10 rock albums Classical fans must own

So I go to opera and classical concerts, I drink wine on occasions other times beer. When I go to work I wear a suit, when I come home I put my jeans on. Am I posh then?
It sounds like you have a very bad problem with class issues.
Sociologically this country now has a tiny upper class, a very large middle class, a small and diminishing working class and an increasing what has been termed under-class.

Posh is now used in a derogatory way, it actually stands for a way of travel. The most expensive tickets on a cruise were POSH. Port out Starboard home. Now if someone wants to denigrate something they don't understand 'It's only posh people that go' is the first accusation thrown at it.

I don't think I've ever claimed opera to be the music of the people, don't know anyone who has, but answer me this. If you don't like it and somebody else does, does that make it any the less valid? Should opera be banned in this country because notaclue says only posh people go? Finally do you actually know anything about classical music, or have you ever been to a concert?
I think the answer to the last will be no, so in effect you are arguing from a postion of bigotry and prejudice. That's not a nice place to be standing .

 

..or maybe he's just Rebecca Loos in drag?

He's clearly talking utter crap. The demographic I see at Covent Garden (where the 'posh' will hang out if anywhere) is pretty much as you describe - with a healthy proportion of "young professionals" (i.e. twenty-somethings). I suspect there are not a tremendous number of the unemployed due to the reputation of being very expensive. This however is also not entirely justified - the last time I went to ENO I paid just £5 for over 4 hours of music, and there are about 260 tickets at £10 or less for most performances at Covent Garden, and this season there's a ballot for an additional 100 top-price seats on sale for £10 each for most Mondays. I also can't remembe the last time I saw a dinner jacket there - it's mostly yer average casual garb.

Opera may be an acquired taste, but the vast majority of that go do so primarily for the music (although I can't comment on the audience at Garsington ).

Albums I have that seem to say a fair bit more musically than most are: "Wish you were here", "Lamb lies down on Broadway", "Dummy", "The Joshua Tree". Not entirely sure the last two would really attract the "classical" soubriquet, though. "Atom Heart Mother" was probably another ground-breaker (and was played to us in a school music appreciation class, immediately after some Berio Sequenzas!).

 

:ffrc: :ffrc: :ffrc:

Without doubt he doesn't get it. This notion of any form of music being posh riles me. It's probably down to what I spend most of my days doing.
Mind you the holidays are great

 

Of course it's all about scales, or at least important bits of it are. It's very difficult to cultivate a long, singing tune without moving step-wise up and down, and most of the best ones are fairly scaley - think of the gorgeous, aching dark theme that opens Rachmaninov's 2nd piano concerto by way of example.

However, we were talking about the bits that are technically difficult to play, and except in the world of guitar solos they don't often sound like scales unless there's something particularly special about them (Liszt-style passages in double octaves on the piano or Paganini-style passages in tenths on the violin, for example).

Because of the fixed nature of classical music, the virtuoso bits are written in such a way as to exploit to the full the physical limits of what it's humanly possible to play on the instrument. The composer is at liberty to write extremes of technical difficulty - which usually he isn't remotely able to play himself - with the expectation that anyone who wants to play it, even a top-flight soloist with extraordinary technique, will be prepared to engage in detailed technical study of that precise series of notes for months or even years if necessary.

Semi-improvised solo playing is of course a skill in itself, and really good free improvised jazz is a great pleasure, but you necessarily don't explore the limits of the instrument in the same way as you can with something you've had to spend months learning to play - and that's for the ultra-disciplined, ultra-talented front-rank players who have spent a lifetime engaged in a rigorous and thorough study of their instrument (the rest of us just don't have a chance).

 

If you drink wine, you must be very posh.

I don't get the "Rebecca Loos in drag" line, GrahamN. Is it a posh joke?

I never said only posh people go the opera. That would be a ridiculous statement. I said that people who aren't posh also go. But they only go out of curiosity (so they can have a look round). Which isn't a ridiculuous statement at all.

I like some classical music (I don't have that much, though). Mahler, Beethoven, Sibelius, Debussy, Ravel, Copland, Vaughan Williams, Stravinsky spring to mind as all having done good stuff. I used to listen to it more but don't listen to it that much now. I don't like Mozart and opera is just the worst thing ever.

 

I am not a fan of Vai or Satrinai either,they are like Maria Carey to my ears,always showing off,twiddling about all the time,no emotion,few melodies to write home about,just plain boring.Ritchie Blackmore and Jimmy Page anyday.,

 

I cant disagree with your comment regarding the use of the pentatonic scale, blues scale and in some cases modes in modern rock guitar. I in fact agree.

The original thread was ''rock music for classical fans'' - and Yngwie Malmsteen plays riffs which pay more homage to Bach than they do Jimmy Page which is why I mentioned him.

His riffs are played at incredible speed, and I know of few guitarists (whatever their favoured style of music) that can even attempt to play something from one of his records.

I dont like his music that much, but thats not what Im talking about.

Steve Vai is a superb musician. A graduate from the Berklee school of Jazz, he can play in almost any timing, sight read music and has written parts for an orchestra. Before his career with DLR and his solo career he was a session guitarist for people including Frank Zappa.

To promote the average skills of Vernon Reed, and say that Steve Vai is poor, is frankly ridiculous.

 

I agree they are technically very good,i admire their playing,they just don't stir any emotion in me,unlike say Jimmy Page in full flow,or even Blackmore

 

I think Saab that was my point. Vai is a very good musician but so is Joshua Bell the violinist. Both of them fail to stir any emotion in me, hence I prefer others

 

Yep Saab has hit the spot, Vai and co are Techinicians, very good for sure, but just don't have that something that makes you go. (Wow I need more mana ) sorry, they don't have the Nth degree, some of them are superbly polished, dot the 'i's and cross the 't's but its almost mechanical and predicitable, one of my old band members is now one of the most requested session junkies in the business over here (he's been playing for 25 years now), he's played on all forms of music, from maddona/Toni Brackston etc, yet his roots are firmly R 'n' R, with a large helping of the 'cargo blues thrown in.Now he's so pin point spot on, timing is prefect rythym if required, he 'can mold to the music' very few people are born with this talent, most have to work solidly over decades to accquire the skill, yet for all his ability, its not the Nth degree, however If you were playing a gig, you wouldn't kick the boy off the stage
Strange old world aint it

 

Agreed with the comments re Vai and Malmsteen, both very accomplished technically, but very often leave you cold with their style of music making. Vai does some amazing stuff with cross rhythms in some his stuff, his style's sort jazz-funk-metal, mostly too avant garde but some stuff of his I do like. Again, Malemsteen, like his more mellow electro-acoustic neo-classical musings, but otherwise too tedious to listen to unless you're attempting to emulate his style/technique because you're learning axe shredding as a masacistic past time/ambition.

Must stand up for Satriani though, as I really like the guy, got several albums. Yes, the Mariah Carey of the rock world maybe, but he's got that natural gift of good tune/melody ideas IMHO and there's nothing that please me more than a good tune... and he also does emotion too (for me anyway). Sort of like rock's equivalent of Tchaikovsky maybe, both gifted tune writters? Not that I'm saying that one's at least as great as the other!

 

"Opera will never be the music of the people"

Try saying that in Italy where Verdi wrote music for the people, in support of the Italian reunification and is still revered by the people. It helped that he wrote some of the greatest tunes ever.

English National Opera, the lot that played at Glasto. Cheaper tickets than a football match which is apparently the peoples game. I can assure you it is not posh! Not where I sit anyhow.

There are some very blinkered comments posted from both the rockers and the classicists. Open your ears people, there is great music in all genres if you'd let go of your preconceptions. Dom, Stravinsky: the Rite of Spring is the obvious place to start for a bangin' techno fiend. I'm partial to both (Techno and Stravinsky).

 

Woah - wish they'd played Floyd to me at our school, though we did get to hear "Penny lane", some Deep Purple (in nice mono-stereo wishy washy tape), and, on one particular occasion, we got to bring some of our own stuff in :slayer:

IIRC at least two people brought in that Pepsi hits tape (1985?) - can't remember which track Henryt played, but I remember someone else sticking on "Cloak and dagger" by Nik Kershaw

Atom Heart Mother though - love those horns, and the album cover's cool as well. As for the locked, dripping tap runout groove on the vinyl - that's just the perfect iciing on the cake!

 

I've always found Satriani just too boring, , and dare I say a little bit twee.
I'm going to get bounced on here I'm sure, but I like Gary Moore. Another cracking musician, but somehow he seems so much more musical, not all 'nwing ping tiddle tiddle tiddle phwoarp' if you get what I mean. Some heavy metal guitarists play like they're trying to knock a quick one off, and they've only got two minutes in the bathroom before their missus asks awkward questions

 

Encouraged (if that's the word) by this thread, I expanded my knowledge of Led Zeppelin by listening to one of their CDs (can't remember which one - Greatest Noises of, or something like that). Extrapolating from that sample and being kind and assuming uniform musicality across the entire Led Zed repertoire, I conclude that the group's total summed musicality approaches that of ABBA's "Ring, Ring". A fair, indeed generous, assessment, I'm sure you'd agree. :duck:

 

Tones, if you fancy trying out some rock music can I suggest an album called Die Donnergötter by NY composer Rhys Chatham. He is a 'proper' composer and the title track is a 21min piece for 7 guitars and drums. Also on the lp there is Waterloo no.2 for brass and snare drum and the self-explanatory 'Guitar Trio'.
I'm not sure how easy this is to get hold of, but still available is the 'An Angel Moves Too Fast to See' 3xcd box set. The title track is a piece written for no less than 100 guitars...
Beats the nonsense otherwise suggested in this thread (DSOTM, Zep... bah!)

 

Yes. Going to the opera in Italy is fine. Yes. Some people are very blinkered. Not me, though. I champion all forms of music.

 

but you also said this

You're not making sense. If you have nothing useful to say don't say it.

 

Dammit, Lordsummit, I thought that the whole point of internet forums was to post in order to specifically not make sense, and to only say something when it is likely to be considered useless.

Now I am not so sure.

 

Ah but he did it without wit my friend, neither of the humour variety nor of the quick variety either. He didn't even understand why Rebecca Loos might have Posh envy.