If I Could Choose Only One Work By...PURCELL
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- Опубліковано 18 жов 2024
- It Would Have To Be...Dido and Aeneas
Because, well, what other choice have we got?
The List So Far:
1. Ravel: Ma Mère l’Oye (Mother Goose Ballet)
2. Bruckner: Symphony No. 7
3. Schubert: String Quintet in C major
4. Shostakovich: Symphony No. 4
5. Mahler: Symphony No. 2 “Resurrection”
6. Tchaikovsky: The Nutcracker
7. Debussy: Preludes for Piano (Books 1 & 2)
8: Handel: Saul
9. Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro
10. Brahms: String Sextet No. 2 in G major
11. Vaughan Williams: Job
12. Bach: Goldberg Variations
13. R. Strauss: Four Last Songs
14. Berlioz: The Damnation of Faust
15. Haydn: “Paris” Symphonies (Nos. 82-87)
16. Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen
17. Beethoven: String Quartet No. 14 in C-sharp minor
18. Mendelssohn: Violin Concerto in E minor
19. Chopin: Preludes
20. Verdi: Rigoletto
21. Roussel: Symphony No. 2
22. Copland: Appalachian Spring (complete original ballet)
23. Grieg: Peer Gynt Suites Nos. 1 and 2
24. Bartók: Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion
25. Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 2
26. Rimsky-Korsakov: Opera Suites (Scottish National Orchestra/Järvi) Chandos
27. Schoenberg: Pierrot Lunaire
28. Smetana: Ma Vlást
29. Falla: Nights in the Gardens of Spain
30. Bizet: Carmen
31. Elgar: In the South
32. Sullivan: The Mikado
33. Dvořák: Symphony No. 8; Cello Concerto (Piatigorsky/Munch/Boston Symphony) RCA
34. Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsodies
35. Monteverdi: Orfeo
36. Scarlatti: Sonatas
37. Schumann: Fantasie in C, Op. 17
38. Berg: Wozzeck
39. Hermann: Psycho (film score)
40. Rachmaninoff: Rhapsody on the Theme of Paganini
Funeral Sentences is one of the greatest works of art in any medium whatsoever. Utterly transcendent of its period and original use.
Oh yes. Anyone who thinks Purcell was an underachiever or didn’t reach his peak just needs to listen to “Thou knowest Lord the secrets of our hearts” and it should totally stop them in their tracks ;)
@@murraylow4523 It's simply a miracle and having worked with some really excellent musicians on the piece (Anthony Rooley, Evelyn Tubb, Andrew Parrott) it always hits hard.
I'll just register here that I am a US-American who "swears by Purcell". Dave is entitled to his taste, but I agree with the other commenters saying that he is an artist of far more admirable qualities - which saw fulfillment - than our host suggests in this particular video.
my choice for Francis Poulenc: "Dialogues des Carmélites", because "of course", and what better musical immolation to a god than the concluding "Salve Regina"! For the closing sequence alone, this would be worth not forgetting for all eternity. But it's so much more besides: bewitching harmonies, brilliant and distinctive rhythms, ambiguous tones, voluptuous tenderness, subtle humour, sensuality, spellbinding tunes, luxurious melody lines, rapturous lyricism...What a great composer! He's among my favourites, so I'd add another 25 works to the top spot. And since I don't believe in gods that"s what I will do in the safety of my own home, but to the not-so revolutionary crowd I offer "Dialogues des Carmélites" to the composer's shortlist.
A difference of opinion here on the merits of the composer, not on the work selected, which was an obvious choice. My choice had been "King Arthur," which sports a wider variety of idioms and moods than "Dido and Aeneas," though the latter is definitely a more integrated work. One point I will make on Purcell's behalf is that he was one of the absolute master of art song, comparable in the estimation of many (not just in the UK) with Schubert and with his English predecessor, Dowland. Granted by the time of his early death he hadn't quite mastered "large forms," though his final Cecelian Ode, "Hail, Bright Cecelia" must rank alongside the great odes of Handel, and is clearly also an "integrated whole."
Personally, I love how Purcell sets the English language to song, and some of what he wrote to me seems quite ahead of his time, but like you say, I think he died too young to write a lot more 'profound' music, but what we do have, I am very fond of. Great video as always, I would pick Dido & Aeneas too. Thanks, from a young Briton trying not to be too provincial :)
Samuel Barber is still in queue, so my choice is his Three Essays for Orchestra which span the gamut of his career and captures the various styles of his creative output, also highlighting his brilliance as an orchestrator.
The Frost Scene was what came to my mind immediately when I saw the world "Purcell"...1
henry purcell....the music for the funeral of queen marie.....with its introductory march which has always fascinated me....of course it was used for the film ''clockwork orange'' by kubrick.....this is still my favorite from purcell
As much as I like D and A, my favorite Purcell is the Fantasias. They never fail to move me.
I spent a day listening to music by this composer and it was a struggle for me. I did find a recording I liked but not sure how often I would listen to it: Purcell: Sacred music & Funeral Sentences - Funeral Music for Queen Mary - Baroque Brass of London and Choir of Clare College Cambridge 55 min. Although I normally do not like classical vocal music, I did enjoy the choir on this one.
Hail, Bright Cecilia. Larger scale and also more representative of his vocal writing. (or, allowing for groups, I'd go for Odes.)
Also, he was quite a big fish in the whole ocean. His sense of dissonance is unmatched, and still convincing; for a proof listen to e.g. Funeral Sentences.
I don't know all that much about Purcell, so I'll just take your word for it here!
Good choice although I have to add my voice to the unease here that you’re damning Purcell with faint praise. I have no English axe to grind (I’m Scottish and have problems with Elgar, Sullivan etc) but he wrote a pile of church music, anthems, chamber music etc and the semi operas are what they are - implying they’re substandard because they’re not a string of da capo arias is not very helpful. Purcells music is widely admired in the continent, especially in France as is attested by lots of recordings! I am not a fan generally of 17th century music (what a horrible century!). But Purcells music gets much more attention than Lully, Charpentier etc. he was a very great composer
@@ColonelFredPuntridge Och aye lol
I had no idea Purcell was particularly appreciated in France! I’m originally from France, and Purcell is my favourite ever. Some composers are arguably greater, but none gives me more joy.
Well...I would've voted for The Fairy Queen, because it has greater variety than Dido - 'arias' popular songs, dance music...and a wider range of emotion. Purcell has a distinctive melancholy, surely....
Doesn't everyone?
Well, 'melancholy' is not the word I'd use to describe, say, Vivaldi....
Previously the criterion for these choices has been "most characteristic" work. Dido, his only opera, can not be that. I respectfully submit that the "semi-opera" (we might just call it incidental music) was the form in which he wrote his two great masterpieces, The Fairy Queen and King Arthur, (and several others) and one of those would have been more in keeping with the spirit of this series. In the world of the "semi-opera', Purcell was a mighty giant whale in a now dried up pond.
No. The music was secondary, and Purcell could not be master of a medium in which music was not the prime consideration, even if some of his best music appears there (and I said that). Semi-opera was typical of the period. It was not typical of Purcell.
Lowborn clods. I've met a few. Speaking of which, can you quickly get Milton Babbitt out of the way. It will take 2 seconds to say "Who cares if he wrote music?" That's characteristic.
For Samuel Barber, I nominate Knoxville: Summer of 1915. I think the choice should be a vocal work, and this has the advantage of being written with an orchestral accompaniment, which is remarkably effective, and also gives our choice some heft. I would also say it's an exemplar of Barber's melodic gift, and it's as beautiful and emotionally affecting as anything written in the 20th Century. It captures that particular American sound that's commonly associated with Copland, and here even the text is similarly evocative.
For Barber I nominate the Three Essays for Orchestra, which span his entire creative career and captures his brilliance as an orchestrator.
for once, I don't quite agree - as great as Dido is, I would suggest that the big Ode, «Hail! Bright Cecilia» is also a major work, which displays the best and the most typical of Purcell, which shines here as a major composer (no small fish, indeedon major genius, and I agree that it is perfectly acceptable to disagree on the matter! thank you once more!)
It's Cecilia for me too. Purcell's Odes and Welcome Songs are desert island music for me. I think Dave perhaps has a point about the slightly limited forms in which Purcell worked, but even so, before Bach and apart from Monteverdi, who's greater, deeper more captivating and satisfying a composer than Purcell. No one in my humble but heartfelt opinion.
Fair enough, though Fairy Queen has superb numbers. But who could give up lines like, "Take a boozy short leave of your nymphs on the shore?" A bit of absurdly mixed high and low diction worthy of Gilbert and with Purcell's catchy setting.