What I bought with my $100 CDN

[Spatula]

What I bought with my $100 CDN for today:

Bach's WTK book volume I                  $22.00
Rach's PC 3 score                         $23.20
            
Vivaldi 4 Seasons CD                        $7.45
Ashkenazy Rach Concertos              $18.50
            
Mastering Piano Technique - S Fink          $40.61
            
Total                                                   $101.76


Wow...$101.76 just spent on music stuff for one day. 

 

[DarkWind]

Rach's PC 3 score                         $23.20

You could have gotten the Dover Edition and had Concertos 1-3...

Ashkenazy Rach Concertos              $18.50

Terrible buy... Ashkenazy plays the worst Rachmaninoff Piano Concertos on the face of this planet. They are horrible. He even rolls the chords in the beginning of the Rach2! Honestly, if you haven't listened to any performances before, these will give you a bad idea of how to play them and you will probably have these performances as a mindset. The phrasing is totally wrong...

[BoliverAllmon]

it is heresay whether ashkenazy is bad or not. Let him listen and make his own conclusions.

boliver

[Spatula]

Heresay not quite, however:

Ashkenazy does roll the Rach 2 opening chords...totally loosing the atmosphere of the piece.  He then further doesn't emphasize the triplet minors during the "cadenza" on page 15 or recapulation with a weak phrasing.

What I really look for in this piece is at the bars on Page 21.  Part "14" in the numbers in the box.   He does probably a mediocre job at best, a bit better than Kissin in my opinion, but still lously and can be improved.

What this section, page 23 at meno mosso, needs is not a theme of pp or quiet, but of uncertainty and anxiousness, for in the pianists, but in the mood of the music to build up.  I'm always dissappointed when I hear recordings (I've heard 4 of them for Rach 2 including this one) where the violins seem to not give a care in this section.

For the best recording, I HIGHLY recommend Alexander Bohnke's version with the Tubingen Medical Orchestra with Norbert Kirchmann as the conductor.

This version is found on a CD called "Romantic Moments from The Piano Concerto"

No recording I've found so far comes as close as this, not even Rachmaninoff's own recording.  BTW, I think Rach's is the worst I've heard, perhaps of the recording technology used back then, but as well Rach is hesistant and sparely uses the damper pedal in his recordings. 

Ashkenazy's Rach 3 is not worth much mention, still is beaten by Horowitz hands down and Agerich's version reigns supreme for the Rach 3 out of all of them.  I don't understand why Ashkenazy used the ossia for the cadenza because I always prefer the faster version.   The third movement was not all that great, it was about the level of David Helfgott's version, and that's not saying very much.

So to recap for R3 and who I prefer the most (1) to the least (5)

1. Argerich
2. Horowitz
3. Earl Wilds
4. Kissin
5. David Helfgott (he does a somewhat jazzy version I think in my opinion)
6. Ashkenazy
7. Lang Lang

(I hated Lang Lang's recording....gawd aweful I thought)

And for the Rach 3 score...I bought the Kalmus edition...is that a decent one?  I don't plan to play it...I just wanted it for a keep sake sorta thing like a collectable item or for me to follow the score when I listen to the recordings.

I ordered the Mastering book by Fink and it should be freighted to my house in 2-3 business days.

By the way...did Argerich do a Rach 1,2,4 and Paganini?  If so...dammnn I wanna here those ones!!! 



And what the hell is Urtext?  

[brewtality]

Heresay not quite, however:

Ashkenazy does roll the Rach 2 opening chords...totally loosing the atmosphere of the piece.  He then further doesn't emphasize the triplet minors during the "cadenza" on page 15 or recapulation with a weak phrasing.

he rolls them because his hands aren't big enough to reach those chords. Overall that set with Previn is terrible.

Ashkenazy's Rach 3 is not worth much mention, still is beaten by Horowitz hands down and Agerich's version reigns supreme for the Rach 3 out of all of them. 

say what?! Horowitz owns this piece imo, i don't get why people like Argerich's so much. I reckon Byron Janis' rach3 with Munch is much more exciting than her's.
If you wanna hear a great Ashkenazy Rach 3 get his first recording of it with Fistoulari. Its soft and gentle but very moving.

[Spatula]

hey is previn that dude that has long brunette hair and thinks hes some maestro and virtuoso with the violin? Gawd that guy is just as terrible as um...

some person who doesn't know much... just for show.

God, I should have looked at the conductor as well as the pianists name before buying that CD...oh well..

[xvimbi]

hey is previn that dude that has long brunette hair and thinks hes some maestro and virtuoso with the violin? Gawd that guy is just as terrible as um...

The "dude" has grey hair (by now), and he is reasonably good - with the piano! In addition to being the Conductor Laureate of the LSO, he composes too, so he is a Triple Threat. His wife is the one with the violin.

some person who doesn't know much... just for show.

Who are you talking about? Yourself?

Search functions in this forum and Google can save a lot of embarrassment

[allchopin]

No recording I've found so far comes as close as this, not even Rachmaninoff's own recording.  BTW, I think Rach's is the worst I've heard, perhaps of the recording technology used back then, but as well Rach is hesistant and sparely uses the damper pedal in his recordings.

Do you realize how foolish this is... the composer himself by default has the best recording because he is the one who wrote it.  However he wants it, that's how it is.

And what the hell is Urtext?  

Ur loosely is German for original, so these editions are the closest to the original text as one can get.  They are still slightly modified, however, as a publisher may add fingerings and whatnot, but stays true to the score.

[Spatula]

hey is previn that dude that has long brunette hair and thinks hes some maestro and virtuoso with the violin? Gawd that guy is just as terrible as um...

The "dude" has grey hair (by now), and he is reasonably good - with the piano! In addition to being the Conductor Laureate of the LSO, he composes too, so he is a Triple Threat. His wife is the one with the violin.

some person who doesn't know much... just for show.

Who are you talking about? Yourself?

Search functions in this forum and Google can save a lot of embarrassment

Maybe I got the wrong guy in mind.

And no ...not embarrassed at all...since already I carry a reputation for umm... not much...so I find it very difficult to lose any prestige in the first place  .

now if bernhard did that....that's another story. 

[Spatula]

No recording I've found so far comes as close as this, not even Rachmaninoff's own recording.  BTW, I think Rach's is the worst I've heard, perhaps of the recording technology used back then, but as well Rach is hesistant and sparely uses the damper pedal in his recordings.

Do you realize how foolish this is... the composer himself by default has the best recording because he is the one who wrote it.  However he wants it, that's how it is.

And what the hell is Urtext?  

Ur loosely is German for original, so these editions are the closest to the original text as one can get.  They are still slightly modified, however, as a publisher may add fingerings and whatnot, but stays true to the score.

Still doesn't sound nice.... wasn't there a thread where a discussion if the composers did the best "interpretation"...or not?

[brewtality]

No recording I've found so far comes as close as this, not even Rachmaninoff's own recording.  BTW, I think Rach's is the worst I've heard, perhaps of the recording technology used back then, but as well Rach is hesistant and sparely uses the damper pedal in his recordings.

Do you realize how foolish this is... the composer himself by default has the best recording because he is the one who wrote it.  However he wants it, that's how it is.

i don't think its foolish at all. Rachmaninoff was known to admit that certain pianists played his works better than he did. Eg Moiseiwitsch for the rach 2 and Horowitz for the rach 3

[DarkWind]

Besides, Rachmaninoff recorded them too fast. He had a small limited amount of time to play and record them on an LP, so he had to be as quick as possible.

[Spatula]

Besides, Rachmaninoff recorded them too fast. He had a small limited amount of time to play and record them on an LP, so he had to be as quick as possible.

No kidding, just hear the opening chords of his rach 2...like he wants to finish it in the same time he drinks tea or something and take off to the airport or something.  Hurry Scurry Rachie!

[Motrax]

It's time to dispel the notion that Rachmaninoff's cuts were necessary due to space constraint... quoting from https://classicalcdreview.com/rachnaxos.htm :

"Surprising he made all of these cuts; it would not seem space was the problem as the original issue took five double-sided 78s with side 10 blank."

The cuts Rachmaninoff made were purely of his own whim. My personal opinion is that either he was not feeling technically comfortable to play those sections (which is rather unlikely, though he was rather self-concious and would probably make cuts before making mistakes), or, with more likelihood, that he simply felt the piece was a little too long and wanted to record it in a shorter way.

When he premiered his Corelli Variations around Europe, he left out variations depending on how much the audience was coughing - his longest performance in this manner was 18 out of 20 variations, where his shortest featured only 10 out of the 20 variations. He cut his first Sonata a great deal from the original manuscript before publishing it, and he still felt it was too long even after it had entered the piano repertoiry. He had a similar opinion of his third symphony, I believe.

So he was certainly not afraid to cut things for no other reason than thinking they were too long.

[DarkWind]

Interesting... I seem to have the opposite problems, my pieces are too short!

[Spatula]

My Fink book arrived today in decent order.  The cover jacket was a bit brushed up but in relatively good condition. 

Now to start collecting technique books!

I have Chang's book, Bernhard's notes, and now Fink's book.  I think I'm going have a little music library for meself!