News:

BEFORE POSTING read our Guidelines.

Main Menu
Menu

Show posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.

Show posts Menu

Messages - Fidelio84

#1
Quote from: Delicious Manager on Monday 30 April 2012, 12:35
Apologies. I'm afraid I am very dismissive of Hovhaness' music. ... all of Hovhaness' music sounds more or less the same - rather like a half-decent film score, with very little structural, harmonic or thematic integrity. It is floss, pure and simple. I truly believe that, in this case, the composer has spread himself (or rather, his mediocre talant) far too thinly.

Much of it (yes there are 400 works I believe) is not "floss" and Hovhaness's music certainly DOESN'T all sound "more or less the same".  I've been re-discovering his music of late, and I cannot think of a SINGLE American composer whose music is more DIVERSE.  For example, if you hear symphonies 9, 10 and 11, you could be forgiven for thinking they were by three different composers - you can't say that about many symphonists!  9 sounds folkish, 10 sounds ethnic Indian, and 11 is steeped in a sort of Sibelius/Vaughan Williams-like romanticism.

Quote from: Delicious Manager on Monday 30 April 2012, 12:35
If he had written, say a quarter (or even less) of the number of works he did, maybe (just maybe) there would be at least one memorable or truly remarkable piece. As it stands, I have to confess to having yet to find anything that deserves repeated listening.

I agree he wrote too much, which watered down the overall quality.  But that "memorable or truly remarkable piece" for many is certainly Mysterious Mountain (Symphony #2) which must have been recorded by at least 6 of our major orchestras (under such notables as Fritz Reiner, John Williams, Andrew Litton, Gerard Schwarz, etc).  I dont think such conductors would have gone near "floss"  ;)

Can I recommend giving Mysterious Mountain serious listening - it seems to mesmerize a lot of people, and with just cause.  His xylophone concerto Fantasy on Japanese Woodprints is also very attractive, if more lightweight.