Classical Music Thread

[Swedish Extrovert]

[Swedish Extrovert]

Originally Posted by broncosteven

Cage is totally inaccessible and a difficult listen.

http://courses.unt.edu/jklein/files/babbitt.pdf

There have been academic pieces written on 4:33. I don't think it's particularly brilliant, but interesting nonetheless. John Cage is an interesting composer... some of his stuff is beautiful, some of it more dissonant... some of it just downright weird. It's pretty well-known in the music community that he composed a lot of his scores on shrooms.

[Odysseus]

Originally Posted by broncosteven

You are 100% right about Lenny Bernstein, he was very flamboyant with his presentations, but his Mahlers 9th is stunning. His Young person's guide to the Orchestra is Epic. I always prefered the straight conductors to the Michael Tilson Thomas's of the world, guys like Reiner, Karajan, Kublick, no one would **** with them.

All conductors record with multiple symphonies and some of the lesser ones like NBC or early century Vienna were hit or miss, among others.

The thing people don't get until they have gone to alot of concerts is that the orchestra is a team and the conductor is the coach, it is up to the coach to prepare the team and get them to work to each others strengths and those are things that people like me watch for at a concert. How does the conductor handle certain passages, how he balances the sound, technique etc... you do have to learn the piece to know what is coming when but that is just listening.

I highly recommend anything by Fritz Reiner. You should check out Bernard Haitink, I think he is the best living conductor out there now and he is alot like Reiner.

Check out Chamber music also, they usually dont have a conductor under an octet in size so you get players having to work together more plus the composer can't hide behind bluster or volume, I find it more intense than a loud orchestra some times.

One of my music teachers studied with this big conducting teacher, Richard Lert out in LA during the 50's, and intimadating guy who's wife wrote the book that they based the movie "The Grand Hotel" on. Anyway he asked Lert how he knew something specific about an obscure piece they were listening to live and Lert replied "You must know ALL the literature"! That was my biggest take away from his lessons.

Everyone has their Ah Ha moment, I am glad it was Figaro for you, mine was hearing the 2nd movement to Beethoven's 7th for the 1st time, I just got it.

I wish I could have done more and glad I did what little I did for you and your buddies.

I love technical music. Joe Zawinul, a jazz composer, put out some amazing spacial music where there were huge gaps of unpainted rhythm everywhere in his music. Instead trying to do Miles Davis (where he comes from musically) he used African beats and well timed silence)

I have heard some modern classical pieces that tried to imitate that but I am not savvy on who actually created that or where I heard it. It was after 2001 Space Odyssey but in that same type of spacial tempo but it was pure classical.

I wish I could check out the YouTube links. I bet there is some inspirational stuff being posted.

[broncosteven]

Originally Posted by Odysseus

I love technical music. Joe Zawinul, a jazz composer, put out some amazing spacial music where there were huge gaps of unpainted rhythm everywhere in his music. Instead trying to do Miles Davis (where he comes from musically) he used African beats and well timed silence)

I have heard some modern classical pieces that tried to imitate that but I am not savvy on who actually created that or where I heard it. It was after 2001 Space Odyssey but in that same type of spacial tempo but it was pure classical.

I wish I could check out the YouTube links. I bet there is some inspirational stuff being posted.

Ligetti's vocal works were used on the 2001 soundtrack, you should check out Melodien and his double concerto, he uses these lines that keep overlapping and get very intense. I am not sure but I thought I may have sent you one of his CD's I like.

Also check out anything by Stravinsky.

[Odysseus]

I don't mind music that is overlapping and kind of busy. Some forms of jazz that are "too busy" are kind familial to me. It's like a room with screaming kids and having the ability to listen to all the conversations happening at once. It requires a certain grandpa mentality where you can interpret the clutter rather than discard it. It is just additional contextual data.

Coney Island represents a time marker in New York as well as a context marker. A hot dog made in New York does not make New York what it is but because it is in New York there are additional context markers associated.

This is why, in some respects, I would like to learn the context of when, where, and how classical was made so that I can fully understand why a particular symphony matters more than another or in what context it was created.

Any books on Classical music that give a broad contextual based understanding?

I thought that book on the movie Amadeus was fascinating.

[fdf]

Full fledged off-season mode now (maybe no-season mode--sigh). Just a few random classical music notes:

1. 75% of the time I hear a symphony on the radio that is REALLY good but that I don't recognize, it turns out to be post-Mozart Haydn. I think he is undeservedly overshadowed by the brief brilliance of Mozart. In some ways, Haydn was more important in setting up the romantic period than Mozart. Mozart was unique. But noone after ever really sounded like him. The great romantic composers learned a lot more from Haydn.

2. Most overrated: Mahler. Crash crash bang bang drama drama.

3. Can't say that I care for atonal music much. It usually makes me want to scratch my ears out and manages to bore me at the same time. When the mandatory atonal piece in concert comes around, it feels like the conductor is trying to make me eat my peas. Stravinsky is not atonal--he was a classicist in structure with dissonant harmonies as an overlay.

4. I love Gershwin. But he was a little like Mozart. Unique. Brilliant. But so singular that he did not spawn a school of music.

[fdf]

Originally Posted by Odysseus

If you wanted to learn more about Baroque music. Where would you start?

Just my opinion, but start with Monteverdi. He was a key transitional figure from Renaissance music to Baroque--also wrote wonderful music. Here's a sample of his madrigals:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrIivhE2xRs

This was pretty radical stuff in his day A lot of folks didn't like it because it was so, well, different.

[Swedish Extrovert]

Different:

[Odysseus]

Originally Posted by fdf

Just my opinion, but start with Monteverdi. He was a key transitional figure from Renaissance music to Baroque--also wrote wonderful music. Here's a sample of his madrigals:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrIivhE2xRs

This was pretty radical stuff in his day A lot of folks didn't like it because it was so, well, different.

I like Baroque music quite a bit. I always like listening to music that was, in it's day, a game changer.

[cutthemdown]

I don't know a lot about classical. Always been more a Jazz/Soul/Blues/Rock lover. I really enjoyed listening to a few of these tunes though and I agree it is amazing stuff. I do have a ton of Mozart I love listening to. What blows me away is how young some of the classical masters were when they wrote this stuff.

Also you can find cool riffs to use in other music listening to classical. You can especially hear how those metal guitar guys use those classical runs in there music.

[L.A. BRONCOS FAN]

Originally Posted by cutthemdown

I don't know a lot about classical. Always been more a Jazz/Soul/Blues/Rock lover.

Same here.

I'm only interested in classical music to the extent that I can steal ideas or theories that can be applied to jazz, fusion, etc.

Chick Corea has looted Bach pretty liberally throughout his career, so I guess there's nothing new under the sun, eh?

[broncosteven]

Originally Posted by fdf

Full fledged off-season mode now (maybe no-season mode--sigh). Just a few random classical music notes:

1. 75% of the time I hear a symphony on the radio that is REALLY good but that I don't recognize, it turns out to be post-Mozart Haydn. I think he is undeservedly overshadowed by the brief brilliance of Mozart. In some ways, Haydn was more important in setting up the romantic period than Mozart. Mozart was unique. But noone after ever really sounded like him. The great romantic composers learned a lot more from Haydn.

2. Most overrated: Mahler. Crash crash bang bang drama drama.

3. Can't say that I care for atonal music much. It usually makes me want to scratch my ears out and manages to bore me at the same time. When the mandatory atonal piece in concert comes around, it feels like the conductor is trying to make me eat my peas. Stravinsky is not atonal--he was a classicist in structure with dissonant harmonies as an overlay.

4. I love Gershwin. But he was a little like Mozart. Unique. Brilliant. But so singular that he did not spawn a school of music.

1) Haydn was about 20 years older than Mozart, he is considered the father of the classical symphony. I love his London Symphony #104. Great stuff.

2) I agree about Mahler to an extent, I look at it like ear candy sometimes you need to listen to a small chamber piece and sometimes you want full on Heavy Classical blow the doors off.

3) For the most part I agree though I like it when ensembles play "all the literature" even if it is not well known. I remember being in HS and hearing Edgard Varese Piece thrown on just before the 1st intermission. I ran out and bought every Varese LP I could find after that.
BTW Stravinsky had a 12 tone/serial period, his opera "The Flood" is an example. Stravinsky loved the work of Carlo Gesualdo who was a 16th century madrigal composer, Igor rearranged some of Gesualdo's work which got him back into tonal compositions near the end of his life.

4) Gershwin died too young, what a loss who knows what he would have gone on to write.

[broncosteven]

Originally Posted by Odysseus

I don't mind music that is overlapping and kind of busy. Some forms of jazz that are "too busy" are kind familial to me. It's like a room with screaming kids and having the ability to listen to all the conversations happening at once. It requires a certain grandpa mentality where you can interpret the clutter rather than discard it. It is just additional contextual data.

Coney Island represents a time marker in New York as well as a context marker. A hot dog made in New York does not make New York what it is but because it is in New York there are additional context markers associated.

This is why, in some respects, I would like to learn the context of when, where, and how classical was made so that I can fully understand why a particular symphony matters more than another or in what context it was created.

Any books on Classical music that give a broad contextual based understanding?

I thought that book on the movie Amadeus was fascinating.

We had to study Grouts book on the history of Western Music.
http://www.amazon.com/History-Wester.../dp/0393979911

I thought it was pretty dry, my copy is 20 years old so maybe a new revision is an easier read but I doubt it. The thing is he covered just about everything in good detail.

Bernard Shaw's book "The great composers" was an OK read.

If you have time and are willing to wade through stuff that you may not understand Stravinsky wrote a series of books with his conductor Robert Craft where they converse about writting, his childhood experiences with Russian folk music and studying with Rimsky Korsakov who's Sherazade was a brilliant work and I got a CD of his symphony's which are underrated and should be played more.

http://www.amazon.com/Expositions-De...6378386&sr=1-1
others in the series are titled memories and commentaries, themes and conclusions, and the 1st in the series: conversation with Igor Stravinsky.
Great series if your hardcore into his music as is his Harvard lecture, "Poetics of Music".

This is a very good bio of Igor, he led a very interesting life during an interesting time:
http://www.amazon.com/Stravinsky-Com...tt_at_ep_dpi_2

[broncosteven]

Originally Posted by L.A. BRONCOS FAN

Same here.

I'm only interested in classical music to the extent that I can steal ideas or theories that can be applied to jazz, fusion, etc.

Chick Corea has looted Bach pretty liberally throughout his career, so I guess there's nothing new under the sun, eh?

Check out Wendy Carlos's Switched on Bach if you are into synths. Still great stuff to this day, with the move to virtual analog on synths now a days this still sounds fresh and interesting.

[fdf]

Originally Posted by broncosteven

BTW Stravinsky had a 12 tone/serial period, his opera "The Flood" is an example. Stravinsky loved the work of Carlo Gesualdo who was a 16th century madrigal composer, Igor rearranged some of Gesualdo's work which got him back into tonal compositions near the end of his life.

I didn't know this. Most of what I have heard from Stravinsky is shockingly classical in form--although the harmonies tend to conceal that. I'll have to check it out--especially the madrigal stuff. I like madrigals a lot.

[Odysseus]

Originally Posted by broncosteven

We had to study Grouts book on the history of Western Music.
http://www.amazon.com/History-Wester.../dp/0393979911

I thought it was pretty dry, my copy is 20 years old so maybe a new revision is an easier read but I doubt it. The thing is he covered just about everything in good detail.

Bernard Shaw's book "The great composers" was an OK read.

If you have time and are willing to wade through stuff that you may not understand Stravinsky wrote a series of books with his conductor Robert Craft where they converse about writting, his childhood experiences with Russian folk music and studying with Rimsky Korsakov who's Sherazade was a brilliant work and I got a CD of his symphony's which are underrated and should be played more.

http://www.amazon.com/Expositions-De...6378386&sr=1-1
others in the series are titled memories and commentaries, themes and conclusions, and the 1st in the series: conversation with Igor Stravinsky.
Great series if your hardcore into his music as is his Harvard lecture, "Poetics of Music".

This is a very good bio of Igor, he led a very interesting life during an interesting time:
http://www.amazon.com/Stravinsky-Com...tt_at_ep_dpi_2

I am the guy that read techical manuals for fun and builds a sailboat out of concrete just to see if he can do it. This book is an amazing find. Thank you.

[Swedish Extrovert]

Originally Posted by broncosteven

BTW Stravinsky had a 12 tone/serial period, his opera "The Flood" is an example. Stravinsky loved the work of Carlo Gesualdo who was a 16th century madrigal composer, Igor rearranged some of Gesualdo's work which got him back into tonal compositions near the end of his life.

Unless I've received bad information 12-tone serialism was developed by Arnold Schoenberg, which Stravinsky only used in brief measures, late in his composing life. That's not to say that Stravinsky didn't have serial elements, he was probably just not doing it consciously.

How I understand it:
Anton Webern was the pioneer in serialism and klangfarbenmelodie
Arnold Schoenberg developed 12-tone technique
Milton Babbitt took it further with total serialism

Originally Posted by fdf

3. Can't say that I care for atonal music much. It usually makes me want to scratch my ears out and manages to bore me at the same time. When the mandatory atonal piece in concert comes around, it feels like the conductor is trying to make me eat my peas. Stravinsky is not atonal--he was a classicist in structure with dissonant harmonies as an overlay.

Stravinsky generally followed rules of classical music, but he's is considered influential precisely BECAUSE of of his use of complex rhythmic structure.

[broncosteven]

Originally Posted by Mightysmurf

Unless I've received bad information 12-tone serialism was developed by Arnold Schoenberg, which Stravinsky only used in brief measures, late in his composing life. That's not to say that Stravinsky didn't have serial elements, he was probably just not doing it consciously.

How I understand it:
Anton Webern was the pioneer in serialism and klangfarbenmelodie
Arnold Schoenberg developed 12-tone technique
Milton Babbitt took it further with total serialism




Stravinsky generally followed rules of classical music, but he's is considered influential precisely BECAUSE of of his use of complex rhythmic structure.

You made me pull my copy of "Stravinsky The Composer and his Works" off the shelf and as I vaguely remembered there was a chapter devoted to his Serialist phase from 1952-1960 titled "The American Serialist". It describes his admiration of Webern as well as how he thought the Serial tech was pure music due to their adhearance to the rules.

His works Threni, Movements for piano and Orchestra as well as the previous mentioned "The Flood" all used Serialism 12 tone tone rows, among others. I remember the Flood being based on 12 tone tone rows because I studied it trying to understand Serialism better about 25 years ago.

What Stravinsky brought to "Classical Music" were the Russian Folk songs of his youth which had meter different than what us Westerner's are used to. The funny thing about the Rite is that the opening Bassoon melody that is so famous is based on a Lithuanian folk melody but the rest of the piece is what Igor thought prehistoric folk songs would have sounded like.

I would say that Stravinsky's impact was more based on utilizing different meters rather than rhythm as well as incorporating near Eastern Folk songs into his works which was something that Bartok also was a proponent of.

Before Stravinsky Composers might go from 4/4 in to 3/4 for a series of ordered measures as Beethoven and even Mozart had done but Stravinsky would let the melody dictate the meter as in his Dumbarton Oaks:

Bar 3 of 1st movement: 4/4, 3/4, 5/16:2/8 (subdivided measure), 2/4, 2/4
Bar 4: 3/4, 3/8, 3/4, 3/8, 2/8:3/16 (subdivided), 3/4, 3/8...

Stravinsky composed at the piano and would plunk out melodies or themes he heard and then he would **** with them to see if he could get something new and something better. Stravinsky had to craft his works much more than Mozart or Beethoven, changing meter of melodies was nothing new, Stravinsky just took it to the extreme and made some great works because of that. He could also afford to play around because he had his training with Rimsky Korsakav to fall back on to orchestrate his works with.

[Swedish Extrovert]

http://www.npr.org/blogs/deceptiveca...biggest-badass

[broncosteven]

I found this program on PBS, I am not a fan of Michael Tilson Thomas but I am glad to see a series dedicated to Classical music.

http://video.pbs.org/program/1295137935/

They have had 2 shows on Mahler's life and inspirations and I have seen the performance of his 1st symphony and next week they have a show performing Mahler's 5th.

Check your local PBS listings.

[Swedish Extrovert]

(Mods move as appropriate)

Christmas time is alway big on Ballets... esp. Tchaikovsky (Swan Lake, the Nutcracker).

Who's planning on going to a ballet this holiday season?

[epicSocialism4tw]

Originally Posted by Mightysmurf

(Mods move as appropriate)

Christmas time is alway big on Ballets... esp. Tchaikovsky (Swan Lake, the Nutcracker).

Who's planning on going to a ballet this holiday season?

Hey man...you realize this is a football message board, right?

[Swedish Extrovert]

Originally Posted by epicSocialism4tw

Hey man...you realize this is a football message board, right?

I look at it more as a "Broncos lifestyle" forum. I, like many others here, have other interests: economics, classical music, beer, tech, popular science, attractive women, religion....

You're the one who brought up Margaret Sanger, sicko.

[Swedish Extrovert]

How bout this.... I'll wear my Broncos underwear under my black suit at the next opera I go to?

[epicSocialism4tw]

Originally Posted by Mightysmurf

I look at it more as a "Broncos lifestyle" forum. I, like many others here, have other interests: economics, classical music, beer, tech, popular science, attractive women, religion....

You're the one who brought up Margaret Sanger, sicko.

Oh, don't take it personally.

Everyone has other interests. It just happens to be true that ballet is about as far away on the continuum from football as you can get. It comes right before crochet and shopping.

Now, Spandau Ballet...you might hit a gold mine here with that one.