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On Beethoven’s Birthday
Happy Beethovenmas Sony readers! Today we celebrate the maestro’s 239th with, of course some Bach.
Ok, hear me out. Really.
Bach, though probably not as known to Beethoven as he was to the later romantics (it took Mendelssohn to officially “rediscover” the great baroque master), it is the kind of thing he would [...]
Nine is Quite Literally in Vogue
Maury Yeston is a real composer, equally invested in writing for the Broadway Stage and his own version of the concert hall, as anyone who has ever heard his complex, haunting song cycle December Songs can attest. He wrote the musicals Titanic (nothing to do with the movie), Grand Hotel (everything to do with [...]
Serkin in the “Moonlight”
Is it me, or does Rudolf Serkin’s recording of the first movement of the Opus 27 “Moonlight Sonata” (which I’ve got on The Essential Rudolf Serkin) really really slow down to the end, like a watch winding down, in a way out Mahler-ing Mahler? I listened to it several times and even tried to [...]
You Never Forget your First Tchaikovsky.
Or at least, I probably won’t. It was, of course, The Nutcracker, that sinister, imaginative, and like completely, totally weird piece which seems not so much composed as etched on the consciousness of the Western World. One of those pieces, like Beethoven’s Fifth or Eine Kleine Nachtmusik that belongs to the prefecture of [...]
Joshua Bell At Home With Friends
Yes, it’s finally out, superstar violinist Josh Bell’s new record, At Home With Friends which includes “duets” with some of his pals—and when you are a major world-over music star, your friends are some heavy hitters. Apparently Bell is known for having “musicales” in his Manhattan living room, and this record is the result. [...]
The Worm in the Ear
I am going to do a huge composition project that I call The EarWorm Project, which is basically going to be a series of pieces based on those insidious songs—love them or hate them—that you cannot for the life of you get out of your head once they are there; more about this later. What [...]
The Excellent Listening Never Ends
Its been a good few musical days—apart from my own work, I’ve had a veritable orgy of listening. Lenny’s Haydn, of course, more gems from the Complete Stravinsky (Mavra!), Horowitz playing Brahms (First Piano Concerto!) and Schumann (C Major Fantasy from the Carnegie Hall Private Collection) and some old recordings like Bernstein’s Mass and [...]
Important, and Actually Good
I for one am glad that Sony is making available all those old fantastic recordings of the core repertoire by the Juilliard String Quartet. I mean, just having these in an easily downloadable format (or via “to order” CD from the always amazing Arkivmusic.com) is critical because these are indeed Important Recordings of the [...]
Song of the Earth
I’ve always been a sucker for those big Mahler song cycles, the ones where in a way he manages to out-Wagner Wagner, writing what are essentially music drama-symphony hybrids that pack deep emotional punches and yet are full of whimsy, humor, longeurs and deep melancholic beauty. Not bad for just over an hour.
So yes, [...]
Mandy and Me
Mandy and Me
I’m not afraid to sound sappy saying I just plain adore Mandy Patinkin. His voice, his take, his performances, I’ve listened to some of his records more times than I can count and seen him in concert more than a few times. I just think he’s one of the brilliant interpreters [...]