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In Reply to: RE: "Live" Recordings are a Menace imnsho posted by Mel on February 02, 2021 at 11:31:58
Most (nearly all?) "live" recordings of major orchestras on major labels are recorded over a series of performances, often supplemented by patch sessions. The final release is edited from these various elements. How is that a "live" recording? For this reason, the inclusion of applause in such a recording seems to be something of a cheat. And as Donald Vroon said in American Record Guide, all applause sounds the same, and it never sounds musical. Its inclusion in a recording is a ruinous distraction, at least to me.
Follow Ups:
And there's always the idiots standing and screaming Bravo! before the music has died down.
When I record I try to cut the applause and patch in some silence where needed.
. . . applause "definition" is a great test of one's system! ;-)
OTOH, I once interviewed Aldo Ciccolini for our local newspaper in Palo Alto. He agreed with you, and he said he hated the whole ritual of applause and bowing to the audience. He claimed that when the last note is over, the pianist's work should be done, and he should just get up and leave the stage in silence, especially since applause breaks the spell. Of course, the peanut gallery would never stand for this! ;-)
Furthermore, he said that a musician should be like a monk, and not get married or have a family or social life. Rather, a musician should be married to the music!
One other tidbit Ciccolini mentioned was that he was scheduled to perform the Busoni Piano Concerto with Furtwangler, but Furtwangler died a few months before that performance was to take place. That performance might have been very interesting if it had occurred.
I saw Garrick Ohlsson play the Busoni a couple of years ago with Cleveland Orchestra; he didn't look any more stressed than someone eating a sandwich. Even the Hamelin video on YouTube shows the pianist looking plenty stressed from time to time.
I wonder if Ciccolini had the technique for the Busoni--I mean I only know his Satie records, and that repertoire surely didn't stretch him that much.
Complete Mozart Sonatas, complete Beethoven Sonatas, complete Debussy piano works, Tchaikovsky Concerto, Albeniz, Granados, Falla, lots of Liszt (my own first exposure to his playing), Chabrier, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, Mendelssohn, Ravel, Saint-Saens, Grieg, and (yes) Busoni (even aside from the Concerto). (And I didn't even mention Satie!)In fact, when I interviewed him, Ciccolini mentioned that he was excited to be recording some of Busoni's solo works (which is how his story about the (non) performance of the Busoni Concerto also came up). Also, it looks like Erato put out a collection of Ciccolini's recordings from 1950 to 1991 this past November - 56 LP's [EDIT: Oops! I meant CD's].
Edits: 02/03/21
A fine musician. My only quibble is that, to me, he made Spanish music sound Italianate (you know, just as Karajan made Prokofiev 5 sound German, as did Pappano with Aida, amazingly enough).
Maybe it's just me?
Jeremy
But one such recording of applause should do.
I notice that sometimes, especially where the endings are not at maximum orchestral force, the conductor will leave his arms in the air as though to lead the audience in silence, and not break the spell, until he lowers his arms.
"I notice that sometimes, especially where the endings are not at maximum orchestral force, the conductor will leave his arms in the air as though to lead the audience in silence, and not break the spell, until he lowers his arms."
And sometimes, even that doesn't deter some of the yahoos in the audience! ;-)
He has to be first! I always listen for him at the end of live recordings. :)
Weissenberg/Ozawa/SFSO doing the Rachmaninoff Third at Flint Center in Cupertino. Some kid a couple of rows in front of me turned around and gave me a dirty look! ;-)
But I've been clean and on the straight and narrow for goin' on 50 years now!
.
I don't remember the quote exactly, but I think Brahms once said that the monks of St. Florian have the transgressions of Bruckner's compositions on their souls!
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