any classical enthusiasts?

[qualia]

also heard recently a guy by the name of jeroen van veen - very steve reich like, hypnotic piano loops, i like it

the actual composer is simeon ten holt (canto ostinato), the dude playing was jeroen van veen

Edited October 20, 2011 by qualia

[Psylo]

Not sure how much you want argue the point of "Classical", and timeline purists may object to his inclusion, but Igor Stravinsky is wonderful if you get your hands on a well-recorded & performed CD. Many elements of mood, a dark heady blend of the heavy and the sinister, delivered with great organic instrumental forcefulness. That said, there are also vast elements of his work that embody the traditional beauty of the Classical genre, but with compositional twists & turns that make his music quite unique.

Stravinsky is certainly one of my recommendations for listening to in a darkened room with no distractions, played through a quality hi-fi (forget your shitty PC speakers, at the very least buy some proper headphones). It hurts me to do this, because YouTube music quality oh so goddamn awful, but as a wee few tasters, see below. Links are embedded into the titles......... may I suggest you click the links but don't watch the video presentations (they detract from the music IMO). Better still, may I suggest you hit the torrent sites and find out for yourself.

The following examples are only parts of greater movements, but it may whet your whistles enough to uncover more of Stravinsky's body of work.

 

May 1913: Stravinsky debuted the The Rite of Spring Ballet at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris on May 29, 1913, to an audience accustomed to the grace, elegance, and traditional music of "conventional" ballets, i.e. Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. Opposition to Stravinsky's work literally happened within the first few minutes of the piece as members of the audience booed loudly in response to the inharmonic notes accompanying the unrecognizable bassoon's opening solo. What's more, the work's unconventional music, sharp and unnatural choreography (dancers danced with bent arms and legs and would land on the floor so hard their internal organs would shake), and Russian pagan setting, failed to win over the majority of the audience.

As the ballet progressed, so did the audience's discomfort. Those in favor of Stravinksy's work argued with those in opposition. The arguments eventually turned to brawls and police had to be notified. They arrived at intermission and successfully calmed the angry crowd (yes, the show wasn't even half way over before people were throwing punches). As the second half commenced, police were unable to keep the audience under control and rioting resumed. Stravinsky was so taken aback by the audience's reaction, he fled the scene before the show was over.

Variations

Stravinsky began work on the Variations in Santa Fé, New Mexico in July 1963, and completed the composition in Hollywood, California on 28 October 1964. It was first performed in Chicago on 17 April 1965, by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra conducted by Robert Craft. The score is dedicated to the memory of Stravinsky's close friend Aldous Huxley, who died on 22 November 1963, when composition of the Variations was in progress.

 

(Ok, this video is pretty good to watch! And my pick of the three for a sonic experience)

The ballet centers on the journey of its hero, Prince Ivan. Ivan enters the magical realm of Kashchei the Immortal; all of the magical objects and creatures of Kashchei are herein represented by a chromatic descending motif, usually in the strings. While wandering in the gardens, he sees and chases the Firebird. The Firebird, once caught by Ivan, begs for its life and ultimately agrees to assist Ivan in exchange for eventual freedom.

Next, Prince Ivan sees thirteen princesses, with one of whom he falls in love. The next day, Ivan chooses to confront Kashchei to ask to marry one of the princesses; the two talk and eventually begin quarreling. When Kashchei sends his magical creatures after Ivan, the Firebird, true to its pledge, intervenes, bewitching the creatures and making them dance an elaborate, energetic dance (the "Infernal Dance"). The creatures and Kashchei then fall asleep; however, Kashchei awakens and is then sent into another dance by the Firebird. While Kashchei is bewitched, the Firebird tells Ivan the secret to Kashchei's immortality – his soul is contained inside an enormous, magical egg. Ivan destroys the egg, killing Kashchei. With Kashchei gone and his spell broken, the magical creatures and the palace all disappear. All of the "real" beings (including the princesses) awaken and (with one final hint of the Firebird's music, though in Fokine's choreography she makes no appearance in that final scene on-stage), celebrate their victory.

[FancyPants]

Or not! There is nothing that kills an emerging interest in orchestral music as much as cheap recordings. Go to Thomas' and ask for some recommendations, or research and order online. Seeing as everyone is recommending Vivaldi's Four Seasons, I would definitely suggest Chesky's recording, especially if you have high end equipment to listen to it on. I have a Raglan Baroque Players recording (produced by Virgin) that is also very good and is in a four disk set with a lot of other pieces. But Chesky blows everything else out of the water if you have the equipment to hear the subtleties in it.

Lol. That, my friend, is the quote of the century

EDIT: Oops. Just realised the OP is in NZ. Thomas' is probably out of the question then, lol.

 

I didn't realise those were shit recordings, I only usually listened to them on long car trips so through the factory cd player. I should look for some classical blurays.

[Psylo]

I didn't realise those were shit recordings, I only usually listened to them on long car trips so through the factory cd player. I should look for some classical blurays.

 

Blu-Ray doesn't automatically equal good quality, it's just a medium in which to transmit something. YOu could just as soon find a sonic masterpiece on a 70 year old shellac record

Ok, maybe not shellac.

[ThunderIdeal]

same as many i like it but i'm not sure which stuff i like. i listen to classical abc and it's pretty good not a fan of opera though.

i like classical music that sounds like world war two.

barber, adagio for strings op.11 - the music in the movie platoon

pachelbel canon in d major - who doesn't know this??!!!!

i will listen to what i've got (not much) and comment again.

good thread!

and ballzac your initial comment was beautiful, i love to hear anybody who can attempt to explain the how and why of a subtle thing!

[hebrew]

don't forget hector berlioz's symphony fantastic, or is it fantastic symphony, anyway written after he consume opium, and he dreamed of killing this woman he loved but she never knew he loved her, and ended up getting his head chopped off by the guillotine, and found himself at a witches sabbath. one of the first pieces of music called program music, where the music was set to a storyline, in the 3rd or 4th movement i forget you hear it end with his head falling to the ground the last movement of the witches sabbath is mighty.

sorry if someone has mentioned this one already, i am just skimming at the moment no time to read everything in detail

[hebrew]

Listen to the sixth Brandenburg concerto and try to follow a single instrument with your ear from beginning to end (of one movement at least). The amazing thing that happens if you do this is that you realise each instrument is playing its own beautiful melody that fits into the soundscape as though every other instrument is there to support it. It has its own subtleties and its own emotions that it can evoke, yet it also contains themes and motifs that it shares with the other instruments. Another thing that amazes me is how difficult it actually IS to follow a single instrument. You will start with one instrument and realise shortly that you are listening to a different one as the melody you were listening to has been picked up and carried away by the second instrument, so smoothly that you may not have noticed at the time. In addition to this you have conversations going back and forth between instruments. Again, being consistent with the themes in the piece, but expressing them in a different context and evoking different emotions.

 

yes this is called contrapuntal, bach was a master at contrapuntal writing, really he was one of the pioneers of this style of writing. and his fugues are amazing, so much theory within them. as a child playing bach was my little place of peace. i won many piano competitions performing bach as a child. the thing with his music is that is spans all levels of musicianship. for kids to people like glenn gould who does fantastic renditions of bachs work, a lot of people didnt like the way he performed bach but he was a brilliant pianist.

bach's sons were also great composers but not like their father.

mozarts sister was also a great composer and there has been talk in the last decade or so that some of his work may have actually been composed by his sister, it wasnt until they uncovered a lost score and analysed the writing and realised that it was actually his sister who wrote it.

for some modern music that is not classical but resembles classical, i recommend, the icelandic band amiina, they started as a quartet but moved into making pop music i guess you could call it. very beautiful. this is one of their tunes with the genius lee hazelwood's last ever recording before he died. beautiful everytime i hear it

 

 

i have to put this in here as it's a cover of lee hazelwoods leather and lace, but it so captivating

 

 

Edited October 20, 2011 by VelvetSiren

[sethomopod]

For some reason I'm not able to post a link, but search for a torrent called The Greatest Classical Collection Ever.

50 cds.... It's a good collection to start off an apreciation of classical.. It has all the well known composers.. Have a listen and find what you like, then go from there...

I just had a look and saw that it only has 1 seed... But I am currently getting good speeds from several seeds...

Hope this helps..

[bogfrog]

wow i love that leather and lace cover, Icelandic music is so ethereal!

[hebrew]

i have a decent selection of scores mostly 20th century, if there are musicians that wish to see scores i can send them to you easily. arvo part, messiaen, satie, hans otte, glass, feldmann, plus many more

scores

[Psylo]

a good collection to start off an apreciation of classical.. It has all the well known composers.. Have a listen and find what you like, then go from there...

 

^^ this

Unlike a "best aussie pub songs of all time" style of compilation, the classical polular giants in compilation CD's are... well...giants of the genre. Discovering those riffs you heard as a kid, through newscasts, through Disney, take some time to hear the full composition, and the essence of that which is a musical tale.

Fantasia.... aka the Sorcerer's Apprentice

 

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

[Rabaelthazar]

Qualia, that piano in the vid you posted is quite possibly Yamaha's most hideous design. I've spent a fair bit of time with it up close and, while it's interesting you gotta ask the question, "What on earth were they thinking?" There are some far out designs out there, some of them quite beautiful like this, some of them super imposing like thisand some of them just plain weird like this one.

Anyway.... I digress.

In response to the Bogfrog's OP, I agree that getting some good recordings is a great thing to do. Don't buy ten dollar bargain bin "Best of Classical" CDs - they will end up at the bottom of your CD collection after a while, never to be played again. As someone mentioned above, get recommendations (either online or from someone you trust in a shop) and buy recordings of really good quality performances.

The other thing to do is head out and actually listen to some live performance. There's plenty of good, free live classical music all around Australia. There's nothing like being in the room with the musicians as they play and watching how they bring such amazing sounds out of inanimate objects.

In terms of style, you'll find out what you like and don't like. As with any genre, each period of classical music has some amazing work and some absolute bog. I think the further back you go, the greater the ratio of good to bog is (and please, bogfrog, no offence by my use of the word bog... ah, maybe I should have used a different word. I could always backspace, but...) possibly for the reasons that the best has survived while the crap (ah, there's the word I was after) has been forgotten and left to rot in the depths of time. Maybe in 300 years the same will be able to be said about music of today. Time will filter out all the Justin Bieber and leave our future descendants with the cream. Also, 300 years ago not everyone could play music. Only the best prodigies would be patronised and be given a thorough musical education creating great composers whereas now everyone has garage band and even the greats of today probably only do formal study for a few years. If you took a musically gifted child today and gave them a full time musical education from the time they were four until the time they were 18 you might create another genius equal to somebody like Bach.

<end grumpy old man mode>

[ballzac]

not a fan of opera though.

 

I used to hate opera. I think we hear the same pieces (or even just a part of a particular piece) over and over again as incidental music in things. Then we see the same things sung over and over again on "....'s got talent". We generally hear them under pretty poor circumstances because mostly it's on tv. Even the cinema, in spite of the impressive sound system, is not the greatest place to listen to music. Point being that I think my impression of what I thought opera was put me off.

I was kind of forced to listen to an operatic piece (I'm using the term loosely here to mean a vocal work). I have always loved an organ piece by Bach called "Wachet auf Ruft uns di Stimme", but much as I love the way it sounds on organ, I prefer the subtleties that can be heard in an orchestral piece. Luckily there IS an orchestral version of it, but it has singing in it. The first dozen times I listened to it, I think I stopped it when the singing started, lol. After a while I started putting up with the vocals, and eventually I actually started appreciating it to some extent. To be honest though, I would still prefer to listen to that piece without the vocals. There are seven movements in that, and they tend to be quite comical and take away from the depth of emotion that I generally appreciate bach for, but I can still enjoy listening to them.

Recently, however, I started listening to some Handel. I gotta say, the Cleopatra Arias from Giulio Cesare (as performed by Natalie Dessay) can be incredibly powerful at times, and I've been really enjoying listening to them. It actually makes me very excited that there's a whole genre of music out there that I thought was of little value to me that I can perhaps now mine for auditory pleasure.

[hebrew]

yes same i am not huge fan of operatice work, however, i went and the barber of seville some years ago and really enjoyed, i also went to see batavia, an australian opera and enjoyed that too, i guess you gotta put it into perspective, and take it for what it is. like ballzac says, it is often taken out of context, but still i am not a fan of the way operatic singing is done.

i love organ music, i think it is one awesome instrument, back in 2002 i was invited to write for the melbourne town halls organ to celebrate its restoration which is the largest pipe organ in the southern hemisphere, nothing like walking through the guts of an instrument, and being so much smaller than the instrument.

[ballzac]

i love organ music, i think it is one awesome instrument

 

My problem with the organ is mainly, I believe, the fact that it must either be heard in person or on incredibly expensive equipment. I have a great recording of Bach's organ works on 192kHz DVD-A, performed by Ton Koopman. My Event TR-8 loudspeakers, which I usually consider to be very adequate low-end hi-fi, really don't do it justice and a lot of the detail is difficult to discern. My ATH AD-900 headphones I would describe as incredibly detailed and transparent for dynamic driver, but they struggle with organ music (though fair much better than the TR-8s) and do not have the bass to really fill out space and give that sense of awe that organ music should have. I have heard some organ music on electrostatic loudspeakers, and it sounded pretty incredible, but that was a $40 000 sound system for the two speakers and the amp, plus the ESLs also lack the bass, though it matters little when the mids and highs are so detailed.

Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that I prefer orchestral music to organ music mostly due to the conditions under which I can listen to it on a daily basis, rather than anything intrinsic about the quality of the instrument and its music.

[ThunderIdeal]

i saw bits of 'igor' and now that i know the words i enjoy singing figaro wherever i go. the bigger the figure the better i like her the more that i feed her the better i feed the bigger the figure the bigger the figure the more i'm in love

heheh, always did like figaro, but dramatic italian singing isn't something i seek out.

[naja naja]

Some other peices I really enjoy are peter and the wolf, it's like classical for kids. I used to have a cartoon when i was like 3 and watched it over and over..

The simpsons intro is also a modern day classic IMO,

[ballzac]

Some other peices I really enjoy are peter and the wolf, it's like classical for kids. I used to have a cartoon when i was like 3 and watched it over and over..

The simpsons intro is also a modern day classic IMO,

 

Yeah, I used to love Peter and the Wolf when I was little.

Don't get me started on Danny Elfman. The Edward Scissorhands soundtrack (especially the ice dance) makes me cry every time. While we're at it, what about John Williams. Sometimes it's easy to overlook the really familiar artists, but John Williams is so successful for a reason and Many of his scores are masterpieces, especially the way they embody the essence of the characters and themes in the movies. Take the imperial march for instance, or the main theme from Indiana Jones. Pure genius.

[qualia]

who can't love this

 

[paradox]

i don't think anyone has mentioned any eastern classical music yet...

as far as i'm concerned one of the best examples of modern indian classical music is the work of the violinist Lakshminarayanan Shankar.. in my opinion he is the most incredible violinist who has ever lived.. he plays a double necked violin which he designed himself.. he can play these rich deep tones like a cello all the way up to the most intensely piercing high notes your ears can handle & often plays them both at the same time.. just frickin mind blowing music

 

 

[bogfrog]

wow fuck yeah thats awesome

[Darklight]

i love organ music, i think it is one awesome instrument, back in 2002 i was invited to write for the melbourne town halls organ to celebrate its restoration which is the largest pipe organ in the southern hemisphere, nothing like walking through the guts of an instrument, and being so much smaller than the instrument.

 

I would totally love to hear more about that, it would have been fantastic, what an honour!

[qualia]

i took this thread to be western classical art music. hindustani classical is another thread altogether, imo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rG3Rpv78DA

[hebrew]

I would totally love to hear more about that, it would have been fantastic, what an honour!

 

Not much more to say the organist I worked with took on a tour through the instrument where we walked through corridors and stairwells surrounded by pipes the deep pipes were very long and when played them you wouldn't want to be standing in the instrument I reckon it would be pretty close to the brown note it was a concert of Australian organ music with mine and David chisholms works being premiered. Hosted and recorded by abc classic fm I was pretty happy with the. Composition being my first organ work, I was lucky to work with a world reknowned organist who provided me with plenty of first hand experience dealing with stops and understanding the dynamics of the instrument. I have the recording not sure if it is on YouTube it has been released on a uk based independant label along with a piano piece I recorded In a school classroom very low-fi if I find a link will put it up. Although my music is different these days

Edited October 21, 2011 by VelvetSiren

[paradox]

i took this thread to be western classical art music. hindustani classical is another thread altogether, imo.

 

yeah i figured as much too but the OP just said classical.. couldn't help myself.. by the slant of bogfrogs posts i figured she'd appreciate it maybe we can get another thread going... or is there a similar one already?

Edited October 22, 2011 by paradox