Great recordings of classical music

[Presently42]

Willem Mengelberg's Columbia recordings of 1928 through 1932 featuring the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam.

A most unexpected find - both the disc, and the person who knows of this! I found a few months ago a series of videos, Great Conductors of the Past. Here's the one in which Mengelberg appears, as he conducts the Concertgebouw in Paris:

 

[Robin L]

Beethoven? Probably here:

View attachment 334342

No, as I've already said I'm referring to the Tchaikovsky symphonies.

 

[Robin L]

A most unexpected find - both the disc, and the person who knows of this! I found a few months ago a series of videos, Great Conductors of the Past. Here's the one in which Mengelberg appears, as he conducts the Concertgebouw in Paris:

Too bad it's blocked here in Washington.

 

[Presently42]

Too bad it's blocked here in Washington.

How silly and annoying. I watched it a few weeks ago - and for me as well, it's blocked. Thankfully, vpns exist!

 

[pinger]

Check out the Grand Piano label for solo piano music. Piano in the room quality. I was blown away when I listened to an Enescu disc

 

[dualazmak]

Too bad it's blocked here in Washington.

Sadly, it's also blocked here in Japan, Tokyo area.

 

[dBiz]

Doesn't have the 4th on Spotify.

Open Qobuz

open.qobuz.com

 

[Robin L]

Doesn't have the 4th on Spotify.

Open Qobuz

open.qobuz.com

And the 5th here is with the Berlin Philharmonic, thus a different performance.

 

[mSpot]

Very highly recommended, but good luck in finding a copy.

Historical recordings like these are in the public domain, no longer under copyright, and get reissued on a regular basis by small independent labels.

These albums are on Qobuz, Tidal and Amazon Music:

This is on Spotify.

Curiously, I can't find a version on Apple. On YouTube, I see 4 different uploads of the 1928 Mengelberg Tchaikovsky 5th.

 

[Robin L]

Historical recordings like these are in the public domain, no longer under copyright, and get reissued on a regular basis by small independent labels.

These albums are on Qobuz, Tidal and Amazon Music:

This is on Spotify.
View attachment 334435

Curiously, I can't find a version on Apple. On YouTube, I see 4 different uploads of the 1928 Mengelberg Tchaikovsky 5th.

Here's one in much better sound than the one I previously posted:

 

[computer-audiophile]

Today I would like to recommend the Ukrainian contemporary composer Silvestrov, if I haven't already done so.

My wife sent me an e-mail this morning saying I should listen to him. But I had already heard of him before. We often e-mail each other because we sit in different study rooms in front of the computer with our own studio monitors.

In the 1960s, in his mid-twenties, Silvestrov was part of the Kiev avant-garde, had advocates in the West such as Pierre Boulez, Bruno Maderna and Theodor W. Adorno, while his music was far too complicated, too modern, too Western for the Soviet cultural officials in his home country. Then, in the 1970s, came the turnaround, a backlash in the direction of the composed past: melodious, tonal, nostalgic. He himself calls it metamusic. Or: unaccentuated classical music.

Silvestrov's pieces are antimonuments, he composes like a Romantic thrown into the present - as New York organisers already found in the 1980s when they announced him as a contemporary Schubert on a concert poster for one of his concerts in Carnegie Hall. Silvestrov, this master of silence, who has just been honoured with the Opus Klassik for his life's work, still likes this fitting comparison today.

 

[Keith_W]

My friends and I had a debate about Silvestrov some time ago. For me, his music is inoffensive and pleasant, but he doesn't seem to have anything to say. No exploration of human struggle like Beethoven, no sadness and melancholy like Chopin and Schubert, no exploration of beauty and counterpoint like Bach, no sardonic irony like Prokofiev, no sensuality like Debussy. It's just ... nice. My friend pointed out that Brian Eno's Music for Airports is also "nice", so why can't music be like that?

He has a point, I suppose!

 

[computer-audiophile]

My friends and I had a debate about Silvestrov some time ago. For me, his music is inoffensive and pleasant, but he doesn't seem to have anything to say. No exploration of human struggle like Beethoven, no sadness and melancholy like Chopin and Schubert, no exploration of beauty and counterpoint like Bach, no sardonic irony like Prokofiev, no sensuality like Debussy. It's just ... nice. My friend pointed out that Brian Eno's Music for Airports is also "nice", so why can't music be like that?

He has a point, I suppose!

Yes, Ukraine's most important composer is repeatedly accused of having a penchant for kitsch. But Valentin Silvestrov's tender music is anything but schmaltzy, in my opinion. Music can simply be beautiful.

 

[DavidEdwinAston]

I think we are missing a thread like this, with recommendations of great recordings of classical music.

I would start with this one:

Dvořák: Symphony No. 9 in E Minor "From the New World" – Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Václav Neumann – SUPRAPHON.com

Dvořák - Symphony No. 9 in E minor, "From the New World" / Czech Philhamonic, Václav Neumann Antonín Dvořák - Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 95, "From the New World", analogue recording from 1972 Czech Philharmonic, conducted by Václav Neumann On two occasions during his tenure as chief conductor…

www.supraphon.com

and I am also posting a link to a 54 second full quality sample: https://pmacura.cz/Moltovivace.zip

Just listened to this recording via Qobuz.
Top drawer!
Thankyou.

 

[Robin L]

Got this box of the complete works of Beethoven on Brilliant Classics when this specific edition (the third, if I'm not mistaken) came out, can't exactly remember when. I do remember it was $27, new from Amazon.

I really haven't listened to it all that much as the form factor - 85 discs in cardboard sleeves - is a bit clumsy. But every year around Christmas time, for no reason I can explain, I want to hear Bach's Goldberg Variations and Beethoven's Diabelli Variations. This is the version in my collection I haven't heard previously. FWIW, Artur Schnabel nails it. Even the recorded sound quality is above average by the standards of his other recordings.

The piano solo recordings in this box are of Alfred Brendel's first go-round for Vox, which turned up in the states initially in budget boxes with poor quality pressings and packaging. These Brilliant Classics masterings are much better than my memories of the versions in the Vox boxes, sound quality much better than I recall, though there's still some overload in the climaxes. I suppose Harris Goldsmith's dismissal of these recordings in High Fidelity's overview of Beethoven's solo piano on LP in 1970 prejudiced me, as these strike me now as both well played and recorded.

Of course, there's much more to this box than early Alfred Brendel. There's the Guarneri Quartet in their Philips digital re-recordings of the middle and late quartets, Herbert Blomstedt leading the Staatskapelle Dresden in the symphonies and Arthur Grumiaux/Clara Haskil in the violin sonatas. Also plenty of pieces I've never heard before. Seems like a good way to spend my time post-Christmas.

 

[Robin L]

Beatrice Rana's recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations is much better than Glenn Gould's:

There, I've said it.

 

[Albertine]

https://www.tenebrae-choir.com/reco...sent its BBC Music,appeal in the 21st century.

Some of the most sublime music ever composed, in a beautiful performance. It's hard to believe the recording is already 13 years old.

 

[Byrdsmaniac]

Beatrice Rana's recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations is much better than Glenn Gould's:

There, I've said it.

Maybe so, but she doesn't sing along as much.

 

[Robin L]

Maybe so, but she doesn't sing along as much.

Like I said, much better.
If you want a hum-free Gouldbergs, try this:

Surround sound recording of a glorified player piano recreating the 1955 recording. Not bad, but some of the incisiveness of the original is lost in the process, along with the humming. There's actually less of Gould's sing-along in the 1955 recording of the Goldberg Variations than most of his later recordings.

 

[Keith_W]

Beatrice Rana's recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations is much better than Glenn Gould's:

There, I've said it.

I just listened. That is beautiful!! I shall have to seek out more of her recordings. I think this recording alone might challenge my notion that Angela Hewitt is the greatest living Bach interpreter.