Stravinsky, Piano Concerto - Gergiev, Toradze, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra

[@artofmusic303]

Fabulous performance by all the players, perfect intonation among the winds, and what an aggressive pianist!

[@robertrodes1546]

+Robert Wilks If you can find Toradze playing Ravel's Gaspard de la Nuit it's well worth a listen. I heard him play it live once and it's one of my favorite performances.

[@ferdinangenius]

A ferocius perfomamce of a ferocius concert with all the beauty of a powerful jet engine in the glory of its power

[@bonniebrauer7486]

Well said!

[@JPJOFREvideos]

perhaps the best recording of this masterpiece...

[@themightyquinn94]

Wow the second movement is tremendously beautiful!

[@loudrimshot]

It makes me freeze in place. The second movement has long been one of my favorite moments in music ever.

[@gerdlindlar1980]

fantastic .... strawinsky.... compositeur de l ´avantgarde! congenial, breathtaking performance! Rythm is it!!!! bravissimo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@TomD67]

Anyone else notice the quotations from Bach's Musical Offering at 5:30 and thereafter (in the first movement)? And maybe a few phrases from Handel's Water Music in the last movement? This is a tremendously interesting piece, not at all like a romantic piano concerto, yet (at least in this performance) more "romantic" sounding (to my ears) than most of Stravinsky's output. Thanks for posting this!

[@stephenhall3515]

What you mention occurs earlier at about 3 minutes in.

[@anjunzheng7305]

So amazing performance

[@benjamincuevaseninde]

-- Un Concerto énergique, énervé, oscillant entre tourments et apaisements. --

[@eagle1ear]

Sadly, Toradze had a heart attack during a performance in Vancouver, WA. in April of this year and died in May (2022). I found this performance very interesting and idiosyncratic. (Not sure Stravinsky would've liked it but he had very precise ideas about the performance of his works.) The tempo transposition between 6:30 and 7:00 (movement one) is, to me, quite fascinating. Some commenters here have remarked about the use of themes from the Baroque/Classical periods. The 1920's jazz band references are also much in evidence. S. even quotes one of his own themes (from L'Histoire du Soldat).

[@danielramos7772]

stravinsky created the music of the 20th century, simple as that.

[@ronwalker4849]

DANIEL, IGOR HAD LOTS OF INFLUENCE FROM DEBUSSY, RAVEL, SATIE, AND MANY FRENCH INNOVATORS.

[@dou40006]

no certainly not, Debussy yes !

[@csaponxypan1]

True culture is always thriving on cross fertilisation, and continuous variation: Scriabin, Debussy, Bartók, Schönberg, Webern all contributed...so did Liszt, Berlioz and even Schubert, much before all of them, contributed to how music in the Twentieth Century got shaped! Xenakis, Stockhausen, Boulez, Cage, all of them took the mantle and took it further...further....and further; and there is no end.

[@MrAam1964]

Magnificiant piece by Stravinsky, well rendered by Gergiev and the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra... Just wishing the quality transfer was better for this video really.

[@malcolmnicoll1165]

Gorgeous piece and a fantastic performance by Gergiev, Toradze, et. al. Thanks for posting.

[@gerdlindlar1980]

OVERWHELMING!

[@holliefitzzz]

the bit in the middle where everyone's blasting the quartals is super pretty

[@notaire2]

Spannende und zugleich gut kontrollierte Leistung dieses kompakten und zugleich anspruchsvollen Klavierkonzertes unter der künstlerischen Leitung vom genialen Dirigenten. Der zweite Satz klingt besonders schön.

[@biagioconsoli]

Excellent performance!

[@thethikboy]

These are rhythms that could only be heard from the machines of the modern world, which Stravinsky heralded.

[@ronwalker4849]

LE SACRE DU PRINTEMPS (RITES OF SPRING) ARE RHYTHMS FROM THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO. FROM THE DAWN OF HUMAN RELIGOUS PRACTICES.

[@thethikboy]

@@ronwalker4849 So we've gone full circle - go figure

[@thethikboy]

@Διονυσιος Κουτσιμανης Well from the sound of it. Machines echo paganism. Regardless of his primitivism Stravinsky was a thoroughly twentieth century composer - revolultionay.

[@giancitton2604]

Piano concerto con strumenti a fiato (1924) Largo - Allegro 00:33 Larghissimo 08:31 Allegro 16:59

[@Dylonely_9274]

Thank you.

[@gerardbegni2806]

I must confess that I have always been uneasy with this concerto and its neoclassical harmony and melodies coming after the rite of spring, even if I acknowledge a major know-how and most often an unmistakable greatness. This neoclassical period and his "return to ...." are in my mind deadlocks. I feel much more comfortable with Stravinsky when he joined back the avant-garde in the middle of the 50's.

[@richardparks5639]

Thank you Frank Zappa for putting me on to this... It only took 37 years.

[@prototropo]

Unbelievably, as a student of music theory possessed of life-long awe for Stravinky, I’d never before heard this piece! It’s so typical of the wealth in the well of xerophillic, crystalline sounds used for metallic ensembles and anthem-like portrayals of perhaps some mythologic origin story, of a distant civilization, from the ancient future.

[@AthSamaras]

Beautiful... NPS 1997

[@minch333]

Fuck. I'm lost for words

[@bevaconme]

no argument.

[@maratom34]

BUT NOT THE F WORD

[@PabloPonce31]

the conductor does not only wave his arms on time, he conducts.

[@ronnie4697]

OMG, that second movement… Stravinsky claims to have written this music through a purely intellectual process with no emotional input at all. So why does it hit me so hard in the feels?

[@daniellu8282]

His process was intellectual but he was still standing on the shoulder of emotive giants who came before him. You're hearing the weight of history through Stravinsky.

[@paulfaulkner8788]

excellent sound engineering, unlike the BBC Proms.

[@MrInterestingthings]

Does Toradze ever leave Russia. Does he do world tours? I've never seen him in Losangeles or Miami.He has phenomenal clarity in every voice and mucho energy and here some wit!

[@jdiwkall]

he teaches in Indiana at South Bend...that's not in Russia

[@csaponxypan1]

Music has a better home in Russia than in the U.S., with cultural life sacrificed to capitalism and steady decline. As long as he plays the piano, all is fine with Toradze. Yet, check out the gorgeous recording of Maria Yudina with the USSR RTV Symphony and Rozhdestvensky....although far less exact, it is incredibly good and passionate. Did those artists tour the U.S.? I don't think so...

[@lawrencechalmers5432]

The pianist is a joy to watch!

[@alexs1504]

I find the entrance of the pianist absolutely hilarious

[@partituravid]

what a musical insight.

[@alexs1504]

@@partituravid Because you think humor doesn't exist in classical ?

[@sgut1947]

Although, ya know, conducting is very easy really. I conduct the television all the time, and it really plays very well :)

[@Tfrne]

my boi gergiev

[@j.e.8442]

Nice...

[@robertgarcia4123]

Why is there a cello section in this performance? (It's a great performance - and I like the cellos - but I don't remember there being a string part to this work.)

[@abcaster]

Robert Garcia They are double basses, not celli. He used the pretty much same setup for his Symphony of Psalms, here including celli and a piano duo.

[@abcaster]

PS: String Bass(es) have been part of the wind band for centuries. The french military bands even had strap on celli for marching use before Adolphe Sax invented his family of single reed brass instruments.

[@TheBeautyIn3Dee]

Lyrical slow movement, very nice. Context: Mozart wrote 27 piano concertos, Beethoven 5 ... Liszt and Chopin 2 each, Brahms 2, Rachmaninoff 4, Ravel 2, Prokofiev 5 ...

[@santi4332]

Scharwenka 4, Kapustin 6, Tveitt 5, Adigozalov 4 and so on and so forth 😂

[@user-zd6tt5by9z]

Что ты хочешь этим сказать?

[@thefrankonion]

Notice that, other than double basses, there are no strings, which makes this a jazz concerto.

[@thethikboy]

Stravinsky didn't like the combination of violin and piano - he said a string struck and a string stroked don't sound well together.

[@scotjamiesonpiano]

Despite the handicaps of not wearing a beautiful, revealing gown or being female, young and attractive, Alexander plays so well -

[@sgut1947]

Do you mean the man sitting on the floor in front of the flutes? I think he's a cameraman. I have a question too: why does the conductor get prior listing in larger letters than the pianist? After all, the conductor only has to wave his arms in time. The pianist has to wave his arms in time AND hit the right notes :) Nice performance, anyway.

[@encarsiaformosa]

Movie directors don't act or (often) write scripts, nor do CEOs design and manufacture the products their companies sell. They're probably a little overpaid and overpraised, but they do have to coordinate and understand what everyone under them is doing, make the important decisions, and take responsibility for the end result. The best conductors often play multiple instruments themselves, know entire scores by heart, and have a very deep understanding of the music in all its components, as well as an integral vision of the entire piece.

[@m.a.3322]

Last time I was this confused was listening to Prokofiev...

[@KenNickels]

+Mehra Ahsan Ha ha!

[@slateflash]

Prokofiev isn't confusing. You just need to have quite a morbid imagination.

[@GeorgeClarendon]

"What kind of harmony is this? I, IV, and V!" Prokofiev in his Conservatory days.

[@borisbrinkmann]

Hat jemals jemand Gergiev einen erkennbaren Taktstock benutzen sehen?!?

[@muslit]

who needs strings? (except for the bass)

[@PabloPonce31]

What is the man sitting in the middle doing?

[@yoshi007master]

probably recording

[@blairmcmillen1299]

Fantastic performance overall. Wow. But. Sorry to nitpick - if you're learning this piece, this recording has a painfully slow 2nd movement, far slower than marked. Tempo contrast is great in theory, but not at the expense of the long, lyrical line in a beautiful movement. Bravo overall.

[@dstarr3]

I didn't know Louie Anderson could play piano.

[@Dylonely_9274]

2:20

[@sgut1947]

Um, yeah. I was joking, a bit :)

[@osushi1366]

吹奏楽とは一味違う管楽伴奏

[@limzane1581]

Why are there so many chord clash

[@organman52]

The pianist isn't bouncing around quite enough. And why is his mouth open? Is he about to say something?

[@dou40006]

the problem with Stravinsky is that he was unable and uninspired to compose melodic line , so his musical thoughts are limited to very short cells of themes that are unable to develop, he compensated by rich orchestration and energetic rhythmic base but still his music always left me with an impression of lack of deep musical sense and inspiration. I know that he grew tremendous frustration of this incapacity.

[@csaponxypan1]

I am sorry: "unable?! uninspired?! lack of deep musical sense?!" For God's sake, please try to listen, not with prejudice, but with ears!!! Musical thought thrives here on rhythm and accent placement, tine colour, counterpoint. What do you know about music to pass such a superficial, trivial judgment?