Current recordings - do you agree?

[ArturPS]

Hey guys (and gals), I was just wondering if people here agree with me. Are current recordings of unsung music (actually, unsung symphonic music, as chamber music fare a whole lot better) standart's a bit low?
I mean, I absolutely love Ries' symphonic music (for example), but whenever I listen to the available cds I can't help but wonder if it wouldn't sound 10x better were, say, Harnoncourt conducting the WPO. And wouldn't it also factor into why acceptance isn't as high as we'd hope?

Just a thought...

[Alan Howe]

Possibly, but three points in response:
1. There's a lot of guesswork involved in this. Harnoncourt, for example, is no favourite of mine (I personally often find him wilful).
2. We should be thoroughly grateful to those dedicated and able musicians who do attempt unsung music.
3. Beggars can't be choosers...

Having said which, I'd dearly love to hear Abbado in Raff 3 with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra...

[dafrieze]

"Beggars can't be choosers" seems the most appropriate response.  A first-rate orchestra is an extremely expensive proposition, and that makes it extremely conservative.  Most first-rate conductors don't even know the names, let alone the works, of most unsung composers, and they're not going to "waste" precious time learning them as long as audiences and critics still want to hear what they do with the standard repertoire.  There are thousands of contemporary composers demanding that contemporary orchestras play more contemporary works (which they do - once - for the sake of performing a "premiere").   And let's face it:  the unsung composer of the past is a minority interest in what, culturally speaking, has become a minority interest itself (i.e. classical music). 

So, on a practical level, I suppose we should be thankful that there are ANY decent conductors and orchestras (and radio networks and record companies) who are even willing to perform the kind of stuff that we love, and that the results are so often as good as they are. 

[Gareth Vaughan]

Spot on, dafrieze.

[Richard Moss]

As an enthusiastic listener (but no more!), I have no idea of the economics of researching, preparing, producing, marketing and distributing an 'unsung', even if the scores are available with a library or publisher (it  must be even more of an overhead if the scores are missing or need to be recreated - e.g. Brull or Draeseke VC?) and, having incurred the cost, I've no what sort of sales might result.

A previous comment, quite rightly, praised CPO for accepting the overhead of producing the 'complete' works of xyz, not just (their guess) at the most popular items (credits also to Sterling, Hyperion, Danacord, Chandos et al also come to mind as well as Dutton and some of the French/Benelux labels who seem committed to their national composers regardless of cost!

One of the issues surely is not just comments about how 'nicer' some works might sound if recorded with a 1st division team but why unsungs remain unsung.  How many years ago was 'The Lark Ascending' and unsung and what happened to change its status?

When I look at what is offered for local concerts (in my case, the 'SAGE', Gateshead), I might well see a modern work I've never heard of coupled with some standard repertoire (I guess the latter to pull the punters in) but I've never noticed a 19th century unsung.  Nuff said!

Best wishes

Richard

[jerfilm]

Right on, Richard.  You want first rate, you get war horses.  And I can't think of a more fitting example than the Hyperion 50th PC recordings.  Get the Minnesota orchestra, Vanska and Stephen Hough and you get the Tchaikovsky first.   The Minnesota doesn't DO unsungs.  The last one I can remember was Moscheles Concertante for flute and oboe and that was at least 35 years ago....

I've been a season subscriber for over 50 years.  What puzzles me is that week after week they program some piece of mid 20th century music (and I use that word so as not to offend those of us who appreciate such things) - music that I expect 2/3rds of the audience has no understanding of (and would happily leave if they had the courage to program it last on the program).  The alternative (even if only once a year) would be to program one of the hundreds of unsung works that all of us love.  And audiences would react accordingly.  And go home a helluva lot happier.....

Get off the soapbox, jer.......

Jerry

[ArturPS]

I may have given the wrong impression... Don't get me wrong, I'm 100% in the "beggars can't be choosers" zone, and I'm most grateful for the balls CPO, Hyperion, Sterling and others have to go ahead with these projects.

It's just that the mind does wonder while listening. I mean, take Ries' 7th Symphony, the strings are scrawny, the performance can't carry momentum equally across all sections of a movement and there are serious phrasing issues. When I first heard it I was flabbergasted, "why haven't I seen this live yet??", but on repeated hearing you do wish for better performances.

Also, Harnoncourt and the WPO was just something that popped on my head (even though the WPO will always pop on my head...)

[eschiss1]

to correct by the way a misapprehension that i sometimes see... somewhat better-known conductors and orchestras do indeed conduct and take some of these works on tour - one of Onslow's symphonies some years back i seem to recall is a good example, taken on tour through Great Britain by a fairly well-known conductor - better-known than the cpo and Ligia recording conductors..., will have to look up the details... but do not then commercially record them.  I wasn't there- this was after the second of my two brief visits to the Isles - but I did read about that in the Musical Times i think, and other examples should not be hard to find either. 

Slatkin's broadcast recording of Ropartz's symphony no.5 - maybe some day that will be released commercially, but this is a thread only about commercial recordings i think... not sure... - is another example...

[Amphissa]

I come down on both sides of this. Yes, big orchestras with big name conductors are expensive. But there are big orchestras with big name conductors who play unsungs in concert. And in fact, they do occasionally do first tier recordings. They just don't do studio recordings of the complete works of an unsung. At least, not often. There are exceptions even to that.

For example, Dausgaard's recordings of the Langgaard symphonies with the Danish National Orchestra. There have been quite a few very good recordings of the music of Myaskovsky over the years, although many were on LP. Paavo Jarvi has made some terrific recordings of Tubin. There are fine recordings of Chausson, Taneyev, Karlowicz, Berwald, Magnard, et al.

The problem is completists. There is just a much bigger audience for the complete works of Beethoven than for the complete works of an unsung. cpo and other smaller labels to us a great service in producing collections -- music that falls into a small niche market (that's us). They need to keep their costs down in order to break even on these collections.

So I am thankful to the small labels who specialize in music we want to hear. And tremendously thankful to the big name orchestra and conductor who decide to include an unsung on one of their disks, offering exposure of an unsung to a much larger audience.

[JimL]

Perhaps Naxos had the best idea of all in their coupling of the Reinecke flute and harp concertos.  In each concerto, the soloist in one was the conductor in the other, with the same orchestra (Swedish Chamber Orchestra, I believe) accompanying.  A very economical concept.

[mbhaub]

I guess that over the decades I've come to accept the fact that if I want to hear some obscure music, I'll have to put up with some lousy playing and conducting. When Marco Polo first came out many years back there were plenty of examples. It's really expensive to hire and record orchestral music, so rehearsals were minimal and low cost orchestras the order of the day. Nonetheless, I bought most of them just to finally be able to hear these forgotten works.

But this was nothing new. Back in the 60's and 70's there were several record companies recording obscure music: Vox and it's subsidiary Candide, Genesis, and others. You want to hear bad playing, try the Raff 3rd with the orchestra from Recklinghausen. The Nuremburg orchestra in the Rubinstein concerti.

I am very grateful for the large number of obscure works that have been recorded with overall pretty good orchestras and in generally fine sound. You don't need the Berlin Philharmonic all the time. And there have been plenty of recordings of lesser-known orchestras that have demonstrated a very high level of performance. That's a testament to the extraordinary quality of music schools these days. One of my favorite sets of Beethoven symphonies comes from Des Moines, Iowa of all places.

[Paul Barasi]

I'd like to hear Rott's symphony with say Haitink (Concertgebouw) or Jurowski (LPO). There again, my fav Bruckner 3 is Tintner (Royal Scottish SO), or for Szymanowski violin concerto: Khadem-Missagh, NTO Tonkuenster Vienna. Those with world class reputations don't always play their heart out but less known performers sometimes do.

[eschiss1]

that said, too, while i haven't heard it yet, i can well believe the rave reviews for the semi-commercial recording of Kubelik conducting the Bavarian RSO in Suk's Asrael symphony that came out some years back, many reviewers placing it at or near the top except possibly for Talich and a couple of other really classic versions. i can easily believe Kubelik tops my Neumann cd and probably the Pesek Virgin C. recording i used to have, good though that was...

then again i still remember when that , and Shostakovich's 4th symphony too, were - in the latter half of my brief lifetime - more recently even - considered ridiculously obscure and out-there repertoire.  .

.. then again considering that a composer i'd never heard of until last year, Ewald Straesser, had his symphonies performed at least 2 or 3 times by Furtwängler , and by other top conductors of the day too ... erm... erm. well, that's what sinking without a trace does for one - very very similarly Weismann, others... never mind- we were saying...

[ArturPS]

I'd like to hear Rott's symphony with say Haitink (Concertgebouw) or Jurowski (LPO). There again, my fav Bruckner 3 is Tintner (Royal Scottish SO), or for Szymanowski violin concerto: Khadem-Missagh, NTO Tonkuenster Vienna. Those with world class reputations don't always play their heart out but less known performers sometimes do.

hear hear! That Bruckner 3rd with Tintner is nothing short of phenomenal! I also agree with the last sentence, one of my favourite conductors is Christoph Spering and his rendition of Kalliwoda's 5th and 7th is superb (imho), Bernius is also fine in the 6th. Willens isn't, however in the 2nd and 4th, nor is Mosesus in the 3rd. I have Vonk's performances here and they satisfy me better even with atrocious sound (if I can and people want, I'll upload it).
I always return to Ries, I guess. I dislike the symphonies' and that oratorio's performances, the chamber music is well represented, at least.

[Alan Howe]

I'd like to hear Rott's symphony with say Haitink (Concertgebouw) or Jurowski (LPO).

Well, you'll soon be able to hear Paavo Järvi (FrankfurtRSO) on RCA...