Tips On Critical Listening: Observations on Timbre

[@ggannuch]

Happy New Year and Happy listening!

[@richardwilde9157]

Just a Christmas wish for you. I really enjoy your talks. I wanted to share that I just listened to Tchaikovsky's Symphony #1 with the LSO, Antal Dorati conducting. What a gangbusters performance. It had enough inspiration to carry me through this Christmas Eve day. All the best to you and Classics Today.

[@colincrandal1280]

On a Doráti kick now too at the moment! I think in the Tchaik Cycles video Dave mentioned that this particular performance edges on vulgarity at the end, but perhaps life has room for that at times… 😉

[@dmntuba]

What a wonderful way to spend my Christmas eve...fantastic discussion. Thank you for all the wonderful, insightful videos. Look forward to many, many more. All the very best to you and yours for the Holidays and all year long.

[@johkkarkalis8860]

Ditto! dmntuba. The art of intelligent discourse, sadly, is going the way of the passenger pigeon. Dave is doing his part to ensure its continuance. Informative. Provocative. Funny.

[@Vandalarius]

I enjoyed this talk. Speaking of timbre, I have always been fascinated by the use of wordless voice/choirs as an instrument in large scale orchestra music because it offers a unique timbre. I would love to see one of a repertoire list from you on this. I know you made one for vocal symphonies but to me "sung" voices perform a different role than wordless voices. My own list would probably be something as follows: Wordless Choirs 1) Holst - Neptune from The Planets 2) Debussy - Sirènes from Nocturnes 3) Ravel - Daphnis et Chloé 4) Vaughan WIlliams - Sinfornia Antarctica (first and last movements) 5) Puccini - Humming Chorus from Madama Butterfly 6) N. Tcherepnin - Narcisse et Echo 7) Pierne - Cydalise et le Chevre-pied 8) Delius - Song of the High Hills Wordless Voices 1) Gliere - Concerto for Coloratura Soprano 2) Rachmaninoff - Vocalise 3) Nielsen - Symphony 3 "Sinfonia Espansiva": Movement II 4) Melartin - Symphony 4 "Summer Symphony: Movement III 5) Vaughan WIlliams (again) - Symphony 3 "Pastoral": Movement IV 6) Alfven - Symphony 4 "From the Outskirts of the Archipelago. Thanks and Merry Christmas!

[@tomasz2834]

Merry happy and Godfull Christmass Mr. Hurwitz

[@graydomn]

A discussion about what kind of audio system is best suited to classical music would be interesting. Even there the kind of classical you listen to could drive choices in putting together an audio system.

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

I have no interest in that topic, nor so I think there's a useful answer. Sorry.

[@graydomn]

@@DavesClassicalGuide No problem, just a thought.

[@bloodgrss]

As per your correct assessment that Berlioz was not the first (tho. I am glad he was mentioned); Messiaen perhaps was influenced by a book written in 1923 by Paul Marie Masson in French. Poor Berlioz was still taken to task by some professors and critics for his harmonic 'capabilities'. "Not having begun with the piano, the 'logic' of his harmonies depended more than that of the ordinary composer of his day and before on the relations of orchestral timbre". M. Masson also puts it that Berlioz' "..harmonises by timbres; his famous unison's become veritable harmonies". Certainly food for thought, and perhaps why such as Adolph Adam and others damned him and his music...

[@MDK2_Radio]

It was interesting, the notion that the routing of the Turks at Vienna in 1683, and their leaving almost everything behind on the battlefield, had such an effect of Western European culture. Besides leaving their musical instruments (and thus giving orchestras Turkish percussion as used in the works mentioned) they supposedly left behind so much coffee that Viennese cafes got their start from those spoils. Thanks goodness for both! A world without the Military Symphony or coffee isn't one that holds much appeal for me. Thanks for the discussion.

[@pozsoz]

Merry Christmas! Thanks for all your insights it's a joy to listen to your critiques and recommendations. One day I would love to hear your opinions on Ligeti and the best conductors and recordings for his rather diverse and divisive repertoire. Cheers!

[@robertdandre94101]

merry christmas Mr Hurwitz and have a wonderful new years in music ....!

[@jackdolphy8965]

And Beethoven! Indeed so. I recall Saul Goodman pointed out to a student of his how the tympani anticipates the ultimate chord resolution towards the end of the first movement of Symphony #2; such an amazing moment. Goodman said that this usage of the tympani as a melodic instrument like that was a first.

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

It wasn't...

[@hendriphile]

First heard the symphony ages ago, when I borrowed it from my university record library, the old Scherchen performance. Ever since, I’ve been spoiled for all other performances, which seem to be embarrassed to make an overwhelming racket with their percussion battery, which is surely what Haydn intended!

[@bbailey7818]

It's always fascinated me that every composer we care about, including the so-called minor ones, has his own individual sound, his own thumbprint, despite using the same instruments and mostly the same harmonic language. Bach never sounds like Handel, Haydn like Mozart, Strauss like Mahler, Saint-Saens like Massenet or Franck, Sullivan like Offenbach. Beethoven's orchestral music only sounds like Beethoven; Dvorak's like no one else, not Smetana or Brahms. When I hear an unfamiliar piece on the radio it's nearly always the sonic "thumbprint" , timbre allied with harmonic quirks, that helps me at least guess the composer and not his or her melodic profile.

[@tuttifrutti2229]

Do you agree with Messiaen saying that Berlioz was the first composer to truly understand the concept of timber.

[@DavesClassicalGuide]

No.

[@stefanehrenkreutz1839]

Someone might argue that Strauss uses the timbres of the viola and cello in Don Quixote as core features. a