Album of the Evening

[graham]

Now available as a 6 CD boxed set.

Heinz Holliger conducts a superb band.

All symphonies are included in addition to overtures and solo works with orchestra. Soloists include Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Dénes Várjon,  Oren Shevlin and Alexander Lonquich.

The sound of the orchestra is very well captured. Reasonable price for 24/48 download.

[christopher3393]

Christmas Music from Medieval and Renaissance Europe

The Sixteen, Harry Christophers

released 1987

 

 

https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA66263

 

Good selection and performances.

[Hugo9000]

I love your new avatar for the joyful holiday season, @christopher3393!

 

[Melvin]

Another classic (1956).

 

[Musicophile]

 

24/44 from Qobuz. 

 

See also here: https://musicophilesblog.com/2015/06/05/can-heaven-be-captured-on-disc-bachs-b-minor-mass-bwv-232/

[christopher3393]

Christmas Carols and Motets

The Tallis Scholars, Peter Phillips (conductor) 

 

 

https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDGIM010

 

"This recording presents three traditional ways of celebrating Christmas in music – medieval carols, Renaissance motets praising the Virgin Mary, and German chorales. The medieval pieces are sung in their original forms, without modern ‘arrangement’. All those performed here are of English provenance and culminate in three versions of the Coventry Carol, which include Byrd’s famous Lullaby. This is followed by four settings of Ave Maria, presented in chronological order of composition: two early Renaissance examples by Josquin des Prés (c.1440–1521) and Verdelot (fl.1520–1550) with two by the great Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria (1548–1611). The last group of pieces is made up of some fine traditional chorale melodies, harmonized by the German composers Hieronymus Praetorius (1560–1629) and Michael Praetorius (c.1571–1621), who were not related to each other, and by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)."

 

NOTE: The 2CD Christmas with The Tallis Scholars includes 12 of the 15 tracks...2 CDs for the price of one:  

 

https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDGIM202

[rando]

Rossini has a been recent favorite. I didn't have a single version of this work and thought a tossed off highlights would suffice to review it. Would be open to suggestions for a full version worth seeking out.

 

This Callas outing is exactly the type of disc I need to stop buying in favor of streaming the one exploratory play through it will probably ever receive. Which I did enjoy without focusing on the Soprano's increasingly adroit posthumous career moves. 

 

[WAM]

An antidote for all the Christmas-hassle:

 

 

[Hugo9000]

Four Thousand Winter

Daniel Taylor/The Trinity Choir

 

[Melvin]

Been revisiting some albums I haven't listened to in a while. This is such a good one:

 

 

GoGo Penguin V2.0

[Musicophile]

Christmas is getting closer.

 

 

FYI, here's my latest review: https://musicophilesblog.com/2018/12/22/christmas-time-is-here-two-more-beautiful-christmas-jazz-compilations/

[rando]

[TAV]

On 12/20/2018 at 5:27 PM, Hugo9000 said:

Four Thousand Winter

Daniel Taylor/The Trinity Choir

 

 

Beautiful,  thanks. 

[crenca]

Tycho's latest, Epoch.  With roots in a low-fi'ish "garage" electronic scene, most of Tycho's work is not true "audiophile" quality.  I generally listen to them over bluetooth when working out, but Epoch is sounding good (if not great) through the hi-fi...

 

 

[crenca]

On 12/18/2018 at 9:47 AM, sphinxsix said:

Shai Maestro Trio - Live at Bimhuis, Amsterdam (22.11.218).

 

 

Streaming from :
Bimhuis Radio

More Bimhuis concerts here:

 

 

 

What an annoying site.  Agree to tracking or no music for you.  

 

Love Shai Maestro however, just not enough this evening...

[Hugo9000]

George Frideric Handel

Dixit Dominus

 

This glorious masterpiece, a setting of the Latin text of Psalm 110, was written in April of 1707, when Handel was 22.  This is far and away my favorite performance:

[Melvin]

[Melvin]

Groovy ..

 

[sphinxsix]

A great album, one of my favorite ones from Tzadik label.

.

 

[Norton]

Discovered on Tidal, a different RVW symphony cycle with plenty of muscle and menace:

 

 

https://tidal.com/album/30071768

 

[christopher3393]

Friday eve winter solstice listening:

 

John Tavener: Total Eclipse. Agraphon

Academy of Ancient Music / Paul Goodwin - Conductor

 

 

 

Tavener's notes: http://www.musicsalesclassical.com/composer/work/11842

 

https://www.qobuz.com/us-en/album/tavener-total-eclipse-agraphon-the-academy-of-ancient-music-paul-goodwin/0093046727123

 

"John Tavener’s ability to arrest the listener’s ear is nowhere more apparent than in the extraordinary opening pages of Total Eclipse. The work, Tavener tells us, is an esoteric contemplation on the word metanoia – meaning ‘change of mind’ or ‘conversion’ – and Tavener uses the conversion of St Paul on the road to Damascus in order to give the work structure and meaning." -Gramophone

 

Total Eclipse is a difficult piece and has received mixed reviews from lofty praise to scorching critique.

There are SACDs floating around, but I didn't find high-res download.

 

 

[christopher3393]

Last night's listening:

 

Thomas Tallis (c1505-1585): The Tallis Christmas Mass

The Tallis Scholars, Peter Phillips (conductor) 

 

 

https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDGIM034

"Our fourth disc dedicated to the music of Thomas Tallis contains two of his most substantial masterpieces – the seven-part Christmas Mass Puer natus est nobis and the antiphon Ave, Dei patris filia. Not long ago neither of these pieces could have been recorded: the manuscripts for some of the voice-parts were missing, believed to be lost forever. It is a privilege to put such significant works together on disc for the first time.

Tallis’s Missa Puer natus est nobis, based on the Christmas plainchant of the same name, is the most elaborate setting of the Ordinary to come from England in the middle of the sixteenth century; it is also by far the most elaborate by Tallis himself. Its scale is determined by the way the plainchant is distributed through the polyphony. This is done in quite exceptionally long notes, always in the tenor, in a style which had been popular in England (and elsewhere) early in the century but of which no example from later than about 1540 is otherwise known. The cantus firmus thus makes the movements lengthy in performance; but Tallis’s music is also substantial vertically, requiring an unusual choir of seven voices, scored mean, mean, alto, alto, tenor, bass, bass. Since all these voices are used almost continuously – there are no scorings down to trios and quartets as was customary in earlier festal masses – the cumulative effect really is massive. In our interpretation, we have encouraged this in-built sonority to speak for itself by making the phrases as spacious as possible."

 

This wonderful Christmas mass is included in the 2CD Christmas with The Tallis Scholars: https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDGIM202

[Hugo9000]

It's still unsettling in a way to see anyone other than Christopher Hogwood leading the Academy of Ancient Music, just as it is for anyone other than Trevor Pinnock to lead The English Concert!  I find that both ensembles have now lost part of what gave them each a distinctive "voice" compared to other orchestras.  Oh, well, time marches on, and I'm grateful for Trevor Pinnock's solo work since he stepped down from The English Concert.  Not sure what Christopher Hogwood is doing now, I guess I'll have to "google" him lol

[accwai]

16 minutes ago, Hugo9000 said:

[...] Not sure what Christopher Hogwood is doing now, I guess I'll have to "google" him lol

 

 

[Hugo9000]

Thank you, @accwai    I don't have a huge number of his recordings, but his Beethoven Symphony cycle is my favorite overall, edging out Gardiner's for me.