What are you listening to now?

[Decrepit Poster]

Continuing on with discussion of the "Serioso," just the other day I chanced upon a YouTube video of Benjamin Zander conducting an "interpretation class" during which he stresses the importance of following Beethoven's tempo markings for the first movement. The video begins with a quartet playing the movement at what I assume is modern standard performance tempo. Zander then has them play it at B's designated tempo. For my money, the movement is ever so more exciting and alive at the faster tempo. Zander is an .... ummmm... enthusiastic instructor. Good stuff.

[Megan]

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCEzh3MwILY[/YOUTUBE]

[Quijote]

Been listening to 2 pieces.
First, Steve Reich: Piano phase.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P_9hDzG1i0

[Quijote]

Second, Berio: Sequenza III.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGovCafPQAE

[Chris]

Been listening to 2 pieces.
First, Steve Reich: Piano phase.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7P_9hDzG1i0

It would be quite the challenge for two pianists to actually play this together live!

[Quijote]

It would be quite the challenge for two pianists to actually play this together live!

It's been done, quite often.
Now imagine only one pianist on two pianos doing it (nor the best performance ever, but bravo even so): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnQdP03iYIo

[Peter]

Clementi sonata in F# minor / Horowitz - beautiful piece and playing.

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fI8Zjz1Xj9A[/YOUTUBE]

[Fidelio]

Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 4 & 5
Philippe Jordan, Wiener Symphoniker

[Quijote]

Arvo Pärt, Spiegel im Spiegel.
A very pleasant way of playing around with an F major scale.
What do you think? Melancholic, certainly. Great music?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aS7qmtQLSyY

[Enrique]

Mozart: Piano concerto no.26, Friedrich Gulda at the piano.

This concert begins in an odd way. The pianist repeatedly striking a key on the piano while the orchestra plays. In Mozart's time the piano used to enter after an orchestral introduction. And the pianist plays only one note: a D natural!

[Peter]

Arvo Pärt, Spiegel im Spiegel.
A very pleasant way of playing around with an F major scale.
What do you think? Melancholic, certainly. Great music?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aS7qmtQLSyY

I think to achieve this beautiful contemplative state with such simple means is great. It lasts over 8 minutes with the same repetitive accompaniment yet it doesn't create a sense of boredom, only peace - quite extraordinary really when you think about it!

[Fidelio]

Beethoven Complete Piano Sonatas
Brendel, Decca 1994

[Michael]

Beethoven Complete Piano Sonatas
Brendel, Decca 1994

My favourite set of the sonatas. I also have his earlier Vox set but the 1994 one has much better sound quality.

(My edition is on Philips though. Have they been re-released on Decca?)

[Fidelio]

During the 1960s, he became the first pianist ever to record the entire piano works of Beethoven (on the Vox label), a set which, in the opinion of one critic, contains 'some of the finest Beethoven ever recorded'. In the 1970s, Brendel returned to Beethoven with a complete cycle of the piano sonatas on the Philips label. With this 10-CD set, Brendel becomes the first pianist to have recorded Beethoven's 32 sonatas three times. Although presented in broadly chronological order, there are some exceptions – on the second, fifth and seventh to ninth CDs. Also a minority of these performances are live. The first two are analogue cycle, this is digital.

The Philips recordings are my favourite.

[Sorrano]

This morning I caught the last half of the Schumann Cello Concerto. The last movement reminded me a bit of Rachmaninoff.