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198.27.242.3
And the wife is out of the house so...
Shosty can play!
Less than perfect (even though new) with quite a few loud static 'pops' that I do not recall ever hearing on a NEW CD very often, let alone a new SACD. Just adds to the awfulness of the subject matter.
OK, maybe not the SACD, maybe my system is blowing up in sympathy for the music being played?
A powerful work, whether one understands the language or not, you just gotta know whatever they're talking about ain't good!
Gromadsky is MASTERFUL as Bass/Speaker!
Follow Ups:
having had the great misfortune to die the same day that Stalin's death was announced, so it was almost completely overlooked in all the hullabaloo. DDS, too, died in early August when many were away at their dachas, so, likewise, got short shrift for his funeral.
Mark in NC
"The thought that life could be better is woven indelibly into our hearts and our brains" -Paul Simon
Isn't that just Stalinist/Politburo/Russian Commie Party Propaganda fodder?
Wouldn't that pretty much go completely against the music and poetry of the Shost piece?
Severius! Supremus Invictus
If one can divorce the text from the music, "October" is worth a listen.
The composer put a lot of time and effort into the immense piece only to withdraw it out of fear that it would offend. Scary times for Soviet composers, even the Idealist Prokofiev.
October was performed for the first time after Prokofiev's (and Stalin's) death and it still gets resurrected from time to time.
"Revolution" (with it's multitude of notes) is particularly vivid, and who couldn't love a piece that includes four accordions? "Spring" and "Philosophers" are worth a listen as well.
I just want to make sure I've understood you.
You don't care for him?
Even the 8th and 10th syms?
Even the string quartets?
Severius! Supremus Invictus
.
. . . and, every so often, I'm even forced to grind out some practice and play many of these pieces against my will (both piano concertos, cello concerto, violin concerto - last two movements anyway, cello sonata, piano trio and various smaller pieces). When the music you've heard and/or played by a given composer seems so trashy to you, you generally don't make a point of trying to listen to even more of that composer's music. OTOH, owning (or having owned) the following recordings, I'm very familiar with Prokofiev's great (and far from cheesy!) "Cantata for the 20th Anniversary of the October Revolution":
BTW, thanks for that link (in your previous post) to the Gergiev performance on uTube - I'd forgotten about it. OTOH, this is a work where only the highest fi recordings will do! ;-)
We are talking about arrangers of noise, after all. : )
You've got awhile to go before you're worthy of his muse.
Shostakovitch's muse:
Now THAT'S some fine cheesiness! ;-)
Prokofiev's Op. 74 ("Cantata for the 20th Anniversary of the October Revolution") was written to celebrate the Russian Revolution and the gains of the proletariat consolidated under Stalin. Certainly the text would fall into our ideas of "fodder" (Prokofiev may have simply have considered it patriotic), but the music was considered too dangerous and dissonant for the commissars. At the preliminary audition at the Committee on Arts Affairs, Prokofiev was admonished by Kerzhentsev, "Just what do you think you're doing, Sergey Sergeyevich, taking texts that belong to the people and setting them to such incomprehensible music?" Prokofiev took the "hint" and withdrew the work before it was ever performed publicly. The first performance (not even of the whole work!) took place in 1966 - Prokofiev had been dead for 13 years. I think the recording shown in the OP of this thread was made not long afterwards.
This cantata is IMHO a masterpiece of musical imagination, truly an awesome work! The forces used in this work are in themselve staggering:
Quadruple woodwinds
Eight horns
Four trumpets
Four tombones
Two tubas
Timpani
Percussion
Accordion orchestra (bayan concertinas)
Military band (saxhorn family instruments, extra trumpets, French horns, tenor horns, euphonium, tubas, and snare drum)
Percussion ensemble (alarm bells, cannon shot, sirens)
Eight-part chorus
Speaker on megaphone (as the voice of Lenin)
Harps
Keyboards
Strings
Maxim Gun (I don't even know what a Maxim Gun is!)
(list from the Wikipedia article on this work)
Yevgeny Yevtushenko just passed away April 1st in Texas.
Here's the Russian account from Tass:
No, this is incorrect. Yevtushenko died in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He was a faculty member at the University there for many years.
John Proffitt
I'm sorry - he died on April 1st in the US. That was the point of my comment; that this notable poet responsible for this very moving poem was living int he uS and had passed away very recently. I am curious about your pedantic and aggressive" this is incorrect."
I saw him on a US television show back then (David Susskind?) and I was surprised the commies had let him out.
"...pedantic and aggressive..."? Nothing of the sort was intended -- sorry. The post said Yevtushenko died in Texas which was indeed incorrect. He died in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I was correcting the record, plainly and simply.
John Proffitt
He died in Tulsa. However, he visited Houston several times to perform Symphony 13 with the Houston Symphony under Hans Graf (I sang in the Chorus!); and Symphony 13 and The Execution of Stepan Razin with the Moores School Chorus and Symphony under Franz Krager. He did extensive readings from his poetry before both performances.
John Proffitt
performances than I.
Please check it out for me if available on your newfangled steaming site. : ) I like a really atmospheric 1st movt. Ominous tam tam a plus. (Or gong, I haven't looked at the score.)
I'm afraid to say anything about Lamsma's facial expression at this point. Carrie's long-lost sister? Is she about to do the telekinesis thing? Make Chris' car explode from 20 miles away? : )
Better not to take the chance on being labeled a misogynist. ;-)
BTW, I have Simone's Elgar album on Naxos - I like it! I think she's appeared a couple of times with the SF Symphony, but I missed them both.
Actually, I think her cover photos on the Challenge label show her in a more flattering light - especially the "big hair" Mendelssohn/Janacek/Schumann album:
D'oh! There I go again - I just can't rid myself of my misogynist ways! If only those record companies wouldn't put those lurid photos on their covers!
Lamsma played the Britten concerto with the Cleveland Orchestra, as a replacement for Janine Jansen. A lot of the performance was out of tune. Maybe she had an off-night...
. . . after one of her appearances with the SF Symphony. Since I don't trust our local critics, I kind of dismissed his remarks. But since you mentioned the same weakness in her playing, it would seem that there IS something to that observation. (The Elgar CD I mentioned seems fine to me in this respect however.)
Well, Lamsma is coming back for another Cleveland Orchestra appearance in the upcoming season. I'm no longer a season subscriber, so I definitely won't be attending.
and only, David.
And indeed, our lady is doing a very good job with the first movement. But in the end, my heart is still safely in my chest.
David would have had it ripped out and laying on the floor by the end of the first movement!
And by the way, this is a GREAT piece of music. If DDS had written nothing else in this life, this would have been enough to be remembered by. With some help from David, of course.
Not a bad one either, as one of the two guys on the CD cover new a thing or two about the composer. ;-)
Vengerov is a good fiddler but not nearly the depth of soul nor the ability to project emotion in his playing as David.
I humbly think Mravinsky's Leningrad orchestra digs even deeper into the score. The 1st movt seems to flow better and is more evocative.
David Oistrakh!
.
And justly so!
.
The CONTENT of the SACD likely caused a problem somewhere in the system. Surprising as I don't think I have any Russian tubes that might be sympathetic to the music in the system.
Noticed a loud 'pop' when I turned it off yesterday. DIY tube audio (12 years old?) so it could be ANYTHING. I wasn't in the room when it was popping and arching so I don't know if it was left or right or both. Now I'm looking at the speakers and nothing! I did pop a couple times after the SACD was over so it ain't the SACD.
Just make sure your system is in tip top shape by May. I was hoping to bring by a flash drive with the mono Juilliard Bartok quartets and Scherchen's Beethoven.
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