So all the Halloween candy has been disbursed (and we've yet to stock up on Decemberween weevils yet), and so Maddie and I settled back to listen to WRR play their Halloween special, which's a panoply of pieces that they adjudged appropriate -- first up, was the Toccata from Bach's Tocatta and Fugue in D Minor. That's kinda cool, although I've always thought the fugue was the cool part, I can see the "evil-scary" purpose of putting the 1st part in. But this was something of the conductor's own arranging: a mixture of Bach's version for organ and Leopold Stokowski's rendition for symphony orchestra.
And it sucked. Chuped. Choked on the big one. I mean, lemme ask one sovereign question to put it in perspective: how does anyone who has half a clue as to what they're doing arrange Bach to be sluggish and leaden?
It was almost as bad as the Bolshoi's rendition of Khatchaturian's Masquerade Waltz, aka, to quote Maddie, "You'd think the Russians could conduct a Russian". It nearly stood up to the vicious Chicken of Bristol. It was almost enough for me to want "MTT" back. Almost.
6 comments:
No argument. I used to listen to that station, but the local conductors all seem to suck. In fact, it seems like all the contemporary conductors suck: MTT's claim to fame is, what, that he's good at promoting himself?
I'm hoping Las Colinas will be better, but the first way you can tell that classical is in trouble is to look at how pathetic the conductors seem to be lately.
One of the reaasons I decided not to experience the Beethoven series of the DSO was precisely because , as we discussed ah so often, none of the contemporary conductors this side of the pond is able to play him the way he intended his pieces to be played. I am totally spoiled by my home country's, Austria's and Germany's classical performances with which I grew up.
I have a recording by Zander that you might like. In general, I concur.
That'd be cool; thank you! I got some that are actually to tempo, but I had to look far and wide to find them, and they are not US orchestras or conductors...
Litton tends to over-tempo marches and attempts to draw out melodies to the point of despair.
Compare their recording of the Russian Sailors Dance(Red Poppy) and the Marche Hongroise (Damnation of Faust) and you'll see what I mean. The sailors dance sounds like a death in the family and the hungarian march is all chipper. What the hell?
And you're right - Eastern Europe is about the only remaining place you can hear a piece the way it should be done.
Several of the commenters disparaged American conductors and cited that as a reason not to hear the DSO Beethoven series. This is clearly an excellent example of failure to do your homework: the conductors for the Beethoven series are: G Varga (Hungarian), M Stenz (German), J van Sweeden (Dutch) and J. Belohlavek (Czech). OOPS!!! Don't sound off until you know what you are saying!!
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