The Classical Music Thread

[Pearly Di]

I think we need one.

Last night I listened on my CD player the Brahms Piano Concerto No.1, a piece of music I find incredibly intense, gorgeous, magnificent and Romantic with a capital 'R'.



I can't believe they hated it when it was first played in 1859. It is amazing, what new ground these great composers broke ... and they often suffered for their art and their innovations.

The piano and the orchestra are very much partners weaving round each other in the dance in this fabulous work. Goodness - if I was an A-list pianist, how I would love to play this emotional and powerful - yet very controlled - work!

I'm not an expert in classical music. I've just built up a little collection over the years of things I fell in love with, and the Brahms No. 1 is most definitely one of them.

I also adore his beautiful violin concerto.

I also listened over Easter to Bach's St. Matthew Passion. Just ...

[JewelSong]

Yay! Thanks for starting this thread, Di!

I'll be back!

[Erunáme]

I can't believe they hated it when it was first played in 1859. It is amazing, what new ground these great composers broke ... and they often suffered for their art and their innovations.

There's a lot of stories like that, unfortunately. Stravinsky's debut of The Rite of Spring comes to mind:

The audience responded to the ballet with such a din of hisses and catcalls that the performers could barely hear each other.

I can't find my CD insert right now, but I remember reading about Brahms's difficulties with his violin concerto in D. He was writing it at the same time as Tchaikovsky was writing his violin concerto in D. I think Tchaikovsky premiered his first and generally people liked Tchaikovsky's concerto much better. I did find this stuff that was said about Brahms's concerto:

Critical reaction to the work was mixed: the conductor Hans von Bülow said the work was not so much for violin as "against the violin". Henryk Wieniawski called the work "unplayable", and the violin virtuoso Pablo de Sarasate refused to play it because he didn't want to "stand around while the oboe played the only melody in the piece."

It often seems people didn't realize how wonderful composers were until they were gone.

edit: I'll have to listen to that piano concerto. I really like Brahms a lot. He was my favorite composer until I discovered Mahler.

[yovargas]

There's a lot of stories like that, unfortunately. Stravinsky's debut of The Rite of Spring comes to mind:

The audience responded to the ballet with such a din of hisses and catcalls that the performers could barely hear each other.

When I took my Music Appreciation class in college, The Rite of Spring was one of the few pieces I really liked. The story of how the crowds supposedly rioted always made me laugh.

[Erunáme]

Really? I can't say I like The Rite of Spring all that much. If I want to listen to Stravinsky, I choose The Firebird Suite. It has some amazingly beautiful and strong melodies in it. I was lucky enough to be able to perform it. It was very challenging, but so enjoyable.

I think I might actually go play the CD.

*is for once thankful for Iavas's incredibly good sound system*

[yovargas]

Oh yeah, Firebird was the other one I liked a lot! (Though not as much as Rites). I guess that means I like Stravinsky.

[Erunáme]

Firebird really is beautiful.

Poor Sammy, though. He was totally freaked out by the first big chord hit of King Kastchei's Dance. He was snoozing on the couch next to me and all the sudden jumped and his eyes were wide.

While it is pleasant to listen to the music, I found that many memories were coming back to me. I could see my fellow musicians around me, us working on certain parts, the conductor talking to us and then other general memories of the people around me came back to me. Most of them aren't particularily people I want to remember and I found the memories fairly distracting. I wanted to enjoy the music, but the music seems to be very tied up with my memories. That would make sense as I rehearsed that peice of music for a couple of months every other day.

Does this happen to anyone else...a peice of music calling up specific memories?

edit: yov, have you listened to Prokofiev?

[yovargas]

yov, have you listened to Prokofiev?

Don't think so. Outside of that college class or my dad's living room, it's been rare to ever find me listening to classical.

[Erunáme]

I realize that. I was wondering if you might have heard him in your class.

[yovargas]

Well, the class was probably a good five-six years ago, and Rites and Firebird are the only things I remember from the class, except that the Mozart we had to listen to bored me (don't ask me what Mozart it was!).

Do you meantion him cuz he's Stravinsky-esque?

[Erunáme]

He was writing music at the same time Stravinsky was. To me they are a bit similar. I like them both because their music sounds modern yet classic/romantic as well. It's a lovely mix. They both have great melodies and fantastic chord progression....especially Prokofiev...his chord progressions are extremely kewl!

[cemthinae]

I adore Firebird!

The first time I ever heard it was actually during Brass Theater. I just realized that I don't have a good recording of it.

[samaranth]

Thanks Di for opening this thread. The last concert I went to (just before Easter) was of the St Matthew Passion, and it was a highly emotional experience for a number of reasons, not least the sheer beauty in the lines of the music.

I’m not overly familiar with Brahms 1st Piano Concerto, but will now go and find myself a copy to listen to on the strength of your recommendation.

I adore the Rite of Spring, Yovargas. I wonder if audiences nowadays would riot like that, when they were confronted with something so new and boundary-shattering. I seem to recall that the audiences were also a little unsettled when Debussy’s ‘Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune’ premiered. Perhaps we’re all a bit complacent now, too sophisticated to do more than clap politely.

I also like Stravinsky’s Firebird, but for ‘comfort’ listening I’d probably turn to ‘The Pulcinella Suite’, his take on various classical styles. (I do prefer his earlier works to the later, atonal ones full stop, actually. I like form and relatively predictable tonality, I do!)

I’m amazed at the immense creativity that was flowering in Paris around the time that Stravinksy lived there. At the tail-end of impressionism (Debussy was to die just 5 years after the premiere of the Rite), Stravinsky himself worked with Diaghilev and Nijinsky, and later Picasso and others. In music, in art and in poetry – it must have been a wonderful time to be alive and talented!

Eru, you asked if music triggers memories. The short answer is yes, it happens to me too.

[truehobbit]

I can't believe we didn't have such a thread before!
Thanks for starting it, Pearl!

*shudders at the thought of Stravinsky*
I really can't stand Rite of Spring or any of his stuff I've heard so far (which isn't much, because I never felt like more ).

It must be horrible for an author to find his work booed at first performance, but I think it's kind of cool that audiences in former times had no qualms to trust to their own likes and dislikes and express what they felt.
Today, I think this wouldn't happen. Not that I think they should actually riot - there is a lot to be said for an audience trained to behave themselves - but the audience nowadays are just trained to adore everything new - I often think it's an "Emperor's New Clothes" phenomenon.

I know only a little by Brahms, and some I like, some I don't.

I've never listened to St Matthew's Passion in one go from A to Z!

[Primula Baggins]

I've heard it straight through twice—both times with Helmuth Rilling conducting, without a score.

The first time they left the house lights up so everyone could follow along in the English translation. The second time they had supertitles. Either way it's a marathon, but a heavenly one.

[samaranth]

Speaking of the St Matthew Passion, I saw on TV (again, at Easter time) a little of a performance directed by Jonathan Miller, which was in modern dress, and, more or less, acted out. Apparently it has been performed live this way numerous times. This sitehas some details about that.

What impressed me most – apart from the way this humanised the emotions and fear and sadness/joy in the story – was that all the singers performed their parts from memory.

Like. Wow.

(Prim's right - it is a marathon. And it must be sung in German, but with a readily accessible English translation )

[Jude]

I was told once, and I have nothing to back this up, that the Matthew Passion was never intended to be performed in one go.

This makes sense to me - it is, after all, divided into a Part One and a Part Two, each of which would make a perfectly proportioned evening's listening.

[Primula Baggins]

It makes sense to me, too, from a practical standpoint. Based on my own experience in orchestras, playing that long would have to be seriously painful for a lot of people. The singers—I have no pity for the singers; they get more breaks.

However, hearing it all at once probably makes the emotional arc more powerful.

[Jude]

Well, yes - if you can keep your attention focused that long

[Primula Baggins]

Well, I am no great deep scholar of music, but I could listen to Bach (even in German! ) until the cows come home.