www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3VDGnxq8sk (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3VDGnxq8sk) - ROFL, as they say ;D.
It's not funny...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSwFQl7UI9Y (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSwFQl7UI9Y)
IT'S PAINFUL!
But Elmo thinks DH is funny...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5saiwm_zuo (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5saiwm_zuo)
Boulez is neither painful nor funny but - boring (also as conductor).
I don't like Hurvitz much. I find his manner patronising (and a bit weird) even when I find what he says interesting. But I forgive him everything for this video. Brilliant and IMHO, right.
Please don't generalize der79 sebas!
Just listen to Boulez's last Ravel and Debussy recordings he made for Deutsche Grammophon. He has never before been as sensual and imaginative as that in his whole life! These recordings are a revelation! I also find his Bartok box for DGG and his earlier Schoenberg and Webern collections for CBS milestones. I am only disappointed by his Mahler.
And in my opinion, he made one of the best recordings of Stravinsky's "Sacre" and "Firebird" (in both earlier CBS and later DGG versions). Although I find Bernstein's "Sacre" (both CBS versions, not the later DGG one) a stroke of genius, Boulez stuns me every time I follow them with the scores, to be surprised what everything he was able to "sort out" with his orchestras - and with what great precision!
And some of Boulez's original compositions are very valuable and important too. "Le Marteau sans Maître" and "Le Soleil des eauxs" are masterworks - at the same time very original and epoch-making. They are just not of your taste, that's why perhaps you find them "boring".
I don't find Boulez boring as a conductor - but I do find his music very difficult (and I have tried hard). A lot of 12-tone and aleatoric music is worth persevering with - Schoenberg, for example, Stockhausen, Hans Werner Henze... but Boulez I just can't seem to grasp.
I had the '60s recording he made of the Rite of Spring and Firebird which was my introduction to Stravinsky. A fine recording indeed.
This thread disappoints but does not surprise me. There's always been an unwritten codicil to our (last-few-years) rules that one may not praise, analyze, talk about, discuss etc. music sufficiently outside of our orbit here _except to disparage it_.
Unwritten laws, eschiss1, can be a weapon for both Liberals and Tyrants... :-)
Thanks Adriano for the recommendations. I only know the conductor Boulez with Mahler and never bothered to go any further; so I will try his Ravel!
The 3-CD DGG album "Pierre Boulez, 3 Classic Albums" has been deleted in the meantime, but there is a 2-CD low-priced album available, which excludes the Piano Concertos and Valses nobles et sentimentales:
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/Maurice-Ravel-1875-1937-Daphnis-et-Chloe-Ges-Aufn/hnum/9699128
On the other hand, there is a Debussy-Ravel box, which includes all his DGG recordings:
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/Pierre-Boulez-dirigert-Ravel-Debussy/hnum/2350129
Still, Boulez's earlier CBS Debussy and Ravel recordings are very valuabe too!
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/conducts-ravel/hnum/8278530
(The Debussy has been deleted too)
I remember Boulez' recording of the Ravel piano concertos with Zimerman. Much as I appreciate Zimerman, he seemed so unsuited for this repertoire and the orchestral accompaniment was just leaden.
Ahem! This thread is about Boulez the composer, as disparaged by DH. Not Boulez the conductor!
I freely admit that I don't know very much about Boulez the composer, but I would never have expected to be reading about him on a forum
Quotefor the open-minded lover of music from the romantic era
...
I seem to have opened a can of worms here, for which I apologise. I just thought Hurwitz' video funny, in the context of all his others...
Dont' worry Mark :-)
We are but human beings and that's the great fun about it.
One might argue that UC exists to counter Boulez's compositional credo, i.e. that all music prior to his brand of revolutionary modernism had been superseded. Strange to think that he actually conducted some of this reactionary stuff! All revolutions, of course, eventually devour their own children. Boulez left music nowhere to go...
In my view his "music" is Stockhausen with the piano as the synthesizer.
Listen to his own piano pieces, Justin, then you may realize how wrong you are!
The fact that pianists like Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Maurizio Pollini, the Kontarsky brothers and others performed it, speaks for itself.
And to all those who have a bad opinion of Boulez because they do not like (or do not understand) his music, I strongly recommend his 60 minutes' interview with Claude Samuel of October 2011. In there one can also learn his ideas about conducting and what a modest person he was! It also exists in English translation, but not in the internet. It's a bonus disc of DGG's Boulez Edition box.
And, as a teacher in conducting, in my opinion he was one of the best of his generation. In my younger years I could not afford to play his masterclasses, but could attend one class as a guest. All my colleagues who studied with him were enthusiastic.
That's why you're the conductor Adriano, and David Hurwitz and I are not. ;D
I heard one of his sonatas and that's just what came to mind. Hurwitz has probably heard all of it.
QuoteThe fact that pianists like Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Maurizio Pollini, the Kontarsky brothers and others performed it, speaks for itself.
With respect, it doesn't. Maybe there's always someone willing to believe that the Emperor actually has clothes on when in reality he is naked. Maybe they're simply dupes...
Where I agree, however, is that Boulez was a fine conductor with an extraordinary ear for sonority and detail.
Boulez's three Sonatas were written in 1946, 1950 and 1957, meaning that they are earlier works. The Second is inspired by various poems and paintings; the Third refers to Franz Kafka.
The abovementioned pianists were all other than musical prostitutes.
Here a short introduction:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_sonatas_(Boulez)
And here soemthing on Idil Biret's Naxos CD:
https://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=8.553353
https://www.naxos.com/mainsite/blurbs_reviews.asp?item_code=8.553353&catNum=553353&filetype=About%20this%20Recording&language=English
I consider it unfair to disapprove music pieces one has never heard.
And (incidentally) the fact that those pieces are "anyway, too difficult to play, so just leave it" is also unfair; it could also be applied to Alkan's works.
I promise to remain silent now on this theme in here... I see it does not make sense to continue trying to awaken some interest for music requiring more brain work and patience (in a way, Fritz Brun's Symphony also may show such aspects). Even if it's beyond the restrictions of this website, it could be refreshing to remind that we have already reached the 21st century and that our ears and brains could do with a bit of adventure; this could eventually make it possible to become able to hear our favourite Romantics with different ears and appreciation...
OK, I started this thread as a bit of fun and it threatens to be anything but that, so I'm closing it now.