Mario Pilati's orchestral works

[Alan Howe]

I am sorry that you were given such harsh treatment, Adriano. Fortunately, there are many people 'out there' who know better and have the courage to pursue their interests in the teeth of this sort of destructive and generally unhelpful criticism.
Carry on regardless, I say!

[Alan Howe]

BTW, some lovely samples from Adriano's latest CD are available here:
http://www.ineditacd.com/asp/Dettaglio.asp?ID=PI2757

[adriano]

Hi eschiss1 and hi dafrieze
Thanks for your feedback :-)
It is not question of correctly pluralizing an exotic word: Pilati's composition is called "Divertimento" in singular and the reviewer has not even read it correctly and calls it "Divertimentos". It's a question of reading/spelling/quoting correctly!
Incidentally, in the same issue of ARG, reviewer BYELICK calls my Organ-and-strings piece entitled "Obscure Saraband" (please sit down!) "Obscene Saraband" - even though the review is a good one :-)
So I have a double frustration with this Magazine.
On my letters, they answered saying "We do not publish letters like this".
These American Magazines seem to employ dilettantes and to be badly in need of money.
Hav you already haerd that FANFARE even offers reviews for cash? They send letters to artists and CD companies offering various categories of such kind of "subscriptions".
Read this shocking link:
http://www.artsjournal.com/slippeddisc/2011/10/how-to-buy-a-record-review.html
Regards from Switzerland
Adriano

[adriano]

Thanks Alan!
You and all other respondings to my contributions made my day :-)
Leaving on Saturday for the North German town of Krefeld, whose Opera House is premiering my Wind Quintet (!!) "digest" arrangement of Dvorak's "Rusalka" in a production for the Youth. They will give 31 performances! Of this same opera I have done a much more interesting and luscious "digest" arrangement for flute, clarinet, harp and string quartet, which I hope will be performed soon. I agree that "Rusalka" needs a harp and a few strings :-), but they wanted a wind quintet...
This better version could also be performed in a chamber concert with a narrator in-betwwenn the muscival numbers.
I love the ensemble flute-clarinet.harp and string quartet, which Ravel uses so masterfully in his "Introduction et allegro".
One of my most successful arrangement for this group is Debussy's "Afternoo of a Faun", which you can hear on this link:
http://www.andreakolle.com/recordings.php

And samples of my latest Brun CD (Symphonies 6 and 7) can be heart on:
http://www.guildmusic.com/shop/wbc.php?sid=920780a80da&tpl=produktdetail.html&pid=13357&rid=280&recno=1

[eschiss1]

I've had issues enough with ARG for years even on just occasional acquaintance - subscribed to Fanfare and gained much from it but even in the foreground (and increasingly, with many of its- well, in my opinion ...! - best reviewers leaving... ) - it.. erm.

[Latvian]

These American Magazines seem to employ dilettantes and to be badly in need of money.

I haven't read either magazine in several years, but I've rarely taken offense at Fanfare. ARG is a different story, though. While I know a couple of the reviewers personally, and know them to be serious,and knowledgeable, the magazine's editor is another matter. For example: he has stated in his editorials that he has "convictions," not "opinions." Therefore, once he forms his view on something, he is absolutely inflexible. He also berates readers who disagree with him. I have a friend who does not write for ARG but knows the editor, and has argued with him in the past on musical matters. When he tried to renew a subscription to ARG, the editor refused his renewal out of spite! I gave up reading ARG a few years ago when I just couldn't take this man's attitude in his editorials and reviews any longer.

Sadly, I would not take much of what is in this magazine very seriously.

[Mark Thomas]

I have an acquaintance  who reviews for ARG and it's fair to say that he has "issues" with the editor too. I only ever buy the magazine if I see it in Barnes & Noble when I'm in the US and then often regret the money I've spent.

[eschiss1]

Hrm- as to Fanfare employing dilettantes, that may be mainly so now, I don't know. Wasn't true when I subscribed (though as I struck up some really good email conversations with people who I often first found out about because of their reviews there, and found out about some composers and music likewise more often than from Gramophone or ARG because of the then-detailed, comparative, thought-provoking and generally interesting reviews..., I'm not the person to ask or to give an opinion- too biased... and self-contradictory, obviously... )

[JimL]

Is that JB you're talking about Mark?

[Mark Thomas]

No, Jim, it isn't. I'd forgotten that he used to review for them too.

[JimL]

Wish he were back on here, sometimes. 

[Mark Thomas]

I suspect that he lurks... 

[adriano]

Dear Forum Members
Happy New Year 

Yesterday, Roger Hecht of ARG has answered to my earlier reaction to his review as follows:

Maestro Adriano,
I have enjoyed your recordings for years, e.g., the Strong discs, Herrmann's score to Jane Eyre, Honegger's to Les Miserables, film scores by Ibert and Bliss, the lesser known Respighi, and the Fritz Brun symphonies. I expected something really good from your new Pilati disc and was shocked to find the music so uninteresting. I would never have associated it with you. I might have passed it to a "specialist" if it were well known and its quality needed no comment from a reviewer, or if its light music genre were all that was at issue, but neither was the case. My "problem with the [Pilati] pieces" was the music and the conducting. It didn't require a specialist to hear that, so I alerted the reader to my tastes and perspectives, noted there were positive reviews elsewhere, and reviewed it.
As for your comment about "Italian folk music", etc., I was not writing about folk song arrangements. I was reviewing orchestral music that used folk songs or folk style songs as thematic material--like Bartok's Dance Symphony, Kodaly's Hary Janos, Martinu's symphonies, works by Vaughan Williams, Chavez, Villa Lobos, etc. One does not have to be an ethnomusicologist to appreciate what Copland did with `Good Bye Old Paint' in Billy the Kid, what Mahler did with `Frere Jacques' in his First Symphony, or the questions surrounding `Goin' Home' in Dvorak's Ninth. Nor must one analyze a major scale to marvel at what Tchaikovsky created in the `Grand Pas de Deux' from Nutcracker. Knowing those things adds to appreciation, but final judgment rests on the piece as a whole, and that is where I found Pilati wanting. As for his harmonies, let's just say that those of Respighi and Casella are far more sophisticated and interesting.
My proofreading missed the errors of "Antonia" and "Divertimento" (which I at least got right in the heading), and I apologize. "Uncomfortably Russian" referred to the Tarantella, which sounds more Russian than Italian and feels out of place. "Melodies say little" means they are not interesting, compelling, or particularly beautiful. "Sounds square" means, dull, bland, not particularly inventive, routine. Perhaps I should have said those things in the first place. I stand by my review and would advise people to look into your other, far more interesting discs now and into the future.
Sincerely,
Roger Hecht
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Dear Mr. Hecht
Thanks for your explanations.
About the conducting, you should comment such things only by comparing with the scores, to see what exactly I have done with them.
All the best for 2012.
Adriano

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Has anybody ever seen a critic not standing by one of his reviews? The problem Mr. Hecht has with what he calls an apparent Russian inflection of the Tarantella is really strange. Pilati uses there the same devices as Respighi and other Italian composers who orchestrated Napolitain Tarantellas for large orchestra. These devices include exotic intervals and harmonic changes who are traditional. Incidentally. I do not find that this piece feels "out of place" at all; on the contrary, it completes and concludes this Suite effectfully. All three pieces are Neo-Baroque renderings of ancient Napolitain themes. They are, incidentally, the composer's orchestrations of his own three pieces for violin and piano of 1929-1930.
Hecht still admits in his explantions that he "alerted the reader" to his "tastes and perspectives"; which, in my opinion, is just what a reviewer should not do. Reviewer's personal opinions should not be the subject of a review. Reviews should be written by professional musicologists, who are trained to objectivity.
At least, Hecht admits not to like these pieces, but just this is of no interest.
A real pity he still does not (or cannot) explain in detail why he finds my conducting not good enough. Of course I realize not to be a revelation, but I am aware of doing a respectful and sincere job.
Remember Bernard Herrmann's statement about criticism, saying that he would accept judgements only from his peers and not from his inferiors?

Best regards from Zurich/Switzerland
Adriano