Records recently heard

If we talk about Rosalyn Tureck, whom I generally find old fashioned, even if she (according to my piano teacher) was avant garde in 1950, I personally find her WTC (from 1950) more listenable. I saw Tureck live in 1965 playing Partita 2, English Suite 3, Toccata g-minor and three minuets (G,g,G) and some more Bach, I don't remember, and to me her music making sounded more like Beethoven than Bach.

 

Certainly more interesting to me than Tureck, but which label?

 

He,he, you will need to start a non-baroque keyboard music thread.:MILD:

 

I did... see here.

But nobody else posted in it, except Tones, and then to talk about Vivaldi.

 

Hey, c'mon, Alan, the thread was "records recently heard that aren't Bach" and Vivaldi is definitely not Bach!

 

Sibelius Academy's own label.

 

I'll see about renaming it to "records recently heard that aren't baroque".... because that was my intention!

 

Too full-frontal a diversion, in retrospect. I should have eased in via 'Just picked up Shostakovitch's rarely heard 1947 'Divertimenti on a theme by William Cornysh' played on period instruments. Despite being written while reduced to eating his horse during the siege of Grnvnsk, this series delights with its ironic whimsy.........'

 

I just listened to samples of her "Young firebrand" record at amazon. Live 1930s-1940s virtuoso stuff, Liszt, Brahms etc, none Bach. WOW! To my ears she was really good at that time, to put it mildly.

 

I can well imagine, that her old interpretations of romantic music is well worth listening to. But unfortunately for us she choosed to concentrate on Bach for the rest of her life.

 

The recordings of the late, lamented David Munrow, one of the pioneers of Renaissance music, are becoming widely available again. I have a vinyl recording of the "Two Renaissance Dance Bands" recording (dating from the early 1970s), and I was pleased to get this double CD*. It's splendid music, well played and recorded, and the transfer to CD is good.

The best record of this sort of repertoire I've heard is Philip Pickett's marvellous "Terpsichore" on l'Oiseau Lyre:


sadly no longer available. Hopefully they'll bring it back too.

* My mistake, only a single CD.

 

Renaissance dance music

David Munrow´s charisma was very special. I had the luck to attend two of his recitals with his Early Music Consort London playing renaissance music, a few years before his untimely suicide. The virtuosity of and the interplay between the members of the band (among whom Christopher Hogwood and James Tyler) was perfect, they acted almost like a jazz-band, and the spirit was much similar, even if they almost never improvised. Everything was obviously planned in advance in detail. The prevailing mood was intense extasy.

Concerning renaissance dance music I would like to draw attention to at least two other interesting recordings, both available at present.

1) The old classical Archiv recording from 1960, which started the renaissance dance fad with Collegium Terpschichore led by Fritz Neumeyer playing selected music by Praetorius, Widmann and Schein:

http://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/hnum/7320259

And the recording of selected items from Susato´s Dansereye (Het derde musyck boexken Antwerp 1551) made by the spiritual successor of Munrow, the recorder player Philip Pickett with his New London Consort. The recordings of Pickett are milder, less accentuated than Munrow´s, but not less rewarding.

http://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/hnum/6850285/rk/classic/rsk/hitlist

 

J S Bach: Clavierübung III
Holm Vogel, Schuke orgel, Paul-Gerhardt-Kirche,Leipzig, a neobaroque, modern German organ.
Label: Querstand, Midprice.

Holm Vogel b.1939 was ,if I am right, blind from birth. Study with Robert Köbler and later lessons with Helmut Walcha.

Bat drew my attention to this recording, and now I have given it a listen.

All in all it is a most sympathetic performance. Registrations rather conventional, but crystal clear like the playing. Articulation detached and stylish, phrasing rather short (of course longer in the great Vater unser and the great Aus tiefer Not), tempi not too fast. Interpretation devoted and subtle expressive, only in a few instances showing signs of a little uncomfortable nervous energy, most prominent in the Prelude Es-major. Not a first choice, but a worthy addition to the mandatory interpretations.

Regards,

 

Not completely a classical record, but bright, lively playing and great fun. La Volta is a Swiss ensemble of young musicians playing mainly plucked instruments, led by Basel lutenist Jürgen Hübscher. As well as classical pieces, it tosses in Irish, Scottish, US and other traditional tunes.

http://www.la-volta.com

 

The world is small, they performed on my music school recently.
I admit, that I didn't attend the show.
Es wird gesagt, das man nichts hübscher gehört hat.

 

Das kann ich glauben!

 

Pe-zulu, so you did get the Holm Vogel Clavierübung III. It is very spiritual, isn't it? And the Schuke organ allows the music speak.
By the way, have you heard Pierre Hantai's new John Bull record? I saw it today but didn't listen.

 

Yes , spiritual is a good description. And with great sense of the counterpoint.

Did Hantaï make another Bull recording? I have owned a Bull recording by him (on Astreé/Naive) for the last five years. It is a couple of years since I listened to it the last time. I recall, it is dramatic and expressive as could be expected. Maybe I should give it a listen again soon.

 

Dear Pe-zulu: How does it compare to Christensen's?

 

Ah, but that is just because they do not know a consort of viols or, better still, a really good renaissance choir.

But my point is this: why German?