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In Reply to: RE: JJ's new Album - she's looking old on the cover posted by Chris from Lafayette on November 09, 2015 at 13:00:47
Chris piqued my interest in this recording by bringing it up in his usual manner :)
I gave the Brahms portion a casual listen on Tidal, and from that I decided to download the 24/96 offering at HDTracks.com.
I'll start with the Bartok, which I am quite unfamiliar with. I know I've heard it before (couple of versions in my collection), but I don't think I ever really listened to it in a serious manner. So, just going with this performance, I liked the piece. It was very exciting and demanding and engaging and well-recorded. Since I have to comparisons to go on, that'll have to be it for my comments on the Bartok.
I have heard many Brahms Violin Concerto performances, and this one rises to the top 25% or so. The recording is very good. The violin sounds natural. Ms. Jansen has an excellent sound, and the music flows easily. I found the performance compelling and passionate. I did notice some different orchestral phrasing in the early part of the first movement, but I don't know if it was indeed different or if it stood out because of the very good detailed recording.
All-in-all, I enjoyed it a lot. For modern recordings I usually turn to Repin, Barton, Znaider, or Szeryng. I can add this one to the mix.
Follow Ups:
. . . and no one here except for me will engage with you regarding the MUSICAL values of JJ's new release! I can't help but sense that there's a bit of hypocrisy at work: on one hand, we have certain offendees in this thread who are ready to leave us and saunter off to new pastures "where one can talk about music" without the terrible distractions and suffering they endure from reading babe musician posts. On the other hand, here you've posted a very fine summary of the musical highlights of the album - but do they want to discuss this at all? NOOOO! They'd rather continue to play the role of the TRUE defenders of women and public morality. Frankly, I think this speaks volumes about many of the offendees in this thread.Anyway. . .
I downloaded the 24/96 file from Pro-Studio Masters. It took only 5 minutes - incredible. The main things that struck me on first hearing were:
BTW, I listened through headphones (Stax 4004) rather than through speakers.
- JJ gets incredible articulation in both works, but a big factor in that impression is that she's recorded so closely.
- The London Symphony (in the Bartok Concerto) plays with way more brilliance and precision that the Santa Cecilia Orchestra does (in the Brahms), and moreover. . .
- the engineering of the LSO Bartok is miles beyond that in the OSC Brahms, especially in terms of depth of image. The Brahms engineering seems flat and two-dimensional in comparison (at least to me).
- It's also nice to hear a modern recording of the LSO from Walthamstow Assembly Hall, rather than from the Barbie. Although I don't mind many of the LSO Live Barbican recordings, this new release from a better hall is certainly a nice breath of fresh air!
- I compared JJ's Bartok Concerto to the James Ehnes recording on Chandos, and I think I like the Ehnes recording even better. I may need to live with JJ's recording a bit longer to be sure, but it seems that she pushes the first movement just a bit (compared to Ehnes) - maybe that's not a bad thing however. In terms of engineering, I think I like the Ehnes recording even better too.
- Among babe recordings of the Brahms concerto, I think I like Lisa's (on DG with the SkD) the best, but I know some folks don't like the Busoni cadenza she uses. (It was a very brave choice, actually!)
- I checked both concertos with spectrograph software and the high frequencies do extend beyond 22kHz, but not by much - they seem to die out just beyond 25kHz, and this is true for both concertos with their slightly different engineering teams
- I may have mentioned this before, but I've actually seen two performances of the First Bartok Concerto - one with Kyung Wha Chung (and de Waart) and another with Lisa (and Slatkin). I feel I don't know the concerto that well and I ordered the piano score a few days ago. I feel I could really get to like this work - moreso even than the famous Second Violin Concerto.
Edits: 11/16/15
Yes, I really know how to kill a thread, don't I? I was going to make a snarky comment a couple of days ago, but I wimped out.
Just to show you how perceptions affect reality, I thought the Brahms was the LSO and the Bartok was the Santa Cecilia Orchestra. That made me think the Brahms was the better accompaniment! I have always argued that reviewers should not know the performers while they are writing their review to keep biases in check.
Anyway, thanks for the comments. I've listened both on my home system and also my portable system (for playing digitized files) which currently consists of a Samsung Galaxy Tab A, an Oppo HA-2, and a pair of Oppo PM-3 headphones (the most I've ever spent on a pair of headphones--and I love them). I personally don't think the violin is too close, but I've always preferred a close-in recording.
. . . I hadn't realized that the Brahms is a live performance while the Bartok is a studio performance. I think that could explain why I was hearing a comparative lack of depth in the Brahms - probably zillions of spot mikes in order to exclude audience noises.
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