Esa-Pekka Salonen: Karawane

[@anniewall7643]

I just read an article about Esa-Pekka Salonen in the New York Times on August 18, 2024 and told my Finnish friend about it. She told me to see this, which she sang in. What an incredible triumph! The filming of this concert was outstanding. Wow!

[@derekchai3344]

beautiful, sad, thrilling and yet accompanied with an unrelenting hopeless desperation. Amazing how Salonen's encaptures such emotions from a Dada poem with no meaning. I'm moved every time I hear this second movement.

[@jamesmcmurry799]

Out of mind ! ! ! ! A vacation ! Go Dada !

[@spiritbeckonyou]

Esa-Pekka Salonen is one of the greatest composers of our time!

[@wastrel09]

tru dat

[@robotypist]

THE greatest. No one comes close.

[@wanderlngdays]

@@robotypist I kind of like some of Salonen pieces, but that statement is a joke. He’s an ok composer, but there are many composers much better than he is

[@Qazwdx111]

@@wanderlngdays Agree

[@Pogouldangeliwitz]

@@wanderlngdays Absolutely. He's a good composer. Sometimes really good. Not a genius like Sciarrino, Holliger, Poppe, Neuwirth, George Benjamin an others.

[@gloriaivandavalossha]

GREAT MUSIC !!!

[@kuang-licheng402]

SUPER CONDUCTING

[@BenjaminStaern]

Try listening in double speed! Really funny!

[@robotypist]

Magnificent and brilliant! I wish I could discuss this piece with him, to hear the background story.

[@filizdener6052]

Magnificent!!!

[@PaulJones-oj4kr]

Salonen's sonorities often have this beautiful Stravinskyesqueness about them....

[@rr7firefly]

Yet he manages to keep that Finnish-Russian border wall in place. I love them both.

[@rr7firefly]

Wow. I really like this. Coming at the end of a long work day it is like the sun breaking through the clouds. (13:00) // From Wikipedia (you can read the whole entry there): Composed between January 2013 and July 2014. Salonen decided to connect to Zürich's history, especially Dada's origins in 1916. He wrote, "I settled for the best known Dada poem by Hugo Ball, founder of Dada, author of the Dada Manifesto."

[@MegaVicar]

Some of this piece reminds me of music from Charles Koechlin; not just the name but the way he uses the words and percussion.

[@BenjaminStaern]

Can imagine, do you know which piece you have in mind?

[@MegaVicar]

@@BenjaminStaern , The Persian Hours & The Seven Stars’ Symphony.

[@BenjaminStaern]

@@MegaVicar Thank you, will look it up

[@kuang-licheng402]

better than the other version

[@__t__s__]

22:28 Oof, nice chords!

[@pi314156]

Karawane, by Hugo Ball jolifanto bambla o falli bambla großiga m'pfa habla horem egiga goramen higo bloiko russula huju hollaka hollala anlogo bung blago bung blago bung bosso fataka ü üü ü schampa wulla wussa olobo hej tatta gorem eschige zunbada wulubu ssubudu uluwu ssubudu -umf kusa gauma ba-umf

[@iancurtis6490]

I heard Nyx in SF...this is not NYX...but then nothing is

[@MrWhitty09]

What happens when Rite of Spring meets La Mer? Well...

[@BenjaminStaern]

And jazz

[@rigneycomposer]

This is a lovely work. In many ways it seems to be a restatement of Images pour Orchestre by Achille-Claude Debussy - the dynamics, the harmonic velocity and acceleration, even the orchestration are all redolent of Debussy. The vignette solos, the light at various times, all very Debussy-esque. But there is not the same understanding of orchestral balance in the louder passages. Debussy was an absolute master - perhaps the greatest ever, even greater than Ravel, at achieving the finest balance from section to section, vertically and horizontally. His understanding of space is a constant source of amazement. Salonen gropes towards a similar space but cannot find it. Debussy was simultaneously a nostalgist and an avant-gardist. The circumstances of Europe before WW1 that gave rise to such immense talents as Karl Kraus, Robert Musil, Debussy, Picasso, and so many others, are unrepeatable. The interstices (the network of lines that interlace, to paraphrase Italo Calvino) in which Salonen finds himself, militate against recuperating such a space. Despite the very understandable urge to rediscover that space. Debussy showed us nature without the window.

[@orangetack1099]

rigneycomposer i like the taste of bread

[@georgeboeck1298]

Thanks for the analysis. This is a beautiful, listenable piece. I'd make two comments. First Salonen is quite familiar with Debussy's work. His La Mer is splendid. Second, keep in mind that this is dada. Here's Hugo Ball as a lobster: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ball#/media/File:Hugo_Ball_Cabaret_Voltaire.jpg. I wish Salonen had been a bit more outlandish.

[@wastrel09]

@@orangetack1099 yes, everything with modern "composers" has to be intellectualized to the nth degree.

[@themajor2072]

rigneycomposer I think the sentiment of this comment is misguided. Your unqualified praise of Debussy should not come at the expense of other composers, especially when that praise is mired in a high minded sense of musical mysticism that has no bearing on reality. Ask any conductor, and I mean any conductor, which is easier to balance between Debussy and Ravel, and Ravel wins hands down. Debussy had an extremely vast and rich musical imagination no doubt, but he has nowhere close to the mechanical mastery of orchestration that Ravel did. Now here we have Salonen, a very unique artist the likes of which we haven’t truly seen since Leonard Bernstein, a composer and a conductor in equal measure. Imagine the vast wealth of understanding that Salonen must have at his fingertips; imagine how vividly his inner ear can hear and how novel his sound conceptions can be with a knowledge of the orchestra known only to an incredibly select few. Debussy is not a bad orchestrator by any stretch, but don’t discredit the work of other composers in your haste to praise him, especially when said composers are actually technically superior orchestrators.

[@robotypist]

Salonen is nothing less than brilliant and magical. He is the finest composer/conductor of his time.

[@davidbondehagen1616]

Some of this is somewhat pleasant to listen to. A lot of it is more of the usual weird modern stuff you have to sit through in order to get to the real music programmed for that night’s concert. I’m happy for Salonen that all the other commenters like this piece (the story of the “Emperor’s New Clothes” comes to mind) but for me and the majority of listeners (whether they’ll admit it or not) it’s a waste of time in the concert hall waiting for the next piece. Notice the modern stuff is always programmed at the beginning or the middle of concert programs, never at the end when people who know better can leave and avoid the new, supposedly cutting-edge stuff

[@frippinit]

The experience I had last night hearing the LA Phil perform this was nothing short of incredible from start to finish. Right before the 5 minute standing ovation, a person in the audience audible said “holy shit”. Careful thinking your words are gospel.