Celibidache's Tchaikovsky

Tchaikovsky’s last three symphonies are probably the most performed and recorded symphonies in existence. Other contenders include those of Beethoven, Mozart, and maybe Haydn by virtue of there being over a hundred of them, but the trinity that is Tchaikovsky’s four, five, and six delivers a sampling of Romanticism that has proven irresistible to popular taste. Brahms might be worth mentioning too, had he left us more than four to choose from....

February 25, 2010

Dear Ms. Wang

Out of a mostly irrational desire to witness two musical greats synergized in one absolutely fantastic display of awesomeness, I’d like to see Yuja Wang perform Rachmaninoff’s sonata. The second one of course. The first one is great too, but let’s face it, for a girl who professes a love for those lyrical, big, romantic pieces, Mlle. Wang can’t go wrong with Op. 36. And with Chopin’s second already under her belt, I’d only find it in the natural order of things....

February 11, 2010

James Horner and the Lydian Mode

It’s a curious thing how an artist who has reached a certain level of creative maturity becomes somewhat of a prisoner to idiosyncrasy. Many composers, to take music as an example, have some kind of musical trademark. Some exhibit their signature flourishes subtly or almost imperceptibly, while others do us the convenience of posting a big, blinking, neon sign in the sky. At the moment, I’m starting to think that there’s a lot in the music of film composer James Horner that is big, blinking, and neon....

January 28, 2010

Politics, A Bad Thing for Art

I can’t speak from experience, but I bet the first half of the 20th century was a God awful time to be living. It was a time when war and economic crisis scathed the face of humanity. (Actually, we haven’t come very far in this respect.) It also was a time when so much about art and its dissemination was necessarily political, and that is a terrible thing. I sympathize with men like Prokofiev and Shostakovich—artists whose musical output was, at least for some portion of their careers, dictated by the aesthetic counsel of the Soviet Union....

January 22, 2010

Russian Steppes

From a distance, Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky look much the same. Fact is, one name rarely ever surfaces without some mention of the other, and if you like music by one, chances are you also enjoy music by the other (convenient given the sheer number of classical albums that pair their works together). The opinion inherent in their seeming inseparability is that their works demonstrate an uncanny gift for melody and emotional expression....

January 15, 2010