The Classical Music Guide Forums

fishgrit

In my youth (a long time ago) I pigeonholed RVW as a typical reactionary English composer, in the Elgar tradition, all pastoral patriotism and folk songs, hopelessly out of touch with 20th century music. Just look at his photos, all done up in tweedy suits, and bushy eyebrows. The over exposed Talli...

fishgrit

Both works are of course marvelous. But if the question was if only one were created which would you prefer it be, I would have to say Le Sacre. Much more difficult for me to imagine a world without it rather than without La Mer. Jeremy

fishgrit

jserraglio wrote:Another UK-based site with pristine transfers of OOP and out-of-copyright in the UK (well, mostly anyway) LP vinyl: The Music Parlour, in HQ mp3s, flacs, and wavs.

http://themusicparlour.blogspot.com/

Thanks for the link - there's a lot of good and interesting stuff here, Jeremy

fishgrit

Here is a site that has free flac downloads of interesting avant-guard music

http://www.avantgardeproject.org/index.htm

fishgrit

Leon Botstein conducted the first US staging of the opera at Bard over the weekend. it was a great success. The score is stunning - heady, emotional, vividly orchestrated and tuneful. The lead soprano, Yamina Maarmar, was perfect and the brothel designs of Thaddeus Strassberger quite extraordinary. ...

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I think this is the ultimate bargain. I have the previous set without the scores, but for $100 you get 155 CDs of the best music ever composed. Maybe not the best versions, but all those cantatas and keyboard works to explore - fantastic, jeremy

fishgrit

stefanher wrote:Are there any transcriptions of the Goldberg for the synthesiser?

I have a version of the Goldbergs done on the synthesizer by Joel Spiegleman. Its OK.

My favorite transcription is by Kurt Rodarmer on multi-tracked guitar - really great, Jeremy

fishgrit

A Divine Art CD that I really liked was chamber music composed by David Earl - a cello sonata and a piano suite. I do hope more CDs with his work will be issued, Jeremy

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johnQpublic wrote:A few months back I met a composer who named his cat "Darius Meow"

And we had a half wild cat that answered to Claw de ***

Jeremy

fishgrit

Thanks, now I now what the Bose waveguide is. But I do think their noise canceling headphones are rather good. Jeremy

fishgrit

Interesting article.

It's a pity KH was not asked why Naxos only offers MP3 downloads. It seems obvious to me that there will a limitation on the number of people who are willing to accept lossey files, Jeremy

fishgrit

Here's a selection from contemporary composers (at least I think they are all still alive) that I enjoy, Jeremy William Bolcom Songs of Innocence and Experience Morten Lauridsen - lux Aeterna Robin Holloway - Sea surface full of clouds Golijov Oceana James MacMillan - lots Tarik O'Regan Threshold of...

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A few years ago I went to a small lunch organized by the Freedom From Religion Foundation at which David Randolf, a committed atheist, was the principal guest and speaker. He gave an amusing talk and was keen to point out that one does not have to be religious to enjoy enjoy music inspired by religi...

fishgrit

I was listening to the Canadian Brass AoF a few days ago and was reminded of this thread and saw this

fugueistkdf wrote:Try googling "flagmusic". This will lead you to Jeffrey Hall's website.

What a great site, thanks. Jeremy

fishgrit

July 10th is perfect - I and wife Barbara would like to attend. Not fussed about a music event; it will just be nice to be with people who like classical music. Thanks Jeremy

fishgrit

I would love to meet you folks. Not available for the last 2 weeks in June Jeremy

fishgrit

Do you have to hook up a PC to the oppo to this? As I understand it, the Oppo it does not need a pc hooked up to it. It has inbuilt software and display to select and play files on a hard drive connected to it via usb. There is another thread somewhere in which Henry Slofstra explained this. Jeremy

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David I haven't heard the Vegh's Op 132. I may have heard some of their Beethoven LPs a long time ago and I used to own LPs of their Bartok Quartets; they were very fine. I can imagine that the Vegh's did a good job of Heiliger Dankgesang - minimum vibrato and not over emotional. Are their Beethoven...

fishgrit

I need to defend the Lindsays. Overall I think their Beethoven is great. Please find me a better Op 132 Heiliger Dankgesang. Jeremy

fishgrit

You might consider buying a DAC rather than a replacement CD player. You can take the S/Pdif output from the Masterlink ML-9600and put it through one of the many great DACs that are now available. at every price range from $100 up. Jeremy

fishgrit

stenka razin wrote:Any more Galzunov lovers here in the CMG willing to come out and defend him?

Absolutely, I have recently heard a few of his chamber music pieces including string quartets 3, 5 & 7 - all great to listen to. What's his best chamber works? Jeremy

fishgrit

Among the last things to arrive was a 35-CD boxed set of all of Alfred Brendel's Vox/Turnabout/Vanguard recordings (now on Brilliant Classics). Though I knew most of these performances from LPs or subsequent CDs (I didn't have all of the Vox Beethoven sonatas on CD but did on LP, for example), I wa...

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I am absolutely not prepared to answer this question - it may incriminate me. I am a recovering CD addict. I have my compulsion more or less under control and although I still lustfully pour over the review mags I no longer smuggle CDs into the house and hide credit card statements from my wife. Jer...

fishgrit

Staying with Bach Cantatas, there are three boxes from the Suzuki/BIS set on sale at eBay. Each box has 10 cds and costs $47- not perhaps as good a bargain as the Werner/Erato set but still good and the seller is reliable - I have dealt with them before. Suzuki generally does a great job. Jeremy

fishgrit

Yes, thanks for the recommendation. I had seen the sets come up at Berkshire but wondered about the recording quality - they are old! But as you say at that price.... I will snap them up. Jeremy

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Well as it happens a secondhand version amazingly popped up in the local shop for a few bucks. It's played by the Bekova sisters on Chandos and coupled with their arrangement of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. I agree that the R-K is worthwhile and should be far more widely known. I have sev...

fishgrit

Thanks for the recommendation - I like R-K and will definitely look out for it. I have a CD of his string quartet music played by the Lyric Quartet It has an early quartet that's nice but not particularly distinctive and the String Quartet "B-la-F", in which he composed the 1st movement; other movem...

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I heard the Nose at Bard in 2004 conducted by Leon Botstein. Great fun experience and very good to see in the rather intimate Fisher Center. Jeremy

fishgrit

I think the market for physical CDs will inevitably wither. The retail stores are declining and online stores are positioning themselves for a transition from CDs to downloads. I think there are some positive aspects of the download market - the distribution economics are favorable, lossless and hi-...

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MarkC wrote:BTW....if you like it enough, maybe you can give me a "5" -- I'm only a few decimals away from being kicked up to the next notch.)

Certainly - it was a pleasure! Jeremy

fishgrit

Thanks Mark,

I listened to your YouTube Scriabin. Absolutely brilliant.
So now I know what you look like, if you ever get on the same train as me....

Jeremy

fishgrit

I buy the notion that the brain is a expert pattern recognition system. One major use of the system is to detect exceptions to patterns - for obvious evolutionary reasons - and instantly direct attention to the exception so that it can be evaluated and predictions made. In fact we ignore the unexcep...

fishgrit

Thanks Richard. I listen to WQXR sometimes and will try the others. I have a whole load of stations set up on my foobar radio playlist and I usually listen to the BBC 3 - well I am a Brit! I have an 120 gig ipod for the commute but get so annoyed by it's stupid limited display and menus. Is the Zune...

fishgrit

Hi I'm Jeremy, male, 61 years old, a Brit living in Connecticut USA, working in New York City and a frequent visitor to Academy Records. My screen name is a deficient anagram of my surname - Griffiths. My wife Barbara and I have always had a major interest in classical music. Up to our late 20s we p...

fishgrit

I really enjoyed a couple of Boulez CDs I recently acquired, They were not at all off-putting.

Répons and Dialogue de l'ombre double conducted by Boulez
and
Sur incises and other works conducted by Boulez

Jeremy

fishgrit

Bach is one of the greatest joys of my life - better than sex?... I can't imagine tiring of his music. I started out years ago mainly with his keyboard works but over the years his choral works have become equally important for me and now seem central - Bach clearly held a deep Christian belief that...

fishgrit

Check out the Naxos Music Library. Someone around here does subscribe to it. I boycott Naxos (I bet that really bothers them) because they will not do lossless downloads and the quality of their Music Library and Radio streaming is only 64k (what they risibly call near-CD quality). However I guess ...

fishgrit

Excuse my ignorance but has any company applied the Netflix business model to music?

What a great idea. As far as I know there is nothing out there. As you say, it would be perfect for comparing different versions before buying outright.

fishgrit

I think you can plug the drive in Jeremy. The Oppo player has some firmware built-in that allows you to access the folder structure on the drive and select files to play. If you're curious, the manual is available on the Oppo site and has a section on using the USB port. You can also plug in a USB ...

fishgrit

Have you tried the Rachmaninoff? And do you think the lifelessness stems only from the absence of hiss and other recording artifacts or is it "in the performance"? Henry, the Rachmaninoff sounds wonderful to me - completely convincing. I wasn't able to listen to very much - I couldn't find many fre...

fishgrit

So how do you choose which files to play and see the information on which files are being played? Is there software and a display on the Oppo?

fishgrit

I'm interested in knowing how I could fully realize 96/24 sound. For example, I have an Apple mini-Mac in my stereo setup. It provides a dual purpose audio output jack - optical/ analog for sound output. Presently, I just run this jack into my amplifier AUX inputs using copper. Presumably the optic...

fishgrit

I listened to the 3 Goldberg variations that are available for download on the Zenph site. They are so strange to my ears because the original recording is so ingrained in my mind. But without the tape hiss, groans and other noises, the Zenph version seems lifeless and lacks some of the peculiar sou...

fishgrit

My vote goes to hi-rez downloads. The sound quality is studio level so there is no reason for any compromise with disc based formats. The real reason downloads will win is because it's the best way to listen to music. My listening has been revolutionized by having all my cds on a server. It's also e...

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This is indeed a terrific site and thanks to the site's creators. I have been using it to pick up the texts to songs and choral pieces that I have have on my music server. Using the functionality of my music player I then automatically display the words as each piece is playing - thus solving one of...

fishgrit

Thanks for the suggestion. I will look out for the Case for God. I recently read and was impressed by the Evolution of God by Robert Wright. Although I don't go along with his speculations at the end of the book it does seem well researched and thought provoking. Jeremy

fishgrit

I imagine Apple developed Apple lossless to try to keep a proprietary lock on downloads. FLAC has always been available and is freeware, it's typical Apple to ignore it. Thank goodness most of the labels and music sites that offer lossless downloads are using FLAC. I concur that Hyperion have a grea...

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I love Naxos and their whole approach. But I don't want to download any of their lossy MP3 files. It seems ridiculous that they don't offer proper lossless downloads. I often complain to them about this and they always agree with me and hope to be able to offer lossless files sometime in the future ...

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The 'truths of sanctity' and the importance of ritual, and culture, in defining and acquiring such truths is another reason why multiculturalism is such a profound threat to all societies. Sanctified truths permeate the fabric of a society, but can only be acquired organically through 'deep' member...

fishgrit

Henry, I don't know if you have read any of my posts on this topic, but I am primarily interested in improving the quality of online data that is available on classical music and used to create metadata tags on ripped files. The present data from freedb, musicgiants etc. is execrable. I have briefly...

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