cross-relations, bird-calls and breezes….

(not to mention meow-meow-meow-meow)

!

Having discovered this blog a few weeks ago, I was not the least bit surprised you played a Bach Partita instead of the Beethoven Moonlight. I have never heard the 6th before, and I loved it.

There was a magical moment around the time of the “tripped out” Sarabande. In the silence right before you started playing the Sarabande, one could hear sirens from a distance. Then the dance began with a hauntingly blurred not-quite-arpeggiated chord. The sirens became a bit louder. The music proceeded into what could best be described as a delirium. Soon, the boat started rocking. I could not tell what was driving what – the music’s intensity making the barge pull against its moorings; the waves on the East River driving the already fidgety Sarabande into flights of further frenzy; or merely a cosmic coincidence. In any case, I was breathless.

Immediately following the non-danceable Gigue of the 6th Partita came the Barber Sonata for Cello and Piano. I don’t have the music here, so I am trusting my ear, but the main theme of the Barber first movement very much reminded me of the angular theme of the Gigue. Again, very well-played.

Thanks again for a fantastic performance. I can’t wait to hear you again.

Joe Murray
jfmurray3@aol.com

Once addicted to counterpoint, music that lacks that aspect seems weak and, well, effeminate. I don’t personally care for the music of Bartok. It communicates nothing of value to me, though I percieve it is well crafted enough. Just too much uglyness in the dissonance, instead of beauty. But, Tchaicovsky; gag, retch. I’d rather be shot than play that pablum, or listen to it. No contrapuntal aspects at all.

Ironically, his best student, Sergi Ivanovich Taneiev, was the foremost contrapuntal scholar in all of music history (And, he was quite critical of his teacher’s music): His “Convertible Counterpoint in the Strict Style” and “The Technique of Canon” are the crowning achievements of contrapuntal pedagogy. Nothing else even comes close.

Also, his Fourth Symphony is as good as anything Brahms ever wrote (IMVHO), but with more erudite counterpoint (Get the Le Chant Du Monde/Melodia U.R.S.S. recording of 1962 if you want to hear it done right: Western European and American orchestras simply can’t bring themselves to blare the horns out properly in more modern recordings for some reason).

Taneiev also wrote some stunning chamber music around the piano you might be interested in, Jeremy: It will certainly exceed all your wildest expectations with respect to satisfying your polyphony Jones. The Piano Trio Op. 22 is great, and the Piano Quintet Op. 30 is even better.

Then, there is the sublime String Quartet No. 9. Holy Moses, what an amazing work. It’s almost impenitrably good.

After Taneiev, there have been no “real” composers for me (He died in 1915, I believe). He was the last gasp of the tradition as far as I’m concerned.

You didn’t mention my favorite Bachian aspect of that slow Bartok movement–namely the piano accompaniment to the chorale when the chorale re-appears in the orchestra after the nature music. Here the piano plays two voice imitative counterpoint, which sometimes seems to be lifted straight out Bach’s Two Part Inventions.

One other thing…Bartok was a self-proclaimed atheist, but he marks this movement Adagio religioso. Sounds to me like a tip of the hat to Bach’s spirituality, don’t you think?

If I was, as I doubt, your “one remaining reader,” you should know that I finished the post sated – or, to continue with your theme, high –

jb