- Thread starter Nigel Watts
- Start date
Penners
Member
- Messages
- 17,294
- Location
- Suffolk, England
I suppose that's worthy of consideration. Although I'm not sure that the youth of the composer actually makes it a better piece of music in its own right.
On the plus side, he was obviously a better composer in his teens than he was as an adult! :wink:
On the plus side, he was obviously a better composer in his teens than he was as an adult! :wink:
Penners
Member
- Messages
- 17,294
- Location
- Suffolk, England
Very mainstream, in classical terms: Elgar, Beethoven, Brahms, Rachmaninov... the usual crew.
A bit more up-to-date: Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd, Cream, Gerry Rafferty, etc.
As you can see, I'm not musically adventurous!
A bit more up-to-date: Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd, Cream, Gerry Rafferty, etc.
As you can see, I'm not musically adventurous!
Nigel Watts
Member
- Messages
- 1,779
- Location
- London N7
Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream at Gyndebourne a few years ago was as near to perfection as it gets. Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra; Les Illuminations; Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings; War Requiem; Canticles (no 2 is my favorite)...
As a 13 year old I performed in front of the great man and his friend Peter Pears at the Snape Maltings in the first ever (all boy) Prep Schools' Association orchestra. We hacked our way through Handel's fireworks music and various other popular classics. Britten is reported to have said of our performance "It sounded like autumn leaves waving gently in the breeze." Given how caustic he could be I think this was a compliment.
As a 13 year old I performed in front of the great man and his friend Peter Pears at the Snape Maltings in the first ever (all boy) Prep Schools' Association orchestra. We hacked our way through Handel's fireworks music and various other popular classics. Britten is reported to have said of our performance "It sounded like autumn leaves waving gently in the breeze." Given how caustic he could be I think this was a compliment.
Great selection indeed. Who was Oberon?Nigel Watts said:
[quote
As a 13 year old I performed in front of the great man and his friend Peter Pears at the Snape Maltings in the first ever (all boy) Prep Schools' Association orchestra. We hacked our way through Handel's fireworks music and various other popular classics. Britten is reported to have said of our performance "It sounded like autumn leaves waving gently in the breeze." Given how caustic he could be I think this was a compliment.
[/quote]
What's your instrument, Nigel?
Nigel Watts
Member
- Messages
- 1,779
- Location
- London N7
Benjun Mehta as Oberon, Peter Hall Director i think.
I was the inside player of the back desk of the second violins, a place I was later to hold for a year in the Second Essex Youth Orchestra, which meant I got to play the triangle quite often.
I was no great player, but we had an enthusiastic Director of Music at our school. From the ages of 12 to 17 I was playing Dvorak, Brahms and Bruckner symphonies and accompanying the school's better musicians in various concertos (Mozart's 23rd for piano, Rachmaninov's 2nd, the Elgar cello concerto, Richard Strauss 2nd? for horn (I do remember that its second movement had 7 flats in the key signature - A flat minor I think)
My 16 year old, who is at a much more famous school, is grade 5 cello but can get into the orchestra where the entire cello section a doing grade 8. Sometimes there is something to be said for being large fish in a small pond I think.
I was the inside player of the back desk of the second violins, a place I was later to hold for a year in the Second Essex Youth Orchestra, which meant I got to play the triangle quite often.
I was no great player, but we had an enthusiastic Director of Music at our school. From the ages of 12 to 17 I was playing Dvorak, Brahms and Bruckner symphonies and accompanying the school's better musicians in various concertos (Mozart's 23rd for piano, Rachmaninov's 2nd, the Elgar cello concerto, Richard Strauss 2nd? for horn (I do remember that its second movement had 7 flats in the key signature - A flat minor I think)
My 16 year old, who is at a much more famous school, is grade 5 cello but can get into the orchestra where the entire cello section a doing grade 8. Sometimes there is something to be said for being large fish in a small pond I think.
LadyArowana
Member
- Messages
- 3,687
Gareth Hughes said:
That's what was done with the old Highbury ( Arsenal's home before Emirates ) http://www.highburysquare.com/ about 300K for a one bedroom.
Nigel Watts said:
Very nice - it got rave reviews.
Nigel Watts said:
What an excellent way to be introduced to good music. I always hope that my pupils will look back in later life and feel similarly. I do my best!
Yes indeed (or Cb major!) - clearly well taught!Nigel Watts said:
Should that read "can't get into"? If so - what a shame. I can't see why they couldn't adapt the parts if necessary - I do for my pupils all the time!Nigel Watts said:
oxalate said:
In the olden days, when I taught Textiles at a sec. mod. in Chiswick, I 'borrowed' a number of lps from the music department and played them as background music during lessons - for no other reason than my own pleasure.
One afternoon a particularly gormless lumpy teenager came into the room and complained about the music that was playing. Did we have to listen to that Mozart violin concerto? Couldn't we have the other side? - she much preferred the Mendelssohn one (Both played by Oistrach).
And a group of sixth-formers** announced on the last day of term that they were all going to buy their own copies of the Vaughan Williams Thomas Tallis Theme.
** Yes - there was a sixth form. Quite a number of these 11+ failures went on to higher education. One of them is now a Professor of Drawing at a well-known Art School and has work in the Saatchi collection.
Penners
Member
- Messages
- 17,294
- Location
- Suffolk, England
Oh yes - that's hairs-on-the-back-of-the-neck stuff! Gorgeous!Moo said:
Penners
Member
- Messages
- 17,294
- Location
- Suffolk, England
Let's introduce her to it (if she doesn't know it already):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxdOYgTXtH8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxdOYgTXtH8
Penners
Member
- Messages
- 17,294
- Location
- Suffolk, England
Now you've started something, oxalto! I want to know all about those instruments!
Two massive lutes (if that's what they are), but apparently with two different sets of pegs - and the woman's lute appears to have strings that run outside the fretboard. Very odd! The smaller lute looks (to an untutored eye) smaller than normal.
Is the percussion instrument a virginal? Is the wind instrument an haut boy?
Do explain - please!
Two massive lutes (if that's what they are), but apparently with two different sets of pegs - and the woman's lute appears to have strings that run outside the fretboard. Very odd! The smaller lute looks (to an untutored eye) smaller than normal.
Is the percussion instrument a virginal? Is the wind instrument an haut boy?
Do explain - please!
Nigel Watts
Member
- Messages
- 1,779
- Location
- London N7
Thanks Oxalto! Having been a football fan for less than a year this is my first heartbreak, for which this music is just perfect.
Isn't that the singer? - Remarkable voice. Quite castrato like I would imagine, but I guess we will never really know what those great stars of the past really sounded like.
Penners said:
Isn't that the singer? - Remarkable voice. Quite castrato like I would imagine, but I guess we will never really know what those great stars of the past really sounded like.
Right, here goes!Penners said:
Two massive lutes - these are arch-lutes or theorbos, a wonderful big daddy of a lute that has an incredible rich low register and can caover the same kind of range as a harpsichord. The lenght of neck stops you from being able to stop the stings too far down and the ones outside the fingerboard are the bass notes, tuned to the normal intervals of the bass in functional harmony (a bit like a short octave on a harpsichord)
The smaller lute is just that - the same size as normal but made to look small by the others - size would vary as with all hand-made instruments.
The percussion instrument is a kind of zither still played by buskers central Europe today. Very lovely if a little quirky! A virginal is a member of the harpsichord family and has a keyboard - much easier! Queen Elizabeth I was an excellent player.
And finally but most gloriously, the wind instrument is a Cornett (note the spelling) the body is made of wood wrapped in leather with finger holes like a recorder but the mouthpiece is a brass one hence it sounding like a mellow trumpet. they were all the range in Monteverdi's time and to my mind the most heavenly instrument out there. If I could have my time again, it would be the instrument I took up first as a child.
Check out Monteverdi Vespers under Gardiner for a real treat - same instruments but in St. Mark's Venice. To die for.
Nigel Watts said:
He is my favourite Countertenor at the moment as he has an absolutely unforced soprano register falsetto of great beauty. Quite rare. He also has very good taste and his discs explore really worthwhile and often neglected repertoire, unlike some others!
Nigel Watts said:
Ah but we do-ish! there is one recording of Alessandro Moreschi who was the last Castrato who worked (where the first ones worked) in the Papal choir. He was recorded in the early days of recorded sound on very basic wax cylinders. The engineers had intended to record the Pope but he was ill that day so they recorded the choir and he was the star singer. People always state that the recording is not representative as he was old. In fact he wasn't that old (current Opera singers keep singing until much later), but the sound quality leaves a lot of room for interpretation. If one listens to how the piano and violin sound on the recording it shows how little of the true timbre was captured. What is most noticeable is that the style of performance is fully romantic - incredibly different from Handel's day. People often forget that Rossini and Mendelssohn wrote for Castrato (as did Mozart of course) but the Romantic period Castrato was clearly a very different sounding voice from the Baroque or Classical.
Either way I think that Monteverdi would have loved to have written for Philippe!
Penners
Member
- Messages
- 17,294
- Location
- Suffolk, England
:lol: :lol: :lol:Nigel Watts said:
I confess I've never been a fan of countertenor (castrato) singing. Boy sopranos can have a purity of tone that adult female voices find it hard to emulate. But adult male falsetto always sounds, in my view, uncomfortable, with a strained edge to it.
oxalto, many thanks for those fascinating explanations. As a lapsed guitar player I find the lutes particularly interesting.