Classical Listening

[kasie]

Neely - so glad you are enjoying discovering opera - you have many happy hours ahead!

Keep an eye open for Welsh National Opera on tour - they sometimes make it over the border! Their productions are a bit of a curate's egg, the new ones are imaginative and innovative but some of the old productions are a bit tired. Their latest Marriage of Figaro is a joy, set in the 20s - it really works - and their production of Rossini's Cinderella was a delight, costumes like the pack of cards. I see Fidelio is in their autumn repetoire.

[stlukesguild]

Yes... This production of Le Nozze di Figaro looks like something not to be missed. But Salome also looks like a real stunner... especially if you ant to shock the hell out of the Mrs. with a little garish German Expressionism and a little late Viennese decadence... besides... its Oscar Wilde and Richard Strauss!!! What more could you possibly want???!!!

[LitNetIsGreat]

Thanks Kasie I will check that out for sure, I am addicted to Figaro at the moment, it is the only thing that matters.

Oh yes StLuke, I clocked the Salome of course, I will have to get to that one too. There is a Carmen on at the O2 but I think three is pushing it. I don't think that the evil one will be coming though, she's not that interested (don't ask) and it'll cut back on costs, I'll go with a friend or force my brother to come!

You are so correct about London, (you always are, like Wilde) how blind I have been - it is because I am only a thick Northerner... I mean from St Pancras station to the Royal Opera House en route, which is only three miles, there is The British Library, the British Museum and the Dickens House Museum – what distractions - gasp!

* I know that I've got to book quickly because the Aida and the La Traviata are fully booked already, (and I would have certainly wanted to have gone to those) - I've registered on the mailing list to book immediately!

Really, life can't get better than this...actually it is life, it is the only thing that is truly real!!

[stlukesguild]

I saw Salome live about 2 years ago. The wife absolutely loved it. To make things better the film Salome (with Rita Hayworth) was playing just the night before. Strauss and Wilde sure had a different spin on things. Of course I've long been a fan of German Expressionism and Viennese Decadence: Strauss, Mahler, Schreker, Zemlinski, Klimt, Schiele, E.L. Kirchner, Max Beckmann, and films like Nosferatu, The Cabinet of Doctor Caligary, M... not to forget such literature as the works of Hesse, Kafka, George Trakl, Frank Wedekind, Bertolt Brecht, etc...

[stlukesguild]

To return to Mozart (Le Nozze di Figaro) I recently came across this insightful post by a member on a music site which I frequent:

There's a kind of quicksilver character to the best of Mozart. He has a way of conveying, in his greatest music, certain essential qualities - or perhaps I should say, parallels to the qualities - that we experience, moment by moment, in our lives and in the way we live them. Those little complexities that we barely notice, consciously - the touch of humour in our most serious moments, the doubts that flicker even in our deepest convictions. These - or rather, symbolic equivalents of them - are present in Mozart to a degree that I find astonishing, and which I've never encountered with any other composer. I don't know how it's taken me so long to see it. I must have been blind, or deaf, or something. But now I do see it, it has me completely hooked.
quoted: Elgarian: http://www.talkclassical.com/8259-mo...garbage-3.html

In much of the music there is an absolute child-like... some might say "God-like" joy... pure... perfect... untouched by mortality or the least sadness. This absolute perfection... this fluidity or fluency... this simplicity... is often mistaken for something "simple"... something lacking depth and profundity, and Mozart is perhaps the single giant among composers whose reputation is so problematic to some. But his music is not as simple as some would have it. Every so often... the dancing... or the theatrical drama stops... as if the actor suddenly were to reveal the man behind the mask.. and there is this sublime moment... as if Mozart had suddenly stopped... and a momentary darkness passed before him... a momentary thought of sadness and mortality... only for a moment... and then off he goes singing joyfully once again. And such moments occur again and again... more in Mozart's work than in the work of anyone else I can think of.

For example following a minute and a half of theatrical drama there is this moment of profound sadness that cuts to the very soul from this scene from Don Giovanni beginning at 1:36 and ending at 2:17 when Mozart goes off dancing again:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRYc149doI8

Of course Le Nozze di Figaro has several such moments... but none is as heart-wrenching as the moment in the finale in which the Count loudly refuses to pardon any whom he believes have deluded him... only to come face to face with his wife who holds out the ring he had given to her when she was disguised as her servant, Suzanna, and when he had earnestly attempted to seduce "Suzanna". The Count falls to his knees begging... and being granted... pardon... forgiveness in the most magnificent manner. It is such a moment that I quite concur with Salieri's interpretation in the film, Amadeus, tha we are witnessing an absolute forgiveness... God's pardon to all:

The entire scene can be seen here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcB0N...eature=related

but the sound quality is far better in this clip which begins right at that magic moment:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2yrDWEoCpc&translated=1

[Emil Miller]

Here is a clip from a film about spies in East Germany during the cold war starring James Mason and directed by Carol Reed. The final scene shows an attempt to smuggle Mason and his accomplice out of the East while Salome is being performed at the opera.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6B0cq10NQM

[LitNetIsGreat]

That's an interesting little find.

I think that I’ll certainly have to get the production of the 2006 ROH recording as well because it seems to me to be a particularly well set performance all round with excellent sound quality to boot. Though for some reason it seems to be set slightly later in the 1830s? Even so it comes across to me as a wonderful production that I must own as well as see. Certainly Figaro is stoping me from getting any work done at the moment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF655YJolQI
(Incidentally I just love the playful opening section, I'm watching/playing this part alone about 10 times a day - as a minimum. )

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymRVgj_KBE0

[Emil Miller]

That's an interesting little find.

I think that I’ll certainly have to get the production of the 2006 ROH recording as well because it seems to me to be a particularly well set performance all round with excellent sound quality to boot. Though for some reason it seems to be set slightly later in the 1830s? Even so it comes across to me as a wonderful production that I must own as well as see. Certainly Figaro is stoping me from getting any work done at the moment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF655YJolQI
(Incidentally I just love the playful opening section, I'm watching/playing this part alone about 10 times a day - as a minimum. )

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymRVgj_KBE0

I have to admit that I have always been afraid of opera, knowing that once I commit to it it will take up all my time and money. However, it's not possible to avoid it completely and seeing this performance by Ljuba Welitsch reminds me what I am missing. It's just stupendous and Richard Strauss's music is overwhelming in its glorious orchestration.

[LitNetIsGreat]

Ha, ha "every impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind, and poisons us" you'll just have to yield to it! Mrs Neely I'm sure will be fine with the fact that we might have to go without food for the rest of the year in order to supplement my new addiction! I can't think of a better way to spend both time and money than being as fully immersed in this beautiful art form as possible - surely one of the highest, if not the highest of them all!

[LitNetIsGreat]

Woo hoo!

I have managed to get hold of a Noddy seat for the aforementioned Le Nozze di Figaro - really though they opened bookings today and are virtually sold out already!

Look out London; here comes Neely!!!

Aside from that though how perfect is the prelude to La Traviata? Just so dainty and heavenly.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WomiJqiPQY

[stlukesguild]

My computer was down for about 5 days (fried modem) and so I found myself motivated to just sit back and listen to some opera recordings. The first I listened to was Josef Krips recording of Mozart's Don Giovanni:



I cannot recommend this recording highly enough. It was recorded in 1955 and sells for around $9 US... and yet it is an absolutely marvelous recording. The sound quality is exceptional, considering the age, and there is not a single weak link in the entire cast. The climax in which Don Giovanni is hauled of to hell cannot be beat. Seriously... I took a chance figuring I couldn't go wrong at the price... and instead I find that with the possible exception of the recent Rene Jacobs recording (which is exquisitely packaged) this may be my favorite Don. The only drawback: no libretto... but having several other recordings I merely followed along on one of those (and the entire text is available online).



The second opera I listened to was Haydn's Orfeo ed Euridice... Yes! Haydn wrote operas... almost as many as Mozart... and if this one is any measure, they're pretty damn good. Orfeo was a favored operatic theme going back to the first extent opera: Monteverdi's Orfeo. In this telling of the story Euridice has been promised by her father, the king to another king... but being in love with Orfeo she runs away to escape her fate. She is come upon by roving bands of shepherds who plan to sacrifice her until Orfeo arrives and placates them with a tune on his lyre (music soothes the savage beast?). Returning home, Euridice's father relents to allow the two to wed. Following the wedding ceremony the rival king's henchmen arrive and attempt to abduct Euridice, but she is bitten by a snake and dies. The rest of the narrative follows the traditional Orpheus narrative with Orfeo entering Hades, being given the chance to take Euridice home... on the condition he not look back. Unable to do so she is lost to him forever. Orfeo returns home to lament. He is come upon by a band of Bacchants who entreat him to "eat, drink, and be merry". He declares that he has sworn off love forever. They respond by poisoning him. He dies. The furies arrive and begin to torture the Bacchants and the curtain drops.

The plot is about as ridiculous as The Magic Flute... and perhaps even weaker when one considers that the work was never staged, thus Haydn was never afforded the chance to edit and hone things in. Nevertheless, the work is quite strong. It dates from his period in London and Haydn was able to compose the work for a far larger orchestra than ever was at his disposal at the Esterhazy court. He was especially influenced by the works of Handel and made a great use of the large choruses for which the English were/are renowned.

There are any number of lovely arias and choruses. I am especially fond of Chi spira e non spera and aria/lament sung by Orfeo following the death of Euridice:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5caZsa1DyEg

A few of the other better moments from the opera that can be found on YouTube... including this dramatic use of chorus, Ferma, ferma il piede, o principessa!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4fpHNpEy5w

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT8CKsb8oUY

[LitNetIsGreat]

Well I’ve managed to find an old favourite while hunting around on the top of my wardrobe: Mozart's piano concerto no.23 (and no.26).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vttZzUPg3A

The whole thing is quite lovely. I think I am going to be playing it quite a bit today while doing a bit of uni work, I might as well while I’m in the mood for writing, though not too much of course.

Edit: Just got through the post next season's classical concert listings for the City Hall, not only is there a performance of Bach's Brandenburg Concerto (No. 3) Concerto for Two Violins and Vivaldi's Four Seasons - what a concerto that will be - but there is also another performance of, yes you guessed it, Mozart's 23rd!!!

[Emil Miller]

England used to be referred to as 'The land without music' which wasn't completely true even though it could seldom match the greatness of Germany or Russia, not to mention Italy or France, but occasionally it produced a masterpiece. It might sound fanciful to speak of a country having a soul but if it's at all possible then this is the soul of England.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_D6sI5zx4ro

[stlukesguild]

Vaughan-Williams work may be perfectly suited to represent the "soul" of England in musical form. He was a master of the pastoral in music... that music so suggestive of the English landscape... which was so central to English painting and poetry. Structuring this work upon the example of the work of the early master, Thomas Tallis, didn't hurt any. I have been recently listening to early English music (Thomas Tallis, William Byrd, Henry Purcell... and of course the Italianate German master of English opera and oratorio: Handel). These composers should in no way be underrated. The more I explore Handel's extensive oeuvre... his cantatas, operas, and oratorios that were long ignored... the closer he comes in my esteem to J.S. Bach. Right now I'm listening to this disc of Purcell's music for Queen Mary...



... and I must admit he is far better than I had previously thought... or remembered. I will certainly be exploring more of his music soon.

[Bastable]

I've been inspired to "get into" classical music, with an emphasis on opera. Since this is where all the classical music fans congregate - where would you recommend I start?