Waghalter's Violin Music Released by Naxos

[JimL]

Got my copy today.  I can hardly wait!

[Alan Howe]

Good news from David Green:

In its current list of Naxos "Best Seller" CDs, the Waghalter recording is Number 29! Considering the enormous number of CDs released each week by Naxos, this is an impressive result -- all the more so when one considers that this is a recording of a composer, dead for more than 60 years, whose work had been so totally forgotten. It is evident that Waghalter's melodic genius is evoking a significant response among music lovers.

Naxos has also included the Waghalter CD among its "Critics Choice" list for January 2013.

http://www.naxos.com/best_sellers.asp
http://www.naxos.com/feature/Critics_Choice_January_2013.asp

[JimL]

Anybody notice right below the Waghalter?  The CD listed is the complete Rossini overtures, but the one pictured is Sarasate music for Violin and Orchestra.

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Actually, Jim, it is called 'creative marketing' - give the punter a slight puzzle to solve, and when they do so they're more likely to purchase the product.

Further down, the image of the English Viola Music CD by Sarah-Jane Bradley and Christian Wilson is also out of place.

Ignore my frivolity! I'm really intrigued by the fact that Waghalter comes in at 29. Absolutely great news, of course, that it does. But, and this is the question, why? Waghalter is clearly not a household name - the man in the street doesn't go out with the intention of bagging a Waghalter in his christmas shopping. I also have the impression that the publicity given to the CD by Naxos is no more and no less than any other of their numerous releases. And apart from jubilant whoops of delight in places like this forum, there isn't any reason to suppose the release of this CD is some kind of major cultural phenomenon.

So why the successful sales? The only possible explanation is that the general public out there have become more knowledgeable and discriminating. The public must keep an alert eye out for things of real musical significance. And, if true, that's wonderful for it allows us to be a little more optimistic about the success of sales and projects with all the other composers that we care so much about.

[petershott@btinternet.com]

This chap clearly can't be quiet! I know that most on the site respond to Eduard Franck with somewhat less enthusiasm than I do, but I am delighted to note the recent Naxos Franck disc comes in at 15. Splendid! Do give Franck a chance - his music is much more than the pretty confectionery that it is sometimes reputed to be. It is wonderfully well crafted music from this composer who moved in the Mendelssohn - Schumann circle and intent on composing within traditional forms.

[jerfilm]

For what it's worth, Peter, you're not alone.  I really like the E Franck works (and Richard, too, for that matter).   They may not be "profound' - whatever that means- but they're a darned good listen.

Jerry

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Thank you Jerry! You are clearly a man with a highly developed sensibility. Alas both of us will doubtless have to face the firing squad for going way off a Waghalter thread. Awrgh, hell!

[eschiss1]

It's been years since they began, but I'm still occasionally a bit flabbergasted(?) that Naxos is recording some of this music (a lot of it). Way off their original schedule. Often very well and all to the good and no complaint from me. Just pleasantly very surprised. Anyhow, back to the thread. Sorry.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Having at last found time to listen to the Naxos recording, I must say that this music fares much better in the fuller, richer sound of the RPO than it did in the under-nourished orchestral sounds I heard at the Cadogan Hall concert at which, as Mark and Alan will testify, I was not as enthusiastic as I had hoped to be.  This work is no forgotten masterpiece, but it is beautifully written for the instrument and contains lots of gorgeous, late-Romantic lyricism which makes it a joy to hear when presented in the sumptuous colours and textures intended by the composer.  It really is important with forgotten works to give them the best possible advocacy - otherwise, many listeners will just shrug and say: "Well, I'm not surprised it was forgotten!" I hope Jarvi will do this for Raff because his recording of the Symphony No. 2 really makes the music leap out at you and will surely convince doubters of Raff's importance as a serious composer of real merit in a way that some of the recordings of the symphonies we have hitherto enjoyed (and we have enjoyed them - no doubt of that - and are grateful to those conductors and orchestras who have given them to us) are unlikely to do to nearly the same extent..

[eschiss1]

even better-known music could use being treated much less routinely- but really, agreed.

[DavidWGreen]

First of all, let me again express my appreciation for the interest this site has shown in the progress of the Naxos release of my grandfather's  Violin Concerto (and other music for the violin). In a recent posting, Peter Schott writes:

"So why the successful sales? The only possible explanation is that the general public out there have become more knowledgeable and discriminating. The public must keep an alert eye out for things of real musical significance. And, if true, that's wonderful for it allows us to be a little more optimistic about the success of sales and projects with all the other composers that we care so much about."

I share Peter's optimism. For decades, it seemed unimaginable that my grandfather's music would be publicly performed, let alone be recorded by an orchestra of the stature of the RPO and released by a label such as Naxos. And yet, suddenly, events moved with incredible speed. In 2009 I was contacted by the extraordinary musician Irmina Trynkos. Within little more than a year and a half, I found myself witnessing the recording my grandfather's music. Before Alexander Walker raised his baton on March 15, 2011 (the 130th anniversary of Ignatz' birth), I had never heard any of my grandfather's music with orchestration. "Is this really happening?," I wondered. Then, in  the autumn of 2012, the recording was released. And through some incredible process of word of mouth, the CD seems to have found a substantial and appreciative audience. Yes, the music is beautiful. But it always was, and yet it languished unheard for such a long time. So many things had to happen for the music to come to life again. But all these "things" involved people taking an interest in the sort of, excuse me if I use the word, "beautiful" music that critics and academics have deprecated for decades. Irmina had to take an interest. Alex had to take an interest. The RPO had to take an interest. Naxos had to take an interest. Yes, so many people had to take an interest, including the many writers and readers of this invaluable web site, and now, finally, the music lovers who are responding to Waghalter's music.

What does this tell us? The sudden presence of a critical mass of "interested" listeners suggests that we are witnessing a shift in musical aesthetics. Waghalter's "success," however modest it may appear, is one of the many signs of the deep dissatisfaction of the music-loving public with the self-absorbed, demoralized, elitist ("who cares what the masses like") and frequently unlistenable music that has enthralled so many academics for decades. There is a new openness and receptivity to unknown and unsung composers who, for a vast complex of historical and cultural reasons, were thrust aside and forgotten. But the roots of melodicism are too deeply embedded in musical history and human emotion to be eradicated forever. The rediscovery of the old masters of melodicism -- and I suspect that Waghalter will not be the only beneficiary of this process -- will provide inspiration for a new generation of musicians who will champion this idiom and raise it to new heights.

[petershott@btinternet.com]

I'm rather touched, David, that the grandson of this fine composer has become a participant in discussions on the Forum. An especially warm welcome to you! And I do hope you'll keep us posted of future Waghalter happenings.

[eschiss1]

I'm interested in both the supposedly "unlistenable" music in question and in Romantic music that has fallen through the cracks but have come to think that, well, trying to get people to realize that the classical audience isn't so large that we can pit parts of the audience one against the other without "hang together, or hang separately!" coming to mind, is more than a bit of a lost cause itself.