I've mentioned both of Glenn Gould's studio recordings of Bach's Goldberg Variations several times over the past couple of years. They are one of my few desert island picks that never change. They were recorded roughly at the beginning of his career and the end of career. I think one of the best descriptions I have ever heard is that the 50s recording sounds like a greeting and the 80s recording a farewell. I know that I cannot listen to the end of the latter without being reduced to tears. They are currently packaged in a 3-CD set titled A Sense of Wonder that I cannot recommend highly enough.
Another of my desert island picks is Beethoven's 6th (Pastoral) Symphony, specifically Gunther Wand's recording with the Northern Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. I love all of Beethoven's Symphonies and the 9th is certainly grander and more profound, but there is a sense of joy in the Pastoral that moves me.
I'm a great fan of Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto and as with a lot of his works, for me, not necessarily for the reason everybody showed up in the first place. Late in the first movement there is a statement of the theme by the strings supported by the brass that really demands to be blasted at full volume. Oh, and the violin part's pretty swell, too. My favorite recording is with Kyung Wa Chung and Charles Dutoit with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra (if memory serves, it's loaned out right now).
Now Playing: "Black Dog" Led Zeppelin IV <-- which also likes to be blasted...
Posts: 1584 | Location: Bloomington, IN | Registered: 23 May 2004
Mozart: Concertos Nos. 10 & 24 in Chamber Arrangements by Hummel -Pianist Fumiko Shirag
This album was an album-of-the-day on AMG a few weeks back. Hunted down what few samples I could find online and then sought the cd. I'm very impressed with the recordings, and will probably look for an earlier Fumiko Shirag record, Chopin: The Two Piano Concertos (Chamber Version), based on what I've heard so far.
Posts: 8784 | Location: State of Insanity | Registered: 22 September 2005
Originally posted by kelly 1l1: Such a wonderful piece. I'll check out the Solti recording.
There's a disc that has that paired with "Pictures At An Exhibition," the Ravel orchestration, both with Solti/CSO. It might be out of print but look for it on Amazon. That version of "Pictures" is one where the Chicago brass really live up to their reputation -- the "Great Gate" finale is just spine-tingling, God-like.
George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra performing Mozart's Jupiter Symphony.
Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Orchestra performing Bartok's "Music for Strings, Percussion and Celeste".
Finally, I am consistently blown away by Radu Lupu's recording of Schubert's Cm piano sonata. This seems the ideal merging of composition and performance. Incredibly powerful, delicate, expressive, and logical.
I'm more into modern compositions so that's what most of these are (I'm new to classical so some these would probably be better fit in avant-garde...?):
Steve Reich's Music For 18 Musicians Philip Glass Einstein On the Beach Glenn Branca Symphony No. 1 and The Ascension Mahler Symphony No. 1 in D Major Boulez The Perfect Stranger Shostakovitch The Gadfly: Five Days- Five Nights
I have this brilliant 3-CD collection of Gyorgy Sandor playing Prokofiev piano pieces. I got it when I was studying Prokofiev's third sonata for a piano competition when I was in high school, and it's one of the best performances of that particular sonata I've ever heard. Amazing.
Also, John Ogdon's two-CD set of Scriabin's piano sonatas are disturbingly nail-on-the-head interpretations--perhaps it takes a mad man to so purely comprehend another mad man's Music.
Oh, and I can't forget the 15-CD box set I got a few years ago as a birthday present of Sviatislav Richter--many of them are rare recordings, and his pianism is outstanding to an extreme. So talented. And mostly self-taught. Disturbing.
