Love Your Classical Music Geek

My original pinned message, containing links to various box set and composer threads was deleted by BlueSky. So here it is again. Once you click into the first post, you’ll find all of the others set out below. bsky.app/profile/love...

New acquisition. I realised only recently, when I stumbled across this box, that the only Solti Strauss opera recording I have is Die Frau Ohne Schatten. I see reviews of the others are variable in some quarters, but I’ll decide for myself! Solti complete Decca Strauss Opera Recordings on 15 discs.

#NowSpinning Shostakovich Violin Concerto No.1 with Perlman and Mehta. The Mehta Warner box has quite a few really interesting couplings and this is certainly one of them. And great cover art, too!

#NowSpinning Bruch’s Second Violin Concerto, a work I do not know. Fortunately Perlman seems to know it rather well! How interesting to hear it’s first movement almost pick up where the First left off. A bit of recycling isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

#NowSpinning Weinberg’s achingly beautiful Cello Concerto with Nicolas Altstaedt taking the solo part. The meditative opening is grippingly gorgeous. What a corker this work is.

#NowSpinning Strauss Also Sprach Zarathustra in Karajan’s digital recording. I have tended to prefer his earlier versions, but I am very happy to be hearing this again. Karajan was a fine Straussian and this recordings holds up the high standards, regardless of comparisons with earlier efforts.

#NowSpinning Mahler Symphony No.2 with Rattle in Bavaria. Against a backdrop of divided opinion I always really enjoyed his 1987 CBSO version, even if it feels a touch slow. I never really warmed to the Berlin remake, though. So where will I end up with this one?

Oh and how hauntingly lovely is the Maconchy? A little gem of a coupling right there.

#NowSpinning Pappano’s Vaughan Williams Sea Symphony. It took a short while to get used to the slightly anaemic choral sound, as recorded, but the orchestra and soloists are caught with impressive clarity and definition. It’s important to keep this work moving and Pappano does just that.

#NowSpinning truly stupendous Sibelius from Ormandy. This is thrilling Sibelius, played at white heat.

#NowSpinning this new version of Bantock’s Hebridean Symphony. As works, I much prefer the Celtic Symphony and Omar Khayyam, but this is a very nice disc. For me, the fanfares in the closing minutes are a touch silly, but there is a lot to like in the work.

WARNING: I’ve reported the issue but every time I browse classical CDs on Amazon, money leaves my account. Looks to me like it happens every time. Be warned. Probably some kind of scam.

#NowSpinning Karajan’s digital Liszt Les Preludes, as part of this slightly odd compendium of works. This was actually the very, very first Karajan recording I ever heard. My Dad had it on a slightly different compilation, which I played to death at university.

#NowSpinning Mariss Jansons with Mahler’s Fifth. This conductor has managed to record Mahler with a few great orchestras. I always come away feeling the players are the reason for success rather than any particular insight. I’m afraid this Fifth is all about fabulous playing and little else

#Nowspinning some late-night Brahms with Sir Colin Davis in Bavaria. I am somewhat struck by the colossal weight of this performance. Perhaps some detail is lost, but it feels grand and imposing. I must say this is one performance I think I will return to.

#NowSpinning Mozart Piano Concerto No.23. I must say the slow movement is particularly sublime here. The autumnal shading is to die for, in the orchestra as well as with the piano. An absolutely exquisite moment of poise and introspection.

#NowSpinning Morton Gould’s Fall River Legend. This is totally new to me. It’s apparently based on the trial of Lizzie Borden, but instead of a not guilty verdict - as in reality - Borden goes to the gallows. Apparently the choreographer, Agnes de Mille, believed Borden was guilty.

#NowSpinning Shostakovich Symphony No.8 in a vivid and architecturally solid performance. I am tempted to think Mravinsky has the emotional edge and raw power, but this is an impressive recording nonetheless.

#NowSpinning some very fresh and characterful Ravel from Robert Trevino and his Basque players. This is music making to really open the ears and the mind. The Orchestra is very refined, yet somehow edgy at the same time.

Good to know this box is coming later on in November! It’s really the only corner of his discography left to cover. Some of the Concertgebouw recordings in here are exceptional, including the Sleeping Beauty and Nutcracker. Can’t wait.

#NowSpinning Mozart Piano Concerto No.25 with Alicia de Larrocha and Colin Davis. I’ve really enjoyed these discs so far - 9, 20 and 21 already done - and can only lament that it didn’t turn into a full set with this particular partnership. All of these musicians are fabulous Mozartians.

#NowSpinning Karajan’s digital DG Beethoven Fifth. I am much more familiar with the earlier versions Karajan made in Berlin and London, so it’s good to hear this again.

#NowSpinning Sibelius’s Suite from the music he wrote for Maeterlinck’s Pelléas et Mélisande. Wonderful music, for sure, but I’m not sure this is Karajan’s Sibelius at its best. Immediate comparisons with Petri Sakari on Chandos reveal how much more inner life the music can have.

#NowSpinning a rather lovely disc and of Ravel. The Introduction and Allegro is especially gorgeous. Not quite as misty as the wonderful Decca version with Ellis/Melos, but a cracking recording its own right.

#NowSpinning Berlioz Symohonie Fantastique with Ormandy in Philadelphia. Well the cover certainly makes reference to the drug-induced content of the work. Let’s see if Ormandy found the trippier corners of the score.

#NowSpinning the two Grieg Peer Gynt Suites, in Karajan’s last-of-many recordings in Berlin. One of those moments where all his previous versions seem better. It’s amazing how easy it is to undermine the drama of the Mountain King by playing it too fast from the start!

#NowSpinning Rachmaninoff Symphony No.2. It’s cut - composer-sanctioned excisions - but it’s totally luscious. Some of the phrasing is quite indulgent, but if you’ve got it, flaunt it!

“Whereas most other modern composers are engaged in manufacturing cocktails of every hue and description, I offer the public cold spring water.” Remembering the great Jean Sibelius, who died 69 years ago on 20 September 1957.

#NowSpinning Johann Strauss’s Die Fledermaus, with Ormandy and some very interesting soloists and the Metropolitan Opera Association. I hardly know this work so I’m following with the vocal score, which helpfully has English and German printed together. Clever!

#NowSpinning Bruckner Symphony No.9, live in Hamburg, under Wand in 1993. I do wonder if this might be more dramatically contrasted than the Berlin Philharmonic version he made later.

New acquisition. Bruno Walter Complete Warner Classics Remastered Edition, on 30 discs. I also really need to get going properly on his Columbia box. So many treasures await.

#NowSpinning Strauss’s Suite from Der Rosenkavalier, with Doráti in Minneapolis. Through the mono years box it was obvious that Doráti was shaping this orchestra into something very distinctive. As we emerge into the stereo era, the benefits of that development are clear!

#NowSpinning Grieg’s Piano Concerto with the steely, hard-edged Krystian Zimerman and the voluptuous Berlin Philharmonic under Karajan. First impressions point to a lack of sentimentality in the solo part.

#NowSpinning Sir Thomas Beecham with Sibelius Symphony No.7. It’s good to hear this conductor’s finely-spun magic again. He has a truly winning way with Sibelius.

#NowSpinning Mussorgsky in Ravel’s clothing, with Zubin Mehta in New York. Recorded in November 1979, at this point Mehta had only been at the helm of this orchestra for a year or so, but band and baton seem to have been in lock step.

#NowSpinning Solti’s 1975 Chicago Also Sprach Zarathustra. So far, very impressive. This magnificent band did, of course, record this music incredibly well with Reiner and they have to take at least a good whack of the credit here. The playing is spectacularly virtuosic.