[excluding your favourite pieces, and your favourite composer]
[occasionally updated to include this week's thing - most recently on 2nd June 2000]
Baroque'n'Roll | The Osteopath's Friend | Romantic Excesses | This one go Plunk
This is based on a series of tapes I made for a friend who asked me to recommend some classical music. [Bet he's sorry now]. I don't pretend to any expertise or balance: these are simply pieces that stirred me more than most. There are astonishing omissions: Mozart, since I didn't know where to start; most of Beethoven (whose music is better than any drug: better than Prozac, says my mischievous side, thinking of search engines) because it'd take too long ... Since my selections are almost certainly different to yours, I apologise in advance and advise you to close this page if it all gets too upsetting.
Anyway, when is anything like this ever finished, hmm?
Andreas Scholl's vivacious version of Vivaldi's Stabat Mater gives the lie to anyone who thinks that Baroque music is formal and sedate. The free London-based newspaper Metro memorably described Scholl's voice as 'dreamy [and] creamy', and there is something rather luxurious about it, especially in the secular cantata 'Cessate, omai cessate', in which the singer bemoans cruel love. As usual.
Purcell's Hail Bright Cecilia - as conducted by Sir John Eliot Gardiner. Now, unlike my friend Maureen, I am not absolutely fanatical about Gardiner: on the other hand, quite a few of my selections seem to be from recordings bearing his name. Well, with Gardiner you're almost certain to get brilliant orchestral precision and top-class vocal performances, and a sense of joie de vivre: this particular piece is a welcome relief for the typical English climate on St Cecilia's Day, November 24th.
As counter-tenors go, James Bowman manages to sound more robust than most: try his album of Handel's Heroic Arias, many of which were originally written for castrati singers. The castrati fascinate me: it's a dreadful operation to perform upon a child, especially under the barbaric conditions which prevailed: the failure rate was damningly high. Yet those that survived sang like no one before or since, and were treated like royalty. Here, as in many areas (this is irony), we find that science fiction has much to offer: the genetically-engineered, or freshly-evolved, individual whose voice echoes those of old. On the other hand, the sole extant recording of a castrato is unimpressive. Let's hope it wasn't all a mass delusion of our ancestors.
The 'counter-tenor' album to end 'em all: the soundtrack of the film Farinelli. They created the sound of a castrato by electronically blending counter-tenor Derek Lee Ragin and soprano Ewa Mallas-Godlewska. Mostly, it doesn't sound much different to a good counter-tenor, except that the timbre of the voice is rather lighter. Occasionally, though, the sheer range of the voice becomes apparent, and it's a shock - the modern ear is unused to such contrast in a single voice.
 |
Cherubini's opera Medea was, apparently, Beethoven's favourite opera: although composed a mere decade after Mozart's Don Giovanni, in 1797, in some ways it seems much closer to the 20th century than the 18th. True, the introductory scenes have ancient Greeks sounding very Enlightened, with plenty of cheerfully ornate woodwind and pretty harmonies: then Medea appears, and sounds entirely alien and anachronistic. In contrast to the elegant phrasing of the other parts, her voice is at first almost a monotone, evocative of ancient rituals. (There's one aria that brings 'Summertime', from the rather later Porgy & Bess, irresistably to mind: just the first few notes, which have more of the blues than of Mozart about them). ... I used to think Maria Callas wavered around in the vicinity of the note by accident: now I realise that it was a conscious decision, and very effective. She sounds very mythic and threatening here. |
Beethoven's Fifth
'Emperor' Piano Concerto, with the Choral Fantasia
Robert Levin on a Fortepiano, abetted by Sir John Eliot Gardiner & the Orchestre
Revolutionairre et Romantique. The fortepiano sounds muddy at first if you're used to a
modern piano - but this is a more accurate sound [I'd say 'as Beethoven heard it' if he
hadn't been deaf by the time he wrote it]. Splendid, uplifting and curiously tender music:
the 'Emperor' is, of course, Napoleon.
The Choral Fantasia came as a wonderful surprise to me: in 15 minutes, it seems
to encompass a great many of the 'greatest hits' of Beethoven. The piano dominates the
first half of the piece, changing mood and tone several times: there's a faux-Russian
section (which probably wasn't intended to sound Russian at all) and some slow, lyric
passages that bring the sonatas to mind. The choral sections are reminiscent of the Ninth
Symphony - and it isanother joyful piece. Featuring Gardiner's Monteverdi Choir.
While we're in JEG-land: Beethoven's Ninth (Choral) Symphony: original metronomic markings and all, which means that you may find it uncomfortably fast at first, as I did. Did you know that the standard length for a CD (74-75 minutes) was determined as the average length of a performance of this symphony? Well, Gardiner's version is under an hour. The Second Movement, in particular, suggests an almost obsessive pacing.
[added 2.6.00]
Beethoven's Missa Solemnis
(yes, that's the Gardiner version too) is a piece that first came to my attention as 'one
of the most difficult choral works in the repertoire'. It also seems to be one of the most
difficult pieces to which to convert anyone ...! But the Sanctus-Adagio movement
(?section) evokes autumn/death/darkness/melancholy like nothing else. For me. Possibly just
for me.
Another confession of opinionated ignorance: for a long while I proclaimed that all good opera was written before 1843 (the year in which Donizetti's Elisir d'Amore was premiered). I blame Bellini: in Autumn 1990, on the cover CD of a classical music magazine, there was a 2-minute excerpt from Cheryl Studer's rendition of an aria from Bellini's La Somnambula, and it hooked me on bel canto* opera for years. Eventually I discovered I Capuleti e i Montecchi - this is the version with Edita Gruberova as Juliet and Agnes Baltsa as Romeo. Yep, Romeo's a girl. Well, it's a breeches role, and while some would say that Bellini's works never had the smoothness or charm of Donizetti's, I'd offer this opera as counter-argument.
Donizetti's most popular work - despite the odd marriage of beautiful tunes and banal, doom-laden lyrics ('libretto') - is probably Lucia di Lammermoor. For the film fans who haven't yet stopped reading, this is the first piece of music sung by the alien diva in Luc Besson's The Fifth Element. For those who want a real diva (and aren't too fussy about whether they get consonants too), try this Joan Sutherland / Luciano Pavarotti version.
For my money, Donizetti's best work is Anna Bolena (that's a Joan Sutherland version, too, with the Welsh National Opera. I just find that her voice interprets his music in a way that appeals to me). This opera has another excellent 'breeches role': that of Smeaton, framed as the doomed Queen's doomed lover. The part is sung in that performance by Bernadette Manca di Nissa, whose voice has the same sensuous androgyny that I find attractive in counter-tenor voices. The range, I suppose, is very similar, though surely not identical: a counter-tenor's high notes sound harder and clearer than a mezzo-soprano's.
Long, long ago there was a prog rock band called The Enid: most of their music passed through my brain without sticking, but I fell for the theme of 'In the Region of the Summer Stars'. Occasionally, once I'd discovered Radio 3, I'd hear something that sounded very like that theme, but in Real Classical Music. And one day I heard Liszt's Totentanz (here interpreted by Krystian Zimerman) - a series of variations for piano - and had the theme identified as 'Dies Irae'. The Totentanz (Danze Macabre) is a spectacularly complex work (at least to the ignorant listener such as I) and its exuberance generally lifts me out of the slough of despond.
If you ever get the chance to hear Saint-Saens Symphony #3 (Organ Symphony) performed live, take it! The theme of the finale may be familiar to my older readers via the chart single 'If I Had Words', by Scott Fitzgerald (1978 or so). I heard it at the Royal Albert Hall during the 1999 Proms: we had seats in the choir, not terribly far from the 9973-pipe organ (which wasn't functioning at capacity, due to ongoing renovation). It was uncannily like being deaf. I could see the string section sawing away busily, but all I could hear was this immense and gladdening sound. The hairs on my arms stood up, clearly eager to do their bit and vibrate along with the instrument we were, effectively, a part of: the entire Hall and every surface in it. Exhilirating.
Until quite recently I didn't think I liked 20th-century music. Then someone introduced me to Arvo Part's Tabula Rasa, in Gidon Kremer's sparse and accurate rendition ... hypnotic and subtle, building ever so carefully on a minimal base.
And someone else pointed out that Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto [back up the page] was written in 1908 ...
There's the relaxing and vaguely mystical, eerily northern Cantus Arcticus, a composition by Finnish composer Rautavaara for orchestra and bird song (though I believe he cheated with the birds, and slowed down or speeded up recorded birdsong to suit the key and the time signature. Naughty Nature).
It does seem to be the Scandinavians (and other Northern types) which appeal to me: I'm also fond of Sibelius, especially the huge and mythic-sounding tone poems (Sir Alexander Gibson conducting Phyllis Bryn-Julson and the Royal Scottish National Orchestra) - including 'Nightride and Sunrise' and 'Pohjola's Daughter', as well as the better-known 'Finlandia'. Perhaps mythic subjects work best when you're less familiar with the myths themselves.
Michael Nyman's hardly northern at all from where I'm sitting, and yet I find myself strangely enamoured of his compositions, plus he is a living composer whom one can see conducting the Michael Nyman Band - as here, with the Piano Concerto. I do admire the energy behind his music: that, and the volume, may go some way towards explaining the presence of Youth in his audiences. Oh, and the music itself, which partakes of popular culture from time to time: hey, he's even collaborated with Damon Albarn (though the latter wasn't apparent at the premiere of Wonderland ...)
[added 2.6.00]
And Poland is, well, more southernly ... but the wonderfully clean and cold combination of
a soprano, a couple of countertenors, a cathedral organ, and full choir and orchestra, on
Zbigniew Preisner's haunting Requiem for my
Friend, captivated me. In parts, the sound reminded me of popular beat combo Dead
Can Dance, but the structure is entirely classical, and the voices purer and
weirder. Beautifully haunting - appealing to Old Goth tendencies as well as to
whichever part of my brain controls 'shivers up the spine during Missa
Solemnis'.
Yet another good reason for listening to Radio
Three, without whose Late Junction I would never have heard this!
More soon, maybe ..!
*Sir Simon Rattle, in the Guardian [31st May 1990], was quoted as saying that "If anyone has conducted a Beethoven performance, and then doesn't have to go to an osteopath, then there's something wrong."
*Molesworth (as any fule kno), brought to public consciousness by Geoffrey Willans and Ronald Searle. Amazon!
*lit. 'beautiful singing'. Personally, I think this depends on the singer not the song.