Repertoire: The BEST Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks
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- Опубликовано: 15 окт 2024
- Just how "merry" are those pranks? Some performances convey more of the music's madcap humor than others. Let's see if we can discover which ones deliver the goods.
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The old CBS disc of Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra playing Till, Don and Tod is a miracle. I've loved it for decades!
First, I am loving these videos. Second, whatever you changed lately to make them louder has made it so much easier for me to hear them. Thanks!
That ratchet is known in the UK as a football [soccer] ratchet. By the way... you mentioned the opening figure of Shostakovich 5 - the pairs of notes - and their similarity to Brahms 4 opening. Well, this Till Eulenspiegel theme has always reminded me of Brahms 4 too. It's funny to hear a percussionist worry about the one triangle note, when the Eb clarinet player (winding up to represent Till's soul escaping his body, after the most terrifying snare drum roll) is about to blow his retinas and what's left of his sobriety. Give me a triangle note any day.
This showed up again in my RUclips recommendations, and I watched again, as delighted as when I first watched it. As light, effervescent and well-structured as its subject matter, it’s funny and informative, one of your greatest hits.
Totally agree about Kempe, his EMI box with the Staatskapelle Dresden was my first Strauss set and I treasure it to this day.
In terms of some more recent recordings I think Petrenko/Oslo and Chailly/Lucerne do a good job. Playing is superb and the performances are really exciting, as well as thoughtfully played picking out lots of detail in the fabulously written woodwind parts.
Also a fan of Dorati's Strauss, on the Mercury disc you can hear him jumping about and grunting at some of the climaxes! Brilliant!
Yes! Your comments on Kempe and the importance of woodwinds tell me why TILL is my second favorite Strauss tone poem. I was gonna ask about DON QUIXOTE, but you answered that. 😎
Your neighbors must love you.
Glad to hear you included the Szell. A budget Odyssey LP was my introduction to three great Strauss tome poems. To be honest, it's still my benchmark, though I also love Kempe/Dresden.
Don't know if it has an appropriately sized ratchet but really like Abbado's performance with the LSO on DG (full of wonderful details, like the grisly sound of the D clarinet sqeeling away during the execution). Also have Karajan's VPO on a Decca LP which I like.
Apart from the coloring, the tempo is very important for the atmosphere and the humor. Conductors who take the piece too slow, making it sound like an excercise, just don’t get it. The same goes for Don Juan.
I have Kempe’s EMI and agree that it’s pretty terrific, though I still prefer Solti. The CSO plays the daylights out of Till-especially those horns!! A new recording that has the best Don Quixote since Reiner’s and Szell’s in my view is by Vasily Petrenko and the Oslo Phil and also contains a delightful Till and a very good Don Juan.
Love your inside stories!
Glad you like them!
I agree that Kempe's Berlin "Don Quixote" is outstanding.
‘Colour comes from the woodwind’, which instinctively would have me reach for Czech Phil. And wonderful recording of Till under Ancerl.
"Till" is one of those works where the more I hear it, the more I wish it would just go away! (we're all different - that's what makes the world go round).
No Szell? It is one of his greatest recordings. And he played his piano reduction for Strauss. Szell is a miracle in this work.
The problem with Szell is that you might as well include him in just about any list of works that he recorded.
Fantastic! I missed Honeck with PSO in your review but as you said: there is a bunch of recording worth of listen ;-) keep on telling Dave!
As I said below, I love the Honeck but I hesitate to add to the "permanent" pile until I listen some more to see how well it ages. I've been sitting on his "Eroica," which I think is one of the truly great ones, for almost a year now just to make sure I still hear what so impressed me on first listen. That's the problem with so much criticism--we have to listen and then write, but so often we feel differently later. With some titles, at least, I don't want to be rushed into making a decision.
David Hurwitz ...this should be a study for aesthetics, cognitive scientist, brain physiologist and psychologist etc. My colleague, who is one of the most important music critics in Poland, Oskar Łapeta (your subscriber also) makes very interesting and insightful guides to various works (recently Mahler's Symphony No. 2) and I know this problem from his example , although in his case, the sensations do not change that much (an issue to be examined by a brain physiologist maybe?) For me, who has lived with various works intensively for 25 years or more, changes in perception are happening with learning new approaches to selected music , it is a really complex process and I value the responsibility with which you approach your reviews process - cheers.Damian
What about recordings of Strauss himself conducting this work?
IMAO, they are primarily of historic interest, as Strauss was a curiously uninvolved performer of his own music, at least in his later years.
How would you rate dudamel’s till eulenspiegel?
Wot! No Toscanini! Hard driven but gets the jokes.
Starting to read your Strauss book, courtesy of my local library.
Enjoy, and thank you!
I just looked at that percussion part you mentioned. Imagine how this entrance issue would be forever resolved if there was a cue of the opening Violin line in this last section. One less minute or two of confusion in the middle of a rehearsal. Geez!
Oh my gosh. I had not heard the Solti. Kind of rediscovering the piece. Until now I had only the San Francisco with HB (Decca) which I bought on release day and love but this Solti might be a close second.
I'll look for the Kempe.
Surprising, but probably not for you, the wittiest, most symphonic Till Eulenspiegel I have ever heard is the Philharmonia's recording with Otto Klemperer. In Mozart, Haydn and virtually any of the core symphonic repertoire, the late Dr. Klemperer was hard to beat. He was, of course, great in 20th century music, going back to his 1920s roots at the Kroll.
I don't disagree with any of your choices. I especially love the Stokowski, but...no Szell, Böhm, Klemperer, Toscanini, or Krauss? Those have long been among my favorite Tills. Chacun à son goût! P.S. I am a HUGE fan of yours, just expressing my opinion here.
Sure!
Your ratchet is what we used to call rattle and they used to be popular at football (soccer) matches until they were banned as dangerous weapons
Triangle players are heros!
Damn right!
I would like to know your opinion of the composers own recording with the Wiener Philharmoniker from 1944.
Nothing special,
I know you don't like him, but my favorite performance of this work is by Furtwängler with the Wiener Philharmoniker. The sheer intensity and variety of colors is amazing.
I don't know why anyone feels I don't "like" Furtwangler because I am critical of some of his recordings. In general, I think many of those that he actually authorized are superior. The problem is that there's a lot of unauthorized junk floating around that does not find him at his best, and that I strongly doubt he would have approved. To this extent, I feel that I am more respectful regarding his legacy, and a better defender of it, than many of his more rabid fans.
@@DavesClassicalGuide I understand, and agree. I got the sense of your dislike for him from your general praises for precision and literalism (specially for the likes of Szell and Toscanini). Furtwangler beign the greatest exponent against this type of interpretation, allied with some of your criticism towards him, made me think that you generally don't like his music.
@@juliodogpit Fair enough, but then I enjoy Beecham, Stokowski, Bernstein, and Scherchen, none of whom could be called "literalists" either. In general, I try to be open to a wide range of interpretive viewpoints, as long as they are realized successfully. Remember, it's not just the conductor's job to have ideas. Anyone can have ideas. He has to get the orchestra to implement them at the highest standard of which they are capable. That is a matter of professional competence, plain and simple.
A little surprised that Honeck/Pitt missed your list. Also, I have a soft spot for Sawallisch/Philly live in Japan on EMI. Kempe I like the performance, but the cymbals sound so chintzy! (His Dresden Strauss set suffers percussion-wise in general I feel.) Szell wins for me of the older recordings. Cheers David!
I thought about Honeck and like it very much, but I just want to live with it a little longer to see how well it ages.
Did Szell conduct more than one recording with Cleveland? I have an old 10" Columbia Masterworks record of it, poorly recorded, jaunty but nothing special, and on the drums, the snares not even engaged. Quite disappointing.
The snares are muffled on purpose, and so indicated in the score. They are imitating something darker and more funereal for the judgment scene.
@@DavesClassicalGuide
Ah, thanks for the clarification. I'm glad Toscanini used snares, then - they heighten the tension.
Dave: How do you feel about Francis-Xavier Roth's Richard Strauss recordings?
Not impressed so far.
@@DavesClassicalGuide Thanks...I completely agree, but I thought I might not have been appreciating what the the more glowing reviewers were getting from these cds...
Say, do you suppose I could borrow that große Ratsche for a couple of days, say February 25-6 of next year? I want to drown out some names. 😆
4:21 omg that’s not expected
David, this is a Purim rattle! ( better than Simon’s...)
Of course--a "grogger."
Intermezzo is funny (and never too long); maybe because he wrote the libretto himself?
Very possibly!
@@DavesClassicalGuide I'd take it over Rosenkavalier...
Try Furtwängler ruclips.net/video/4rOOC7ocE8Q/видео.html