The Classical Music Guide Forums

barney

Brendel is a highly prolific recording artist, and I have well over 100 of his CDs. I find him entirely reliable, always thoughful, poetic and worth hearing.

barney

Lance, please continue your present policy.

barney

Why separate "classical music (recordings) from classical concert reviews? Why even have separate "rooms" for books, films, and "pub stuff?" Some of your other suggestions may make sense, but I can't agree with these two. Listening to a recording and attending a concert are two vastly different exp...

barney

The Right focuses on campus “ brats” to avoid and distract from the criminal slaughter the Right’s Israeli brothers have unleashed on the children of Gaza. Hmmm. I think you can be justly appalled at the toll in Gaza and still agree with this article, as I do. The question I have in my own mind is,...

barney

What are your figures on females killing partners and children, Barney? What annoys me is that the (so-called) Justice system needs to be front and centre for never seriously punishing offenders and letting others out on bail. But is there ever any mention of this? Of course not!!! No government wi...

barney

There does seem to be an upsurge in male violence against women this year, and it's very daunting. Too early to say if it's coincidence or a trend. The only counter-point I'd like to make is that males are overwhelmingly the victims of male violence, far more than women are, and that this deserves a...

barney

Well Lance, the human voice was the original instrument, and is still the most universal. I instantly recognise Pavarotti, Wunderlich, Fischer-Dieskau, Pears, Sutherland, Callas, Ferrier pretty much infallibly. Not many others of whom I could make that claim. There's a couple of dozen whom I'm likel...

barney

I watched Lucille Ball’s I Love Lucy Show every week for years, along with Bob Hope, Milton Berle, Jack Benny, and Sid Caesar I used to listen to Caesar's and Benny's show on the radio before we had a TV ( not until about 1956 for us ) usually around our supper table at home with my family on a Sun...

barney

I am going to defend American humour as I've enjoyed it so much over the years, and I posted Foster doing his thing with Dean Martin. A great parody of a drunk. Australian humour was great before it was 'defenestrated' because it wasn't PC. Think Paul Hogan (whom the Americans enjoyed, BTW). Barry ...

barney

That's the right link. I'll watch tonight. Thanks.

barney

Don't think that's the right link. I went to Jon Stewart again, and life's too short.

barney

In contrast, Australian humor is like dark matter: we know it has to exist somewhere, but good luck finding it. Somehow I suspect you've put the usual effort that Americans do into Australia - none whatsoever. Or you wouldn't say anything quite so ill-conceived. After all, you've suggested several ...

barney

Well, he was certainly singing my song! Every word. Thanks for posting that one, Belle.

barney

Oh, I think we agree there are some very funny American comedians. I named a few earlier. We just disagree on which they are. Especially when it comes to Stewart, even if I probably like his politics. But it's not even Stewart that I mind so much, it's the contemptible fawning audience who burst int...

barney

The unrivalled comedian, Jon Stewart weighs in on the media’s overblown coverage of Trump’s criminal trial, from sketch-artist interviews to following his motorcade via helicopter... https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zqkf2U5jcE0 I know you're just being provocative, Joe, calling him unrivalled but you ...

barney

https://www.newyorker.com/cartoons/daily-cartoon/friday-april-26th-whatever-he-wants?utm_source=nl&utm_brand=tny&utm_mailing=TNY_Humor_042624&utm_campaign=aud-dev&utm_medium=email&bxid=5bea0f513f92a404695e3103&cndid=16856169&esrc=Order_Confirmation&utm_term=TNY_Humor Many a true word spoken in jest...

barney

Good. Obviously it will be too late, too slow, to influence any voters though. And if Trump wins they can all expect pardons.

barney

An eloquent article.

barney

I was extremely worried by Republican intransigence over Ukraine aid. This is good to know, thans Joe. Proxy wars are ugly things, but it seem to me Russia must be stopped at the first hurdle.

barney

From The Age in Melbourne Despite Obama and Trump, America just proved it’s still the ‘indispensable power’ Peter Hartcher Peter Hartcher Political and international editor April 23, 2024 — 5.00am Save America’s credibility never has recovered from Barack Obama’s “red-line” ultimatum to Syria’s dict...

barney

Couldn't read it, Joe, as I'm not willing for them to use my data. Is it possible for you to paste it? I am concerned about preserving free speech, but I can't see Musk's case for posting live vision of a bishop being stabbed. As Oliver Wendell Holmes famously observed, free speech does not include ...

barney · Re: January 24, 2025 Yes, congratulations. Quite a thrill.

Yes, congratulations. Quite a thrill.

barney

Davis was chief conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra for years; I've interviewed him. A gregarious and funny man, who got on really well with the musicians. They loved him, even while finding him occasionally irritating.

barney

John Spooner used to be a quite a good friend at The Age. He is a brilliant cartoonist/illustrator. But with utter crap like this one, I wouldn't know what to say if I met him today.

barney

I'm criticising the credulous simplicity of Americans who think it's really clever and funny to find a news clip then introduce it by asserting the opposite. Even I could do that. And a lotta folks have tried ever since Jon Stewart basically invented parodic "fake news" as a comedy form some 28 yea...

barney

I'm not criticising his intelligence; I'm sure he's very bright. I'm criticising the credulous simplicity of Americans who think it's really clever and funny to find a news clip then introduce it by asserting the opposite. Even I could do that. And in the last clip that was posted here, that's all h...

barney

No they don't, Lance; obviously the question carries its own answer. The argument, which I don't accept, is that they put on a bit of lippy and stockings, say they are women, and, lo and behold, they are women. But the transgender activists - or many of them - are quite vicious. I'm not at all surpr...

barney

Rach3, Thanks for posting the concert. Here is the concert on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXs-1nG6-0E By the way, Hadelich is the victim of a terrible accident. When he was fifteen, a fire on his family farm burned much of his upper body, including his face and bowing arm. He lost a co...

barney

Hadelich is certainly highly rated. He's in Melbourne in a couple of months, and I have forked out for a ticket.

barney

Isn't it time for you two to agree not to talk to each other?
(Yes, I mean you, Joe and Belle.) It's getting uncomfortable. I know I can simply not read, but you both vary invective with interesting points, so I want the latter.

barney

Jon Stewart 15 April — Talking World War III Blues, Trump’s dementia, his drooling at his trial, the “Is he Jesus or Mandela?” debate, etc. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NgeLRtpC2WI I don't really understand why this guy is so popular. His technique seems to be find a bit of news coverage, say the ...

barney

I saw these, too, Steve, and thought they were great. Didn't occur to me to post them here though. Good for you.

barney

Great name for an author.

barney

It is fascinating to hear from the pseudo-libertarian Right on this healthcare issue. They are the offspring of the very gaggle that bitterly opposed Medicare in the twentieth century and then savaged Obama/Pelosicare in the twenty-first. They now presumptively proffer a fix for the real inequities...

barney

There will be a large amount of CYA (cover your a*se) going on. I'm just pleased he wasn't a Muslim terrorist - things are bad enough on Muslim-Jewish (and others) tensions right now.

barney

Yes, lovely piece, thanks.

barney

I bought 37 of the two CD sets as they came out, then found the whole 100 in the two boxes, new, for NZ $537 (about $400 US, I think). They weren't that cheap in Oz. I never regretted that! A while ago Lance posted that he'd seen the whole lot on eBay for US$4000, but it's irrelevant - I'll never se...

barney

Interesting to watch Yuja in these clips. I've never seen her use music whilst playing live though unless it's a chamber music recital. About whether artists risk the clamour of the audience, I think it gives them even more power to be successful and precise especially when traversing a major, virt...

barney

I loved that Four Last Songs. I spent a chunk of yesterday on that website listening to more Lucia Popp and then more, Schuert and various Strausses. (In the evening I changed milieu and went to a riveting MSO concert of American classics: School for Scandal overture, Westside Story Symphonic Dances...

barney

If this is true - and it probably is - this is just appalling. What a terrible war this has become.

barney

As I wrote in another thread, I have nothing but contempt for Wang's ego, childishness and game-playing (eg the ultra-late cancellations). Professional people very frequently have to work with others they don't like, and they mostly manage it. She signed deals; she should uphold them. For people lik...

barney

"Cultural appropriation" is a recently coined and loaded term , and it's very foolish to judge pseudo Asian operas such as Turandot and Madama Butterly by the trendy. PC. standards of the present day . Today, cultural appropriation has to do with. white people doing things such as wearing. the clot...

barney

She can simply not rule until trial starts, then torpedo the case as the article notes.Laurence Tribe and Neil Katyal last night both felt the only safe thing is to find a way for the 11th Circuit themselves to rule on the PRA issue right now, and/or remove her from the case, but there are apparent...

barney

I'm planning to see a 2023 Rome production in an arthouse cinema next week. Watch this space ... or not!

barney

Cultural appropriation is a two-way street. How much western culture has Asia adopted, just as one example? It's all folderol, this line of thinking. All I know is those ravishing tunes by Puccini are loved by people of all nations. It may interest you to know that when Rimsky-Korsakov first heard ...

barney

Indeed, Len. When I say corrupt, I don't mean she is taking bribes - I have not the slightest reason to suggest that - I mean she is abnegating her responsibility to justice and the law in order to help the man who appointed her.

barney

Cannon's bizarre behaviour suggests she is deeply corrupt.

barney

Just see both operas as Western music - which in fact they are - and all the whining can stop. It's very tiresome. How do these cultural appropriation critics think Westerners are depicted in Asia? ARe they whinging on and on about the fact that so many Asians like Western classical music? What shoc...

barney

Febnyc wrote: ↑
Wed Apr 03, 2024 8:16 am
Who you gonna believe?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iik57JL6xvo

or

https://www.google.com/search?client=fi ... sMm1-A4_37

Tht first one has to be having a laugh. Or he's from Ulan Bator.

barney

What about when it has an "e" on the end of it? I thought that was the cue to lengthen out the vowel. Ergo, "smythe" as in "eye" but without the "e" I'd say it's "smith". Sometimes "smyth" is a fancy way of writing "smith". Somebody, somewhere along the line, has changed the "i" to a "y". Maybe the...

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