Some chamber music to close out the week – Brahms Piano Quartet no. 1, Op. 25:
Performed here by a rather all-star cast of Emanuel Ax (piano), Isaac Stern and Jaime Laredo (violin) and Yo-Yo Ma (cello).
Classical Music
Music For The Day
The first movement from “Chichester Psalms” by Leonard Bernstein:
Performed here by the LA Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Gerard Schwarz, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles.
הָרִיעוּ לַיהוָה, כָּל־הָאָרֶץ.
עִבְדוּ אֶת־יְהוָה בְּשִׂמְחָה;
בֹּאוּ לְפָנָיו, בִּרְנָנָה.
דְּעוּ– כִּי יְהוָה, הוּא אֱלֹהִים:
Hari’u l’Adonai kol ha’arets.
Iv’du et Adonai b’simḥa
Bo’u l’fanav bir’nanah.
Du ki Adonai Hu Elohim.
Make a joyful noise unto the Lord all ye lands.
Serve the Lord with gladness.
Come before His presence with singing.
Know that the Lord, He is God.
More on the Chichester Psalms here.
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Music For The Day
“Le Tombeau de Couperin”, in the original arrangement for piano, performed by Angela Hewitt:
As always with Ravel, the clarity of the individual melodic lines and the ripe potential for orchestration is readily apparent. Though it may be that I am reverse-engineering a composition to justify my analysis, I do believe that there is something special in Ravel’s piano music that seems to contain the pure distilled essence of melody and musicality – that kernel of imagination that almost cries out for sketching out with the full tonal palate of the full orchestra.
But sometimes it is nice to enjoy the purity of the original, and Angela Hewitt does not disappoint in this CBC Music recording. There are some moments of real melting tenderness in this performance – indeed, the six movements of the suite were each individually dedicated to friends or relatives of Ravel who had died fighting in the First World War.
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A Symphony From The Heart Of The City
I strongly encourage all readers with an interest in classical music to read this account of the history of Shostakovich’s Seventh Symphony (“Leningrad”) and to watch the linked videos – a fascinating article about an iconic piece of music.
Stephen Walsh praises Brian Moynahan’s Leningrad, a book on how the siege of the city influenced the work of composer Dmitri Shostakovich:
Shostakovich, a native of Leningrad/St Petersburg, was in the city for the first few weeks of the siege, and by the time he was flown out in early October 1941 he had composed the bulk of three movements of his Seventh Symphony. He already saw it as a symbol of the city’s defiance, and in Moscow he told an interviewer: ‘In the finale, I want to describe a beautiful future time when the enemy will have been defeated.’
It had become a Leningrad Symphony in all but name. Its composer had been photographed on the roof of the Conservatoire in a fireman’s outfit hosing down a (non-existent) conflagration. Now, in his absence, Leningraders struggled to concerts played by emaciated, half-dead musicians in freezing halls. Music had become an…
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Music For The Day
Prelude in D flat major, the “Raindrop Prelude” No. 15 Op. 28 by Frederic Chopin:
Performed here by Vladimir Horowitz.
Horowitz has never been a favourite pianist of mine; in all honesty, I have somewhat resented the fame and recognition that his name elicits to the detriment of pianists that I consider far superior. However, it is nearly always the case that pianists excel in the interpretation of repertoire by particular composers, and Horowitz’s affinity for the music of Chopin is both arresting and undeniable.
Semi-Partisan Politics 