What Classical Music Are You Listening To Tonight?

[Kaliar]

Album : Kapsberger - Il Tedesco della Tiorba
Composer : Johannes Hieronymus Kapsberger
Artist : Paul O'Dette
Released : 1990
Label : Harmonia Mundi



What a nice recording to end a long listening day !

Good night !
Guy

[AudioNut]

Little heavy for early in the day - but beautiful nevertheless

Listening to . . . . Beethoven - Triple Concerto, Choral Fantasy

Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, Daniel Barenboim

Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra - Daniel Barenboim, Conductor

[AudioNut]

The Triple Concerto was beating my poor ears to death this morning so I changed to a little gentler fare.

Listening now to Brahms Violin Sonatas Nos. 1-3

Itzhak Perlman - Violin
Vladimir Ashkenazy - Piano



These guys play well together - certainly no surprise - a very good recording.

[Kaliar]

Album : Sweelinck: Psalms from Geneva
Composer : Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck
Artist : Masaaki Suzuki, organ
Released : 2006
Label : BIS

Gramophone: outstanding.

To the general public, Masaaki Suzuki is known as the inspired leader of Bach Collegium Japan, currently undertaking a complete cycle of Bach's cantatas for BIS. He has also received much praise for his on-going recordings of the harpsichord music by the same composer. But his début was actually as an organist – he started playing regularly at Sunday services at the age of 12! When going to the Netherlands to study, Suzuki pursued parallel courses, graduating with a soloist's diploma in both organ and harpsichord. The years spent in The Netherlands also explains his familiarity with the musical world of J.P. Sweelinck, and with the traditions of the Dutch Reformed Church with its ties to Calvin and his 'Genevan Psalter'. The attractively varied programme on this disc alternates secular music for the organ with Sweelinck's settings of psalms from the Genevan Psalter. Due to the suspicion with which the Dutch Reformed Church – and Calvin – regarded instrumental music in religious contexts, these settings were not intended to accompany the congregational singing, but were rather played either before or after the service, providing an opportunity for meditation and afterthought. They fill a similar role on this disc, sandwiched as they are between the more extrovert Toccatas and Fantasias, but also testify to the central place these psalms had in Sweelinck's work. As an epitaph put it, it was he 'who put to music David's royal word, And made it to resound in Zion, in Holland it was heard.' The organ chosen by Masaaki Suzuki is a splendid instrument built by Marc Garnier according to the Northern German and Dutch style of the mid-17th century, especially for the use in the services of the Kobe congregation of the Reformed Church of Japan, where the tradition of congregational singing of Calvin's Genevan Psalter is particularly strong.

[Kaliar]

Album : Handel Concerti Grossi Opus 6
Composer : George Frederick Händel
Artist : The Avison Ensemble (Pavlo Beznosiuk)
Released : 2010
Label : Linn



I have heard so many good things about that version, from Julian and others, that I had to buy it. Last night, I downloaded the high resolution FLAC files (24-bit / 88200Hz) from Linn Records and I'm now listening to the contents of Disc 1 (Concerti Nos. 1-5) for the first time. What a glorious performance and sound !

Thanks Julian for praising the Avison Ensemble. I'm happy to have followed your recommendation !

Guy

[chessman]

Originally Posted by Kaliar

Album : Kapsberger - Il Tedesco della Tiorba
Composer : Johannes Hieronymus Kapsberger
Artist : Paul O'Dette
Released : 1990
Label : Harmonia Mundi



What a nice recording to end a long listening day !

Good night !
Guy

I went to high school with Paul O'Dette. Man, I wish I could hear this. He has come a long way from thrashing out "Gloria" on the old electric guitar.

[Kaliar]

Originally Posted by chessman

I went to high school with Paul O'Dette. Man, I wish I could hear this. He has come a long way from thrashing out "Gloria" on the old electric guitar.

Cool story !
He has indeed come a long way, being now one of the most respected lute players around !

Thanks for sharing !
Guy

[AudioNut]

I'm listening to . . . Kathleen Battle - Itzhak Perlman - The Bach Album

Orchestra of St. Lukes - John Nelson, Conductor



DG changed the name of the album from The Bach Album to J. S. Bach Arias - same recording though.



Kathleen Battle may have been hard to get along with (fired by the Met) but she had a glorious voice. And Itzhak ain't too bad on the violin either.

[Kaliar]

Album : Sibelius - The Origin of Fire
Composer : Jean Sibelius
Genre : Vocal / Choral
Artist : Lahti Symphony Orchestra (Osmo Vänskä) - Tommi Hakala, Tom Nyman, YL Male Voice Choir
Released : 2007
Label : BIS



After the many recent posts about the composer, I was intrigued by this offer from BIS, the Daily Super Bargain of today on eclassical. So I bought it. I just listened to it once and kind of like it !

Classics Today: outstanding; Klassik Heute: outstanding.

This disc brings together seven works by Sibelius for male voice choir and orchestra. Three of them - The Origin of Fire, Sandels and Har du mod? - are presented in two alternative versions, giving the opportunity to sample the composer’s development and the way he responded to circumstances when adapting his works. Other works are better known in different scorings, such as The Captive Queen (normally performed by mixed choir and orchestra) and Rakastava (string orchestra). In various ways these pieces are the products of a preoccupation with national identity and independence which the composer shared with his fellow Finns, under Russian dominion until 1917. The Origin of Fire is a setting of an excerpt from Kalevala, the Finnish national epos, whose counterpart in lyrical poetry, Kanteletar, provided the text for Rakastava (The Lover). With Sandels the composer chose a poem telling the true story of General Johan Sandels who, in a skirmish during the Russo-Finnish war of 1808-09, defeated a much larger Russian army, while the text of Har du mod? (Have You Courage?) is a rousing call on young men to unite in preparation for a future struggle. The symbolic meaning of The Captive Queen, in which a young hero liberates a queen, imprisoned in a castle, was so obvious that the work first had to be performed under a more neutral title. The March of the Finnish Jäger Battalion was written as a regimental song at almost exactly the same time as Finland’s independence was declared in 1917. It came to be closely associated with the ‘white’ faction in the ensuing civil war, and the present version was first performed, in Helsinki in April 1918, after the Whites had finally gained the upper hand but some weeks before the war actually ended. Performing this volatile programme is the YL Male Voice Choir (formerly known as Helsinki University Choir), for whom Rakastava was composed in 1894; to this day, YL is widely acknowledged to be the foremost interpreter of Sibelius’s music for male choir. The choir is joined by the expert forces of Lahti Symphony Orchestra conducted by Osmo Vänskä.

[BlueChiaro]

On the table: Antonin Dvorak - "Legends" Op. 59

Philips LP 6500 188
London Philharmonic Orchestra, Raymond Leppard



It seems like everything I play is for the first time, and this is no different...it took the place of Prokofiev's 5th Symphony (which my wife vetoed when she got home)...I wasn't in the mood for it, either.