A colleague recently asked if I might provide a recommendation about basic recordings from the Classical repertoire. Essentially he wanted a few really good recordings that it would be good to own. Really just a starting point in building a collection. After thinking about this for some time, I came up with a list.
Today, “The Avant-Garde” hardly sounds avant-garde. But it does exemplify the confluence of trends. A landmark recording, capturing two giants of jazz sharing the stage for (I believe) the only time.
Georg Solti embodied energy. Energy so intense that it poured out into the orchestras he conducted, and even into the audience. It was energetic to just to attend his concerts. And the sound generated (live or in recordings) was loud and monumental. Apocalyptic, with no apologies. Unforgettable.
Leonard Bernstein clearly was the most important conductor of the music of Gustav Mahler. Prior to Bernstein, Mahler was admired by many leading musicians. Men like Bruno Walter and Otto Klemperer. Men who played and recorded his music, and used their influence to spread the Mahler gospel. But it was Bernstein who ignited the Mahler flame. His recordings and performances exposed Mahler to millions worldwide, and directly inspired the Mahler revolution.
Jazzorchester Vorarlberg is among the most impressive big bands I’ve heard in years. I was introduced to this music by sampling their 2010 album, “Introducing The Jazzorchester Vorarlberg.” I was so impressed that I downloaded the entire album, and have enjoyed every cut, every moment. Very unusual for me, I’ve found myself listening to some cuts over and over again.
When I was going to college, Jean Sibelius was considered a kind of laughing stock. A composer who had once been in vogue but whose time, it was believed, had passed. The consensus was that his music was dated and irrelevant. These opinions had been formed in part because of comments like the influential composer and critic, Virgil Thomson, who famously called Sibelius’ Second Symphony “vulgar, self-indulgent, and provincial beyond all description.”
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It seemed that I turned to my wife every page. I was compelled to share stories from Ben Macintyre’s book about Eddie Chapman. It is a remarkable book filled with remarkable stories. In a culture overrun with stories, novels, TV programs, and films about spies, this may be the best spy story of them all. And, as hard as it can be to be believed, all of this is true.
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Ronald Brautigam has done what I thought was impossible. His new recordings of the Beethoven piano concertos have not just swept the board but literally have changed the way I listen to this music.
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Sancta Civitas is one of the masterpieces of the 20th century. Sancta Civitas (Latin for “The Holy City”) is Ralph Vaughan Williams’ treatment of the book of Revelation. As a Christian, I find the imagery and impact to be overwhelming. I cannot read Revelation without hearing this music in my mind. Yet, for music of this magnitude and quality, amazingly, it only has been recorded a few times.
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Phil Woods, born in 1931, has been a titan of the saxophone since the early 1950s. He has played in small groups and big bands. His pedigree is flawless, having worked with such luminaries as Dizzy Gillespie, Quincy Jones, and Benny Goodman. He has been a sideman on many glorious albums (including Sonny Rollins’ Alfie and Oliver Nelson’s More Blues and the Abstract Truth). But I always have felt that he did perhaps his best work with what he called his European Rhythm Machine.
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image: detail of installation by Bronwyn Lace