I got a HAUL mid last month and I’ve finally listened to all of it. I have some more listening to do with these discs before it will be time to make a birthday run to the used record store with my best friend, with weed and Mike’s Deli, for another 30 clearance discs for only $34.99:

• J.S. Bach: Complete Cantatas, Vol. 6 (BWV 76, 75, 190, 179, 59, 69, 50, 186, 104, 69a)
• J.S. Bach: Cantatas, Vol. 13 (BWV 1, 62, 96, 38, 93, 33, 133, 122, 92)
• J.S. Bach: Cantatas, Vol. 14 (BWV 68, 6, 74, 126, 26, 125, 178, 103, 42, 123)
  Soloists; The Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra and Chorus/Ton Koopman
  Erato D 225470 (1997)
  Erato CC72215 (2000)
  Erato CC72205 (2001)

Good HIP Bach, good music. I don’t have any particular highlights but I like to throw on a disc at random every now and then – a standard listening session for me is two CDs, and you can do worse than pairing a featured work/”main event” with a disc of cantatas. I’m not an expert on these things but the early and later volumes sound very different, the latter being warmer and more closely miked.

• Orgelwerke, Vol. 2 (Prelude & Fugue C-minor (BWV 549), Chorale “Schmücke dich, o liebe Seele”, Trio Sonata C-Major, Concerto after Vivaldi A-minor, Chorale “An Wasserflüssen Babylon, Prelude & Fugue C-minor (BWV 546))
• Orgelwerke, Vol. 3 (Doric Toccata & Fugue, Partita “Sei gegrüsset, Jesu gutig”, Fantasie G-Major, Trio Sonata G-Major, Chorale “Vater unser in Himmelreich”, Chorale “Jesu Christus, unser Heiland”, Prelude & Fugue A-minor)
• Orgelwerke, Vol. 4 (Prelude & Fugue G-Major, Chorale “Liebster Jesu, wir sind hier”, Fugue G-minor (BWV 578), Chorale “Wir glauben all’ an einen Gott, Vater”, Pastorale F-Major, Chorale “O Lamm Gottes”, Fantasy C-minor (BWV 562), Trio: “Herr Jesu Christ”, Passacaglia & Fugue C-minor)
  Ton Koopman, organ
  Novalis 150 020-2 (1988)
  Novalis 150 036-2 (1988)
  Novalis 150 052-2 (1990)

These are three programs of Bach organ music meant to be listened to as albums, rather than encyclopediae or sets. You’ll have a loud organ showpiece, say a prelude and fugue, a couple chorale preludes, a virtuosic piece, a set of variations or trio sonata, and send them home with another loud showpiece. They’re programmed terrifically and this has been my favorite Bach organ music. I’m sure if I looked for it there are probably abundant Bach organ recital CDs out there but the other organ stuff I have is a reference book of a CD set.

• J.S. Bach - The Great Organ Works: D-minor Toccata & Fugue, Fugue G-minor BWV 578, “St. Anne” Prelude & Fugue, “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring”, C-Major Toccata, Adagio & Fugue, Chorale “Ich ruf’ zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ”, C-minor Passacaglia & Fugue
  Naxos 8.553859 (1988, 93-95, 1999)

Eh, it has a good range and scope and includes all the big ones, but I’m not really satisfied with this CD. For one thing, the cover is plain and minimalist, and an album of the most killer Bach cuts should have a kickass cover. But the way organist Wolfgang Rübsam writhes and grimaces through the first chords of the D-minor Toccata & Fugue reveals that this is going to be a decidedly Romantic, mass-appeal interpretation. Fine, it’s a perfectly legitimate way to present Bach, but I prefer a little more emotional subtlety having accumulated some taste. E. Power Biggs did this kind of thing better.

• Bartók - Violin Concertos 1 & 2
  Midori; Berliner Philharmoniker/Zubin Mehta
  Sony Classical SK 45941 (1990)

The first concerto is consistently lyrical for about 20 minutes, but it’s the second where Bartók sounds like Bartók. The slow movement is a chaconne. I love chaconnes and passacaglias. They’re so fucking cool stoned. All variations are. In addition, the outer movements have rustic fire.

• Bax - “Spring Fire” Symphony, Symphonic Scherzo, Northern Ballad No. 2
  Royal Philharmonic Orchestra/Vernon Handley
  Chandos CHAN 8464 (1988)

I used to have a box set of Bax’ seven symphonies, filled out with the tone poem “Tintagel”. I wonder why not “Spring Fire”? Bax himself designates it “‘Spring Fire’, Symphony”. Anyway it’s a programmatic sinfonietta depicting the day from the twilight before dawn to night – as best as he can in 30 minutes – with lush and effubrious but not hard-edged orchestration. The two other pieces just sound like orchestral Bax. Not the mysterious, knotty, pagan Bax of the symphonies, but a bright and overridingly pastoral disposition, firmly on harmonic terra firma.

• Bax - Piano Works, Vol. 3: Russian Tone Pictures, The Maiden and the Daffodil, The Princess’ Rose-Garden, Apple-Blossom Time, On a May Evening, et al
  Eric Parkin
  Chandos CHAN 8732 (1990)

The first Russian Tone Picture is titled “Nocturne (May-Night in the Ukraine)”. Ouch in Kyiv (Kiev?). The second Tchaikovsky symphony is subtitled “Little Russian”, after a Ukrainian melody appearing in it, “Little Russia” being another name for Ukraine – that’s like there being a ’50s rock and roll classic called “Colored People” in retrospect.

• Berlioz - Messe Solennelle (premiere recording)
  Soloists; Monteverdi Choir, Orchestre Révolutionaire et Romantique/John Eliot Gardiner
  Philips D 102949 (1994)

I didn’t have this one from Colin Davis’ ’60s Berlioz cycle because it hadn’t been discovered at the time. The Gratias was reworked into “Scène aux champs” from the Symphonie Fantastique (I’ve seen that called the first modern explicitly psychedelic music but that’s probably wrong; there was probably a musical Thomas Morley). Some of the other music in the symphony may have appeared elsewhere also, but if they have I don’t know where. The guy wrote a fairly small amount of key music and I’m more familiar with it than most people, but there’s a lot I’m unfamiliar with of his major works.

• Muzio Clementi (1752-1832) - Piano Works: Capriccios 1,4; Sonata Op. 40 No. 3; 7 Monferrinas
  Lilya Züberstein
  Hänssler SWR CD 93.096

He was an adult when Beethoven was born and outlived him by five years. Beethoven’s musical environment was Clementi’s, though in a separate musical sphere (London instead of Vienna).

• Johan Halvorsen (1864-1935) - Symphony No. 2 (“Fate”); Scenes From Norwegian Tales, Air Norvégien, Norwegian Dances 1-3, Veslemøy’s Song
  Terje Tønnesen (violin, 3-5); Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra/Karsten Andersen
  Norwegian Cultural Council NKFCD 50014-2 (1988)

Typical late 19th century nationalism, listenable. Wonderfully evocative slow movement to the symphony – it sounds ripped from a 101 Most Relaxing Adagios CD set you used to see in Borders and which now pollute thrift shops.

• Handel - Deidamia
• Soloists; Il Complesso Barocco/Alan Curtis
  Virgin Veritas 5 45669 2

Speaking of Ulisse. I took a nap to the second disc of this and in my half-conscious state I was very aware of just how many long melismatic runs on open vowels there are in Baroque opera. Handel’s operas are a different animal from his oratorios; they’re the secular “madrigals” to the oratorios’ sacred “motets” both in sound/presentation and in urbanity.

• Ives - Piano Sonata No. 2 (“Concord, Mass. 1840-60”)
  Gilbert Kalish
  Elektra Nonesuch 9 781337-2 (1977)

I’ve gotten so used to digital the last handful of years, when it’s been CD-only, that it’s almost startling to hear noticeable tape hiss. I had never actually heard the “Concord” sonata, but only knew of it as a byword for pianological difficulty. Honestly, the subject matter has never appealed to me: it’s named for four New England writers who I suppose center on that Massachusetts city in the middle decades of the 19th century. This is probably easy Jeopardy-level common knowledge but I could never be fucked about American lit in school. We were still basically a backwater (insert obligatory reflexive anti-American joke about how we still are here) and we clung to our one little philosopho-literary school as if it were the Works and Days. As I get older I want to read Emerson and Whitman, both of whom I’ve effectively neglected (if I read any for school I don’t remember it), for no other reason than that I feel dangerously ignorant of early American lit – I would indeed get shredded in a “Concord, Mass. 1840-60” category on Jeopardy. I have read The House of the Seven Gables. It was one of the most slowly-paced books I have ever read. It was also one of the most worth it.

One of the funny things about the “Concord” is that Ives lived into the LP age, so he was aware that a pianist (1) only needed to be able to play the sonata once for people to hear it a limitless number of time, or (2) failing that, with recently-developed (by Nazi Germany) magnetic tape editing, splicing, and overdubbing, record the different musical parts and assemble them into a whole. This must have influenced his writing. Oddly, there wasn’t a rush of “armchair LP compositions” as you might have thought – the musical medium was “mature” by that point.

• Lord Berners (1883-1950) - The Triumph of Neptune, L’Uomo dai Baffi, Valses bourgeoises, Polka
  English Northern Philharmonia, Royal Ballet Sinfonia/David Lloyd-Jones
  Marco Polo 8.223711 (1996)

The album packaging has very little information about this aristocratic enigma, even leaving his name as just “Lord Berners”. The onomastic mystery here writes two ballets worth of music, which are… good, I guess? I don’t really like ballet except when it’s lush (Tchaikovsky) or exotic (Falla). It’s ok. I’ll probably never put this on again and if in a post-apocalyptic world where people trade used CDs like money, I’d be willing to let it go for a titty grab.

• Mozart - La Clemenza di Tito
  Philip Langridge, Lucia Popp, Ruth Ziesak, Ann Murray, Delores Ziegler; Chor und Orchester der Oper Zürich/Nikolaus Harnoncourt
  Teldec 4509-90857-2 (1993)

Just like I never had a Led Zeppelin phase, I never got into the Magic Flute. I now own all seven of Mozart’s mature operas (Idomeneo, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Le Nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, Così fan tutte, Die Zauberflöte, La Clemenza di Tito). I’ve only spun it once, and without the libretto or any synopsis (I’m actually not familiar with this episode in Roman history – the emperor Titus ruled in a not-very-dramatic time in Roman history and I know or remember very little of him).

The music is good. It’s good late-Mozart opera; there are no huge highlights but there are some nice ensemble pieces, and an aria towards the end of the first disc with prominent clarinets. I’ll have to give it a bit more attention later. I still haven’t listened to Die Zauberflöte libretto in hand. Once I got past a certain point in listening to opera it’s like I said fuck it with the meaning of the words and just listened to the music raw, with maybe a glance at a synopsis.

• Paganini - Violin Concerto No. 1; Spohr, whether you call him Ludwig, Louis, or Luigi - Violin Concerto No. 8
  Hilary Hahn; Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra/Eiji Oue
  Deutsche Grammophon B0007186-02 (2006)

Concerto recordings of big-name soloists often have the most random, C-list accompaniment. I’ve never heard of either orchestra or conductor – and you’d think with a three-letter name, all of them vowels, Oue would stick in my head.

This is an awfully confident, outgoing concerto, isn’t it? With all the glittering and the thudding drums and crashing cymbals it’s a good workout/showpiece for your stereo system (come back Jamie, I messaged him and he said he’d be back but was real busy). It probably also really pisses off your downstairs neighbor, too (we hold each other in mutual contempt to begin with).

• Ravel - Piano Concerto in G Major, Piano Concerto (for the left hand); Honegger, Françaix - Concertinos
  Jean-Yves Thibaudet; Orchestre symphonique de Montréal/Charles Duroit
  London 452 446-2 (1995)

I picked this up under the impression that I had not heard a Ravel piano concerto, or that I had particularly liked the Concerto in G or something like that. Well joke’s on me, I always thought that concerto was less than the sum of its parts. The movements individually are fine but the outer-movements-and-adagio sandwich goes together like pastrami and jelly. The left-hand concerto is necessarily limited but as a big rumbling blustery thing, it’s… there. Françaix and especially Honegger are something else entirely. I’ve heard the name Honegger almost since I started listening to classical music (he wasn’t in the Top 101 Works book I was going off of) and I’m sure somewhere in my vast collection I have more of him. I’ll have to take a look.

This CD has STUPIDLY wide dynamic range. This is why not all dynamic compression is bad. You shouldn’t have to have your ears blown off by the fortissimi just because you turned it loud enough to hear the quiet parts comfortably.

• Schubert - Symphonies 3, 5, 6a
  Royal Philharmonic Orchestra/Sir Thomas Beecham
  EMI Studio CDM 7 69750 2 (1960, a1956)

This is a blast from the past. It was an old favorite of mine for the few months I lived at a certain place, so it’s very definitely a when-and-where CD for me, and where I was in my development as a listener. I had found the 2006 Gramophone guide in 2008 and it took over from the Top 101 book as my rudder, but this particular CD wasn’t from that book. It’s the first stereo recordings of these particular works, and they’re terrific – just bold and assertively alive.

• Schumann - Davidsbündlertänze, Papillons
  Christian Zacharias
  EMI Classics 5 65464 2 (1976)

Not to imply that Zacharias is B-tier or chopped liver, but I had never heard of him until this CD, and I have a large classical LP collection – 1000 or so albums (including some 50 operas), hundreds from the ’50s/’early ’60s “Golden Age of Hi-Fi” and following ’60s, ’70s, and early ’80s “new wave” of classical artists, some of whom are still active today. I’ve digitized all my classical vinyl. I did the metadata; I typed every one of the millions of keystrokes (many of them being “Ctrl V enter” – aka “the troll trill”). Christian Zacharias is among none of my thousand classical LPs or several hundred CDs.

The Davidsbündlertänze are variants on a common thread and like all variants reward close listening while high, in the dark.

• Schumann - aPiano Concerto, bCarnaval; cMacDowell - Sea Piece No. 3 (“A.D. 1620”); dGriffes - Roman Sketches: “The White Peacock”
  Dame Myra Hess, aOrchestra/Walter Goehr
  a1937, b1938, c1931, d1928

It’s funny given my history that I’ve never particularly cared for the Schumann concerto. It’s more interesting as a departure from period norms than for its actual musical content. Grieg did it all better and added Balls of stone fury with a capital B, and churned out his own A minor piano concerto, which was the first classical work I “liked on my own”, if that makes sense, after a lifetime of casual contact, when I was 18. (I also had a copy of the Sviatoslav Richter Pictures at an Exhibition I found in a thrift shop when I was 16. First, that wasn’t totally original (though I’ve heard the ELP bastardization – nah, they’re having fun with other people’s music; musicians and composers have done that forever; let them enjoy themselves – all of maybe once), and second, it was just another album to me.

Carnaval is one of those works that I want very badly to like more than I do. I bought this CD for it, and I feel like it’s his most “finished” piano work, but frankly as the Davidsbundler goes, give me the Tänze any day. It’s amazing how much detail is in those old grooves in these transfers. It sounds really realistic, like it’s right in the room with you, under an undation of surface noise.

• Scriabin - Poème-Nocturne, Vers la flamme, Fantasy Op. 28; Prokofiev - Sonata Nos. 4 & 8, Légende, Visions fugitives, pieces from “Cinderella”; Shostakovich - Prelude & Fugue No. 14, 17, 15, 4, 12, 22
  Sviatoslav Richter
  Philips 438 627-2

There’s no question this disc is really the pick of the whole HAUL. Three very different Russian composers contributing each in his own way – Scriabin the crazed mystic, Prokofiev the dancer, and Shostakovich the conservatoirien – writing great music, recorded live. Both Scriabin tracks about fire (“Vers la flamme” and the second of “2 Danses”) are the highlight of his part of the disc. The Prokofiev sonatas are nice to have, but I found I actually have a box of them I never fully absorbed. Disc 1, through the Prokofiev sonatas, is a great program and I see myself getting to know it better.

Disc 2 is a little harder to recommend as anything other than listening to after the first disc. The Shostakovich is nice, though the program is too quiet and if the AC is up in the room I had to strain to hear much of it half the time. The “Visions fugitives” are “variants on a common thread” as the Davidsbündlertänze, but for some reason Richter omits some of them to present us a bunch of dances.

• Mark-Anthony Turnage (b.1960) - Orchestral Works: Momentum, aKai, bThree Screaming Popes (after Francis Bacon), Drowned Out
  aUlrich Helnen (vc); City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, aBirmingham Contemporary Music Group/Simon “Don’t Call Me ‘Sir’” Rattle
  EMI Classics British Composers CDC 5 5555091 2 (1994, 1992)

The second youngest composer in my collection, after Thomas Adès. He writes in an orchestral idiom in conventional contemporary tonality and writes big blocks of music that shift and subtly mutate, with kaleidoscopic orchestration. Idiomatically he’s a lot like Adès, if that means anything to you. This would be a good classical CD for a teenage rock fan to discover. Imagine like the Twilight Zone “Things You Need” episode: you walk up to a kid with the Rush naked-butt-and-star logo on his T-shirt. Take that copy of Scenes From a Memory from his hand.

“No, wait, kid. You’re going down the wrong path. Take this. Go. Listen. Then await further orders and practice your marksmanship and skill with volatile substances until that time.”

And the kid goes and lies down to “Drowned Out” in the dark, even without drugs (remember, he’s 15), and his life is changed with music that were it not classical could pose as post-rock.

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• Vivaldi, Handel, Telemann, CPE Bach - Oboe Sonatas
  Heinz Holliger (ob), Christiane Jaccottet (hpd), Thomas Demenga (vc)
  Philips 422 070-2 (1987)

Baroque chamber product, as packaged and sold now on interchangeable background-music CDs that reward closer listening, as were churned out literally by the dozen then. Heinz Holliger did a lot of “like light-baroque, but authentic, to show you have taste” kind of albums.

• An Irish Rhapsody: Bax, Moeran, Stanford, Harty
  The Ulster Orchestra/Bryden Thomson
  Chandos CHAN 6525 (1980s)

I bought this as a disc of pastoral-style instrumental music from the time and general mien of Bax and Vaughan Williams. If you like 20th-century British orchestral music of that sort, this is the sort of thing you’ll like. And really, it should be the sort of thing everybody likes. For that kid who’s rocking out to Turnage now, the “Rhapsody on ‘Greensleeves’” is at most two doors down. Top marks, sad to say, as I’m 45% English and 0% Irish, and I like to jones on Irish-Americans.