Sergei Rachmaninov

[redbaron]

A month or two ago I started a thread to find out people's opinions on Franz Liszt. Now I'm doing one for Rachmaninov. Do you think he was a superb composer and a sensational pianist or simply out of date and longing for the music of the past? Try not to squabble about it too much...

[thierry13]

As Horowitz said : He was a composer, a pianist and a conductor, and first-class everything!

[dnephi]

IMO: Excellent pianist.  Don't know anything about conductor, but I assume he was good.

As far as a composer goes, his output has varying degrees of inspiration, but his workmanship is impeccable and his character granitic.

[opus10no2]

Only fools don't recognise the innovation in his music.

[rachfan]

In his younger days, Rachmaninoff was not only a symphonic conductor, but conducted opera in Russia, and was in great demand there.   He later shifted his emphasis mostly to composing as he had so much music on the drawing board.   And finally, when he landed in the U.S., his first priority was making a livelihood, so his focus changed once again, this time to touring, and he did recitals and concerto appearances right up to the end of his life.  He continued to compose during that period, but to a lesser extent, given his stringent time limitations, particular given his needs to expand his repertoire and to practice.  (yes, Rachmaninoff practiced.)  There is no question that he was an extraordinary conductor, composer and virtuoso artist.  During his career touring, his only peer was Josef Hofmann. 

As a composer Rachmaninoff wrote in just about all the forms, large and small--operas, songs, symphonies, concertos, choral works, chamber music, preludes, etudes, character pieces, duo-piano works, transcriptions, etc.  And I believe it's fair to say that all of it is of high quality, which is why his music has endured so well.  If I had to classify Rachmaninoff, I would call him both a Late Romantic and Neo-Romantic.  Many of his 65 songs and the Piano Concerto No. 1, as examples, extend the Tchaikovsky tradition into the 20th Century.  At the other end, I believe that the 4th Concerto, the Variations on a Theme by Corelli, and the Symphonic Dances attained a newer sound.  That is not to suggest that Rachmaninoff was a revolutionary--clearly he was a conservative.  Yet it seems that he was exploring and evolving toward a newer idiom. 

If we did not have the music of Rachmaninoff, we would be much poorer for it.  I think he was an extraordinary and masterful composer and a nearly peerless pianist.

[mattgreenecomposer]

I'll put my two cents in since Im a composer.

There is no right or wrong answer of course to who is a good composer as we all connect with different styles and genres of music through our physical and psychological experiences as a fetus and child which shapes the way we hear different sounds and thus makes us feel a certain way.  If we are talking sheer skill on the other hand, I would say Rachmaninoff is unsurpassed by the ability to paint in a tonal atmosphere an emotion or thought, package it, and deliver it to the listener.  The tricky part is the "delivery."  Our receptors, may be turned on or off to different music. If the music does not attach to our receptor, it is noise and does not induce an emotional response and is thus worthless.  Some people may only respond to Jazz for example, and may not have a receptor for classical music at all.

Rachmaninoff is for me, the highest potency of an auditory drug that attaches to my individual receptor.  He is  the morphine of sound which takes me to another place everytime I listen to him-no matter how many times.
In short, if people want to argue about his music, and do not feel Rachmaninoff the way I do, I just feel sorry for you because you just don't know what your missing.