Passeggiata veneziana booklet

[ryguillian]

One of my Christmas gifts was Jonathan Powell's recording of Sorabji's Villa Tasca and Passeggiata veneziana and I can say I like both works quite well. It's Sorabji, it can be quite entertaining, I don't think it's anything "groundbreaking" musically... but that doesn't matter much with Sorabji, he's very unique and I like most of his music that I've heard.

“[Passeggiata veneziana] embellishes material from that most famous episode of Les contes de Hoffman with a fantasic mélange of arabesques and contrapuntal ingenuities.”

When I read a passage like that, I think, “Why?”—Why is it necessary to write pretentious prose like this? Does this explain anything or add to anybody's appreciation of this music? I've underlined the portion that I found the most annoying. Sorabji did use counterpoint, yes, but what—may I ask?—is so inventive about his counterpoint? Nothing, if you ask me; often he used counterpoint for counterpoint's sake (such as in the hour-long fugues) and none of it is very creative at all. I like his music, but it really is sad that people seem only able to write pretentiously about his music rather than presenting it as it is... This kind of meaningless writing needs to go out of style real quickly. I'm just really sick of people painting Sorabji like some kind of amazing musical genius, a portrait which dipicts Sorabji as some amazing musical architect capable of creating massive "temples" and "pillars" of music... Why not talk about him in more concrete terms? At least a starting point, something? Not this inflated nonsense...

Please, though, correct me if I'm wrong: is there anything ingenuitive about his counterpoint? ... Something I just don't “get”?

—Ryan

P.S. Happy 2006.

[contrapunctus]

I'm just really sick of people painting Sorabji like some kind of amazing musical genius.

So am I.

[JCarey]

You make an interesting point, Ryan. May I ask, who wrote the notes for that CD? Was it Alistair Hinton? Perhaps he can add his two cents on the matter.

[ahinton]

You make an interesting point, Ryan. May I ask, who wrote the notes for that CD? Was it Alistair Hinton? Perhaps he can add his two cents on the matter.

I confess to being a little surprised at your evident uncertainty as to the authorship of the liner notes accompanying Jonathan Powell's CD of Sorabji's Passeggiata Veneziana and Villa Tasca and at your wondering whether I might be the said author; I understand from your own forum that you already possess this CD and I understand from this one that Ryan (who began the thread) has one also. Although the paragraph in these notes (on Villa Tasca) commencing with the words "A copy of the manuscript was sent to its decdicatee by Alistair Hinton" should in itself be sufficient to eliminate me from candidacy for such authorship, the matter is made unequaivocally clear at the end of those notes with the marking "Copyright ©2002 Jonathan Powell".

There's my one cent's worth...(!!)

Best,

Alistair