Sorabji plays his own music!

[ctrastevere]

https://www.archive.org/details/AM_1973_11_08

Just discovered this yesterday, and wasn't sure if it's been posted before. On this site, one can hear Sorabji play several of his pieces, including the great Solo Concerto.

As for my own thoughts of it... well, it's obvious Sorabji was "NOT a pianist." In fact, the recordings are terribly inaccurate and sloppy in most parts (as anyone familiar with the commercial recordings of these works will recognize). However, this could have been for a variety of reasons, and I think the main one is simply that he was playing from his manuscripts, probably years after he wrote them, and was really struggling to read his own (rather messy) notation. However, that aside, his style of playing is quite impressive in the sense that it never becomes percussive or overly violent, which is something I believe all who plan on playing his music should take note of.

Enjoy!

[Etude]

Can't be any worse than Madge, I'll give it a listen right now.  Good find!

[ctrastevere]

Can't be any worse than Madge...

True. Sorabji's playing actually sounds like... well, you know, music.

[Etude]

Hmm the Djami recording seems to be pitch-shifted for some reason.  I'm sure it could be corrected nowadays with wave editing software etc.

[retrouvailles]

Nice! Gonna check this out immediately.

EDIT: Heh, it's funny to hear descending A flats in Djâmi. It is a bit annoying, but good to hear his playing. I've waited for this for a long time.

[tompilk]

this is great... i've been looking for it for ages. Thanks!

[Petter]

That first guy talking sounds like a bit like HAL in space odyssey 

[ahinton]

It is certainly a great pity that this material has gotten out into the public arena, inevitably without the benefit of the myriad of necessary accompanying caveats which are well known to Sorabji scholars and followers but not necessarily to others who might encounter these presentations. Sorabji was persuaded (after quite a long time) to record some of his works privately, albeit not for general public consumption. The resultant recordings, made in the 1960s, are inevitably far from representative of how the works that he recorded should go, as he was himself the very first to admit. He was in his 70s when he made them and had not practised regularly for many years. He made no claims for them other than that he sought to get over the basic ground of what he'd written but was not at all pretending that what he'd done in these recordings constituted representative, let alone authentic, performances (which indeed they are not). The circumstances of the recordings were in themselves far from ideal in that they were made by a genuinely well-meaning but inexperienced person using some domestic recording equipment in a similarly domestic situation (that of Sorabji's own home studio, the acoustic of which was far from ideal for recording purposes) and, when one also considers that the composer did not do the necessary preparation work that one would expect were he to have set out to make recordings for general public circulation, the results are inevitably compromised, although some of them do nevertheless give some idea of the kinds of sound that he wanted (Charles Hopkins, for example, found Sorabji's recording of Gulistan, its textual inaccuracies notwithstanding, an invaluable guide to the nature of sounds and sonorities that the composer was after, when he was preparing his own recording of the piece).

Best,

Alistair

[Etude]

A lot of the playing is obviously improvised, but considering the circumstances it's remarkable he was able to get through the pieces.  I remember reading that he also had rheumatic fingers when this took place.

[Petter]

Pardon my ignorance but I thought it sounded great. Im not very familiar with Sorabji, but out of the things I´ve heard I liked this the most so far.

[Etude]

Pardon my ignorance but I thought it sounded great. Im not very familiar with Sorabji, but out of the things I´ve heard I liked this the most so far.

There you go.

[ctrastevere]

Pardon my ignorance but I thought it sounded great. Im not very familiar with Sorabji, but out of the things I´ve heard I liked this the most so far.

He certainly has a very nice touch in his playing, and I can imagine, given the proper preparation, these pieces would have sounded absolutely magnificent under his hands. The good thing about the performances here is that even though they may not be technically as accurate as one would hope, one can still get a very good feel for Sorabji's musical style from them. If I had never heard, say, Powell's or Habermann's playing of the pieces, I'm sure I would have loved Sorabji's playing of them. But the inaccuracies leave much to be desired for those of us who have heard other recordings of these works that had been adequately prepared by the pianists.

It's good you enjoyed the music though. I would suggest supporting the efforts to bring Sorabji's incredible music to a wider audience by purchasing some recordings (though you should avoid the two available recordings of Opus Clavicembalisticum -- wait for Powell's).

[Etude]

And you could visit https://jonathanpowell.wordpress.com/recordings/ and check out some of the live recordings, which are all incredible.

[ctrastevere]

And you could visit https://jonathanpowell.wordpress.com/recordings/ and check out some of the live recordings, which are all incredible.

Ah, excellent point. The OC recordings really puts a lot of things into perspective.

By the way, to the older members, notice how rare it is to see all the Sorabji-hating posts that were sadly so common in the past here? Quite a relief to be able to have intelligent discussions about this composer, I'd say.

[Etude]

It's alright if people who don't like it can argue their point, if it's just "omgwtf sorabjee sux" then I agree entirely.

[ahinton]

There can be no doubt that Sorabji knew what he wanted in his own piano music, although he was far from dogmatic about such matters when others began to perform it in public some decade and abit after he made these recordings. It is a pity that there are no recordings of Sorabji playing his work in the days when he was (albeit infrequently) performing it in public (i.e. the 1920s and 30s); even in those days, however, he didn't practice a great deal because his work as a composer didn't allow him the time for that and in any case he really didn't have any pretensions or desires to be a pianist. Of the recordings tht he made, those of 11 of his 100 Transcendental Studies are probably the best, but, as I've said before, the others are at least worth delving into to get some kind of perspective on the sounds he was after (this applies especially to works such as Le Jardin Parfumé and Gulistan).

Best,

Alistair

[liszt1022]

The circumstances of the recordings were in themselves far from ideal in that they were made by a genuinely well-meaning but inexperienced person using some domestic recording equipment in a similarly domestic situation (that of Sorabji's own home studio, the acoustic of which was far from ideal for recording purposes) and, when one also considers that the composer did not do the necessary preparation work that one would expect were he to have set out to make recordings for general public circulation, the results are inevitably compromised, although some of them do nevertheless give some idea of the kinds of sound that he wanted (Charles Hopkins, for example, found Sorabji's recording of Gulistan, its textual inaccuracies notwithstanding, an invaluable guide to the nature of sounds and sonorities that the composer was after, when he was preparing his own recording of the piece).

Longest sentence on pianoforum.

[thierry13]

That was absolutely beautiful! Thank you very much for the experience.

[ahinton]

Longest sentence on pianoforum.

And your point is?...

In any case, can you even be sure of that? Have you actually trawled through every post on the forum since day 1 and checked?

Best,

Alistair

[Etude]

Sorabji seems to get through these pieces incredibly quickly, were these the tempos he actually intended or was he just rushing?  He plays faster than any other pianist I've heard that has recorded his music (with the exception of John Ogdon in certain places of OC).

[ahinton]

Sorabji seems to get through these pieces incredibly quickly, where these the tempos he actually intended or was he just rushing?  He plays faster than any other pianist I've heard that has recorded his music (with the exception of John Ogdon in certain places of OC).

Yes, he did - and contemporary accounts of most of his public performances seem to indicate that he did the same on the concert platform as he did when recording. I cannot help but think that he was rushing from time to time, due in part to a kind of unease and even irritation at the whole business of having to play his music; he was never an enthusiastic presenter of his own work and rarely cared to discuss it either. The one major exception seems to have been his Fourth Sonata, which he premièred in 1930, where he took at least two hours to play what occupied almost the same amount of time at the second performance by Jonathan Powell a few years ago (although Jonathan's recording of it is somewhat more expansive).

Best,

Alistair

[ctrastevere]

Wasn't Sorabji's performance of Opus Clavicembalisticum about two and a half hours long?

[ahinton]

Wasn't Sorabji's performance of Opus Clavicembalisticum about two and a half hours long?

Reportedly so, yes, but then he never recorded it so there's no surviving evidence of the length of time he took to play it and the minds of the critics could easily have played tricks with them at the time of his one and only performance of it in any case; for example, when Yonty Solomon premièred Sorabji's Third Sonata in 1977, three UK newspaper critics cited durations in their reviews - Anthony Payne gave it 65 minutes, Meirion Bowen 75 minutes and Max Harrison 90 minutes and they were definitely all present at the performance!

Playing OC in 2½ hours without any cuts (and there's no evidence that Sorabji himself made any) would be both ridiculous and impossible; indeed, parts I & II of the work, which Jonathan Powell's bucks what might otherwise be a trend by presenting without a break, themsevlves occupy about that duration!

Best,

Alistair

[retrouvailles]

Does anyone besides Yonty Solomon play Sonata No. 3? Possibly someone else that we could rely on for a recording? I really want to hear this work.

Also, has anyone checked out Sonata No. 0?

[ctrastevere]

Also, has anyone checked out Sonata No. 0?

I'm going to order it on Amazon as soon as I get my next paycheck. I'm very curious about it.

[ahinton]

Does anyone besides Yonty Solomon play Sonata No. 3? Possibly someone else that we could rely on for a recording? I really want to hear this work.

Tellef Johnson, who recorded Sonata No. 2 for Altarus, has played it but his recording has yet to be released and we do not know when that might be. No one else has ever performed the work in public.

Also, has anyone checked out Sonata No. 0?

This piece is Sorabji's first known work for piano solo and has been premièred and recorded by Soheil Nasseri on the Centaur label; a new typeset edition of it has ben prepared by Frazer Jarvis and he and I plan to go over it this coming weekend, so once any amendments have been fixed by him after that, the edition wll become available from us.

Best,

Alistair

[richard black]

Sorabji seems to get through these pieces incredibly quickly

I find it fascinating how often the composer's performance (any composer/piece/instrument or scoring) is the quickest, or at least one of the quickest, on record. Of course there are exceptions but that holds fairly frequently.

[retrouvailles]

Tellef Johnson, who recorded Sonata No. 2 for Altarus, has played it but his recording has yet to be released and we do not know when that might be. No one else has ever performed the work in public.

Oops, my mistake. I meant Tellef Johnson. But yes, no matter who it is, I can't wait for someone (anyone!) to release it.

[liszt1022]

And your point is?...

In any case, can you even be sure of that? Have you actually trawled through every post on the forum since day 1 and checked?

Best,

Alistair

Looks like you're taking that observation a little too seriously. Chill out.

[ahinton]

Looks like you're taking that observation a little too seriously. Chill out.

It might look that way to you. It is not, however, the case. My reason for questioning what your point is was because, if indeed you had one, you failed to clarify it. I'm already quite cold enough here in unseasonably chilly UK, thank you.

Best,

Alistair

[liszt1022]

Every post has to have a point. This one's got two, one at the end of each sentence.

[ahinton]

Every post has to have a point. This one's got two, one at the end of each sentence.

Indeed so - but I don't think that the absent point in the post concerned was one of the kind that you now mention here and, even if it were such, it would have been your only point and would therefore have conveyed as little meaning as I implied that it did...

Best,

Alistair

[liszt1022]

I'm sorry not every post contains a doctoral thesis, Alistair. Please don't make the classical piano scene seem any more snobby than it already does.

edited for spelling

[ahinton]

I'm sorry not every post contains a doctoral thesis,

Are you? I'm not!

Alistar.

Alistair, if that's OK with you.

Please don't make the classical piano scene seem any more snobby than it already does.

Your problem (if indeed it is such) rather than mine, I have to say; I don't see it that way at all and I certainly do not advocate encouraging anyone to seek to make it so.

Now - any chance of getting back to the topic?

Best,

Alistair

[liszt1022]

On topic, I haven't listened to the recordings out of respect for Sorabji's music - if you say they're not being played in a manner than can represent as many of Sorabji's musical ideas as he wrote in them due to his then-ability as a pianist, I'll leave them be.

I also recommend not listening to Ravel's recordings (there's a CD out called Ravel Plays Ravel,) though I believe they were piano rolls, and if so, a medium not suited for the depth of layering sounds that he writes. Also the Toccata on that CD is painfully slow.

[ahinton]

On topic, I haven't listened to the recordings out of respect for Sorabji's music - if you say they're not being played in a manner than can represent as many of Sorabji's musical ideas as he wrote in them due to his then-ability as a pianist, I'll leave them be.

I also recommend not listening to Ravel's recordings (there's a CD out called Ravel Plays Ravel,) though I believe they were piano rolls, and if so, a medium not suited for the depth of layering sounds that he writes. Also the Toccata on that CD is painfully slow.

Good to see you getting back to the topic and I understand and appreciate your remarks here, both about Sorabji and about Ravel (one of Sorabji's musical heroes, as it happens). As I mentioned before, it's almost certainly a pity that Sorabji wasn't successfully persuaded to record some of his music many years earlier in the days when he did at least perform some of in public on occasion and he was 30-40 years younger than when he did record.

Best,

Alistair

[michel dvorsky]

Rachmaninoff would never perpetrate a fiasco even remotely similar to this.

[Etude]

Rachmaninoff would never perpetrate a fiasco even remotely similar to this.

Ya wha'?

[michel dvorsky]

Sorabji is an idiot.

[Etude]

Cool.  I'm attempting a full thematic analysis of Opus Clavicembalisticum which would prove otherwise.

[michel dvorsky]

The value art can't be strictly "proven".

[ctrastevere]

Sorabji is an idiot.

Care to elaborate?

Cool.  I'm attempting a full thematic analysis of Opus Clavicembalisticum which would prove otherwise.

Whew, good luck with that!  

[michel dvorsky]

Care to elaborate?

Everything I've heard of Leon Dudley seems to point toward the fact that he is nothing more than a third rate composing hack whose memory is kept afloat by a bunch of "technical complexity" fetishists.  Dudley Do-Right makes up in head-exploding pomposity and elaboration what he lacks in actual substance.

One of the better Chopin Mazurkas communicates more compositional technique and depth than this idiot's entire corpus.

He's also a hopeless pianist.

[ahinton]

Rachmaninoff would never perpetrate a fiasco even remotely similar to this.

Rakhmaninov wouldn't write the kind of indiscriminate and tiresome rubbish that you do, either. He wrote his music, Sorabji wrote his and you write your infantile posts. Eash to their own.

Best,

Alistair

[Etude]

Everything I've heard of Leon Dudley seems to point toward the fact that he is nothing more than a third rate composing hack whose memory is kept afloat by a bunch of "technical complexity" fetishists.  Dudley Do-Right makes up in head-exploding pomposity and elaboration what he lacks in actual substance.

One of the better Chopin Mazurkas communicates more compositional technique and depth than this idiot's entire corpus.

He's also a hopeless pianist.

Get it right for goodness' sake.  He was born Leon Dudley Sorabji!  You are completely wrong in everything you just said by the way.  Sorabji never claimed to be a pianist, in fact he specifically explained that he wasn't one, and hadn't even practiced these pieces when he was asked to record.

[ahinton]

The value art can't be strictly "proven".

Leaving aside that this is not a complete sentence, at least you can prove yourself, as indeed you have here. Whether and to what extent anyone might want to know is, however, quite another matter.

Best,

Alistair

[ahinton]

Sorabji is an idiot.

The elaborate, painstaking musicological research that you have undertken in order to arrive at this conclusion surely speaks for itself.

Best,

Alistair

[Etude]

Whew, good luck with that! 

Hehe, I have way too many 'projects'.

[michel dvorsky]

Rakhmaninov wouldn't write the kind of indiscriminate and tiresome rubbish that you do, either. He wrote his music, Sorabji wrote his and you write your infantile posts. Eash to their own.

Best,

Alistair

On the contrary, those chaps were infamously critical of one another.  So much so, in fact, that they made sure their music could stand up to the scrutiny of their compatriots.  Music that cannot pass the "could it have been composed by an hack" test, doesn't stand to last very long.

Perhaps exposure to the critique of a Rachmaninoff or a Casals would have done Neon Leon some good.

When listening to rubbish like the music of Sorabji, I'm always reminded of the words of Antoine de Saint Exupery:

"You know you've achieved perfection in design, Not when you have nothing more to add, But when you have nothing more to take away.  "

[Etude]

If you can keep track of about 50 different themes in the course of a 90 minute MOVEMENT from an even longer work, straight into the final copy without making so much as a single sketch, then you can say that Sorabji is a bad composer.