPS, so I'm not certain it qualifies as
"underplayed", though.
Dave
Jon Buckheit
The Paderewski A-Minor Concerto is a great piece, and used to be played
a lot in the earlier part of this century. Another concerto like that
is the one by Moritz Moszkowski in E-Minor.
Deryk Barker
And both of these are now available on a Hyperion CD. Piers Lane with
the BBC Scottish SO under Kerzy Maksymiuk. Damned good it is too; I
have to say I much prefer the Moszkowski, but they are both fun.
--
Real: Deryk Barker, Computer Science Dept., Camosun College, Victoria B.C.
Email: (dba...@spang.camosun.bc.ca)
Phone: +1 604 370 4452
Peter Dorman
few LPs--Czech imports, very *thick*. I haven't heard them in years,
but I remember liking them a lot.
By the way, his beautiful piano quintet was just released on Supraphon,
but I have been unable to get it anywhere.
Peter Dorman
Mike Quigley
Pijper's Piano Concerto. It's short and kind of jazzy. I have an old
recording of it on European Phillips, which was issued in North America on
the Epic label. There have been 2 or 3 recordings of it made since. This is
one of my favorite recordings, by the way... it contains some other short
pieces by Pijper.
Josh Stern
done with piano is a Marlboro Festival recording featuring R. Serkin.
That performance is stylistically dated in other ways (to its detriment)
but the melodic lines of the keyboard part emerge more clearly than is
typically possible if using a harpsichord - and it's kind of refreshing
when the cadenza sounds like a sequence of notes instead of a chainsaw
that someone lost their grip on...harpsichord and Van Halen fans, no
doubt, disagree.
Josh
Terry Carroll
Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto #2
Ginastera's Piano Concerto #1
Terry Carroll - tj...@juts.ccc.amdahl.com - 408/992-2152
The opinions presented above are not necessarily those of a sound mind.
Deryk Barker
: J.S.B.'s Brandenburg #5 (on piano). The only performance I have heard
There's a famous recording from the 1930s, with the Busch Chamber
players. Adolf Busch is the violinist, Serkin (Busch's son in law) the
pianist. Great stuff.
Brad Pierce
>My favorite underplayed concerti:
>
>Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto #2
What's your opinion of Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto #3?
>Ginastera's Piano Concerto #1
-- Brad Pierce --
sjh
composer of this century. This piece is infused with the harmonies and
rhythms of the Aztecs (IMO) and is quite a shopiece, never ideomatic, but
pure shmiring ancient Mexican sounds. The only recording I know of featured
Eugene List as pianist, and as I recall in the liner notes, he proclaimed
this the hardest concerto he ever learned. I imagine much of the difficulty
lies in the great velocity and compound rhythms over a wide range of the
keyboard. Anyone else know or have opinions of this work, or know of any
modern (CD) recordings of it?
Another pseudo-concerto not seen mentioned here is Scriabin's Prometheus:
Poeme of Fire for piano and orchestra. It marked the real turning point of
Scriabin's music toward the "mystic chord"-based later works (op.60 on).
Steve Heller