[FLAC, TRACKS, LOG, COVER, BOOKLET]

Label: Calig

Year: 1978

Performed by Mainz Bach Choir, Bachorchester Mainz
Conducted by Diethard Hellmann

Tracklist:

1. Prelude
2. Recitative And Choir
3. Aria – Edith Wiens
4. Duet And Choir – Friedreich Melzer
5. Duet – Verena Schweizer
6. Choir
7. Trio – Verena Schweizer
8. Quartet – Edith Wiens
9. Quintet And Choir
10. Choir

LINK

http://uploading.com/files/ea39c26b/SaintSaensOratorioDeNoel.rar/

Artist:  Piers Lane
Title: Camille Saint-Saëns, The Complete Etudes
Purchased at: iTunes
Artist link: pierslane.com
Rating: love it!

I first heard Saint-Saëns when I heard his piano concertos many years ago. My fave recording is by Aldo Ciccolini but his recording is out of print. When I went in search of a new favorite, I listened to a few versions and decided the recording by Jean-Philippe Collard, with Andre Previn conducting, was as close as I was going to get. IMO, Camille Saint-Saëns’ piano concertos are some of the most beautiful music I’ve ever heard and they bring tears to my eyes every single time.

Today I decided I wanted to explore more more Saint-Saëns, particularly on piano and the recording by Piers Lane of the etudes popped up. I listened to the sound samples and was hooked. I bought the downloads and am listening to them now. Gorgeous! The style of the music is close that of his piano concertos, although these etudes are more structured, and more brief.

I’m really excited to have found some more Saint-Saëns to adore. I think I’ll surf around for some more.

I went to another Ohio State University show this night, with the unimaginative title of Resident and Visiting Artists Dance Concert.  But there’s something to be said for a title that just tells you what it is in a few words, unfettered by flourishes trying to express some idea.  Unfortunately I was running late (not a surprise) so I missed getting into the theatre for the first piece and had to watch through a door window.  As a result of my tardiness, I also did not get a program, so as I did with the show earlier, I am going into this review with no information, no ideas, and no titles to clue me in on anything.  But there’s something to be said for that too…the idea of viewing a dance with no expectations (literally).  So it looks like I’m going to have to make up my own titles, although my reactions are of course always my own, and you better believe I believe that we are all entitled to that.  Could renaming the dances for my own purposes be potentially offensive to their respective choreographers?  Maybe…maybe not…it’s not really my problem.

I won’t review every piece (C-bus people should really go see the show on their own…it’s a really good show), just a few highlights of the group numbers to entice the imagination.  The first piece I saw through the window looked really interesting…mathematical formations, Earthy-brown costumes and lots of prayerish gesturing.  And prayer beads.  I shall call it, Goddess Hymn.  Svetlana was actually in the piece so I was mad at myself for missing the direct experience, but she had significant phrases stage left, which was the only side I could see so the glass was half full.  From what I could tell, all of the dancers were female (like that’s a surprise), but the music had soothing female vocals as well.  It was very much a “dance,” with codified movement like arabesque turns, chaînés and grand battements, and yet it was structured in such a way that gave it a real spirituality.  I don’t know if it was specific to any religion, but it felt specific to the sensations of spirituality.  I am not religious (when you have a Catholic father and a Buddhist mother, the last thing you want is more religion!), but I do consider myself somewhat spiritual.  If anything, I say yay Daoism…go with the flow and don’t ask questions because those who know the Dao don’t actually know it.  But the point is, when I see something in nature that pleases me, like a beautiful starscape or a simple oak tree, a certain feeling of spirituality is invoked because I believe those things to be spiritual, and that was something I felt a twinge of while watching this dance.

The piece right after it…er, I think…was Into the Æther (I’ve always wanted to use that symbol), and it was painted in varying shades of cool blues and set to a heinous violin soundtrack.  Like sustained, dissident notes that reminded me of one of my worst fears, which is dying in the vacuum of space.  I’ve never had nightmares of drowning or being burned alive, but somehow the image of my body floating in space is something I’ve unpleasantly dreamt of and fear for no logical reason (as if, I would ever go into space!).  Of course, the music is genius depending on who you are, but we all know me.  At the very least, the music was used effectively.  This piece had a lot of dancers doing some very turbulent and aggressive movement, synching in and out and constantly changing tempo.  This is why I was really getting the image of the sky, because to me, the sky is something scattered, especially as you get further away from Earth, oxygen and other gases become increasingly diffuse.  And yet the sky has this awesome power, arguably the most formidable influence on Earth, but it is a power that can neither be sustained nor harnesses.  It can only conglomerate and dissipate, with no will of its own.  At one point the dancers are following each other in a sinuous line like a current of air, following the same path but not in the same way, and another moment they’re all twitching before crystallizing into a certain pose, like snowflakes, and then evaporating into shapeless vapor.  It was all very atmospheric to me and the creative distance to which one is willing to go in modern dance has to be dependent upon how far into the exosphere one’s imagination goes…too bad neither distance is measurable.  It certainly gives new meaning to the phrase “head in the clouds.”

Me?  I like it terrestrial, with my feet firmly planted on mother Earth.  Hence, simple interpretations and a devout love for ballet.  And there was a touch of that, in a screwball, theatrical staging of a work set to Saint-Saëns’ The Carnival of the Animals.  Despite a nefarious decision to exclude the Aquarium movement (which I can only assume is a personal attack on my integrity), this was the action-packed and comical Looney Tunes performance to the classically romantic music.  I’m not kidding…there was a classic “search” scene, complete with exaggeratedly cautious steps and binoculars, a scene with dynamite, and a Scooby-Doo style chase for the finale.  But it wasn’t just people portraying animals, because there was a turning of the tables as well because most of the characters were actually human.  So it was really like a commentary on the animalistic characteristics of people…or, people, portraying animals, pretending to be people.  You’ll have to choose your own adventure I’m afraid.  With Aquarium absent, Fossils was my favorite musically, and the premise for it was a crotchety ballet teacher, who I shall call Madame Jelena Danyushka Baraksanova, and she basically dictates a class, without words in her old school way.  Of course The Swan was included, and paid tribute to Fokine’s Dying Swan, but with the dancer *ahem* as a child, who can barely walk on pointe, and has epic stage fright, which can only be resolved by a colossal, rainbow colored lollipop.  By the end she does evolve into the more familiar swan, complete with bourées and undulating arms, but instead of the tragic end where the swan settles into that pose on the floor we all know, laying her head to rest with her final breath to trickling piano notes, this swan gets her lollipop, and we are treated to the image of an undulating tongue.  I’ve never seen a tongue choreographed into a piece before, but there’s certainly a first for everything.  P.S. Tortoises will have you laughing until you can’t breathe.

Anyway it was a fantastic show and C-bussers have one last chance to see it on Saturday, November 21^st, 8pm at Sullivant Hall.  And speaking of Sullivant Hall, that building needs to get its act together.  Apparently the swan was even questionable to dance for fears that the ill-supported stage would collapse under the concentrated weight of a dancer on pointe.  First of all, that’s one of the funniest images I could ever think of (up there with a mitten exploding because a cricket set one foot in it when there were already too many animals inside) and second, that stage is ridiculous.  Why it was ever built that way, and why it apparently has no support underneath is beyond me.

I was fortunate enough to see two performances of the same program, a rare treat for me at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. I went for college card tickets on both the Thursday night and Saturday night performances of last week. The BSO played Arthur Honegger’s Pastorale d’Été, Camille Saint-Saëns’ Piano Concerto No. 2, and Igor Stravinsky’s Petruska. In truth, I came for the Petruska and stayed for the Saint-Saëns, having the least of hopes for the Honegger, since I was not aware of him until Thursday night. A symphony friend CB and I met at 10 am outside the box office in anticipation of the college card tickets on Thursday, and we were met by a surprisingly long line. The Salvation Army donations guy was out in front of Symphony Hall, which we commented seemed to be occurring earlier and earlier each year. Even with his single tone bell, I immediately recognized the rhythm as that of Jingle Bells. If you sang along with it in your head, as I am sure the Salvation Army’s handbell soloist was, it didn’t sound too bad after all. His virtuoso performance outside the hall reminded me of my middle school days, when I would tap the WIlliam Tell Overture with my four-and-two fingers on the table. It dawned on me then that perhaps no one else could hear the melody in the tapping, and I tried to decouple my tapping with the actual sound I was hearing. I listened hard to hear only taps, but the ever familiar melody always played softly in the background.

For some reason, the box office was allowing everyone to get two college card tickets, so we both got two tickets each, in hopes of corralling others to join us that evening. It’s a surprisingly lofty proposition, to find people I know who want to go experience one of the world’s best symphony orchestras in one of the most amazing concert halls in the world, for free. In fact, we both failed in finding people to accompany us, so we decided to hold onto her pair of tickets, which gave us a great view of the solo pianist during the Saint-Saëns. I had a Fenway Park moment outside the box office just before the show, as I desperately tried to find someone who was looking for tickets but did not have them. I was hoping to give them to someone who would not normally go to the symphony, reminiscent of a photo of a man outside the hall with a sign, Desperate for Tickets. I finally found a pair of college students who had just been turned away from the box office who were very grateful and hopefully enjoyed the show.

With no expectations for the Pastorale d’Été, I settled in for the piece comfortably, and after what was a pretty long day, I found it to be perfectly peaceful and quit a fitting tribute to its namesake of the summer season. The free laziness of summer was captured in the long legato tones of the winds and strings. It is a happy piece, a fitting tribute to a season that, at least for this year, has come and gone.

The featured soloist for the Saint-Saëns Piano Concerto No. 2 was 21-year-old Lise de la Salle, someone whom I had not heard of, and since I did not know the music of Saint-Saëns save the Carnival of Animals, I was not terribly eager for this piece. The first movement of the piece, which numbers among CB’s favorites, is dramatic and serious, a dark contrast with the Pastorale. I found de la Salle’s playing to be quite compelling, though I did feel in a few phrases that she probably could have coaxed even more intensity from the Steinway and Sons. The subsequent movements contained small musical jokes and grand musical gestures, exploring the ranges of human emotion with ease. The piece was executed brilliantly, and her maturity in young adulthood was evident. In addition, I found in Saint-Saëns a composer whose work excites me almost as much as his contemporary from the Romantic period and perhaps my favorite composer Johannes Brahms. I have already begun my exploration into his work and found several pieces that may become part of my standard listening repertoire.

The Piano Concerto far overshadowed my expectations for Stravinsky’s Petruska, a nice piece for a ballet that felt at time confusing, perhaps since it was meant to accompany the missing dancers. Perhaps I will get a chance to see it performed to heighten my appreciation of it. The experience reminded me of my first listen of the soundtrack to the French film noir Ascenseur Pour L’Échafaud, which is improvised by Miles Davis and his trio as Davis watched the scenes of the film. Hearing the soundtrack first, I had no reference point for the music, and while it was all fine, watching the film with the music deepened my understanding and appreciation of the music. (The film is in my top five favorites.)

When I heard of the college card tickets that were released on Saturday morning, I knew I wanted to go see de la Salle perform the Saint-Saëns again. I was treated to the calming Honegger and thoroughly enjoyed the piano concerto, now having some familiarity with the piece. It was similar in more ways than one, as de la Salle appeared to have on the same dress as the Thursday performance! I cannot recall if I noted this in Janine Jansen and Alisa Weilerstein when I saw them perform the Brahms Double Concerto this year, but I did liken de la Salle’s attire to that of some kind of musical superhero with closets full of the same blue dress. I came away from this week with a respect for Honegger, a hope for future Stravinsky, and an excitement to explore the music of Camille Saint-Saëns further.

As part of my ongoing series on the Saint-Saens Cello Concerto, I should like to present the following footage from YouTube of a talented young man playing the concerto’s last movement rather stoically, but expressively, along with a canned electronic, “Music Minus One” version of the piano part.

It seems that nineteenth-century French romanticism, in its cellistic form, is alive and growing in an unknown city in South Korea.

I have to say I admire this boy’s fearless nature.

我们大提琴家怎么都不怕！  真实 – 艺术方面活动都需要那样态度； 无战不胜的。  但是琴是否敌人？  又墙建的，必须有人跳了。  野心，手静，眼高，精神飞了。 小兵不会退出。

Wenn mann etwas echt machen wurden, denn muss mann selbst mit etwas verpflichten…. ein Stuck Musik, zum beispiel.

Well, these things are never planned, but I had 3 different encounters while sitting in Seat AA-5 at the Palace Theater the other night.

1:  “Becoming Medusa” by Stacy Garrop:  I enjoyed the piece as a piece for the most part, but I became increasingly agitated through the whole thing because I could feel Athena’s mounting rage at the presumptuousness of the becoming Medusa, who elicited her wrath with the seduction of Poseidon in Athena’s temple.  (The noive!!!)  The percussion, the strings, the brass, the ominous nature of it all.  My my my.  I could feel the grey-eyed one’s vengeance emergent, and I was actually terrified.  Ms. Garrop effectively channeled Pallas into the piece, and the devastation of Medusa who now was hideous and tormented.  Quite effective, but it left me with a chilling sense of awe at the power of this Goddess.

2: “Piano Concerto” by Saint-Saens, as performed by George Li (age 14!).  I was of course captivated by this young master’s performance, and he truly was a master of the piano at this fresh age.  Li put his whole being into the piece, and oddly, I felt that Artur Rubinstein was in the house for some reason.  Midway through the performance, I decided to check the program notes and discovered that CSS had actually written the piece for Rubinstein.  I was wondering whether Master Li was A.R.’s reincarnation, or whether the piece is so Rubinstein’s, that he appears wherever it is played live. 

3: “Symphony No. 2″ of Brahms.  I found myself impatient through the first 2 movements.  I felt something was being prepared in the 3rd, however.  And with the fourth, I sensed that there was an opening forced onstage from one of the other worlds, and I felt a yellow seam appear, vertical in the middle of the air around where the conductor directed the orchestra from memory.  A giant stag emerged, and said to me “Pay attention!”  He proceeded to juggle 10 suns in his antlers – yes, they had limberness and dexterity, and then he threw them out into the audience which then was ablaze in a gorgeous yellow glow, and the Stag became surrounded in a bubble of that color, and then disappeared in a pop.  Suddenly, each person in the audience had a stag right next to them, and each juggled ten suns of his own in his rack.  But the stags wanted to merge with the various audience members.  (I must confess I was only looking to my right, at the majority of the audience.  I did not see if anyone to my left or immediately behind me was included in what transpired.)  My stag merged with me all right, but the others were sitting next to their people, and they sort of “turned off.”  Still, there were 7 or 8 people whose stags had melded with them, and I could sense they were around, sense that most of them were elders, but I think there was at least 1 other person who was not a senior (probably a child, I would imagine–there were several there).  I did find myself drifting in awe for a few moments, but I remembered I was supposed to pay attention, and I felt a little sad for the people whose stags sat there inert.  I felt they had all become like the background of the Crowley deck 7 of Disks – a sort of thicket of dullness in indigo tones.  Various bright colors dotted the hall, though.  I stayed yellow, but for some reason I could feel vivid green and red and orange.  The Stag started to emit a red light out into the space, and then I felt the music shift toward “home-base.”  The stags were all basically called back into the first Great Stag, and then as the music reached its final segment, I saw the stag bound back into the other world, and the seam close up behind him in a yellow blaze, and then disappear.

Wow, Johannes.  Eat venison much?

cross posted at ordinarysacred at livejournal.

Audio Stream:

http://www.imeem.com/people/8O6×8Hy/music/aQeoAXar/james-cromwell-if-i-had-words/

I know. Life sucks. We are all “born into the grave” so to speak. Humans. The plants. The animals. Everything.

13 years ago though I made a choice though. I wanted it to suck a little less… first for myself. I stopped eating meat starting with beef. I was tired of eating it because I had one too many bad hockey-puck hamburgers (sorry Mom).

It was at that time of my beef boycott I first saw the movie “Babe”. Immediately afterwards I decided I was not going to eat pork ever again. I was going to do my part in not making life suck for “Babe” and all pigs. I know it is like blowing into the wind, especially surrounded by so many meat eaters, but sometimes you have to stick to what you believe even if people think you are crazy or wrong.

I watched “Babe”, yet again, last night and felt reassured and affirmed in my decision. Watching the movie now is like a religious experience for me. I am not so unlike Farmer Hoggett. I believe I am generally quiet and patient in my disposition, and open minded to otherwise abstract, unusual and even bizarre possibilities, just as he is. Although I have never known a pig personally, I do believe them (and all mammals) to be too intelligent for me to consume ethically. I heard the song, “If I Had Words”, played throughout the movie and it was powerful for me. Silly? Perhaps. Do I expect anyone to understand? No. The movie changed my life though. From being annoyed by bad burgers, this movie pressed me to pursuing a new way of eating, and ultimately a new lifestyle that I still have over a decade later. This song represents a sort of theme song for my vegetarianism, and my wish to preserve life, not destroy it.

PS: I only just learned now that the words to this song, “If I Had Words”, were originally written by Scott Fitzgerald and Yvonne Keeley in 1977, with a reggae beat.

PPS: I learned last night that it is actually adapted from the classical piece, the “Maestoso” of Camille Saint-Saëns’ “Symphony No. 3 in C Minor”, written in 1886.

PPPS: Also, for those of you who want more, here is the version with the “mice” singing, which is actually just a sped up version of a recording of “If I Had Words” sung by Scott Fitzgerald and Yvonne Keeley. Crazy, right!? Who knew?!

PPPPS: Despite James Comwell’s rendition being made for film, and not for an album, and being very short, and being a cover of a cover so to speak, it still has a modest, humble and honest quality I appreciate greatly.

PPPPPS: PS (or more properly, P.S.) is Latin for “post scriptum”, which means “written after”, and thus PPPPPS is “post post post post post scriptum”, ridiculous for sure, but if you don’t like it, why don’t you go blog about it or eat one of my mom’s hamburgers?

Song Recommendations

If you like this song, I also suggest:

• Harry Belafonte
• Lolita Ritmanis
• Yann Tiersen

I also suggest the music genre:

• Soundtrack

Click here for more info on James Cromwell – Babe Soundtrack – “If I Had Words”.

The CD of the soundtrack to “Babe” may be purchased here:

Babe Soundtrack

Vogel verdanke ich den Link zu dieser schönen Transkription von Camille Saint-Saens’ “Danse macabre” An der Orgel: Raúl Prieto Ramírez

Enjoy!

CAMILLE SAINT-SAENS – “Carnival Of The Animals: Aquarium

First post of October, one of my favorite months of the year!  I’m also writing this on about two hours of fragmented sleep, which is probably not a good idea and guarantees zero well thought out…content…but you only live once.  I love October because it puts me in the mood for many things…the changing leaves (I’ve always loved the smell of dead, wet leaves), anything involving pumpkins, and All Hallow’s Eve.  It doesn’t really make sense that Halloween would be one of my favorite holidays, considering I don’t go trick-or-treating, attend costume parties, or go to haunted houses, but there’s something about the cheery atmosphere, the symbolic characters, the massive amounts of discounted chocolate (the solution to all problems), and yes, pumpkins.  I do think some aspects of Halloween are pretty lame, and the lengths to which some people will go for costumes is wasteful, but I can’t help but admire the festive spirit.  Plus, one of my favorite memories of one of my best friends occurred on a beggar’s night, when a little child jumped out of a bush and startled her, and without thinking she said “God damn you!”  Good.  Times.

In terms of music, Halloween is ALL about Camille Saint-Saëns Danse Macabre for me, one of my absolute favorite pieces of all time.  Although in a past life I was definitely an orchestra patron who walked out of a Stravinsky concert outraged, I was most defos fascinated by Saint-Saëns.  Most balletomanes would know his name from The Dying Swan set to Le Cygne from Le Carnaval des Animaux.  Although, let it be known that Le Cygne is not my favorite movement, but rather Aquarium and Fossiles are instead.  It’s all a part of my geeky nature…just as I had aspirations to see Carlos Acosta, the Bolshoi Ballet, etc. so do I have aspirations to see certain sea creatures, with whale sharks being the current flavor (it was sea otters before, which was accomplished at the Seattle Aquarium where I bought a magnet).  Whale sharks are going to be tricky though because they’re raised in captivity in far fewer places, most of them in Asia, and I’m banking on my best bet being the Georgia Aquarium, which is also one of the few aquariums to house a manta ray.  Ideally, I would love to dive with whale sharks off the coast of Thailand or Australia, but that’s a much more complicated matter.  Anyway, Saint-Saëns, Aquariums, awesome, Fossiles, wonderful, and the latter quotes Danse Macabre in a major key, bringing us back to the original topic.

People who hang with me are forced to pose with dinosaur bones. And yes, I've made her do this on more than one occasion.

I was fortunate to play Danse Macabre as a part of an orchestra, although my favorite arrangement is a chamber version for violin and piano, from the album Devil’s Dance, by Gil Shaham and Jonathon Feldman.  Another great track on there is Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s Caprice Fantastique, but the whole album is really good and highly recommended, with endless potential for great dances.  As far as Danse Macabre is concerned, I love the time signature (it’s a waltzy three), and the texture is a bizarre juxtaposition of lyrical and bony…a lot like me, which I guess makes it easy to feel at home with it.  It has an element of playfulness to it that you wouldn’t expect from a dance involving death, and interested in seeing how people would interpret this, I of course carried out my usual excavations through YouTube, this time coming up with three unique interpretations.  The first is a fairly run of the mill “the Wilis have come out to play” group dance called La Melodie, and I have to say that I wasn’t particularly moved.  It was a little too technical and got “stuck” in several places, and although not every dance needs a story, I do think that it should evoke some kind of feeling and it was rather flat.  Are the Wilis happy to be playing?  Or are they somber as they journey into the underworld?  In all fairness, the choreographer mentions that it was their first classical work, but I do wish there was some more risk taking.

Next we have a solo from now San Francisco Ballet principal Tan Yuan Yuan, performing a modern solo entitled “Startling Dream,” and accordingly stiffness in her port de bras and the pencil straight lines of her legs were used as a way to convey the awkwardness of the music itself.  It’s an interesting solo, marred by a heinous competition number fluttering from her leotard.  It doesn’t say who conceived the choreography, but I like the real sense of desperation and terror that we often feel in nightmares.  Interestingly enough, I’m not bothered by the lack of a setting, and I think the all black stage enhances the piece, kind of like a body floating in nothingness, which my nightmares sometimes look like.  And sometimes in those nightmares I’m wearing a high cut leotard too.

Last, is a brilliantly disturbing interpretation by a famous Norwegian choreographer, Kjersti Alveberg.  I looked for a website on her, and her bio alone screams “creative mind” (something about her being a gypsy living in the universe of her unconscious where it matters more “who we are than who we want to be.”  She’s deep…and this coming from someone who takes fortune cookies seriously).  Her Danse Macabre is by far the most imaginative and the most grotesque (maybe even too much…I mean speaking of nightmares, her dance might give me them for a week), and her imagery is so creative…reminiscent of Cirque du Soleil but without the concern for acrobatics and impressing audiences, just pure art.  I think it really touches on an innate morbid curiosity humans have, where you can’t look away no matter how unsettling it can be.  It’s an utterly fascinating video dance, although I was a little disappointed with the very end, because the end of Danse Macabre is a cheeky plucking of two notes, which is one of the moments in the music that I find just a little saucy, and pardon the imagery but it’s like a “giving of the finger” if you know what I mean.  It’s a great moment that was purposely edited out, but I have to question that decision.  Tan Yuan Yuan’s solo only used an excerpt and didn’t have this, and La Melodie had it, but didn’t give it enough pizzazz.

So, I’m exhausted, and I’m sorry this entry isn’t particularly funny…when I’m tired most of my humor manifests in slapstick, and I’m glad none of you saw how I tripped coming up the stairs or shampooed my hair twice because I wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing.  And WOW I had a lot of typos…

Gemessen an der Größe meines Plattenschranks gibt es auf diesem Blog sehr wenig über Musik zu lesen. Aber letzte Woche ist wieder ein Album herausgekommen, dass es absolut verdient, an dieser Stelle belobhudelt zu werden. Auch wenn Tamara und Simon da anderer Meinung sind…

Die Rede ist vom neuen Muse-Album “The Resistance”. Zu Muse sei zunächst einmal gesagt: Die Stimme des Sängers Matt Bellamy polarisiert sehr stark, und wenn jemand sich dieses “Gejaule” nicht antun kann ist das absolut legitim. Wenn man sich daran gewöhnt hat und den Gesang mag (so wie ich) eröffnet sich hier in 54 Minuten ein ganzes Universum.

Muse waren schon immer großartig, und bereits beim Vorgängeralbum “Black Holes And Revelations” habe ich beim Erscheinen gedacht “Jetzt haben sie ihr Opus Magnum erschaffen”. Von wegen!

Das neue Album beginnt mit einem kompakten Shuffle-Ohrwurm, der ersten Single “Uprising” (übrigens mit sehr nettem Video, siehe unten). Schon hier gibt es Muse-typische bombastische Harmonien. Nach dem überaus starken Titeltrack kommt eine ganz besondere Perle: “Undisclosed Desires”. Getragen von einem Samplebeat und Pizz-Strings à la “Die Another Day” (Madonna) in viel besser ist dieser Song ein Hybrid aus elektronischen Spielereien und Ballade, und diese abenteuerliche Mischung funktioniert unglaublich gut.

Das seichte Intro von “United States Of Eurasia” gibt nur kurz Zeit zum Durchatmen, bevor ein Queen-Chor den Song nach vorne treibt und ein Klavier/Streicherthema in irgendeiner variierten Phrygisch-Dur-Tonleiter die Kinnlade des unvorbereiteten Hörers vor lauter Schönheit zu Boden fallen lässt. Noch im selben Lied wird dann die Nocturne op.9 von Chopin verwurstelt, total gut!

Es folgen drei weitere, überdurchschnittlich gute Titel, die sich wiederum durch großartige Harmonien und klasse Refrains auszeichnen, bevor ein ganz besonderer Track kommt: “I Belong To You (+Mon Coeur S’Ouvre A Ta Voix)”, Ein grooviger Klaviersong (ja, so was kanns geben^^). Eigentlich sollte man ein astreines Liebeslied erwarten, stattdessen hört man eine groteske Liebeslied-Parodie mit herrlicher Selbstironie. Der auf französisch gesungene Mittelteil stammt ursprünglich aus Camille Saint-Saëns’ Oper Samson und Delilah, und spätestens beim darauf folgenden Klarinettensolo sollte der letzte kapiert haben, wie dieses Lied aufzufassen ist. Herrlich lächerlich!!

Wenn im Vorfeld über die neue Muse-Platte berichtet wurde, gab es immer Verweise auf ein viertelstündiges Orchesterwerk. Aufgeteilt in 3 Tracks, schließt die Exogenisis Symphony das Album ab. Hier brauchten selbst meine Prog-erprobten Ohren ein paar Durchläufe, bevor ich das Werk begriffen hatte. Seitdem denke ich, dass das frenetische Lob mancher Amazon-Rezensenten auf diese Suite absolut gerechtfertigt ist, es handelt sich wirklich um das allerbeste Orchester/Band-Werk dass sich in meinem Plattenschrank befindet.

Dank meinem Hang zu Special Editions habe ich auch die dazugehörige Bonus-DVD, die den Aufnahmeprozess der einzelnen Tracks dokumentiert. Für Musiker interessant, und sicher eine der besseren Bonus-DVDs in meiner Sammlung.

Fazit: Ich habe “The Resistance” mit hohen Erwartungen gekauft, die dann um Längen übertroffen wurden! Definitiv neben der neuen Dream Theater eine der besten Scheiben des Jahres, und ich glaube, dass dieses Album das Potenzial hat, später als einer DER Klassiker des Jahrzehnts angesehen zu werden.

Ach ja, und über das extrem gut gemachte Cover-Artwork habe ich jetzt kein einziges Wort verloren…

After the unsettling charcoal flavor of my most recent post, and amid a blizzard of other real-world/paper-world writing projects this week, I was in need of a reconnection with my main axe, which I luckily found here:

In spite of the fact that my head isn’t completely visible, the left forearm and phalanges are visible, and the sound is clear, which is mostly what matters.

I’m looking forward to being reunited with this particular instrument (Paul Hart, 1989) in about a week, and in the meantime and marking time with the Damon Grey instrument, which I may be kissing goodbye at some point.  One of the scary and exhilarating things about the Saint Saens clip is that the music being explained and worked on here probably goes by in the span of about 10 seconds.

(Herein lies a good lesson for writers or artists about craft — one can’t simply snap a few photographs or dash off a paragraph and call it art; to have lasting value, the work needs to emerge out of the excitable forge of creation and then launch into a series of honing calculations, weighing and recalibration before the whole thing is set out for view, which is to say, further criticism.  At the same time, in the final analysis, the author/artist ultimately has to dam up critical voices [both internal and external voices] go ahead with the work as one envisions it.)

Since I have some minor ambitions to perform the Saint Saens in the fall, I anticipate uploading some longer, performative clips along with a bit of new online cello pedagogy in the period after Labor Day.

Saint Saens "Carnival of the Animals," movement for cello and piano (transcribed here)

On the first Saturday of the month Jack Moore and I host Discoveries from the Fleisher Collection on WRTI 90.1 FM in Philadelphia and on the all-classical webstream at wrti.org. We also broadcast encore presentations of the entire Discoveries series (seven years and counting) every Wednesday at 7:00 pm on WRTI HD-2. For a look at all the shows, click here.

Saturday, August 1st, 2009, 5:00-6:00 p.m.

Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921). Romance, op. 36 (1874). Ulrich Hübner, natural horn, Kölner Akademie, Michael Alexander Willens. Ars 38027. Tr 2
Saint-Saëns. Morceau de concert, op. 94 (1887). Ulrich Hübner, valve horn, Kölner Akademie, Michael Alexander Willens. Ars 38027. Tr 1
Saint-Saëns. Wedding Cake, Valse-Caprice, op. 76 (1885). Stephen Hough, piano, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Sakari Oramo. Hyperion 67331. CD1 Tr 10.
Paul Jeanjean (1874-1928). Nocturne. Ulrich Hübner, valve horn, Kölner Akademie, Michael Alexander Willens. Ars 38027. Tr 5
Jeanjean. Romance. Ulrich Hübner, valve horn, Kölner Akademie, Michael Alexander Willens. Ars 38027. Tr 7
Saint-Saëns. Morceau de concert, op 62 (1880). Philippe Graffin, violin, The Ulster Orchestra, Thierry Fischer. Hyperion 67294. Tr 2

On this French program, we feature three solo instruments with orchestra … or is it four? Camille Saint-Saëns and Paul Jeanjean bring us pieces for violin solo, piano solo, and two different kinds of horns—with valves and without valves, the so-called “natural” horn.

The French horn is usually called just “horn” by orchestral musicians, but France does play a big part in its development. The natural horn is simply a coiled brass tube, the pitches being produced by changes in lip pressure at the mouthpiece and by changes in hand position in the bell at the other end. Interchangeable tubing was then invented to allow it to play in different keys. Players replaced these “crooks” as needed, but still, only a certain number of notes were available at any one time. In 1814 (by most accounts) the first valves were added, providing access to different lengths of tubing, and therefore more notes, without wrestling with any machinery. All modern horns use variations of this valved tubing design.

But the increase in notes comes at the price of a loss in character. Much of the appeal of the natural horn is the different quality of notes and keys. The modern instrument equalizes all of that, and 19th-century composers were quite aware of the issues, usually specifying the type of horn to be used. Richard Strauss loved the new horns, Brahms loved the old ones, and Gounod feared that the horn without its “natural” character would be just another trombone. (Let it here be stated that the Fleisher Collection is second to none in its appreciation of the trombone, and of the trombone-playing community, its friends, and its loved ones.)

Saint-Saëns

Well, thanks to Ulrich Hübner and this recording of the Saint-Saëns Romance, we can hear what the natural horn sounds like. Listen to how diverse and wild the colors of the different notes are! He plays the other works (including the two Jeanjean pieces, supplied for this recording by the Fleisher Collection) on a 19th-century piston-valved horn. Clarinetists know Paul Jeanjean from his many etudes, and while most of his works are for his instrument, he did take time off to write a Nocturne and Romance for horn-playing friends of his.

Other works by Saint-Saëns round out the program, bringing to mind what a versatile composer he is. He wrote masterfully in every idiom. At a time when the classical forms were seen as the special province of German composers, his many concertos are almost a political statement. The shorter works on our program are evidence of the clarity, precision, and balance that are the hallmark of Saint-Saëns in particular, and indeed, of all things French.

.häxan.

.la passion de jeanne d’arc directed by carl theodor dreyer.

.the life and death of 9413: a hollywood extra directed by robert florey and slavko vorkapich.

.die büchse der pandora directed by g. w. pabst.

.the great gabbo directed by james cruze.

.the skeleton dance directed by walt disney.

.un chien andalou directed by luis buñuel.

.das wachsfigurenkabinett directed by paul leni.

.the unknown directed by tod browning.

.the unknown in three parts.part one.

.chelovek s kino-apparatom directed by dziga vertov.

On Saturday afternoon I attended the second concert of the year hosted at a family friend’s home (the first was by Suzanne Kantorski-Merrill, a soprano singer who was accompanied by Charity Weeks on piano). This past Saturday’s performance was by Yoonshin Song, a violinist from Korea who won the Stradivarius International Competition in 2007, and Sayaka Tanikawa on piano, who is both a soloist and chamber musician.

Yoonshin is quite petite, and the sounds she draws from her violin can be just as delicate, but also strong, angry, and passionate. Sayaka’s playing was clear, bright, and precise, and the two musicians timing was spot-on, almost as though there was a magical bond between them.

Yoonshin’s runs and trills in the Allegro first movement of Beethoven’s Sonata No. 6, Op. 30, No. 1 (which was filled with them), were superb. The second movement, Adagio molto espressivo, was precious, with a simple yet gorgeous melody. Notes slurred into one another, riding the sound waves of the one before. There was a banter between violin and piano during the Allegretto con variazioni third movement; at times they played together, at times they took turns challenging each other. The violin made an announcement, and then quickly rolled notes introduced a new section in the music, as it increased in power and became moodier. That moodiness eventually gave way to lighter, agreeable music, which ended the piece.

Yoonshin played solo for the second piece on the program, Elliott Carter’s Riconoscenza per Goffredo Petrassi for Violin Solo, a forward thinking contemporary work. A unique blend of techniques are used to achieve the sometimes odd and dissonant sounds. It was an interesting work, and I look forward to hearing how Yoonshin continues to evolve with her playing of it.

I thought Yoonshin was well suited for Camille Saint-Saens’ Waltz Caprice, Op. 52, No. 6, which was next on the program. The intro was incredibly dramatic, before the beautiful waltz began. More drama followed, interspersed with quiet gentle passages of beauty which were embroidered with sullenness. Double-stops were spread throughout the music, only adding to the drama, and violin and piano advanced to great heights before dropping, only to rise again. There was a pause in the music, before it started again and increased in tempo, flashing to a finish.

Low, ominous notes on piano opened Prokofiev’s Sonata No. 1 in F minor, Op. 80, and violin entered the Andante assai first movement just as darkly. Violin and piano then mimicked one another, the music gloomy and despairing. The violin became flowing and heartbreaking, as piano played even more darkly, with loud chords reaching to the bottom of the keyboard. Violin moved on to play muted fast runs, and was then plucked, before returning to the soft runs — piano all the while playing notes one at a time in the background, affecting ones subconscious. The Allegro brusco second movement was even more restless than the first, feverishly twisting through the bars of music. Piano rumbled in that movement as well, and the music was biting. Parts were like an embittered angry lullaby, but a lullaby all the same — a nice contrast to the harsh beauty of the rest of the movement (and after her fierce playing of it, Yoonshin had to tune her violin). Piano dreamily opened the Andante third movement, joined shortly by violin playing with muted strings once again, and the dreaminess lasted throughout. Like droplets of sound falling from the heavens, piano tinkled away, and violin beckoned the listener, urgently seeking understanding and acceptance. The music floated through from another place, as though on the wings of supernatural creatures — on the fringes of our world, but not. The Allegrissimo last movement progressed in a locomotive-like fashion; steadily, but with more innovation than even a train. The darkness reached it’s full potential in the final movement, finally realized in all it’s shadowy splendor.

Gloomy was the theme for the second half of the program it seemed, for Henryk Wieniawsky’s Faust Fantasy, Op. 20 was as well (although not nearly as much as the Prokofiev). Yoonshin’s hand moved as gracefully as a ballet dancers feet do, as it moved up and down the neck of her violin. The tones of the music were discerning, and the melody was the definition of expressive. In the next stage of the piece, violin had a different perception and wailed with fury. It then calmed, and most traces of angst were gone, leaving in it’s place a free and boundless song touched with warmth and happiness. The music proceeded to turn into a dashing waltz, designed to showcase the violinist’s talent (in this case, extensive), and the ending was positively exhilarating.

VT Governor Jim Douglas honoring VYO maestro Troy Peters

Kind of hard to believe it’s over. For months I’ve been hearing about the preparations, and looking forward to the July 3rd “bon voyage” concert with the Vermont Youth Orchestra. The promising program included music by Corigliano, Mendelssohn, and Gershwin along with two new world premieres written for the Orchestra. The date fell on the eve of the Orchestra’s summer tour (stopping in Québec City first, then on to several appearances in France) and it was their last home turf concert with Troy Peters, the group’s beloved conductor of fourteen years.

Governor Jim Douglas set the celebratory tone for the evening with a fitting tribute to the outgoing maestro. He cited in particular Peters’ artistic vision and dedication to challenging and adventurous programming, as well as the positive effect it’s had on developing the skills of the Orchestra and broadening the scope of audience awareness and interests. True enough. I would further that fact by adding that Troy has not only done this with his choices of repertoire for the Orchestra in his role as conductor, but also in the music he’s personally written for them, as a composer. Including the brand new work that opened the concert: written with the Quadricentennial and the upcoming French tour in mind, it is the bouyantly optimistic concert piece, Champlain’s Dream.

7/3/09 - VYO's final hometown concert with maestro Troy Peters

Apart from the considerable sentimental and historic import of last night’s concert, the group flat-out played great. I’ve never heard the low brass sound better, they were regal and sonorous in Mendelssohn’s Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage. The shimmering violins in Corigliano’s Voyage wove a luminescent aura that delicately hovered around the whole piece, and Saint-Saëns’ potboiler, the exotic, ferocious Bacchanale from Samson et Dalila, was a nearly off-the-road juggernaut that brought the first half to a thrilling end.

How to follow that up for the second half? With the lovely Fauré Pavane; a fresh, saucy, Daugherty-reminscent Prelude and Tango (written by VYO alum Drake Mabry); and – what else? Gershwin’s An American in Paris – complete with dead-on taxi horns and all the cosmopolitan busy-ness one would want from that bustling Parisian street scene.

Undoubtedly it will be a different Orchestra in the coming season as Troy Peters moves on to his new post with the youth orchestra in San Antonio, and the VYO moves forward under new leadership (yet to be announced). But, as with any living organism, every new day brings changes. Some expected, some less so, yet every change brings with it opportunities that are only revealed when the time is right. Now concluding its 46th season, the VYO is every bit up to the challenge.

Bon voyage and very best wishes to Troy and the Orchestra as they embark on the tour together this weekend, and after, on their own undoubtedly interesting life paths.

Remember, among friends it’s never “adieu“. Just say, “a bientôt “!

7/3/09 - Post-concert fireworks over the marina at the Lake Champlain waterfront

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