Keith
The great German philosopher Theodor Adorno once wrote: "We do not understand music - it understands us. This is as true for the musician as for the layman. When we think ourselves closest to it, it speaks to us and waits sad-eyed for us to answer."
We tend these days to think of music as background accompaniment, entertainment, diversion or pleasure: for me music is so much more than that, a passion, an experience, a way of life really. The thing that I love most about music from the "classical" tradition is that I could listen to some pieces for a lifetime and still find more to hear, to think about, to feel each time: it is the most complex and intricate of all the arts and also the most variable and fleeting.
My favourite composers are (in no particular order) Ligeti, Saariaho, Gesualdo, Lachenmann, Brumel, Harvey, Machaut, Agricola, Josquin, Nono, Ockeghem, Liza Lim, Dufay, Purcell, Mahler, Berio, Haydn, Scelsi, Mozart, Berg, Grisey, Schoenberg, Webern, Ferneyhough, Monteverdi, Kurtag, Handel, Reich, Messiaen, Feldman, Nancarrow, Carter, Stockhausen, Murail, Xenakis and of course the 5 Bs -- Brahms, Boulez, Beethoven, Birtwistle, Bruckner and probably most of all, J.S. Bach.
I have just set up a blog for writings about music (a mixture of reviews, criticism, theory and speculation) which will eventually be a fairly large collection of responses to the demands music makes: you can "follow" me at http://falserelations.tumblr.com
BEETHOVEN
Beethoven: Complete String Quartets [Special price 7 CD set]
Artemis Quartet
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[ Virgin Classics / 7 CD Box Set ] Release Date: Monday, 7 November, 2011 "This is 21st Century Beethoven: contrasts and disjunctions vividly emphasised; supremely faithful to the outrageous demands Beethoven makes; precise in ensemble, accentuation and intonation; the resonances of early music brought to the fore in the strange slow movements of the late quartets; in sum totally convincing new interpretations of what these masterpieces... |
![Beethoven: Complete String Quartets [Special price 7 CD set] cover](http://images.marbecks.co.nz/_covers/10726/10726601.jpg)
BIRTWISTLE / WOOD / HARRISON
Antiphonies / Harrison's Clocks / Piano Concertos
Joanna MacGregor (piano) /
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[ Warner Classics / 2 CD ] Release Date: Tuesday, 20 September, 2011 "Now reissued at last the only recording of Sir Harrison Birtwistle's stunning 'anti-concerto' for piano and large orchestra. Written for Mitsuko Uchida in 1993 this is one of the greatest of his works, brutally dissonant and shocking on occasion but shot through with passages of plaintive lyricism. I think of the piece as the last great piano concerto of the... |
MICHAEL FINNISSY
Second and Third String Quartets
Kreutzer Quartet
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[ NMC Records / CD ] Release Date: Monday, 20 February, 2012 Pre-order your copy NOW! Michael Finnissy's Second Quartet is 'based on a compact Haydn model' - originally intended to be the 'Lark', Op.64, No.5 - and traces of its antecedent can be discerned within it. By contrast, the Third Quartet incorporates actual birdsong, both transcribed and recorded, in the composer's response to the natural world and man's place in it: the instruments... |
JONATHAN HARVEY
Complete String Quartets and String Trio
Arditti Quartet
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[ Aeon / 2 CD ] Release Date: Thursday, 1 October, 2009 "The Arditti Quartet's committed and refined playing is as superlative as ever, reflecting their long association with Harvey's music… While the SACD sound is wonderful in the earlier quartets, in the fourth it provides a sensational aural tour de force." BBC Music Magazine *****/***** |
ELLIOTT CARTER
String Quartets Nos. 2, 3 and 4
Pacifica Quartet
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[ Naxos American Classics / CD ] Release Date: Sunday, 1 March, 2009 "There is no getting away from the fact that Elliott Carter's five string quartets present a tough challenge to performers and audience alike. But the conviction and broad scope that the Pacifica Quartet brings to them ensures that the effort yields rich dividends. |
J. S. BACH
Goldberg Variations (recorded at the Gewandhaus zu Leipzig, June 2008)
Evgeni Koroliov (piano)
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[ EuroArts Music / Medici Arts / DVD ] Release Date: Wednesday, 1 July, 2009 "The Yevgeni Koroliov Euroarts DVD performance of the Goldberg Variations is the most convincing interpretation of this masterpiece I have encountered since the Andras Schiff live recording from 2001 on ECM. I adore the "Goldbergs" - I collect recordings of them and have several favourites for various sections (even recordings I do not admire overall have some... |
