# Rachmaninoff vs Shostakovich



## Richard8655

I always found the stark contrast between these two very different composers fascinating as approximate Russian contemporaries. One a resident of Switzerland and Beverly Hills firmly rooted in the late romantic tradition favoring emotional melodies. The other enduring a bitter war with Leningrad under siege composing stark and grim socialist realism under duress of Stalin's terror. What very different circumstances.

Interested in thoughts or preferences (if that's possible). Mine more toward Shostakovich realism, despite the darkness of his works.


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## Judith

Love them both although they are very different. Rachmanonov is soothing and smooth where Shostakovich is adventurous and a challenge!


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## EdwardBast

Characterizing the two as approximate contemporaries is misleading if not outright wrong. All of Rachmaninoff's major works, with the exception of the last six opuses, were pre-revolutionary and were composed before Shostakovich even entered conservatory. Some of the most famous were composed before Shostakovich was born. So, essentially, you are comparing a composer whose composing career all but ended in 1917 with one who composed his last works in the 1970s. As with all such comparisons of composers more than a generation apart, I don't see the point, since the preference is more likely to have to do with ones preference for a given era rather than an individual style.


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## hpowders

I don't care about the history.

Rachmaninov's schmaltzy music sounds like it should have been composed about 100 years before.

Shostakovich's music hits me right in the gut. A Russian Mahler, if you will. Love his symphonies 4, 5, 7, 8 and 14.


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## Richard8655

Yes, their music wasn't composed at the same time. I didn't intend to imply or mislead that they were exact compositional contemporaries, although Rachmaninoff's 3rd symphony was composed in the 1930's for example. My point is that they were Russian native contemporaries (roughly) who lived in vastly different circumstances with opposite styles in a similar time frame.


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## Richard8655

hpowders said:


> I don't care about the history.
> 
> Rachmaninov's schmaltzy music sounds like it should have been composed about 100 years before.
> 
> Shostakovich's music hits me right in the gut. A Russian Mahler, if you will. Love his symphonies 4, 5, 7, 8 and 14.


I'm exactly with this in my preference as well.


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## jailhouse

Shostakovich by a million miles


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## Heck148

Richard8655 said:


> Interested in thoughts or preferences (if that's possible).


Not even in the same universe - Shostakovich one of the greatest composers...Rachm'ff a 3rd or 4th stringer at best.


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## MagneticGhost

Can't believe what I'm reading to be honest. Both amazing composers. Although they have little in common bar their nationality.
Anyone who is calling Rach 4th rate has obviously never heard his liturgical works.


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> Not even in the same universe - Shostakovich one of the greatest composers...Rachm'ff a 3rd or 4th stringer at best.


Perhaps in some parallel universe, but in the current one, Rachmaninoff is considered a top tier composer. Not only that, but he is also one of the composers whose music has been easily accessible for those not as familiar with classical music in general. His music has figured in a major way in many movies (Seven Year Itch, Brief Encounter, Rhapsody, etc.) and has been used in popular songs (All By Myself). Far more people would recognize a Rachmaninoff work than that of Shostakovich.

Also, it is no accident that the Rach 3 has become iconic as a test of the skill of young pianists in competitions.


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## Strange Magic

Let's see: Rachmaninoff--essentially a full-time professional pianist earning his daily bread from 1917 on. 45 numbered works. Shostakovich--full-time Soviet composer all his life. 147 numbered works. Percentage of body of works known and loved by millions?? These "comparisons", like the ones pitting one country against another, have the virtue of being easy to start, I'll grant them that, and only that.


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## Richard8655

Strange Magic said:


> Let's see: Rachmaninoff--essentially a full-time professional pianist earning his daily bread from 1917 on. 45 numbered works. Shostakovich--full-time Soviet composer all his life. 147 numbered works. Percentage of body of works known and loved by millions?? These "comparisons", like the ones pitting one country against another, have the virtue of being easy to start, I'll grant them that, and only that.


Not pitting, just comparing. No rocket science here, just opinions on styles and impact of these 2 overlapping contemporaries. That's all.

I see in an earlier TC poll there's a wide variety of views on this.


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## tdc

I choose Rachmaninov because I prefer his Symphony No. 3, Symphonic Dances, and Isle of the Dead to anything Shostakovich composed.


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## gardibolt

They are both among the greats. Rachmaninoff had a better way with a melody than Shostakovich, but I dig Shosty for his other merits as well. But yes, it's like saying Beethoven and Liszt were contemporaries. Technically their lifetimes overlapped, but their compositions were generations apart.


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## DavidA

However anachronistic Rachmaninov was to his time as a composer he gave us some of the most brilliant piano concertos ever written. He was himself a fabulous pianist and composed what he himself wanted to play. Of course, the fact they are wildly popular means they are often dismissed by musical elitists. But I love them!


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## Brahmsian Colors

tdc said:


> I choose Rachmaninov because I prefer his Symphony No. 3, Symphonic Dances, and Isle of the Dead to anything Shostakovich composed.


I'll choose him because I prefer his Symphony No.2 and Piano Concerto No.3 to anything Shostakovich composed.


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## lluissineu

I agree with Strange Magic in The sense that comparisons are easy to start. As long as everyone take them as a game or an excuse to tell the others which his preferred music is, there's no problem. I take it like that, and I tell everybody Shostakovitch's music is a must for me. I love most of The symphonies, jazz, ballet and film music, concertos...

Sometimes, I'm in The mood for a Rachmaninov symphony or a piano concerto or piece for solo piano.

If It's a game of tastes, Shostakovith without hesitation.


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## DeepR

I barely know Shostakovich' music so I can't say. But I love Rachmaninoff and I'm already bored with the predictable generalization about his music that was already posted and I'm sure will be posted again.


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## Radames

Rachmaninoff is one of my composing heroes because he stuck with pure unabashed romanticism when it went out of style.


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## DeepR

Radames said:


> Rachmaninoff is one of my composing heroes because he stuck with pure unabashed romanticism when it went out of style.


Who cares when something goes "out of style" anyway, I mean it's not fashion, right?


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## Bettina

I'm a pianist, so this is a pretty obvious choice for me! Definitely Rachmaninoff. I love his piano concertos, his preludes, and his etudes-tableaux. 

As a few other posters have already said, I admire Rachmaninoff for having the conviction to write in a style that felt right to him.


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## Sloe

Richard8655 said:


> I always found the stark contrast between these two very different composers fascinating as approximate Russian contemporaries. .


They were not really contemporaries Rachmaninov was 30 years older than Shostakovich. I prefer Rachmaninov I like his symphonies and the Bells.


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## Chronochromie

Radames said:


> Rachmaninoff is one of my composing heroes because he stuck with pure unabashed romanticism when it went out of style.


Yes, but style did develop as the 20th century went on and he was influenced by Modernism, as in his 3rd symphony, 4th piano concerto and Symphonic Dances.


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## DaveM

Radames said:


> Rachmaninoff is one of my composing heroes because he stuck with pure unabashed romanticism when it went out of style.


I wish there had been a dozen Rachmaninoffs in the late 19th and well into the 20th century.


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## DaveM

Chronochromie said:


> Yes, but style did develop as the 20th century went on and he was influenced by Modernism, as in his 3rd symphony, 4th piano concerto and Symphonic Dances.


Which only adds to his record as a top-notch composer. Would have been nice if Shostakovich had done both to the extent that the Rach did.


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## Chronochromie

DaveM said:


> Which only adds to his record as a top-notch composer. Would have been nice if Shostakovich had done both to the extent that the Rach did.


You mean if Shosta had done Romanticism? I dunno, his early period modernist works like Lady Macbeth and the 4th symphony are some of his best.


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## Heck148

MagneticGhost said:


> Anyone who is calling Rach 4th rate has obviously never heard his liturgical works.


sorry, his orchestral stuff is really 3rd or 4th rate...PagVars is ok...


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> Perhaps in some parallel universe, but in the current one, Rachmaninoff is considered a top tier composer.


not hardly....hey, to each his own....I've played, and played Rachm'ff orchestral and concerto works for many years.....very frustrating - think of how many really fine 20th century symphonies or concert works could be programmed in place of the grossly over-blown, excessively bloated, repetitious Rach Sym #2....way, way, over-orchestrated, thick, muddy, gluey...middle school band music orchestration style ["everybody must play all the time"]

Shostakovich was a great master...light-years beyond SR...


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> I wish there had been a dozen Rachmaninoffs in the late 19th and well into the 20th century.


Aaaaaarrrrgghh!! then concert programs would be crudded up with this thick glooey, murky stuff...it would be the death of symphonic concert music :devil:

I find Rach Sym #3 exposes some of his worst shortcomings as a composer - in addition to the hopelessly thick orchestration - there are clumsy transitions, whole sections that go nowhere - musical cul-de-sacs, disjointed, episodic format...

as an orchestra musician - very frustrating to perform Rachm'ff...a violinist friend of mine put it best: 
<<the first violin part has probably a million notes in it, 99.5% of which will never be heard by the audience>>

ain't it....


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## Pat Fairlea

I'm staying out of this! Very much devoted to the music of both composers, for quite different reasons. Perhaps the simplest way to sum them up is that SVR was a Russian composer, and DSCH was a Soviet composer.


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## Chronochromie

DaveM said:


> I wish there had been a dozen Rachmaninoffs in the late 19th and well into the 20th century.


I mean, there were, we just don't hear much about them.


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## Bulldog

Bettina said:


> I'm a pianist, so this is a pretty obvious choice for me! Definitely Rachmaninoff.


I play the piano now and then, but I'll take Shosty's Op. 87 Preludes and Fugues over anything Rachmaninov composed. I do like Rach's music very much, but the other guy is one of favorites. Also, full-blown romanticism is not in my comfort zone.


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## hpowders

Heck148 said:


> not hardly....hey, to each his own....I've played, and played Rachm'ff orchestral and concerto works for many years.....very frustrating - think of how many really fine 20th century symphonies or concert works could be programmed in place of the grossly over-blown, excessively bloated, repetitious Rach Sym #2....way, way, over-orchestrated, thick, muddy, gluey...middle school band music orchestration style ["everybody must play all the time"]
> 
> Shostakovich was a great master...light-years beyond SR...


Exactly. The _Heck _with the _148_ works of Rachmaninov!


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## tdc

Heck148 said:


> Aaaaaarrrrgghh!! then concert programs would be crudded up with this thick glooey, murky stuff...it would be the death of symphonic concert music :devil:
> 
> I find Rach Sym #3 exposes some of his worst shortcomings as a composer - in addition to the hopelessly thick orchestration - there are clumsy transitions, whole sections that go nowhere - musical cul-de-sacs, disjointed, episodic format...
> 
> as an orchestra musician - very frustrating to perform Rachm'ff...a violinist friend of mine put it best:
> <<the first violin part has probably a million notes in it, 99.5% of which will never be heard by the audience>>
> 
> ain't it....


I've never performed the works, but it seems like in some ways Shostakovich _was_ more skilled than Rachmaninov (ie - orchestration). But the Rachmaninov works I like feel _inspired_ to me, as though he is showing us a beautiful world he was aware of within. I would much rather visit the wondrous dream-like world of Rach's 3rd Symphony, than the dreary, war-torn worlds that are Shostakovich's usual fare.


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## Heck148

tdc said:


> I would much rather visit the wondrous dream-like world of Rach's 3rd Symphony, than the dreary, war-torn worlds that are Shostakovich's usual fare.


To each his own...Shostakovich's war-time works, and later works are indeed dark, brooding and violent - but - that's what he experienced in Russia...his earlier works are much more brilliant, flamboyant - the big Ballets - Age of Gold, Bolt, the movie scores, Symphony #4, etc...
I've often wondered how Rachm'ff's works would sound re-orchestrated by Shostakovich or Stravinsky - two real masters...they would clean it up immeasurably...


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> Aaaaaarrrrgghh!! then concert programs would be crudded up with this thick glooey, murky stuff...it would be the death of symphonic concert music :devil:
> 
> I find Rach Sym #3 exposes some of his worst shortcomings as a composer - in addition to the hopelessly thick orchestration - there are clumsy transitions, whole sections that go nowhere - musical cul-de-sacs, disjointed, episodic format...
> 
> as an orchestra musician - very frustrating to perform Rachm'ff...a violinist friend of mine put it best:
> <<the first violin part has probably a million notes in it, 99.5% of which will never be heard by the audience>>
> 
> ain't it....


Seems rather unlikely that the Rach #3 would be programmed in advanced academic competitions if it was as you describe. Credibility suffers when there is so much evidence to the contrary of the trashing of a composer of Rachmaninoff's status. As an orchestra musician, did you by any chance spend a lot of time sitting near the brass? :devil:


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## KenOC

Rachmaninoff was always popular with listeners, less so with critics and academics. From Wiki: "The 1954 edition of the _Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians _notoriously dismissed Rachmaninoff's music as 'monotonous in texture ... consisting mainly of artificial and gushing tunes' and predicted that his popular success was 'not likely to last'."

He who laughs last…


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

Shostakovich is one of my favorite. I like Rachmaninov but not too much. I get excited by his big romantic tunes but his music tends to bore me fairly quickly. Either I need to listen more attentively or maybe his music truly doesn't develop in ways that I can appreciate.


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> Seems rather unlikely that the Rach #3 would be programmed in advanced academic competitions if it was as you describe.


 it [sym#3] is as described. no doubt about it. What "advanced academic competitions"??

Credibility is enhanced when there is so much evidence to support the premise.


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## Bettina

Heck148 said:


> it [sym#3] is as described. no doubt about it. What "advanced academic competitions"??
> 
> Credibility is enhanced when there is so much evidence to support the premise.


I don't know if Rachmaninoff's symphonies are performed in any competitions. But his piano concertos certainly are! In prestigious events such as the Van Cliburn and the Tchaikovsky competitions, many contestants perform Rachmaninoff concertos (as well as his solo works). I'm sure I can find some evidence for this, in the form of program and repertoire listings, if you're interested in seeing some proof.


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## Heck148

KenOC said:


> "The 1954 edition of the _Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians _notoriously dismissed Rachmaninoff's music as 'monotonous in texture ... consisting mainly of artificial and gushing tunes"


a remarkably accurate summation, IMO 

A frequent question we used to ask - <<which do you prefer Rachm'ff PC, or Addinsell's "Warsaw Concerto"??>> lol!!

Addinsell - it's alot shorter!! :lol::devil:


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## lextune

Bettina said:


> I'm a pianist, so this is a pretty obvious choice for me! Definitely Rachmaninoff. I love his piano concertos, his preludes, and his etudes-tableaux.


How is it obvious?
I love Rachmaninov's piano works as well, but Shostakovich wrote tremendous music for the piano!

I wouldn't want to be without either of them, but if pressed I would honestly go with Shostakovich. I love his Op.34 Preludes so very much.

As for orchestral music, I don't think it is very close: Shostakovich.


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## Heck148

Bettina said:


> But his piano concertos certainly are! In prestigious events such as the Van Cliburn and the Tchaikovsky competitions, many contestants perform Rachmaninoff concertos


yes, they are performed often at solo competitions. 
Rachm'ff was a famous, virtuoso pianist by all accounts. He should have stuck with that, and left the composing to the masters - Shostakovich, Stravinsky, Prokofieff....


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## Bettina

lextune said:


> How is it obvious?
> I love Rachmaninov's piano works as well, but Shostakovich wrote tremendous music for the piano!
> 
> I wouldn't want to be without either of them, but if pressed I would honestly go with Shostakovich. I love his Op.34 Preludes so very much.
> 
> As for orchestral music, I don't think it is very close: Shostakovich.


By "obvious" I mean that my choice is predictable and conformist; it is in line with what the majority of professional pianists would choose. My evidence for this is that Rachmaninoff is performed much more than Shostakovitch in piano recitals and competitions. (Unfortunately, I don't have any statistics to cite off the top of my head, but I'm sure I could find some sources to back up my point.)


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## lextune

No need for sources. I think that is a very safe bet.

But as a fellow pianist I must implore you not to neglect Shostakovich! His aforementioned Preludes, and his Preludes & Fugues Op.87 are towering masterpieces.


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## Vaneyes

Re oeuvre, Shostakovich wins, but that doesn't mean too much to me, since I only collect what I like of a composer. Checking my collection, I see these two composers are about even in discs. Number of different works goes to Shostakovich. Number of repeat works goes to Rachmaninov. The latter is swayed by more interest in solo piano, and this outweighs any other genre for either composer. 

Both gentlemen are equally impressive in concerti. Shostakovich is far more versatile, with two each from piano, cello, violin. Though Rachmaninov's PCs 2 & 3 get much of the hurrah, one must listen to Janis for #1 and ABM for #4, to truly see/hear that all are masterpieces.

Love 'em both. Don't have to choose. Jus' sayin'.


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## hpowders

Having a clarinet in the house, I must admit I love the gorgeous, huge solo from Rachmaninov's Second Symphony.


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## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> Aaaaaarrrrgghh!! then concert programs would be crudded up with this thick glooey, murky stuff...it would be the death of symphonic concert music :devil:
> 
> I find Rach Sym #3 exposes some of his worst shortcomings as a composer - in addition to the hopelessly thick orchestration - there are clumsy transitions, whole sections that go nowhere - musical cul-de-sacs, disjointed, episodic format...
> 
> as an orchestra musician - very frustrating to perform Rachm'ff...a violinist friend of mine put it best:
> <<the first violin part has probably a million notes in it, 99.5% of which will never be heard by the audience>>
> 
> ain't it....


It doesn't sound like you have ever heard Rachmaninoff's 3rd symphony. The orchestration is crystal clear with virtually no doubling. Ravel or Rimsky-Korsakoff would have been proud of it. The only thickness in it is the occasional bit of dark writing for low winds, which is intentional and effective. There is not a single section in the work that goes nowhere - everything is goal directed. Nor is there a single passage for the violins that will not be clearly heard. It is not episodic unless one is deaf to motivic connections. The only thing I can figure is that you meant to comment on another work of Rachmaninoff.


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## Strange Magic

Question: Does anyone really think that telling somebody who likes the music of A that the music of A is wretched compared to the music of B, is actually going to change somebody's mind? In the immortal words of Judas Priest, "You Got Another Thing Coming!" I get, to some extent, that it's kind of a game--see how big these hands are!--but to my mind it demonstrates a non-productive, hectoring approach to conversing about music and leads to unnecessary Oh Yeah? Sez You! back-and-forth. Great, if that's the goal. Not so great for civil exchange of views and tastes, think I.


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## Dan Ante

I love Shostakovich I find his music easy to listen to and seems to me to be a natural follow on from Beethoven. 
Rachmaninoff on the other hand is a composer that I have never really liked a lot, I can listen to his works but they don’t grab me at all.


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## Pugg

Rachmaninov, pure and simple my favourite.


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## tdc

EdwardBast said:


> It doesn't sound like you have ever heard Rachmaninoff's 3rd symphony. The orchestration is crystal clear with virtually no doubling. Ravel or Rimsky-Korsakoff would have been proud of it. The only thickness in it is the occasional bit of dark writing for low winds, which is intentional and effective. There is not a single section in the work that goes nowhere - everything is goal directed. Nor is there a single passage for the violins that will not be clearly heard. It is not episodic unless one is deaf to motivic connections. The only thing I can figure is that you meant to comment on another work of Rachmaninoff.


Good to hear, because frankly I don't hear anything wrong with the work either and consider it among my favorite symphonies. But I was willing to give Heck148 the benefit of the doubt in terms of the orchestration since he claims to have performed the work.

Shostakovich's orchestration generally sounds a little more neo-classical like Stravinsky and Ravel, but that doesn't mean that approach would make Rachmaninov's works sound better.

Shosty seemed to excel in things like form and counterpoint. But I think Rachmaninov was the better melodist and I love his use of harmony, especially in his more modern sounding works like Symphony No. 3 and the Symphonic Dances.


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> it [sym#3] is as described. no doubt about it. What "advanced academic competitions"??


My apologies: I somehow missed the 'Sym' and thought you were talking about the concerto. Which doesn't help my credibility...


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## Art Rock

I like Rachmaninoff. I absolutely love Shostakovich. Not even close for me.


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## brianvds

Vaneyes said:


> Re oeuvre, Shostakovich wins, but that doesn't mean too much to me, since I only collect what I like of a composer. Checking my collection, I see these two composers are about even in discs. Number of different works goes to Shostakovich. Number of repeat works goes to Rachmaninov. The latter is swayed by more interest in solo piano, and this outweighs any other genre for either composer.
> 
> Both gentlemen are equally impressive in concerti. Shostakovich is far more versatile, with two each from piano, cello, violin. Though Rachmaninov's PCs 2 & 3 get much of the hurrah, one must listen to Janis for #1 and ABM for #4, to truly see/hear that all are masterpieces.
> 
> Love 'em both. Don't have to choose. Jus' sayin'.


Just about my opinion as well; I like both and would refuse to choose. Why do we always have these Sophie's Choice threads here anyway? 

I find it interesting that people say they love Shostakovich "despite" the darkness of his works. I like his work precisely _because_ of all that bleak darkness, and find myself less fond of his more upbeat work. And all those oceans of sadness are why I like Rachmaninov too. Both of them dug up their treasures in the graveyard. Perhaps it's a Russian thing? They both liked their ciggies too.


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## Sloe

Strange Magic said:


> Question: Does anyone really think that telling somebody who likes the music of A that the music of A is wretched compared to the music of B, is actually going to change somebody's mind? In the immortal words of Judas Priest, "You Got Another Thing Coming!" I get, to some extent, that it's kind of a game--see how big these hands are!--but to my mind it demonstrates a non-productive, hectoring approach to conversing about music and leads to unnecessary Oh Yeah? Sez You! back-and-forth. Great, if that's the goal. Not so great for civil exchange of views and tastes, think I.


Nothing wrong with explaining why you prefer one over the other. None of them are among my favourites really. It just is like that.


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## Strange Magic

Sloe said:


> Nothing wrong with explaining why you prefer one over the other.


I totally agree. It's the trashing of the other person's favorite that gives it its Hecktoring  tone, which is quite unnecessary, and possibly meant to so annoy, yes?


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## Animal the Drummer

Not a value judgment, just a personal reaction, but I find that Shostakovich engages my mind whereas Rachmaninov engages both my mind *and* my heart, so: Rachmaninov every time for me.


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## Heck148

hpowders said:


> Exactly. The _Heck _with the _148_ works of Rachmaninov!


LOL!! very good!! :lol::lol:


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## Heck148

hpowders said:


> Having a clarinet in the house, I must admit I love the gorgeous, huge solo from Rachmaninov's Second Symphony.


It is a nice solo - to bad SR so quickly clutters it up, covers it with the overly thick sonic miasma of excessive orchestration.


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## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> It doesn't sound like you have ever heard Rachmaninoff's 3rd symphony.


I've played it several times, and I stick to my assessment. it is way over-orchestrated - there are lots of nice, little inside solos, counter melodies - all covered up by excessively thick texture. To project these, you must play extra-loud, really pushed, which is hardly consistent with the musical context of the work, which may be legato, cantabile, dolce.... 
also, I was constantly amazed, bewildered, by the clumsy transitions, the episodic disjointed structure, and the seemingly pointless direction of some of the sections....
one orchestration flaw I find with SR is that he keeps the instruments way too much in the lowest, low-mid-range or mid-range of their individual tonal spectra. this makes for a very thick, heavy, dark texture and it just becomes pervasive.
other composers tend to do that as well - but they do vary the ranges - Sibelius is a good example - VWms as well. These composers achieve a clarity, tho the background may be dark, that SR misses.

As I said before - it would have been fascinating to hear Rachm'ff's orchestral works re-orchestrated by Shostakovich or Stravinsky...


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## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> I totally agree. It's the trashing of the other person's favorite that gives it its Hecktoring  tone, which is quite unnecessary, and possibly meant to so annoy, yes?


I admit to being a a bit of a Devil's Advocate here :devil:, but I'm not pretending. I do think that SR is way over-rated as a composer, and his music, for me, is quite frustrating and rather unrewarding to perform. My assessment of his flaws as a composer are based upon a 45+ years career as an orchestra performer. I know what I hear. 
I know SR is popular, esp with audiences; musicians, less so....to each his own, of course, so please don't let my negative discourse spoil anyone's enjoyment.


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## Janspe

I'm always puzzled when people say that Shostakovich isn't an important composer for pianists - I mean, _really?_ He wrote two fantastic (and funny) piano concertos, two very contrasting piano sonatas (the first, wild and crazy; the second, very dark), a set of preludes and the gigantic preludes and fugues (which amount to more than two hours of music) - not to mention all the brilliant chamber music: two trios, a quintet, sonatas with the cello, violin and viola. Loads of songs for piano and voice as well. I do get it, Rachmaninov is one of the greatest piano composers - I love his piano music _a lot_ - but the neglect of Shostakovich's piano work is baffling. He has so much to offer!

I like both composers a lot, but they are too different from one another for me to choose which one I prefer. Both of them wrote music that deeply touches my heart, certainly.


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## Strange Magic

Heck148 said:


> I admit to being a a bit of a Devil's Advocate here :devil:, but I'm not pretending. I do think that SR is way over-rated as a composer, and his music, for me, is quite frustrating and rather unrewarding to perform. My assessment of his flaws as a composer are based upon a 45+ years career as an orchestra performer. I know what I hear.
> I know SR is popular, esp with audiences; musicians, less so....to each his own, of course, so please don't let my negative discourse spoil anyone's enjoyment.


Glad to see that all above is your opinion. Also glad that musicians, for whom you speak, are not in charge of formulating public reaction to the music of this, that, or any other composer. The critic Virgil Thomson wrote that he realized there were sincere Sibelius lovers in the world "although I must say I've never met one among educated professional musicians." I love that touch about "educated"; clearly uneducated professional musicians can easily fall into the trap of liking Sibelius, or even Rachmaninoff. The above tidbit comes from the pen of Harold C. Schonberg's _Lives of the Great Composers_. Schonberg, after further discussion of the concurring views of professionals, ends his discussion of Sibelius by allowing that Sibelius "deserves to occupy an honorable place among the minor composers." Perhaps there is even room for Rachmaninoff in that quiet corner.


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## Pat Fairlea

Janspe said:


> I'm always puzzled when people say that Shostakovich isn't an important composer for pianists - I mean, _really?_ He wrote two fantastic (and funny) piano concertos, two very contrasting piano sonatas (the first, wild and crazy; the second, very dark), a set of preludes and the gigantic preludes and fugues (which amount to more than two hours of music) - not to mention all the brilliant chamber music: two trios, a quintet, sonatas with the cello, violin and viola. Loads of songs for piano and voice as well. I do get it, Rachmaninov is one of the greatest piano composers - I love his piano music _a lot_ - but the neglect of Shostakovich's piano work is baffling. He has so much to offer!
> 
> I like both composers a lot, but they are too different from one another for me to choose which one I prefer. Both of them wrote music that deeply touches my heart, certainly.


Hear, hear! Exactly.


----------



## starthrower

Rach, for the piano concertos, and Shosty for everything else.


----------



## Strange Magic

hpowders said:


> Exactly. The _Heck _with the _148_ works of Rachmaninov!


148? We know _Symphonic Dances_ is Opus 45. Rach must have been a busy beaver in the last few months of his life to have produced another 103 works :lol:.


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## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> Glad to see that all above is your opinion.


of course...I could argue quite objectively about SR's poor orchestration, relative to the great masters, or his disjointed, rambling structures, but there is no need really. Musical preferences are by nature subjective.



> Also glad that musicians, for whom you speak, are not in charge of formulating public reaction to the music of this, that, or any other composer.


sorry to hear you say that. Musicians certainly have valid POV regarding the music they perform...as an orchestra musician, it saddens me that so many great works are neglected on concert programs in favor of the standard old war horses....we cannot help but think that if some of these neglected works were programmed more often, audiences would be most receptive to hear them at concerts. 
instead, we get the usual cavalcade of Tchaik 4, 5, Rach #2, etc, etc...


> The above tidbit comes from the pen of Harold C. Schonberg's _Lives of the Great Composers_. Schonberg, after further discussion of the concurring views of professionals, ends his discussion of Sibelius by allowing that Sibelius "deserves to occupy an honorable place among the minor composers."


I don't pay too much attention to critics - re Harold Schonberg - he has written some excellent books - "Great Conductors", "Great Pianists", etc...that are quite informative, if limited by his own biases. 
I wrote him off long ago as a critic - the greatest concert I've ever heard - March, 1970 - Solti/CSO - Mahler #5 @ Carnegie Hall. a now legendary concert still remembered by those who performed and those who attended - Schonberg blew it off briefly in his review - as an "overly emphatic" performance of Mahler Sym #5.  either he wasn't there, or he totally missed the wild applause and enthusiasm of the audience, which cheered non-stop for 30 minutes at the conclusion...whichever - he blew it completely.


----------



## Pat Fairlea

Heck148 said:


> of course...I could argue quite objectively about SR's poor orchestration, relative to the great masters, or his disjointed, rambling structures, but there is no need really. Musical preferences are by nature subjective.
> 
> sorry to hear you say that. Musicians certainly have valid POV regarding the music they perform...as an orchestra musician, it saddens me that so many great works are neglected on concert programs in favor of the standard old war horses....we cannot help but think that if some of these neglected works were programmed more often, audiences would be most receptive to hear them at concerts.
> instead, we get the usual cavalcade of Tchaik 4, 5, Rach #2, etc, etc...
> 
> I don't pay too much attention to critics - re Harold Schonberg - he has written some excellent books - "Great Conductors", "Great Pianists", etc...that are quite informative, if limited by his own biases.
> I wrote him off long ago as a critic - the greatest concert I've ever heard - March, 1970 - Solti/CSO - Mahler #5 @ Carnegie Hall. a now legendary concert still remembered by those who performed and those who attended - Schonberg blew it off briefly in his review - as an "overly emphatic" performance of Mahler Sym #5.  either he wasn't there, or he totally missed the wild applause and enthusiasm of the audience, which cheered non-stop for 30 minutes at the conclusion...whichever - he blew it completely.


As Sibelius remarked (though presumably not in English) "Pay no attention to critics. No-one ever put up a statue to a critic"


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## Heck148

Pat Fairlea said:


> As Sibelius remarked (though presumably not in English) "Pay no attention to critics. No-one ever put up a statue to a critic"


LOL!! He's right!!


----------



## Chronochromie

Heck148 said:


> LOL!! He's right!!


It may have been true at the time, but now...


----------



## isorhythm

Rachmaninoff. He was an unabashed Romantic while Shostakovich for me is sort of awkwardly in between Romantic and modern.


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## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> I've played it several times, and I stick to my assessment. it is way over-orchestrated - there are lots of nice, little inside solos, counter melodies - all covered up by excessively thick texture. To project these, you must play extra-loud, really pushed, which is hardly consistent with the musical context of the work, which may be legato, cantabile, dolce....
> also, I was constantly amazed, bewildered, by the clumsy transitions, the episodic disjointed structure, and the seemingly pointless direction of some of the sections....
> one orchestration flaw I find with SR is that he keeps the instruments way too much in the lowest, low-mid-range or mid-range of their individual tonal spectra. this makes for a very thick, heavy, dark texture and it just becomes pervasive.
> other composers tend to do that as well - but they do vary the ranges - Sibelius is a good example - VWms as well. These composers achieve a clarity, tho the background may be dark, that SR misses.
> 
> As I said before - it would have been fascinating to hear Rachm'ff's orchestral works re-orchestrated by Shostakovich or Stravinsky...


You know, I think I should apologize. I hadn't listened to the 3rd in a while and it is darker and lusher than I remembered. And yet, what you said about thousands of violin notes that can't be heard makes no sense to me. I can hear clearly every note, and indeed, every line in the texture. Parts of the first movement are probably darker than they need to be. The whole 2nd movement, on the other hand is pretty light and clear. In any case, none of what you say about the structure makes sense to me. I don't hear any sections with "pointless direction." In the 2nd symphony there are such digressions, but can you point me at one or two of these in the 3rd?


----------



## Pat Fairlea

Chronochromie said:


> It may have been true at the time, but now...


Ah, posterity makes fools of us all in the end.

More relevant to the OP, and in explanation of my previous rather gnomic comment, the cultural milieu of SVR and DSCH is so different that comparison is even more odious than usual. SVR wrote the music of Mrs Pat's Russian Granny, steeped in Late Romanticism, Russian folk music and the Orthodox liturgy. And that was also an outward-looking Russia, part of the cultural world of pre-WW1 Europe as a whole. DSCH learned his trade and developed his influences in the more inward-looking Soviet world, within which many of those traits had been lost or suppressed, and the whole purpose of public music was seen in a different light. Despite their apparent connections of century and country, they represent either side of a cultural upheaval. I would not want to be without SVR's Preludes and Etudes Tableaux, but nor would I readily give up DSCH's magnificent Preludes & Fugues.


----------



## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> You know, I think I should apologize.


no need 



> In the 2nd symphony there are such digressions, but can you point me at one or two of these in the 3rd?


Ugh, that means I have to go listen to it all the way thru?? :lol: 

really - I don't own the score...otherwise, I'd go thru it...


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## Heck148

Pat Fairlea said:


> Despite their apparent connections of century and country, they represent either side of a cultural upheaval.


good point, well said....also - SR left Russia to seek his fortune abroad, like Stravinsky, and Prokofieff...DS stayed in Russia and lived thru the many trials and tribulations of that nation's tortured 20th century history.


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## Strange Magic

Heck, you know that the point of the Schonberg quote was that Thomson had never met an educated professional musician who had much use for Sibelius' music. Schonberg based his assessment on what those selfsame professional musicians were telling him too. I read Schonberg for the history and biography, not for his opinions. Like yourself, I care little for the opinions of critics--or anybody else, for that matter--though sometimes the opinions are great reading as a certain kind of literature. No, when it comes to the arts: _de gustibus_ rules supreme. But the audiences do so love Rachmaninoff's music--poor benighted souls, and the professional musicians must put up with it or become electricians. I agree fully that it would be great if large, eager audiences turned out to hear a window-rattling performance of the Prokofiev 3rd Symphony, but it very rarely happens. But nothing really to be gained by blaming the audience--it is what it is. Thank goodness for the vast library of recorded works, both as video and as audio.

For fun opinions on classical music and composers, Brockway and Weinstock's classic _Men of Music_ is a treasure trove of ripe and pungent prose; sometimes I even agree with them.


----------



## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> no need
> 
> Ugh, that means I have to go listen to it all the way thru?? :lol:
> 
> really - I don't own the score...otherwise, I'd go thru it...


That's okay! We'll agree to disagree?


----------



## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> Thomson had never met an educated professional musician who had much use for Sibelius' music. Schonberg based his assessment on what those selfsame professional musicians were telling him too.


that is an odd conclusion for Thomson to offer, considering that some of the world's greatest conductors were championing the works of the Finnish master - Stokowski Toscanini, Beecham, Barbirolli, Koussevitsky just to name a few....is Thomson actually trying to say that these great Maestros were not educated professional musicians??!!



> the audiences do so love Rachmaninoff's music--poor benighted souls, and the professional musicians must put up with it or become electricians. I agree fully that it would be great if large, eager audiences turned out to hear a window-rattling performance of the Prokofiev 3rd Symphony, but it very rarely happens. But nothing really to be gained by blaming the audience--it is what it is.


But it needn't be that way, at least not so excessively....more adventurous programming would allow more exposure to great works that are not [yet] well-known. Yes, there almost always has to be a war horse, or a more familiar work to get people in the seats. This is the constant dilemma of music directors in the modern concert music world: programming - you have to program new stuff, or the orchestra [and audience] goes stale - but you have to attract audiences with familiar works to get them in the seats....you're right - don't blame the audience - educate them...


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## starthrower

Strange Magic said:


> Heck, you know that the point of the Schonberg quote was that Thomson had never met an educated professional musician who had much use for Sibelius' music. Schonberg based his assessment on what those selfsame professional musicians were telling him too. I read Schonberg for the history and biography, not for his opinions.


Which book are you referring to?



> For fun opinions on classical music and composers, Brockway and Weinstock's classic _Men of Music_ is a treasure trove of ripe and pungent prose; sometimes I even agree with them.


Thanks for the tip! Got a used copy for a penny!


----------



## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> I admit to being a a bit of a Devil's Advocate here :devil:, but I'm not pretending. I do think that SR is way over-rated as a composer, and his music, for me, is quite frustrating and rather unrewarding to perform. My assessment of his flaws as a composer are based upon a 45+ years career as an orchestra performer. I know what I hear.
> I know SR is popular, esp with audiences; musicians, less so....to each his own, of course, so please don't let my negative discourse spoil anyone's enjoyment.


Your assessment is so negative. It raises the question as to why SR has been so popular. I recall a longtime violinist in a major large orchestra saying that sitting in the middle of the orchestra he sometimes felt overwhelmed by the cacophony of sound in the big works and was sure he wasn't hearing what the audience was.


----------



## DavidA

Strange Magic said:


> Glad to see that all above is your opinion. Also glad that musicians, for whom you speak, are not in charge of formulating public reaction to the music of this, that, or any other composer. *The critic Virgil Thomson wrote that he realized there were sincere Sibelius lovers in the world "although I must say I've never met one among educated professional musicians." * I love that touch about "educated"; clearly uneducated professional musicians can easily fall into the trap of liking Sibelius, or even Rachmaninoff. The above tidbit comes from the pen of Harold C. Schonberg's _Lives of the Great Composers_. Schonberg, after further discussion of the concurring views of professionals, ends his discussion of Sibelius by allowing that Sibelius "deserves to occupy an honorable place among the minor composers." Perhaps there is even room for Rachmaninoff in that quiet corner.


Hilarious! Shows how ignorant critics are actually. When you think of all the conductors who championed Sibelius - Beecham, Karajan, et al - it makes Thomson's opinion seem the more idiotic.


----------



## DavidA

Strange Magic said:


> Heck, you know that the point of the Schonberg quote was that Thomson had never met an educated professional musician who had much use for Sibelius' music. Schonberg based his assessment on what those selfsame professional musicians were telling him too. I read Schonberg for the history and biography, not for his opinions. Like yourself, I care little for the opinions of critics--or anybody else, for that matter--though sometimes the opinions are great reading as a certain kind of literature. No, when it comes to the arts: _de gustibus_ rules supreme. *But the audiences do so love Rachmaninoff's music--poor benighted souls, *and the professional musicians must put up with it or become electricians. I agree fully that it would be great if large, eager audiences turned out to hear a window-rattling performance of the Prokofiev 3rd Symphony, but it very rarely happens. But nothing really to be gained by blaming the audience--it is what it is. Thank goodness for the vast library of recorded works, both as video and as audio.
> 
> For fun opinions on classical music and composers, Brockway and Weinstock's classic _Men of Music_ is a treasure trove of ripe and pungent prose; sometimes I even agree with them.


I am thankful I am one of those poor, benighted souls who loves Rachmaninoff! :lol:


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## Strange Magic

Heck148 said:


> that is an odd conclusion for Thomson to offer, considering that some of the world's greatest conductors were championing the works of the Finnish master - Stokowski Toscanini, Beecham, Barbirolli, Koussevitsky just to name a few....is Thomson actually trying to say that these great Maestros were not educated professional musicians??!!...


I offer no defense of Thomson, other than to note he was a professional composer himself, as well as critic. Maybe he hung out with a bad crowd. Schonberg's argument, though, appears to hinge upon the days of critical acclaim--as authenticated by your list of conductors--for Sibelius being over by the time Thomson was writing. The ebb and flow of reputations. Schonberg was at pains to rehabilitate that of Rachmaninoff in _Lives_, who had suffered the same fate that Thomson and Schonberg meted out for Sibelius. The only opinion that counts is mine, and maybe yours.


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## Zhdanov

remember that silly title mockumentary _Shostakovich Against Stalin_, so why not *Rachmaninov Against Roosevelt*.


----------



## wolkaaa

Heck148 said:


> I admit to being a a bit of a Devil's Advocate here :devil:, but I'm not pretending. I do think that SR is way over-rated as a composer, and his music, for me, is quite frustrating and rather unrewarding to perform. My assessment of his flaws as a composer are based upon a 45+ years career as an orchestra performer. I know what I hear.
> I know SR is popular, esp with audiences; musicians, less so....to each his own, of course, so please don't let my negative discourse spoil anyone's enjoyment.


Very weird position. I guess, all composers are writing for audience and not for musicians. For me, as a listener, Rachmaninov's orchestral works are even much underrated! I don't care about the problems of musicians, most important is that the listener like the music.


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## Strange Magic

DavidA said:


> I am thankful I am one of those poor, benighted souls who loves Rachmaninoff! :lol:


Me too. The very first LP I bought was the Rach 2 concerto, with Istomin and Ormandy/Philadelphia.


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## Zhdanov

you guys won't appreciate the fight Rachmaninov put up to defy Roosevelt's regime and the horrors he went through.


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## KenOC

Rachmaninoff was a loyal New Dealer! The historical record has not a single statement of his criticizing the Roosevelt regime. He may not even have known about his cousin Freddie Rachmaninoff being hauled off to the forced labor camps in Nevada.


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## Zhdanov

KenOC said:


> Rachmaninoff was a loyal New Dealer!


while Stravinsky was tortured by the police -


----------



## Razumovskymas

Rachmaninov's music doesn't ask questions, it's like listening to very well constructed pep-talks, straight forward and self confident. I enjoy listening to his piano concertos I and III for that reason but for me there's not so much between the lines there.

Where as Shostakovich to me is all about asking questions, reading between the lines, questioning beauty...


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## hpowders

I was about to reach for Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2, couldn't do it and reached for the Shostakovich Symphony No. 4 instead.

Says a lot.


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## Strange Magic

Zhdanov said:


> while Stravinsky was tortured by the police -


More about Stravinsky, Boston, and "torture":

https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2016/06/30/stravinsky/rfnaZtqjCQXZAobdv7kVkI/story.html


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## tdc

DaveM said:


> Your assessment is so negative. It raises the question as to why SR has been so popular. I recall a longtime violinist in a major large orchestra saying that sitting in the middle of the orchestra he sometimes felt overwhelmed by the cacophony of sound in the big works and was sure he wasn't hearing what the audience was.


There is probably some truth to this. At any rate Rachmaninov's music from my perspective is much more colorful than Shostakovich. I think good use of harmony trumps orchestration, the latter being not really that important comparatively, and that is why so much of Shostakovich's music sounds dreary and dull, metallic and mechanical regardless of the clean orchestration. Given the choice I would not re-orchestrate Rachmaninov's music, because I think the lush, thick sound suits his more Romantic approach. Paring it down and cleaning it up would take away from Rachmaninov's sound, not improve it.


----------



## DavidA

Strange Magic said:


> Me too. The very first LP I bought was the Rach 2 concerto, with Istomin and Ormandy/Philadelphia.


I've just got the reissue as part of a boxed set of Istomin recordings


----------



## DavidA

Razumovskymas said:


> Rachmaninov's music doesn't ask questions, it's like listening to very well constructed pep-talks, straight forward and self confident. I enjoy listening to his piano concertos I and III for that reason but for me there's not so much between the lines there.
> 
> Where as Shostakovich to me is all about asking questions, reading between the lines, questioning beauty...


Frankly when I'm relaxing to music I don't want to be asked too many questions. Actually when listening to the Rach 3 my question is always: "How on earth does anyone play that?"


----------



## Bulldog

tdc said:


> There is probably some truth to this. At any rate Rachmaninov's music from my perspective is much more colorful than Shostakovich. I think good use of harmony trumps orchestration, the latter being not really that important comparatively, and that is why so much of Shostakovich's music sounds dreary and dull, metallic and mechanical..


Dreary/dull/metallic/mechanical - Some folks have used those same words to describe Bach's music. Of course, I don't think those words have anything to do with the music of Bach or Shostakovich.


----------



## tdc

Bulldog said:


> Dreary/dull/metallic/mechanical - Some folks have used those same words to describe Bach's music. Of course, I don't think those words have anything to do with the music of Bach or Shostakovich.


I've heard dull and mechanical in reference to Bach, but not dreary or metallic. Anyway Bach is the king of harmony, Shostakovich is way outclassed in this comparison.


----------



## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> I've played it several times, and I stick to my assessment. it is way over-orchestrated - there are lots of nice, little inside solos, counter melodies - all covered up by excessively thick texture. To project these, you must play extra-loud, really pushed, which is hardly consistent with the musical context of the work, which may be legato, cantabile, dolce....
> also, I was constantly amazed, bewildered, by the clumsy transitions, the episodic disjointed structure, and the seemingly pointless direction of some of the sections....
> one orchestration flaw I find with SR is that he keeps the instruments way too much in the lowest, low-mid-range or mid-range of their individual tonal spectra. this makes for a very thick, heavy, dark texture and it just becomes pervasive.
> other composers tend to do that as well - but they do vary the ranges - Sibelius is a good example - VWms as well. These composers achieve a clarity, tho the background may be dark, that SR misses.
> 
> As I said before - it would have been fascinating to hear Rachm'ff's orchestral works re-orchestrated by Shostakovich or Stravinsky...


There's no arguing with taste, certainly, but I'm with EdwardBast on this: I find the scoring of Rachmaninoff's late works marvelous, and would never recognize the 3rd Symphony from your description. You might be describing Reger or some other semi-competent composer, but not Rach.

I concede that the scoring of his early works is thicker and darker, but that is his characteristic sonority, and when well played it justifies itself. Narrow conceptions of what is "good" and "bad" are often just rationalizations of our tastes.

If you were "bewildered" by the 3rd, I would suggest that the problem - if there is one - is not in the work, which I find both masterful and moving.


----------



## Bulldog

tdc said:


> I've heard dull and mechanical in reference to Bach, but not dreary or metallic. Anyway Bach is the king of harmony, Shostakovich is way outclassed in this comparison.


To my mind, Bach outclasses all other composers. So here's how it goes; Bach > Shosty > Rachmaninov > Vivaldi. I just felt compelled to throw the Red Priest into the mix.


----------



## EdwardBast

In this thread Rachmaninoff is not getting the respect he deserves. So …

Start at the first end of Rachmaninoff's career as a composer, in 1917, when he left his homeland and became a touring virtuoso. He could just as well have made a career as a conductor, acclaimed first for his stint at the Dresden Opera during and for two years after the unrest of 1905 (see Shostakovich's 11th Symphony and Andrei Bely's amazing novel _Petersburg_) and offered the Boston Symphony twice. Had Rachmaninoff composed nothing but the last two opuses of his Russian career, the Etudes Tableaux Op. 39 and the Op. 38 songs, he would be worthy of eternal remembrance.

Shostakovich wrote some great music for the piano, but Rachmaninoff's works are great piano music. After the death of his friend and conservatory classmate, Alexander Scriabin, Rachmaninoff had performed some of Scriabin's piano music at a benefit for the composer's family. Soon thereafter Rachmaninoff composed his Op. 38 and Op. 39. They don't sound anything like it, but I suspect Rachmaninoff's deep study of Scriabin's music inspired him to push his harmonic boundaries. It would have been interesting to see how far this expansion of his palette would have gone had exile not silenced him. Here is an amazing live performance of the Etudes, Op. 39:






These songs speak for themselves, and use a couple of poems by the above mentioned Andrei Bely.

Op. 38:






You can count back from Op. 38 ten opus numbers and encounter nothing but stellar work, including the Vespers, Piano Sonata no. 2, The Bells (choral symphony), the Songs Op. 34, Etudes Tableaux Op. 33 and Preludes Op. 32, the Third Piano Concerto and the Isle of the Dead.

I listen to more Shostakovich than Rachmaninoff, but come on fellow Shosty fans: open your ears!


----------



## brianvds

Zhdanov said:


> while Stravinsky was tortured by the police -


Now, now, it's called enhanced interrogation. Torture is illegal.


----------



## Heck148

DaveM said:


> ...he sometimes felt overwhelmed by the cacophony of sound in the big works and was sure he wasn't hearing what the audience was.


He's probably right.


----------



## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> I offer no defense of Thomson,


really - he missed it with Sibelius...



> The ebb and flow of reputations.


yes,indeed,it certainly happens.


----------



## Heck148

wolkaaa said:


> Very weird position. I guess, all composers are writing for audience and not for musicians.


not weird at all...and...musicians are "audience" as well. I don't care to perform Rachm'ff, and as a listener, I rarely, if ever listen to his music - Pag Variations is OK....I think SR is vastly over-rated. so many other composers do it so much better.


----------



## Heck148

hpowders said:


> I was about to reach for Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2, couldn't do it and reached for the Shostakovich Symphony No. 4 instead.
> Says a lot.


Indeed, it does!!


----------



## Heck148

tdc said:


> ....At any rate Rachmaninov's music from my perspective is much more colorful than Shostakovich.


: :lol:
you're kidding, of course - Rachm'ff's music is about the least colorful of any music I've ever experienced - this constant thick, muddy, cluttered texture - sort of a gray-brown miasma of murkiness way, way too heavy in the bass, and lower mid-range of the orchestral palette. compare SR's orchestral sound to those of the masters - Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich....SR sounds like he's orchestrating for a middle school band.



> I would not re-orchestrate Rachmaninov's music, because I think the lush, thick sound suits his more Romantic approach. Paring it down and cleaning it up would take away from Rachmaninov's sound, not improve it.


Paring it down would allow us to hear what he actually wrote!! SR always has lots of little inside parts, small details which should be heard, but the orchestration is so thick and muddy that these details are lost. cleaning it up would help us hear all of those inside parts.


----------



## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> You might be describing Reger or some other semi-competent composer,


 I am - Rach'ff!! I consider him a 3rd or 4th stringer, at best.



> I concede that the scoring of his early works is thicker and darker, but that is his characteristic sonority,


thick, dark, murky and muddy...obscures the details, of which there are many. even in the best of hands, it doesn't work...



> "If you were "bewildered" by the 3rd, I would suggest that the problem - if there is one - is not in the work, which I find both masterful and moving.


to each his own....I find it an inferior work, structurally deficient, disjointed, overly orchestrated and rather pointless. It does have one advantage over Sym #2, tho - it's shorter!!


----------



## Heck148

Bulldog said:


> To my mind, Bach outclasses all other composers. So here's how it goes; Bach > Shosty > Rachmaninov > Vivaldi. I just felt compelled to throw the Red Priest into the mix.


good one!! except I place Vivaldi far ahead of SR - anyone who composed 38 bassoon concerti deserves proper recognition!! :lol:


----------



## KenOC

It was this thread that inspired the current 20th century fave poll. Shostakovich is leading Rachmaninoff there, by a bit.


----------



## tdc

Heck148 said:


> compare SR's orchestral sound to those of the masters - Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich....


Except those composers were stylistically very different. Compared to them one could argue Brahms sounds 'muddy' too, but Rachmaninov's and Brahms aesthetic goals were not the same as those three, so saying their orchestration isn't as clean is not really a valid criticism.

You've said yourself that you virtually never listen to Rachmaninov's music so I'm thinking you are letting some bad performances of Rachmaninov's music (which you probably couldn't even properly appreciate from your vantage point) effect your perception too much.

I'll say it again orchestration is not _that_ important. Even if you could unequivocally prove that Rachmaninov was a poor orchestrator (which I don't think you have shown) it would not be enough to call him a poor composer.


----------



## Heck148

tdc said:


> Except those composers were stylistically very different. Compared to them one could argue Brahms sounds 'muddy' too,


but Brahms can be played very cleanly, with the inner voices revealed very clearly. Try Toscanini, Reiner, Monteux, or Solti....very transparent.



> Rachmaninov's and Brahms aesthetic goals were not the same as those three, so saying their orchestration isn't as clean is not really a valid criticism.


but your attempt to equate Brahms, [actually quite a good orchestrator in the right hands] with SR is faulty and not valid. Brahms orchestration works, SR's does not.



> You've said yourself that you virtually never listen to Rachmaninov's music


correct, as a home listener, I rarely, if ever listen to SR. As a performer, I've spent many, many hours, many rehearsals and performances, listening, and trying to figure out its attraction....



> so I'm thinking you are letting some bad performances of Rachmaninov's music ...effect your perception too much.


Good...bad performance?? how does one tell?? even a "good" performance sounds murky, muddy and disjointed....silk purse/pig's ear....



> I'll say it again orchestration is not _that_ important.


I disagree completely - orchestration, instrumentation is hugely important - it's the sound you actually HEAR.



> Even if you could unequivocally prove that Rachmaninov was a poor orchestrator


the music, the score, speaks for itself....having tried, for years, to cut thru the murk, I can tell you it really doesn't work. 



> it would not be enough to call him a poor composer.


sure it would, maybe not a "poor" composer, but no all-star - I find the structural problems to be real handicaps, deficiencies as well...compare the wonderful flow, the constant melodic line of late Mozart symphonies, or the inevitable logic and dramatic course of a great Beethoven symphony to the meandering, convoluted wanderings of an SR symphony...


----------



## tdc

Heck148 said:


> but Brahms can be played very cleanly, with the inner voices revealed very clearly. Try Toscanini, Reiner, Monteux, or Solti....very transparent.
> but your attempt to equate Brahms, [actually quite a good orchestrator in the right hands] with SR is faulty and not valid. Brahms orchestration works, SR's does not.
> correct, as a home listener, I rarely, if ever listen to SR. As a performer, I've spent many, many hours, many rehearsals and performances, listening, and trying to figure out its attraction....
> Good...bad performance?? how does one tell?? even a "good" performance sounds murky, muddy and disjointed....silk purse/pig's ear....
> I disagree completely - orchestration, instrumentation is hugely important - it's the sound you actually HEAR.
> the music, the score, speaks for itself....having tried, for years, to cut thru the murk, I can tell you it really doesn't work.
> sure it would, maybe not a "poor" composer, but no all-star - I find the structural problems to be real handicaps, deficiencies as well...compare the wonderful flow, the constant melodic line of late Mozart symphonies, or the inevitable logic and dramatic course of a great Beethoven symphony to the meandering, convoluted wanderings of an SR symphony...


I agree Brahms was a good orchestrator, to my ears nothing sounds wrong with Rachmaninov's orchestration. I hear 'colors', rich textures, depth. I think the only way I would be convinced he was a poor orchestrator would be if I could hear other versions of the work with a different orchestration to see if I preferred them.

But according to your logic Chopin and Mussorgsky are certainly poor and deficient composers, some have questioned Bach's orchestration and that he wrote for all instruments as though they were an organ. I guess he was no all star either. etc. 

(Of course that logic is B. S.)


----------



## tdc

Heck148 said:


> or the inevitable logic and dramatic course of a great Beethoven symphony


Bernstein suggested Beethoven's orchestration wasn't really all that good. I've heard similar criticisms you've given that in some of Beethoven's late symphonies (maybe it was only the 9th) some of the instruments cannot be heard. Some have suggested it was possibly an issue of his hearing loss...

So I guess this means maybe you don't consider him one of the great composers anymore?


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## KenOC

Beethoven wrote for an orchestra of about 60 players, by his own testimony. His orchestration was appropriate and effective for those forces. Modern orchestras are larger, and the strings now outweigh his specified wind parts. Mahler re-orchestrated the 9th Symphony with this in mind; some of his changes are effective, some not. There is a recording available conducted by Kristjan Jarvi.

In his somewhat silly monologue, Bernstein criticized Beethoven's sense of melody, his rhythms, his orchestration, and other aspects of his music (but concluding that Beethoven was still the best). There are cogent and detailed responses on YouTube. When Bernstein published his remarks, they were severely toned down.


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## Strange Magic

Heck148 said:


> not weird at all...and...musicians are "audience" as well. I don't care to perform Rachm'ff, and as a listener, I rarely, if ever listen to his music - Pag Variations is OK....I think SR is vastly over-rated. so many other composers do it so much better.


So many other composers do Rachmaninoff better than Rachmaninoff. I love that! C'mon people, relax. What the Heck is both having fun with us, and simultaneously working out some issues he has with old Sergei. SVR's music and magic remains untouched, and for us lovers of Old Russia, Pyotr Illich's appreciation for Rachmaninoff is not only illustrative, but has been vindicated by both time and enormous popular appeal.


----------



## Schumanniac

Rachmaninov if i had to choose. The comparably more modern sound of Shostakovich with russian influences can make his music grate my ears at times, it just gets a little too screechy or chaotic for my taste. Fortunaly however i do not have to actually choose, i love them both. But only tchaikovsky can beat the Sergei Giant in the russian realm, theres quite a number of little gems, often overlooked like the Elegie in E-flat to name one. Rachmaninov is far more than a few piano concertos, a symphony or two with a symphonic poem here or some solo piano there.


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## Heck148

tdc said:


> I agree Brahms was a good orchestrator, to my ears nothing sounds wrong with Rachmaninov's orchestration.


because you are missing so much detail, because it is obscured by overly thick orchestration. you don't know what you're missing.



> ....the only way I would be convinced he was a poor orchestrator would be if I could hear other versions of the work with a different orchestration to see if I preferred them.


my proof of his poor orchestration comes from playback of concert recordings...I know that there are lots of little inside solos, counter melodies, details of interest which either I, or another orchestra member played at the concert - yet on playback, these parts are completely inaudible, totally obscured. _they might as well not have even been played._ that...to me...is pretty damning proof of poor orchestration. you might as well leave it out, because it will never be heard anyway. 



> But according to your logic Chopin and Mussorgsky are certainly poor and deficient composers


 where, oh where....is that coming from??



> some have questioned Bach's orchestration


not me. Bach was a fine orchestrator - remember - the choice of available orchestra instruments at the time were much more limited than in later centuries.


> and that he wrote for all instruments as though they were an organ. I guess he was no all star either. etc.


stop presenting straw-man arguments...don't put words in my mouth.


----------



## Heck148

tdc said:


> Bernstein suggested Beethoven's orchestration wasn't really all that good.


Beethoven was a great orchestrator - he really pushed the limits of instrumental capabilities, too....all major orchestra audition lists will contain many Beethoven excerpts.



> I've heard similar criticisms you've given that in some of Beethoven's late symphonies (maybe it was only the 9th) some of the instruments cannot be heard.


not in top quality performances...Beethoven's sonic texture is nothing like the murky, cloudy goop that is so prevalent with SR...



> So I guess this means maybe you don't consider him one of the great composers anymore?


Please....stop putting words in my mouth, stop erecting straw-man arguments...I make my case, based on years of experience and study...you don't like it, you don't agree.....fine...but please, don't go attributing false premises to me.


----------



## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Beethoven wrote for an orchestra of about 60 players, by his own testimony. His orchestration was appropriate and effective for those forces. Modern orchestras are larger, and the strings now outweigh his specified wind parts.


at one time, some conductors 2bled all the wind parts to compensate for the increased string sonority - this was, IMO, ineffective and unnecessary...I heard a performance of #9 with Vonk, and IIRC, StLouisSO - 2bled WWs throughout. what a thick, clouded mess. Modern instruments are capable of producing enough projection and sound....and the string section needn't be the same size as for a Mahler or Bruckner symphony.


----------



## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> : :lol:
> you're kidding, of course - Rachm'ff's music is about the least colorful of any music I've ever experienced - this constant thick, muddy, cluttered texture - sort of a gray-brown miasma of murkiness way, way too heavy in the bass, and lower mid-range of the orchestral palette. compare SR's orchestral sound to those of the masters - Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich....SR sounds like he's orchestrating for a middle school band.
> 
> Paring it down would allow us to hear what he actually wrote!! SR always has lots of little inside parts, small details which should be heard, but the orchestration is so thick and muddy that these details are lost. cleaning it up would help us hear all of those inside parts.


The details are lost in bad, under-rehearsed performances. Orchestration like Rachmaninoff's requires significant care to attain proper balance. It is not idiot proof. Is this a defect of technique? Yes, if one's music is performed by orchestras lacking the time, leadership or skill to pull it off. I hear all of the details and internal lines because I listen to orchestras who take the time required to do it right.


----------



## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> The details are lost in bad, under-rehearsed performances. Orchestration like Rachmaninoff's requires significant care to attain proper balance.


even careful rehearsal will not remedy the overly thick murk of excessive orchestration....



> It is not idiot proof. Is this a defect of technique? Yes, ....


agreed. 
I've not heard it work, either in live performance, or on recording....I guess if you recorded it, spot-miking each instrument, you might be able to get the inner details - but those recordings are really artificial, and present a very unrealistic sound picture....


----------



## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> : :lol:
> you're kidding, of course - Rachm'ff's music is about the least colorful of any music I've ever experienced - this constant thick, muddy, cluttered texture - sort of a gray-brown miasma of murkiness way, way too heavy in the bass, and lower mid-range of the orchestral palette. compare SR's orchestral sound to those of the masters - Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich....SR sounds like he's orchestrating for a middle school band.
> 
> s.


I take it you are referring to a different Rachmaninoff to the one I listen to?


----------



## Heck148

DavidA said:


> I take it you are referring to a different Rachmaninoff to the one I listen to?


one and the same, I'm sure!!


----------



## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> even careful rehearsal will not remedy the overly thick murk of excessive orchestration....
> 
> agreed.
> I've not heard it work, either in live performance, or on recording....I guess if you recorded it, spot-miking each instrument, you might be able to get the inner details - but those recordings are really artificial, and present a very unrealistic sound picture....


I've heard it work in both - and I actually listen to it occasionally!


----------



## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> : :lol:
> you're kidding, of course - Rachm'ff's music is about the least colorful of any music I've ever experienced - this constant thick, muddy, cluttered texture - sort of a gray-brown miasma of murkiness way, way too heavy in the bass, and lower mid-range of the orchestral palette. compare SR's orchestral sound to those of the masters - Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich....SR sounds like he's orchestrating for a middle school band.
> Paring it down would allow us to hear what he actually wrote!! SR always has lots of little inside parts, small details which should be heard, but the orchestration is so thick and muddy that these details are lost. cleaning it up would help us hear all of those inside parts.


In the end, none of this matters. Audiences and listeners have already made their decision and, in the end, it is they and not the orchestra that decides.


----------



## Heck148

DaveM said:


> In the end, none of this matters. Audiences and listeners have already made their decision and, in the end, it is they and not the orchestra that decides.


My point is that there are so many other great, neglected works that deserve exposure, in place of the constant repetition of the same tired, old warhorses...there are many great composers whose music should be performed much more often...SR will remain a 3rd/4th stringer....


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## Strange Magic

Heck148 said:


> My point is that there are so many other great, neglected works that deserve exposure, in place of the constant repetition of the same tired, old warhorses...there are many great composers whose music should be performed much more often...SR will remain a 3rd/4th stringer....


If that was your point, you buried it effectively under a thick, murky, muddy, cluttered frontal attack on Rachmaninoff's orchestration. Maybe start a fresh thread on the need to get neglected works performed by orchestras--harder to go off the rails that way .


----------



## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> My point is that there are so many other great, neglected works that deserve exposure, in place of the constant repetition of the same tired, old warhorses...there are many great composers whose music should be performed much more often...


That I agree with.


> SR will remain a 3rd/4th stringer....


 You state it as fact, but the actual history suggests that you are the outlier.


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## Woodduck

Among Rachmaninoff's large works, I consider _The Isle of the Dead,_ _The Bells,_ the _Vespers_, and the _Symphonic Dances_ - at _least_ those - to be among the masterpieces of 20th-century music: original, powerfully conceived, brilliantly realized, deeply moving.

Do they have "inner voices" I'm not hearing? Are they in some way "anachronistically Romantic"? Who the heck cares?


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## Radames

Strange Magic said:


> More about Stravinsky, Boston, and "torture":
> 
> https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2016/06/30/stravinsky/rfnaZtqjCQXZAobdv7kVkI/story.html


Very interesting!



Woodduck said:


> Among Rachmaninoff's large works, I consider _The Isle of the Dead,_ _The Bells,_ the _Vespers_, and the _Symphonic Dances_ - at _least_ those - to be among the masterpieces of 20th-century music: original, powerfully conceived, brilliantly realized, deeply moving.


And aren't the Symphonic Dances the last romantic work by the last romantic composer? Makes them special right there.


----------



## DaveM

Woodduck said:


> Among Rachmaninoff's large works, I consider _The Isle of the Dead,_ _The Bells,_ the _Vespers_, and the _Symphonic Dances_ - at _least_ those - to be among the masterpieces of 20th-century music: original, powerfully conceived, brilliantly realized, deeply moving.
> 
> Do they have "inner voices" I'm not hearing? Are they in some way "anachronistically Romantic"? Who the heck cares?


I'm always looking for the anachronistically Romantic. (The following off-topic, but...)


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## chromatic owl

Interesting. I always found Rachmaninov's symphonic writing to be very accomplished. He had a very personal and imaginative approach to orchestration which is quite challenging to master due to its many subtleties, but this is what makes the music so powerful, after all.
Shostakovich on the other hand had a very clear and colourful orchestration full of contrast which appeals to me equally well and is also extremely powerful. The rich texture of both Rachmaninov's and Shostakovich's orchestration can be easily destroyed by bad orchestral playing: Shostakovich starts to sound dull and ugly while Rachmaninov gets muddy.


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## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> one and the same, I'm sure!!


Ever thought it might be your hearing?


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## DavidA

Of course Rach is at a disadvantage with some as he is popular. Funny Grove in 1940s reckoned by now no-one would listen to his music by now. But then musicologists are often people who can read music but can't hear it!
One recording I would recommend for something different is Weissenberg's Rach 2 with BPO under Karajan. Weissenberg's brittle tone and lean playing contrasts with HvK's lush treatment of the orchestra. A fascinating recording. I think it is the only recording of Rach Karajan made. Pity he didn't give the second symphony a go.


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## Strange Magic

DavidA said:


> But then musicologists are often people who can read music but can't hear it!


Quote of the day! :lol:


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## EdwardBast

All this talk about his orchestral works.  Rachmaninoff was primarily a piano composer. About three quarters of his compositions use it and he was a preeminent master of piano miniatures and songs.


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## EdwardBast

Radames said:


> And aren't the Symphonic Dances the last romantic work by the last romantic composer? Makes them special right there.


I would nominate something like Shostakovich's Tenth Quartet or Prokofiev's First Violin Sonata for the last work, although neither composer was consistently a romantic.


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## Chronochromie

Radames said:


> And aren't the Symphonic Dances the last romantic work by the last romantic composer? Makes them special right there.


Four Last Songs...


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## Dan Ante

DavidA said:


> But then musicologists are often people who can read music but can't hear it!
> .


Often but not always in our local group the man with the most knowledge of musical history, composers and musicians can not read music.


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## tdc

EdwardBast said:


> All this talk about his orchestral works.  Rachmaninoff was primarily a piano composer. About three quarters of his compositions use it and he was a preeminent master of piano miniatures and songs.


But in my mind the late Rachmaninov is the very best Rachmaninov, post-1935.


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## Richard8655

Wow. I felt blasted for daring to start such a comparison, and now glad to see it's become such a lively discussion. Many informative comments and perspectives, all equally valid. What TC is all about.


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## KenOC

tdc said:


> But in my mind the late Rachmaninov is the very best Rachmaninov, post-1935.


Yes indeed. The radio played the Paganini Rhapsody today. Hard to get tired of that. Rach seemed to gain a bit more focus and a sharper edge in his later works, at least in the bigger ones.


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## OperaChic

EdwardBast said:


> All this talk about his orchestral works.  Rachmaninoff was primarily a piano composer. About three quarters of his compositions use it and he was a preeminent master of piano miniatures and songs.


Yes, I have found this a bit odd. I too am a great admirer of his wonderful art songs. And all this admonishment over the orchestration in one or two of his orchestral works, and challenging his standing as a composer based on one of his symphonies (which don't really seem to be among either his most critically acclaimed or most popular works anyways) seems wrong.


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## Bettina

Richard8655 said:


> Wow. I felt blasted for daring to start such a comparison, and now glad to see it's become such a lively discussion. Many informative comments and perspectives, all equally valid. What TC is all about.


Thank you for starting this thread. I think it's a useful comparison which generates some productive questions about politics and aesthetics, including: what label do we use for Rachmaninoff, a composer who employed a Romantic style in a post-Romantic period? How do we approach music in which the style and chronology seem to be out of sync? Is this lack of synchronization necessarily a bad thing?

Also, to what extent was Shostakovich's quite different style shaped by Soviet politics? What is the relationship between (his brand of) modernism and (the Soviet brand of) socialism?

There are no easy answers to these controversial questions, many of which could serve as the subjects of entire books. However, despite the impossibility of achieving consensus on these issues, I'm glad that we're delving into these challenging questions!


----------



## tdc

KenOC said:


> Yes indeed. The radio played the Paganini Rhapsody today. Hard to get tired of that. Rach seemed to gain a bit more focus and a sharper edge in his later works, at least in the bigger ones.


I was referring to the Symphony No. 3 and Symphonic Dances but I agree with your point. The Paganini Rhapsody was composed in 1934 - a fine work.


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## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> I've heard it work in both - and I actually listen to it occasionally!


it doesn't work - playback tapes if recorded on good equipment, do not lie...too much detail obscured....it's an unavoidable consequence of poor orchestration, excessively heavy, thick texture.


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## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> If that was your point, you buried it effectively under a thick, murky, muddy, cluttered frontal attack on Rachmaninoff's orchestration. Maybe start a fresh thread on the need to get neglected works performed by orchestras--harder to go off the rails that way .


lol!! it's a secondary point - obviously, the main point is to respond to the OP....Shostakovich ahead by several light-years...no contest...
now - Shostakovich v Stravinsky - that's a heavy duty contest - both greats....


----------



## Heck148

DaveM said:


> You state it as fact, but the actual history suggests that you are the outlier.


I couldn't care less about the "history"....I go by what I hear. there is no comparison between Shostakovich and SR...DS light-years ahead...for all the reasons I've presented...

oh, let's not forget all of the cuts made to SR's works - esp Sym #2 - SR approved the Stokowski cuts made back in the 40s?? it does shorten it a bit....
the cuts are fine, highly recommended - the only problem with them is that they are no where near extensive enough!! they should be expanded by about 10x!! :devil::lol:


----------



## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> Do they have "inner voices" I'm not hearing? Who the heck cares?


so you are content with the composer's own obscuring of his own creation??
Did he do it deliberately?? if so, why?? or did he do it unintentionally, because he never learned proper orchestration, or presentation of clear musical texture.


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## Strange Magic

Earwax. Perhaps the problem leading to a perception of thick, muddy textures in Rachmaninoff's orchestral works is a buildup of earwax in the ears of some unfortunate listeners. Always a possibility.


----------



## Heck148

chromatic owl said:


> ....He had a very personal and imaginative approach to orchestration which is quite challenging to master due to its many subtleties,


due to its impenetrable muddiness and excessive low, low-mid-range thickness. It is actually impossible to master...without judicious re-scoring.


----------



## Richannes Wrahms

Corn syrup vs crude oil.


----------



## Heck148

DavidA said:


> ..... Weissenberg's Rach 2 with BPO under Karajan. Weissenberg's brittle tone and lean playing contrasts with HvK's lush treatment of the orchestra. A fascinating recording....


no thanx, I'll pass on that one...


----------



## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Yes indeed. The radio played the Paganini Rhapsody today. Hard to get tired of that. Rach seemed to gain a bit more focus and a sharper edge in his later works, at least in the bigger ones.


I've said so before - PagVars is his best piece....Bohemian Caprice isn't bad either....brighter, not so thick and gloomy.


----------



## KenOC

Heck148 said:


> so you are content with the composer's own obscuring of his own creation??
> Did he do it deliberately?? if so, why?? or did he do it unintentionally, because he never learned proper orchestration, or presentation of clear musical texture.


There is often a reason. From a Brahms letter to Clara Schumann: "I know I have been criticized for writing thickly and even obscuring some inner lines. But this is purposeful. I am always aware that some of my ideas are better than others and that some, perhaps, are barely acceptable at all. So those lines I lay among the instruments in a way that prevents people from hearing them."

Telling, certainly. But I have to add that I made this up. :lol:


----------



## Heck148

Bettina said:


> Also, to what extent was Shostakovich's quite different style shaped by Soviet politics? What is the relationship between (his brand of) modernism and (the Soviet brand of) socialism?


A real problem for Shostakovich was his incorporation of Jazz into his works. apparently he was quite fascinated by it, and very much wanted to explore it - however, the All-Mighty Soviet Powers had a very strict and negative attitude towards jazz - which was Jazz = symbolized the decadent, frivolous time-wasting of the materialistic Western world - frittering away their time and energy on low-life entertainment and cheap capitalistic thrills, while totally abandoning the wholesome productive qualities of the pure Proletarian revolution, the honest and creative activities of the dedicated Soviet worker, blah, blah, blah, and so on and so forth..... 
Whenever DS wanted to use jazzy content in his works, it always had to be in the context of depicting the decadent capitalistic Western society - such as in his big ballets, and early works, pre Lady Macbeth/Mtzensk.
This had to be a major frustration for him, for he could not deviate from the Party line.....he got into enough trouble as it is with Lady Macbeth - which so offended the delicate sensitivities of Comrade Stalin!! the "Steel Man" being noted for his delicate sensibilities and sensitive nature  [sarcasm off]


----------



## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> Earwax. Perhaps the problem leading to a perception of thick, muddy textures in Rachmaninoff's orchestral works is a buildup of earwax in the ears of some unfortunate listeners. Always a possibility.


earwax, or no earwax - the texture is overly thick and muddy - too much low, low-mid-range scoring of instruments....a real fundamental flaw....


----------



## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Telling, certainly. But I have to add that I made this up. :lol:


:lol::lol::lol:


----------



## Richard8655

Heck148 said:


> A real problem for Shostakovich was his incorporation of Jazz into his works. apparently he was quite fascinated by it, and very much wanted to explore it - however, the All-Mighty Soviet Powers had a very strict and negative attitude towards jazz - which was Jazz = symbolized the decadent, frivolous time-wasting of the materialistic Western world - frittering away their time and energy on low-life entertainment and cheap capitalistic thrills, while totally abandoning the wholesome productive qualities of the pure Proletarian revolution, the honest and creative activities of the dedicated Soviet worker, blah, blah, blah, and so on and so forth.....
> Whenever DS wanted to use jazzy content in his works, it always had to be in the context of depicting the decadent capitalistic Western society - such as in his big ballets, and early works, pre Lady Macbeth/Mtzensk.
> This had to be a major frustration for him, for he could not deviate from the Party line.....he got into enough trouble as it is with Lady Macbeth - which so offended the delicate sensitivities of Comrade Stalin!! the "Steel Man" being noted for his delicate sensibilities and sensitive nature  [sarcasm off]


Or also known as "Formalism" by the Stalinist regime. Anything that resembled western melodic lines and didn't portray socialist successes, progress, and goals symbolically in music.


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## KenOC

Richard8655 said:


> Or also known as "Formalism" by the Stalinist regime. Anything that resembled western melodic lines and didn't portray socialist successes, progress, and goals symbolically in music.


Formalism was a bit slippier than that, and the definition changed from year to year. For example, Prokofiev's 6th Symphony was branded formalist because it was "autobiographical." It was hard for composers to guess what the current definition was.

A sure-fire defense was to incorporate folk music influences from the various Soviet Socialist Republics into your works. This resulted in quite a lot of music during the Stalin era, some of which was quite good.


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## DaveM

It is reported that thousands of people are suddenly returning their Rachmaninoff recordings due to excessive muddiness and low-mid-range thickness.


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## Razumovskymas

Heck148 said:


> one orchestration flaw I find with SR is that he keeps the instruments way too much in the lowest, low-mid-range or mid-range of their individual tonal spectra. this makes for a very thick, heavy, dark texture and it just becomes pervasive.


isn't that just a composers' choice that contributes to a "signature sound"? I'm not a terrible fan of Rach. but what I found appealing about his music is that it combines a solid powerful sound with some nice details in between. It indeed may lack some fragility but I have the feeling that Sergei wanted his music to sound that way and that he wasn't thinking: "gee I wish my music didn't sound that muddy, how on earth are the other composers avoiding that overly midrange in their compositions"


----------



## Heck148

Razumovskymas said:


> isn't that just a composers' choice that contributes to a "signature sound"? ..... I have the feeling that Sergei wanted his music to sound that way and that he wasn't thinking: "gee I wish my music didn't sound that muddy, how on earth are the other composers avoiding that overly midrange in their compositions"


I don't have any inside info on the creative process involved. all I hear is the result. perhaps he was unaware that his own overly thick, heavy texture was obscuring his own ideas, hiding his own details?? perhaps he composed at the piano, and did not realize how the over-scoring would sound with full orchestra. Whatever the case - SR represents a classic "how not to" approach to orchestration. It's the "middle school band approach to orchestration" - <<everyone must be playing, all the time>>


----------



## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> if that's a "loss"...it's an easy one to endure...


For you maybe, but not me! :lol:


----------



## Richard8655

KenOC said:


> Formalism was a bit slippier than that, and the definition changed from year to year. For example, Prokofiev's 6th Symphony was branded formalist because it was "autobiographical." It was hard for composers to guess what the current definition was.


Actually relative to DS, the regime was using the term to describe western influence in some of his music. But worse, some works appeared to be composed for and unto themselves without expressing the ideology of the system. Hence form over expression. Almost akin to absolute music relative to program music. But the program had to be the system.


----------



## Razumovskymas

Heck148 said:


> It's the "middle school band approach to orchestration" - <<everyone must be playing, all the time>>


As if that could possibly has been his approach. But if it was, doing the opposite would be as immature. In that case you could accuse Shostakovich of using the "politically correct approach" where you say <<not everyone should be playing at the same time and a lot of times there should only be playing 1 or 2 musicians so in that case my orchestration will be seen as very distinct"


----------



## Razumovskymas

But I could totally imagine you poking Sergei while he's rehearsing a symphony and saying: "hey Sergei, not everyone should be playing all the time, that's a middle school band approach"


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## DavidA

Shostakovich was saved because the NKVD official who had been ordered to 'purge' him was purged himself a few days before Shostakovich was about to get the chop!


----------



## Heck148

Razumovskymas said:


> As if that could possibly has been his approach. But if it was, doing the opposite would be as immature.


it was his approach, or rather coincides with that approach.
no skilled orchestrators are rigidly bound by the opposite....they vary the texture constantly and artfully.



> In that case you could accuse Shostakovich of using the "politically correct approach" where you say <<not everyone should be playing at the same time


but DS doesn't do this...you are using a false argument.



> ...there should only be playing 1 or 2 musicians so in that case my orchestration will be seen as very distinct"


and that is a correct technique  DS sometimes uses only chamber music size orchestration, and at other times, full sonority++


----------



## Heck148

Razumovskymas said:


> But I could totally imagine you poking Sergei while he's rehearsing a symphony and saying: "hey Sergei, not everyone should be playing all the time, that's a middle school band approach"


not quite, the musicians poke each other, and make the comment...."Nice solo, too bad nobody will ever hear it" :devil:


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## EdwardBast

DavidA said:


> Shostakovich was saved because the NKVD official who had been ordered to 'purge' him was purged himself a few days before Shostakovich was about to get the chop!


Your summary of the NKVD story misrepresents the account of Venyamin Basner, who is the sole source of the tale. He claims to have heard it from Shostakovich years after the events, which occurred during the purge of 1937. The story goes like this: Like many other associates of Field Marshall Mikhail Tukhachevsky, who was already destined for a show trial and execution, Shostakovich was called in to NKVD headquarters for questioning. His hapless interrogator, a man named Zanchevsky, was trying to get him to say he had heard political discussions and talk of a plot to assassinate Stalin during musical evenings at Tukhachevsky's home. According to the story, Shostakovich kept insisting they only talked about music, and he was told to return a few days later ready to tell the truth. By the time he returned, Zanchevsky had been arrested.

Zanchevsky didn't have the power to "purge" Shostakovich. Doing this to a high-profile and internationally known figure like Shostakovich would have required Stalin's signature on a death warrant. And if that signature was in place, the disappearance of Zanchevsky wouldn't have saved him. That version of events is not credible. We don't know what got Zanchevsky arrested, if indeed he was. For all we know, his interrogation of Shostakovich might have been carried out without the necessary approval from above. This could have been Zanchevsky's error, or perhaps Zanchevsky was scapegoated by whoever gave the order and was covering his a$$. I don't see any reason to think Shostakovich's life was actually in danger, although if the story is true, it is understandable he would have been terrified.


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## Huilunsoittaja

I would be more interested in people sharing things about the _interactions _of these 2 composers with each other. I don't believe they ever met, but they definitely knew about each other...


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## KenOC

EdwardBast said:


> ...I don't see any reason to think Shostakovich's life was actually in danger, although if the story is true, it is understandable he would have been terrified.


Terrified for sure, real danger of not! From Wiki, drawn from Wilson's _A Life Remembered_:

"More widely, 1936 marked the beginning of the Great Terror, in which many of the composer's friends and relatives were imprisoned or killed. These included his patron Marshal Tukhachevsky (shot months after his arrest); his brother-in-law Vsevolod Frederiks (a distinguished physicist, who was eventually released but died before he got home); his close friend Nikolai Zhilyayev (a musicologist who had taught Tukhachevsky; shot shortly after his arrest); his mother-in-law, the astronomer Sofiya Mikhaylovna Varzar (sent to a camp in Karaganda); his friend the Marxist writer Galina Serebryakova (20 years in camps); his uncle Maxim Kostrykin (died); and his colleagues Boris Kornilov and Adrian Piotrovsky (executed)."


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## EdwardBast

Huilunsoittaja said:


> I would be more interested in people sharing things about the _interactions _of these 2 composers with each other. I don't believe they ever met, but they definitely knew about each other...
> 
> View attachment 92453


Whose story is this?

I can understand Rachmaninoff's stony silence and his reluctance to discuss "modern" music. I have the impression that his conservative friends pushed him to render opinions and he was loathe to do so. I vaguely remember a story about Medtner and Rachmaninoff attending a performance of some early songs by Prokofiev, during which Medtner was expressing outrage and expecting Rachmaninoff to support his position.


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## Phil loves classical

Shostakovich was definitely more original and edgy, without getting into preferences. He was also able to write more romantic themes (off top of my head I think it was something in the Gadfly suite and also the middle movement of one of his piano concertos). Great pianist though was Rachmaninov, and his works with piano pushed the bar in that field. Shostakovich's great works are definitely more unique the musical canon, and therefore I do think he deserves the greater praise.


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## Richard8655

Phil loves classical said:


> Shostakovich was definitely more original and edgy, without getting into preferences. He was also able to write more romantic themes (off top of my head I think it was something in the Gadfly suite and also the middle movement of one of his piano concertos). Great pianist though was Rachmaninov, and his works with piano pushed the bar in that field. Shostakovich's great works are definitely more unique the musical canon, and therefore I do think he deserves the greater praise.


Along these same lines, I find Shostakovich's Waltz no. 2 from his Suite for Variety Orchestra flirting with romanticism. Highly melodic and engaging. But this came later after Stalin's death, so he could kick up his feet a bit and compose as the mood hit him.


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## Rhinotop

Shostakovich is more visceral, more human and expressed one of darker sides of mankind. I prefer Shostakovich, but I'm not saying Rachmaninov is bad, enjoy both composers a lot.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> so you are content with the composer's own obscuring of his own creation??
> Did he do it deliberately?? if so, why?? or did he do it unintentionally, because he never learned proper orchestration, or presentation of clear musical texture.


Rachmaninoff did not "obscure his own creation." His textures, in very performance I've heard - and I've heard innumerable - sound perfectly clear, comprehensible, and appropriate to me. That doesn't mean I need to be able to identify every instrument that's contributing to the sound I hear. Not every sound in a musical texture is even meant to be heard for its own qualities; some are meant to contribute subtly to a blended sonority which may not even be analyzable (Wagner does this all the time, and no one, to my knowledge, has accused him of poor orchestration). What you call muddy, another may call rich or luxuriant - which is how I would describe the sound of, say, the second symphony, as opposed to the leaner, more colorful orchestration of his late works. I find both styles effective and suitable for their purpose.

What finally matters in music is what we do hear - not what we don't hear - and how it affects us. If music sounds wonderful and moves us, all else is trivial. You can't respond to Rachmaninoff? Fine. Don't listen to him. Ragging on and on about one's lack of appreciation, and picking out imagined flaws to justify one's tastes, is tiresome.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> Rachmaninoff did not "obscure his own creation." His textures, in very performance I've heard - and I've heard innumerable - sound perfectly clear, comprehensible, and appropriate to me.


The orchestral works?? no way...inner parts, details are invariably obscured, covered



> Not every sound in a musical texture is even meant to be heard for its own qualities; some are meant to contribute subtly to a blended sonority which may not even be analyzable (Wagner does this all the time,


agreed, Wagner does this, so does Richard Strauss - but their orchestrations are crystal clear when they want them to be...They also use the full range of the orchestra instruments - they do not restrict the ranges to low, or low middle range - which SR does habitually, to most detrimental effect...also SR seems to insist upon lots of fast notes, intricate rhythms in the bass choir of the orchestra - unfortunately, this results in a thick, sonic mud...10 cellos, 8 basses, low brass, tuba, etc, do not clearly execute such parts as clearly or easily as say violin, flute, piccolo. This is elementary orchestration 101.



> What you call muddy, another may call rich or luxuriant


call it what you want, it's still thick, muddy, and it obscures the inner parts and details....why bother writing these in if they are just going to be covered, never heard??



> You can't respond to Rachmaninoff? Fine. Don't listen to him.


I don't, but when the conductor programs the music, I don't have much choice...I play it to the best of my ability, and look forward to the next concert series



> Ragging on and on about one's lack of appreciation, and picking out imagined flaws


Whoa!! I'll post about anything I see fit. and I don't "imagine flaws" - I'll put my years of performing experience against anyone's...you don't like it?? don't respond to my postings...


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## Bettina

Heck148 said:


> I don't, but when the conductor programs the music, I don't have much choice...I play it to the best of my ability, and look forward to the next concert series


I enjoy most of Rachmaninoff's music, including his orchestral work, but I sympathize with your position. I know how frustrating it is to perform music that you don't enjoy. To my great annoyance, I often find myself in exactly that position as a piano accompanist (although not necessarily with Rachmaninoff's music, unless it's the overplayed/oversung Vocalise).


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> Whoa!! I'll post about anything I see fit. and I don't "imagine flaws" - I'll put my years of performing experience against anyone's..


You're entitled to your opinion. My opinion: Years of performing in an orchestra does not endow on one the command of orchestration of a composer at the level of Rachmaninoff.


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> You're entitled to your opinion. My opinion: Years of performing in an orchestra does not endow on one the command of orchestration of a composer at the level of Rachmaninoff.


sure it does...most any orchestra musician would orchestrate better than SR...

I've obviously splattered mud on someone's sacred cow...

OK - the OP question presented was Shostakovich v Rachman'ff -

for me, that essentially amounts to a comparison such as:

Beethoven v Dittersdorf

it ain't much of a contest.....


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## Richard8655

Heck148 said:


> sure it does...most any orchestra musician would orchestrate better than SR...
> 
> I've obviously splattered mud on someone's sacred cow...
> 
> OK - the OP question presented was Shostakovich v Rachman'ff -
> 
> for me, that essentially amounts to a comparison such as:
> 
> Beethoven v Dittersdorf
> 
> it ain't much of a contest.....


That's pretty extreme. Do you really think SR was berift of talent as a world class composer? Surly then, most of the preeminent music critics in history were then wrong or misguided? I prefer DS too, but I can't deny SR was a master in his style.

But I respect your point of view and that's why this thread.


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## tdc

Woodduck said:


> Rachmaninoff did not "obscure his own creation." His textures, in very performance I've heard - and I've heard innumerable - sound perfectly clear, comprehensible, and appropriate to me. That doesn't mean I need to be able to identify every instrument that's contributing to the sound I hear. Not every sound in a musical texture is even meant to be heard for its own qualities; some are meant to contribute subtly to a blended sonority which may not even be analyzable (Wagner does this all the time, and no one, to my knowledge, has accused him of poor orchestration). What you call muddy, another may call rich or luxuriant - which is how I would describe the sound of, say, the second symphony, as opposed to the leaner, more colorful orchestration of his late works. I find both styles effective and suitable for their purpose.
> 
> What finally matters in music is what we do hear - not what we don't hear - and how it affects us. If music sounds wonderful and moves us, all else is trivial. You can't respond to Rachmaninoff? Fine. Don't listen to him. Ragging on and on about one's lack of appreciation, and picking out imagined flaws to justify one's tastes, is tiresome.


Very well said. You have shown that you understand the subtleties of this topic beautifully and I agree 100%.

Orchestration is never a black and white issue because it cannot be analyzed completely separate from the rest of the composition. There are general rules, but these are only guidelines and are secondary to the composer's vision.

Heck148 does not enjoy Rachmaninov's music and I think that is why he fails to understand the effectiveness of the orchestration. Whether or not the orchestration follows this or that rule or is the same as this or that composers work is irrelevant. If the music works, the orchestration justifies itself. In the case of Rachmaninov - the music works. The end.


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## Strange Magic

Heck148 said:


> Whoa!! I'll post about anything I see fit. and I don't "imagine flaws" - I'll put my years of performing experience against anyone's...you don't like it?? don't respond to my postings...


Before I thought it was primarily the earwax. After reading more of this thread, I think Épater la bourgeoisie is far the stronger factor here. Poor Rachmaninoff--until now, I didn't realize just how bad his orchestration was. Something should be done.


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## Brahmsian Colors

Woodduck said:


> What finally matters in music is what we do hear - not what we don't hear - and how it affects us. If music sounds wonderful and moves us, all else is trivial.


Getting right to the heart of the matter----Bravo!


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> call it what you want, it's still thick, muddy, and it obscures the inner parts and details....why bother writing these in if they are just going to be covered, never heard??
> 
> I'll post about anything I see fit. and I don't "imagine flaws" - I'll put my years of performing experience against anyone's...you don't like it?? don't respond to my postings...


How many times does one need to express one's distaste in the same way on the same subject in the same thread, and to how many different people, all of whom have different views, and most of whom are content to express those views succinctly and move on rather than bludgeon people to death with them? Of course we're all entitled to express our opinions. But insistently harping on the same point, answering every responder by repeating the same words over and over, and insisting that your value judgments are objectively correct - which they are not - doesn't make you "right" and others "wrong."

When I observe that "what you call muddy, another may call rich or luxuriant," and you answer "call it what you want, it's still muddy," you are not only saying absolutely nothing, but you are claiming that that non-statement has validity while other people's perceptions do not.

You've said "muddy" too many times to count, but "muddy" is not an objective description of any music. It's just an image you use as an expression of your distaste. You don't like the effect that Rachmaninoff gets by scoring those low-register, overtone-rich sounds. And even if it's true - and I'm willing to take your word for it - that some of Rachmaninoff's parts are redundant or unheard in performance, what _is_ heard sounds good to people whose tastes don't accord with yours. Their taste deserves respect, and they aren't required to be impressed by your "years of performing experience." They may have "years of listening experience," and there may be nothing deficient in their hearing or their musical sensitivity.

Rachmaninoff may have scored as he did because he wanted a sound that you just don't happen to like. Muddy, thick, muddy, thick, muddy, muddy, muddy...Good grief, man! Pick up that needle and get on to the next groove!


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## brianvds

Woodduck said:


> You've said "muddy" too many times to count, but "muddy" is not an objective description of any music. It's just an image you use as an expression of your distaste. You don't like the effect that Rachmaninoff gets by scoring those low-register, overtone-rich sounds. And even if it's true - and I'm willing to take your word for it - that some of Rachmaninoff's parts are redundant or unheard in performance, what _is_ heard sounds good to people whose tastes don't accord with yours. Their taste deserves respect, and they aren't required to be impressed by your "years of performing experience." They may have "years of listening experience," and there may be nothing deficient in their hearing or their musical sensitivity.


It occurs to me that it might be an interesting experiment to make a series of recordings, of various works by various composers, minus some of their parts, and then see how many people will notice, and which kinds of people will notice. Just how much can you remove before the work becomes seriously impoverished? In the string section you can probably go through with a scythe without it making much difference; remove one of the two clarinets and the work won't be the same. On the other hand, remove both clarinets during a tutti passage and perhaps not even a conductor will notice? But how much can you remove?

I suspect in most large scale orchestral works by almost any composer there may well be such "redundant" parts, but I don't know. The same really goes in visual art: just how many individual brush strokes (and which ones) can you remove from an impressionist painting before it will become obviously incomplete?

Does it matter? I'm sure some composers were far more guilty of such redundancy than others (apparently Schumann also sinned in this regard) but I am not at all clear that we can judge a piece of music on this and nothing else. I suspect Rachmaninov's popularity has much to do with his great gift for lyrical melody. And moreover, the way these glorious melodies are sunk into a luxurious carpet of silky accompaniment - does it really matter that much if we cannot see every strand of the carpet?

Of course, inevitably, some individuals will experience such luxury as cloying rather than comfortable. So it goes - there is no accounting for taste.



> Rachmaninoff may have scored as he did because he wanted a sound that you just don't happen to like. Muddy, thick, muddy, thick, muddy, muddy, muddy...Good grief, man! Pick up that needle and get on to the next groove!


And remember, he grew up in Russia, famous for its "mud season" (as invaders found to their cost). Perhaps he was simply expressing his native land in the only way he knew how.


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## DeepR

Anyway, back to Rachmaninoff.
There seems to be a lot of focus on his orchestral textures but are we forgetting all his piano music and choral music? And also songs and other chamber music.


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## DavidA

Here's imo one of the great Rach 3's


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## EdwardBast

The discussion above inspired me to think about the differences between Rachmaninoff and Shostakovich with respect to texture and scoring. 

Rachmaninoff was by far the more natural composer for piano, in part because the way he thought about texture is suited to the instrument. His melodic ideas tended to be embedded in dense contrapuntal webs or labyrinthine harmonic progressions. Listen to virtually any piano work of Rachmaninoff and you will notice that every inner line in the texture or harmony goes somewhere and has its own melodic integrity. His voice-leading is fluid and flawless and he thinks on a very long-term scale. He favored having a couple of lines moving against others that were sustained. Because he usually had this dense web of harmonically underpinned motion in mind, it was natural to use sweeping figurations reiterating the harmonic content across the range of the instrument. 

By contrast, Shostakovich’s primary thought was linear (and often modal!) rather than harmonic. He often allowed nothing into the texture that didn’t have melodic significance. In practice this often meant spare, austere textures. When he did write purely harmonic parts it was often more for the sake of rhythmic considerations, like establishing a pulse or a unique pattern of accents contrary to or complementary to those in the melody, rather than for the sake of the progression itself. This is probably why there is so much percussive writing in his concertos, by contrast with the lush piano scoring Rachmaninoff employed. 

Shostakovich was by far the more natural composer for orchestra, in part because of the very issues noted above. Rachmaninoff’s dense, intricate voce-leading, that works so well on piano, always runs the danger of become over dense in a symphonic context because the tone of orchestra instruments is invariably weightier and broader than that of the piano. Rachmaninoff wrote his orchestral works at the piano and then score them later, so sometimes those closely spaced piano chords became overly dark or thick when scored for winds and strings. Because of Shostakovich’s linear thinking and avoidance of purely harmonic accompanimental writing, his symphonic works tended to be open and uncluttered, with every line having melodic significance. Many of his loud passages aren’t dense or cluttered either. He learned how to mass his high winds on a single line in unison or octaves so that it could hold its own against equally concentrated lines in the strings and brass. In this way he created deafening tuttis without sacrificing contrapuntal clarity. His command of the orchestra, the variety of his textures and scoring, and the degree to which his works sound like they are uniquely attuned to specific instruments and choirs are worlds beyond Rachmaninoff’s efforts. Needless to say, these technical issues have little bearing on the aesthetic success of whole works, which depends largely on structure, thematic processes, and narrative continuity.

Shostakovich’s linear thinking made him a natural master of the string quartet, an ensemble with which I can’t imagine Rachmaninoff having much success. On the other hand, Rachmaninoff was a master of piano accompaniment, both as a player and accompanist. The scoring for his cello sonata and his many songs is ingenious and imaginative.


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## DavidA

Shostakovich with slightly older Martha


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## Richard8655

Very interesting discussion with great contributions from everyone. We should all leave the politics and return to the music, as a few others have suggested. But I think the history, background, and circumstances are relevant and fascinating as it made who these two very different Russian composers were. I thought Bettina raised some very good points earlier:



Bettina said:


> What label do we use for Rachmaninoff, a composer who employed a Romantic style in a post-Romantic period? How do we approach music in which the style and chronology seem to be out of sync? Is this lack of synchronization necessarily a bad thing?
> 
> Also, to what extent was Shostakovich's quite different style shaped by Soviet politics? What is the relationship between (his brand of) modernism and (the Soviet brand of) socialism?
> 
> There are no easy answers to these controversial questions, many of which could serve as the subjects of entire books. However, despite the impossibility of achieving consensus on these issues, I'm glad that we're delving into these challenging questions!


Given the evolution of classical music in the first half of the twentieth century, was not Rachmaninoff out of sync? His style (as hpowders also suggested), seems to have been frozen in time as a lost soul from the previous century. But I think this also applied to Brahms to a certain extent in his period, and his music was loved and accepted then.

I also think EdwardBast hit the nail on the head just above in some detailed explanation of differences that nevertheless made each composer in his own way such a significant contributor to classical music.


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## Phil loves classical

Great post Ed. Hit the nail on its head I think. I admit I find something about Rachmaninov, especially in the symphonies that is obtrusive in a way. Your putting it into words I find enlightening, and am glad you spoke your mind. That is why we're here.


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## Heck148

Richard8655 said:


> That's pretty extreme. Do you really think SR was berift of talent as a world class composer? ......
> But I respect your point of view and that's why this thread.


to me, there isn't much comparison - I think Shostakovich is one of the greats....SR certainly has his niche, but I don't think it is comparable to DS'.


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## Heck148

tdc said:


> Orchestration is never a black and white issue because it cannot be analyzed completely separate from the rest of the composition. There are general rules, but these are only guidelines....


but there are basic techniques, and realities that exist for orchestration. as such, it is perfectly reasonable to analyze, criticize a composer's output on this aspect.



> Heck148 does not enjoy Rachmaninov's music and I think that is why he fails to understand the effectiveness of the orchestration.


No, rather, I understand the INeffectiveness of the orchestration - ie- so much of what he writes is obscured by his own overly thick texture. that, it can be argued, is an objective issue, not subjective.



> Whether or not the orchestration follows this or that rule or is the same as this or that composers work is irrelevant. If the music works, the orchestration justifies itself.


it is extremely relevant, on an objective level. the music doesn't work, the orchestration s a major drawback.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> How many times does one need to express one's distaste in the same way on the same subject in the same thread, and to how many different people,.................


There is an objective element here that I will continue to present. SR may have scored as he did because he wanted it to sound that way; or - perhaps he just didn't know any better, or he never learned the basics of orchestration. again - if you don't like my postings, don't read or respond to them.


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## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> The discussion above inspired me to think about the differences between Rachmaninoff and Shostakovich with respect to texture and scoring.......
> By contrast, Shostakovich's primary thought was linear (and often modal!) rather than harmonic. He often allowed nothing into the texture that didn't have melodic significance. In practice this often meant spare, austere textures. When he did write purely harmonic parts it was often more for the sake of rhythmic considerations, like establishing a pulse or a unique pattern of accents contrary to or complementary to those in the melody, rather than for the sake of the progression itself. This is probably why there is so much percussive writing in his concertos, by contrast with the lush piano scoring Rachmaninoff employed.
> 
> Shostakovich was by far the more natural composer for orchestra, in part because of the very issues noted above. Rachmaninoff's dense, intricate voce-leading, that works so well on piano, always runs the danger of become over dense in a symphonic context because the tone of orchestra instruments is invariably weightier and broader than that of the piano. Rachmaninoff wrote his orchestral works at the piano and then score them later, so sometimes those closely spaced piano chords became overly dark or thick when scored for winds and strings..........
> Shostakovich's linear thinking made him a natural master of the string quartet, an ensemble with which I can't imagine Rachmaninoff having much success. On the other hand, Rachmaninoff was a master of piano accompaniment, both as a player and accompanist. The scoring for his cello sonata and his many songs is ingenious and imaginative.


Excellent posting...good points.


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## Taggart

The OP was about the differences between two composers and which one preferred. A number of posts have concentrated on more political matters. These have been removed and some posts edited to remove references to deleted posts.

Please stay on topic and avoid politics.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> *There is an objective element here* that I will continue to present. SR may have scored as he did because he wanted it to sound that way; or - perhaps he just didn't know any better, or he never learned the basics of orchestration. again - if you don't like my postings, don't read or respond to them.


OK, let's be objective. "Thick texture" is an objective fact (though only as "thick" is a relative term). "Overly thick" and "muddy," however, are value judgments, not facts. "Some of Rach's instrumental strands cannot be heard" is an objective statement (if true; I wouldn't know, since I can't know when I'm not hearing something inaudible). "The parts that can't be heard compromise the value of the music," however, is a value judgment, not an objective statement.

You insist on value judgments as if they were implicit in the (assumed) facts. Well, they aren't. I happen to love R's full, dark sonorities and rich, complex textures, finding them part and parcel of his sensibility, and my pleasure is not lessened if not every instrumental strand shines forth with Stravinskian clarity. You happen not to like those same sounds, so you call them muddy and the composer incompetent.


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## Bettina

Richard8655 said:


> Very interesting discussion with great contributions from everyone. We should all leave the politics and return to the music, as a few others have suggested. But I think the history, background, and circumstances are relevant and fascinating as it made who these two very different Russian composers were. I thought Bettina raised some very good points earlier:
> 
> Given the evolution of classical music in the first half of the twentieth century, was not Rachmaninoff out of sync? His style (as hpowders also suggested), seems to have been frozen in time as a lost soul from the previous century. But I think this also applied to Brahms to a certain extent in his period, and his music was loved and accepted then.
> 
> I also think EdwardBast hit the nail on the head just above in some detailed explanation of differences that nevertheless made each composer in his own way such a significant contributor to classical music.


I'm glad that you found my questions useful. I agree with you that Rachmaninoff was mostly out of sync with 20th-century styles. His melodic and harmonic styles certainly are undeniably rooted in Romantic traditions.

But this thread has made me start thinking: maybe Rachmaninoff's thick orchestration was actually a _modernist _trait, one of the few ways in which he fit in with his 20th-century time period. Instead of seeing his orchestration as a throwback to Romanticism, could we perhaps see it as anticipating the complex textures of composers such as Carter and Ferneyhough? Just a thought, and maybe not a very productive one, but I wanted to put it out there to see what everyone thinks!


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## Chronochromie

Richard8655 said:


> Given the evolution of classical music in the first half of the twentieth century, was not Rachmaninoff out of sync? His style (as hpowders also suggested), seems to have been frozen in time as a lost soul from the previous century.


Not really. He was influenced by modernism and jazz in his later works (4th piano concerto and Symphonic Dances are the obvious ones).


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> There is an objective element here that I will continue to present. SR may have scored as he did because he wanted it to sound that way; or - perhaps he just didn't know any better, or he never learned the basics of orchestration. again - if you don't like my postings, don't read or respond to them.


In that case, forum's would be pretty dull places.

I'm sure there might be some truth to what you're saying. It's the extreme element to it that loses me. How do you explain the popularity of his orchestrated works if they are so flawed? How do explain the fact that no conductors that I know of have trashed the orchestration to the extent that you have?


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> "Some of Rach's instrumental strands cannot be heard" is an objective statement


correct. the self-concealment of the orchestration is a fact - now why SR wrote it that way is open to debate - he either didn't realize that the overly thick orchestration would conceal so much detail, or he did it intentionally [which raises the question - why write it in if one knows it will never be heard??] but, whatever the motivation/cause - the excessive orchestration was created.



> You insist on value judgments as if they were implicit in the (assumed) facts.


yet you insist on ignoring the obvious deficiencies in the orchestrations, which greater masters avoid or use to deliberate effect only occasionally. the criticism of faulty orchestration is really objective, when viewed as a specific element of musical composition.



> I happen to love R's full, dark sonorities and rich, complex textures,


talk about a value judgement...



> You happen not to like those same sounds, so you call them muddy and the composer incompetent.


I find the sonic murk monotonous. also, trying to perform it effectively is frustrating, and rather unrewarding. again, we are faced with the objective reality = this lovely little inner part/melodic statement will never be heard unless I blast it forth _fortississimo_ with a most unmusical raucous tone quality, hardly consistent with the musical context of the passage. That, to me, is an objective flaw, a mistake by the composer. 
I think Edward's posting made very excellent points regarding the two composers' approaches to composition....It is very possible that SR wrote for and at the piano - he was then unable to translate that medium into the sonic reality of full orchestra, hence we get the overly thick, self-obscuring, and, dare I say it - "muddy" texture.... 
that this texture is thick and heavy, and obscures many inner details is not subjective, it is objective, a fact, reality.


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## Woodduck

Bettina said:


> But this thread has made me start thinking: maybe Rachmaninoff's thick orchestration was actually a _modernist _trait, one of the few ways in which he fit in with his 20th-century time period. Instead of seeing his orchestration as a throwback to Romanticism, could we perhaps see it as anticipating the complex textures of composers such as Carter and Ferneyhough? Just a thought, and maybe not a very productive one, but I wanted to put it out there to see what everyone thinks!


An interesting thought, but dense orchestral textures have precedent in Romantic music, and are not characteristic of the prevailing modernist trend toward transparency and an emphasis on the distinct colors of individual instruments. Rachmaninoff himself responded to that trend in his later works, and the difference between the second and third symphonies is striking.


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## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> but there are basic techniques, and realities that exist for orchestration. as such, it is perfectly reasonable to analyze, criticize a composer's output on this aspect.
> 
> *No, rather, I understand the INeffectiveness of the orchestration -* ie- so much of what he writes is obscured by his own overly thick texture. that, it can be argued, is an objective issue, not subjective.
> 
> it is extremely relevant, on an objective level. the music doesn't work, the orchestration s a major drawback.


No this is just a subjective comment. What you don't understand is your own subjectiveness


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> In that case, forum's would be pretty dull places.
> 
> I'm sure there might be some truth to what you're saying. It's the extreme element to it that loses me. How do you explain the popularity of his orchestrated works if they are so flawed? How do explain the fact that no conductors that I know of have trashed the orchestration to the extent that you have?


How do you explain the immense popularity of DWTS, which I'll wager, is far more popular than the Bolshoi Ballet or the American Ballet Theater?? or the widespread following of reality TV as opposed to classical theater??

as far as re-orchestrating it, once started, where would you stop?? as I said before - I would love to hear what SR orchestra music would sound like re-scored by Shostakovich or Stravinsky.....Rimsky-K and Shostakovich did re-orchestra a number of Mussorgsky works, so the concept is not without precedent.


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## Heck148

DavidA said:


> No this is just a subjective comment. What you don't understand is your own subjectiveness


no, poor orchestration, failing to properly assess and apply the characteristics of orchestra instruments to the medium at hand is not subjective, any more, than clumsy, incoherent melody and harmony or awkward voice-leading are subjective.
why do you fail to see that creative, intelligent, artistic use of instrumentation is a specific skill set, that is subject to certain objective standards??


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> correct. the self-concealment of the orchestration is a fact - now why SR wrote it that way is open to debate - he either didn't realize that the overly thick orchestration would conceal so much detail, or he did it intentionally [which raises the question - why write it in if one knows it will never be heard??] but, whatever the motivation/cause - the excessive orchestration was created.
> 
> yet you insist on ignoring the obvious deficiencies in the orchestrations, which greater masters avoid or use to deliberate effect only occasionally. the criticism of faulty orchestration is really objective, when viewed as a specific element of musical composition.
> 
> talk about a value judgement...
> 
> I find the sonic murk monotonous. also, trying to perform it effectively is frustrating, and rather unrewarding. again, we are faced with the objective reality = this lovely little inner part/melodic statement will never be heard unless I blast it forth _fortississimo_ with a most unmusical raucous tone quality, hardly consistent with the musical context of the passage. That, to me, is an objective flaw, a mistake by the composer.
> I think Edward's posting made very excellent points regarding the two composers' approaches to composition....It is very possible that SR wrote for and at the piano - he was then unable to translate that medium into the sonic reality of full orchestra, hence we get the overly thick, self-obscuring, and, dare I say it - "muddy" texture....
> that this texture is thick and heavy, and obscures many inner details is not subjective, it is objective, a fact, reality.


I can see that this is hopeless.

Fortunately, Rachmaninoff's highly accomplished works and unique sensibility will enchant, and move deeply, people all over the world for an incalculable time to come, while "objective" dismay over his orchestral "muck" will go the way of all the captious, peevish, nitpicky music criticism we now read mainly for amusement, if ever.

Ciao.


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## Huilunsoittaja

I wish you guys were this knowledgeable about _other _Russian musical topics. Man, I've not seen people get so heated (in a negative sense) about Russian music as I do on TalkClassical. Catch you all on the flip side!

These composers are just too interesting on their own and in contrast to be debating on the topics you guys have chosen to pick.

A Rachmaninoff vs. Scriabin thread could have been interesting to discuss, about what really makes them different despite being classmates undergoing the same pedagogical treatment.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> Rachmaninoff's highly accomplished works and unique sensibility will enchant, and move deeply,


oh, right, just great ...and far better symphonic orchestral works will be further neglected as concert programming space continues to be pre-empted by the mediocre, bloated, overly-stuffed war horses like SR's tedious symphonic bloviations.

Yes, let's not ever refresh the symphonic repertoire pool, not when we can keep on repeating the same mediocrities year after year. [sarcasm on]
actually, two fine, well-deserving symphonies of Diamond, Mennin, Schuman, Hanson, etc could be performed on a concert in place of each presentation of SR's long-winded 2nd symphony


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## Heck148

Huilunsoittaja said:


> A Rachmaninoff vs. Scriabin thread could have been interesting to discuss,


I feel the same about a Shostakovich v Stravinsky thread....both great composers


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## EdwardBast

Phil loves classical said:


> Great post Ed. Hit the nail on its head I think. I admit I find something about Rachmaninov, especially in the symphonies that is obtrusive in a way. Your putting it into words I find enlightening, and am glad you spoke your mind. That is why we're here.


Thanks. But what I didn't say, when focusing on the narrow issue of texture, is that those symphonies of Rachmaninoff are among the most systematically organized in the whole repertoire when it comes to thematic processes and dramatic unity on the grand scale.

The first symphony introduces three themes in the first movement, a short motto, and then two contrast themes in different tempi. All of the material of the scherzo derives from the first theme, all of the slow movement comes from the second theme, and then all three themes return in new forms in the finale. I don't know of any symphony before or since with a tighter formal plan.

In the Second Symphony every theme has a clear role in an evolving drama spanning the entire work, and all of the movements are densely interrelated. But because Rachmaninoff was so gifted at the art of variation and such a consummate melodist, these connections go unnoticed by many listeners; The themes each have such a vital life and identity of their own, that one can get distracted from looking deeper. The opening theme of the finale, for example, is built by fusing key elements of three earlier themes (the motto from the symphony's opening measures, the second theme of the first movement, and the main theme of the scherzo), but because it sounds like such a spontaneous riot of exuberance, it doesn't occur to people that such connections exist or that they are of critical structural significance. The gorgeous melodic surfaces of this and other works made Rachmaninoff a target for critics, who dismissed him as a superficial tune-smith. But those gorgeous surfaces conceal great subtlety and formal planning, so the work always has more to give the deeper one looks into it.

Another aspect of Rachmaninoff's work that draws criticism, as it did too for Tchaikovsky, is its sudden unprepared transitions, especially in its opening sonata-from movements. In the first movement of the second symphony the themes are connected by short solo passages for winds with no effort at organic motivic links. The same is true, more or less, in Tchaikovsky's Fourth and Sixth. The standard critique is to describe these works as episodic and inorganic. What is actually going on, however, is that these movements are underpinned by a unique conception of subjective time. The contrasting themes of the first movements aren't supposed to sound like they follow logically from one another. Instead they represent two incompatible states, mutually exclusive conditions of the soul. When one exhausts itself, the other emerges, but they aren't dependent on one another. In a word, the expressive experience the movements embody isn't linear. The structures would fail if the transitions seemed to embody a straightforward linear flow. They are changes of scene.


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> How do you explain the immense popularity of DWTS, which I'll wager, is far more popular than the Bolshoi Ballet or the American Ballet Theater?? or the widespread following of reality TV as opposed to classical theater??...


Totally non-responsive which doesn't surprise me because your perspective is not consistent with the music's popularity or that from musicians and conductors in general.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> oh, right, just great ...and far better symphonic orchestral works will be further neglected as concert programming space continues to be pre-empted by the mediocre, bloated, overly-stuffed war horses like SR's tedious symphonic bloviations.
> 
> Yes, let's not ever refresh the symphonic repertoire pool, not when we can keep on repeating the same mediocrities year after year. [sarcasm on]
> actually, two fine, well-deserving symphonies of Diamond, Mennin, Schuman, Hanson, etc could be performed on a concert in place of each presentation of SR's long-winded 2nd symphony


Yes indeed. Just great. You can't see it, so you have to disparage what you can't appreciate.

I can fully agree that fine works by those and other composers are not programmed enough. And, sure, put one of them on instead of a popular favorite. But Rachmaninoff is not a popular favorite - more popular than Diamond, Mennin, Schuman, etc. - for no reason, nor merely because he is a great melodist and has a way of hitting people's emotional centers like few other composers. The man actually did know how to compose.

Your terms of disparagement make clear that R simply doesn't resonate with you. It's OK. We can't all enjoy everything. Just try being a little humble about your deficiencies. I don't care much for Shostakovich; I find some of his characteristics disagreeable - and that is precisely why I won't presume that others should accept my personal responses to his music as valid for them.

I trust you have by now read EdwardBast's excellent comments on R's 2nd Symphony. Of course you won't be impressed.


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## tdc

EdwardBast said:


> Shostakovich was by far the more natural composer for orchestra


I think you make a lot of excellent points in this post, particularly pointing out that Rachmaninov was more harmonically focused and Shostakovich more linear. This being reiterated I feel the above statement is subjective and based on your musical preferences which I have noted over time lie mostly with horizontal development in music and not harmony.

From my perspective Shostakovich's orchestration is certainly cleaner but that does not make it objectively more natural or effective. In Shostakovich case (as opposed to say Ravel or Stravinsky) I believe his orchestration is more accurately a result of his linear musical thought. His relative lack of interest in building up thick textures, allows for more clarity of lines but also results in a thinner and weaker sounding orchestra compared to Rachmaninov. In addition to this the melodic material he chooses is often comparatively harmonically simple. He may go on to develop and structure those ideas with great genius, but these works do not have the same effect as a Rachmaninov orchestral work.

Rachmaninov delivers a big, powerful orchestral sound, in contrast (from a harmonic standpoint) Shostakovich is comparatively smaller, and 'tinny' in sound (albeit 'cleaner').

I have said from the start of this debate that Shostakovich was more focused on _form_ than harmony - which in itself is not a flaw. I believe when composers make compositional choices sacrifices have to be made to some extent based on their musical preferences.


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## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> no, poor orchestration, failing to properly assess and apply the characteristics of orchestra instruments to the medium at hand is not subjective, any more, than clumsy, incoherent melody and harmony or awkward voice-leading are subjective.
> why do you fail to see that creative, intelligent, artistic use of instrumentation is a specific skill set, that is subject to certain objective standards??


Subjective argument. As if orchestration can be objective! It is highly subjective upon what the composer set out to do.

You fail to understand that music was made for enjoyment and to listen to not for people who apply their own highly subjective reasoning to it.


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## Magnum Miserium

Sine my post seems to have been lost in toto in the hecatomb, here's the on topic part again: Rachmaninov has a couple of sweet Tchaikovsky/Gershwin-ish melodies and a cool piano style, Shostakovich doesn't, therefore Rachmaninov wins.


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> Totally non-responsive which doesn't surprise me because your perspective is not consistent with the music's popularity or that from musicians and conductors in general.


response was right on....are you actually going to try to tell me that general popular opinion is the valid criterion for actual value??
one has only to look at the political scene....enough said....
it would not matter if the odds were a million to one...the truth is the truth....SR was an inferior orchestrator...I won't bother going into all of the various structural deficiencies.........


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## Heck148

tdc said:


> Rachmaninov delivers a big, powerful orchestral sound, in contrast (from a harmonic standpoint) Shostakovich is comparatively smaller, and 'tinny' in sound (albeit 'cleaner').


Oh please.you cannot be serious....SR never wrote an orchestra sonority even close to the final pages of the Leningrad Symphony, and that's just one example out of so many...Shostakovich delivers some of the greatest orchestral sonorities in the entire repertoire...once again, I cite his excellent use of the full, extreme ranges of orchestral instruments - well-known features of excellent orchestration technique...


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## Heck148

DavidA said:


> Subjective argument. As if orchestration can be objective!


it is objective, when taken and analyzed as a compositional skill. it is an objective flaw when it detracts from the composer's works, such as we see with SR.

I've said from the beginning - to each his own....everyone is free to like/not like whatever music they choose. but don't try to tell me or anyone, that poor technique, poor skill, is great, effective, or first-rate. it isn't, tho you are free to enjoy it as you please.


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## Richard8655

Chronochromie said:


> Not really. He was influenced by modernism and jazz in his later works (4th piano concerto and Symphonic Dances are the obvious ones).


Sorry, but I really don't hear a lot of modernism in his works. Sure, you can ferret out some later pieces that might echo modern references, but to my plebeian ears the majority of his music sounds pretty firmly romantic. But that's not in any sense negative.


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## KenOC

FWIW, on another forum with pretty knowledgeable people, Rach did not make the top ten 20th century composers or 20th century symphonists. He did make #9 of the all-time great concerto composers. His Piano Concerto No. 3 made 4th among all-time great piano concertos.

I don't remember anybody commenting on his orchestration.


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## Chronochromie

Richard8655 said:


> Sorry, but I really don't hear a lot of modernism in his works. Sure, you can ferret out some later pieces that might echo modern references, but to my plebeian ears the majority of his music sounds pretty firmly romantic. But that's not in any sense negative.


I do hear it and have read about it. No "ferreting" going on here, his later works after he left Russia quite clearly show those influences that didn't appear in his earlier work. As someone said in the thread, the differences between the 2nd and 3rd symphonies for example. Now I never said he was a Modernist composer.


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## DaveM

Continuing from KenOC post above:

Nor have I been able to find any reference from a musicologist or conductor that SR was an incompetent orchestrator. And therein lies the problem with Heck148's position: He's not simply saying that Rachmaninoff had orchestration issues -that's likely true just as composers such as Chopin and Schumann have been so labeled- he's saying, in so many words, that SR had virtually no skill as an orchestrator. If that were true, there would be fairly easy-to-find references to the fact by both experts (musicologists and conductors) and amateur listeners. I can't find any.


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## Richard8655

Chronochromie said:


> I do hear it and have read about it. No "ferreting" going on here, his later works after he left Russia quite clearly show those influences that didn't appear in his earlier work. As someone said in the thread, the differences between the 2nd and 3rd symphonies for example. Now I never said he was a Modernist composer.


Makes sense. Thanks.


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## Woodduck

DaveM said:


> Continuing from KenOC post above:
> 
> *Nor have I been able to find any reference from a musicologist or conductor that SR was an incompetent orchestrator.* And therein lies the problem with Heck148's position: He's not simply saying that Rachmaninoff had orchestration issues -that's likely true just as composers such as Chopin and Schumann have been so labeled- he's saying, in so many words, that SR had virtually no skill as an orchestrator. If that were true, there would be fairly easy-to-find references to the fact by both experts (musicologists and conductors) and amateur listeners. I can't find any.


Such references - criticisms of R's orchestration - are exactly what I was looking for. All I could find were Heck148's own (identical) remarks on several music forums. But no one else's opinion need matter in any case; I've always loved R's characteristic sounds, in both his early and late works. The _2nd Symphony_ is a deep, rich tapestry of darkly glowing and glowering sonority that flares into brassy brilliance, and the complex interweaving of lines in its yearning adagio is to me unutterably gorgeous. It may be the most Romantic of Romantic symphonies, a rapturous farewell to a world that's passing. The _Symphonic Dances_ is, orchestrally, at the other end of the Rachmaninoff spectrum, a fascinating work of ephemeral moods and dazzling sonic iridescence, all-Rachmaninoff - even recapitulating bits from his _First Symphony_ and _Vespers_ in altered dress - yet all-new. I have always been struck by how much development occurred in the style of this composer some accuse of being stuck in the past.


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> you're not asking the right people, ask some performers, some orchestra personnel....besides, we've already seen quite a few posters here acknowledge the point.


Which point? That SR was not the best orchestrator in some areas or that he was virtually an incompetent orchestrator as you have frequently implied? Please point out the post(s) where someone has agreed with the latter.

You are very evasive with your answers when asked specific questions. You have not supported your opinion with any evidence from musicologists, professional musicians, or conductors. If SR's orchestration issues were as severe as you make out, at the very least orchestra directors/conductors and/or orchestra-related professionals would be among the first to notice and comment ON THE RECORD sometime and somewhere over the last many decades. Your anecdotal comments alone do not suffice.

Also: There have been attempts to mess with the orchestration of composers such as Paganini, Chopin and Schumann because of their alleged orchestration limitations. I am not aware of any major rewrites of Rachmaninoff's symphonies/concertos because of incompetence-level orchestration. And I'm not talking about cuts due to length/repetition. Those aren't the issues you made a big deal about, issues that would require/suggest major rewrites if they were true.


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## brianvds

It occurs to me that as conductor and concert goer, Rachmaninov had plenty of opportunity to hear his works performed. Thus, he also had plenty of opportunity to revise his orchestration for existing works, or change it in future works, in response to what he learned by listening to the existing works being performed. As far as I know, he didn't do much of either, and thus, presumably, he was satisfied that what he heard was what he intended.

So perhaps he intended the "bad orchestration." In which case I am not sure one can call it bad. I would consider orchestration bad when the performed work diverges wildly from what the composer's inner ear told him it would sound like. In such a case, it would mean the composer really didn't know what he was doing. But if Rachmaninov's works sound the way he intended them to sound, then pointing our orchestration errors might be a bit like pointing out "mistakes" in an impressionist painting.

Of course, one is still allowed not to _like_ what he did, in the same way you are allowed to dislike impressionism.


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## DaveM

brianvds said:


> ...But if Rachmaninov's works sound the way he intended them to sound, then pointing our orchestration errors might be a bit like pointing out "mistakes" in an impressionist painting.
> 
> Of course, one is still allowed not to _like_ what he did, in the same way you are allowed to dislike impressionism.


Now there's a rather clever analogy!


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## Pugg

jailhouse said:


> Shostakovich by a million miles


That's a long way ... a million......


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## Taggart

Members are asked to be polite and civil at all times.

Accusing others of "riding a hobby horse", having "sacred cows", being convinced of the rightness of one's own opinion are not only uncivil, they are also plain boring to wade through.

A number of posts have been removed where the discussion developed into a schoolyard spat.

This is an interesting discussion but please be polite to your fellow members.


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## DavidA

Interesting article
http://www.spectator.co.uk/2014/10/the-drunk-conductor-who-ruined-rachmaninovs-career/


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## DavidA

DaveM said:


> Continuing from KenOC post above:
> 
> Nor have I been able to find any reference from a musicologist or conductor that SR was an incompetent orchestrator. And therein lies the problem with Heck148's position: He's not simply saying that Rachmaninoff had orchestration issues -that's likely true just as composers such as Chopin and Schumann have been so labeled- he's saying, in so many words, that SR had virtually no skill as an orchestrator. If that were true, there would be fairly easy-to-find references to the fact by both experts (musicologists and conductors) and amateur listeners. I can't find any.


I have just done the same exercise. If SR was a 'bad orchestrator' as has been claimed then surely some reference to it would have been made.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> All I could find were Heck148's own (identical) remarks on several music forums.


It is my impression that transferring material, possibly contentious material, from other forums to the home forum is a no-no in cyber-land...why are you bringing arguments from another forum onto this one??

I've made my points, and there has been no refutation - SR's orchestra works suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, they are over-long and suffer from structural deficiencies as well...
listeners are free to like them, or anything else they choose...but on a factual, analytical basis, there are some major problems, which prevent SR from being rated amongst the greatest composers.



> =DaveM;1193750
> Nor have I been able to find any reference from a musicologist or conductor that SR was an incompetent orchestrator.


it isn't just orchestration - it's overly long, and repetitious...I cite Stokowski's substantial cuts to the 2nd symphony, cuts which are still regularly employed today. 
I've made my points, and there has been no refutation - SR's orchestra works suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, they are over-long and suffer from structural deficiencies as well...
listeners are free to like them, or anything else they choose...but on a factual, analytical basis, there are some major problems, which prevent SR from being rated amongst the greatest composers.



> DaveM;1193798]Which point?


I am not evasive at all. I've made my points, and there has been no refutation - SR's orchestra works suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, they are overly-long and suffer from structural deficiencies as well...
listeners are free to like them, or anything else they choose...but on a factual, analytical basis, there are some major problems, which prevent SR from being rated amongst the greatest composers.



brianvds said:


> So perhaps he intended the "bad orchestration."


That is certainly possible. perhaps he did not know any better, or as Edward posited earlier, perhaps he composed his orchestra works at the piano, without realizing that the orchestra texture would be substantially different. either way, it is faulty, and is open to just criticism.

Here is another critique of SR's skills as an orchestrator:

<<Another one worth mentioning; Rachmaninoff. Again, *a composer who should have stuck with his main instrument.* Now, there are a few exceptions here, too (Isle of the Dead, piano concerti), but *his purely orchestral Symphonies are pretty much dull.* He certainly had a handle on the sonorous capabilities of the piano, and even on an orchestra backing up a piano, but not on an orchestra by itself. He actually left the orchestration of some of his Etudes-Tableaux up to one of the greatest orchestrators ever, Otto Respighi, because he knew he wasn't that great at it. Like Dvorak, he had more talent for turning a melody than bringing the melody out in an orchestra; like Liszt, he knew how to make it work better on a piano than anywhere else, and like countless aspiring composers, he was a master of counterpoint and harmony who occasionally got carried away with making his music too thick for the listener.>>
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080616063101AAC64Tm


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> It is my impression that transferring material, possibly contentious material, from other forums to the home forum is a no-no in cyber-land...why are you bringing arguments from another forum onto this one??
> 
> I've made my points, and there has been no refutation -


That's not how it works. It's not up to us to disprove your position. You have made particularly extreme remarks about SR's orchestration that virtually no one here can make sense of. (And I'm talking about the incompetence-level statements not that he was simply not a top-notch orchestrator.) You have provided absolutely no evidence to back it up. The refutation is that no one here has experienced the level of SR's incompetence that you claim and no one here has been able to find any reference that supports your position.

I hope that the next time your orchestra is scheduled to play a Rachmaninoff work, you will be sure to tell the conductor that you are being forced to play an incompetently composed piece which is a disservice to the apparently ignorant audience.

Btw, just for the record, the quote in your post just above that critiques SR's orchestration is moderate and on the level that others here (I'm pretty sure), including myself, have no problem with. It's interesting that the reference is mainly regarding the symphonies and not the concertos. I would think that if SR was incompetent as an orchestrator, it would affect all his orchestrated works.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> It is my impression that *transferring material, possibly contentious material, from other forums to the home forum is a no-no in cyber-land*...why are you bringing arguments from another forum onto this one??
> 
> I've made *my points*, and *there has been no refutation* - SR's orchestra works suffer from *excessively thick, obscuring orchestration,* they are *over-long and suffer from structural deficiencies* as well...
> listeners are free to like them, or anything else they choose...but *on a factual, analytical basis, there are some major problems,* which prevent SR from being rated amongst the greatest composers.
> 
> listeners are free to like them, or anything else they choose...but *on a factual, analytical basis*, *there are some major problems*, which prevent SR from being rated amongst the greatest composers.
> 
> perhaps he did not know any better
> 
> Here is another critique of SR's skills as an orchestrator:
> 
> <<Another one worth mentioning; Rachmaninoff. Again, *a composer who should have stuck with his main instrument.* Now, there are a few exceptions here, too (Isle of the Dead, piano concerti), but *his purely orchestral Symphonies are pretty much dull.* He certainly had a handle on the sonorous capabilities of the piano, and even on an orchestra backing up a piano, but not on an orchestra by itself. He actually left the orchestration of some of his Etudes-Tableaux up to one of the greatest orchestrators ever, Otto Respighi, because he knew he wasn't that great at it. Like Dvorak, he had more talent for turning a melody than bringing the melody out in an orchestra; like Liszt, he knew how to make it work better on a piano than anywhere else, and like countless aspiring composers, he was a master of counterpoint and harmony who occasionally got carried away with making his music too thick for the listener.>>
> https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080616063101AAC64Tm


It's nice that you are able to find some anonymous person on the internet who dislikes Rachmaninoff's orchestration and finds his symphonies dull. However, you might also have included the rest of his post, in which he claims to love Schumann's orchestration but to dislike Dvorak's. He calls the scoring of Dvorak's symphonies "rather bland"!

Well, there's no accounting for taste. But - _taste is what it is._ My taste embraces all these composers for their individual qualities.

As to Rachmaninoff's "structural problems": while it's true that he sanctioned cuts in his Second Symphony, it has become common practice to perform and record the work complete. People who like Rachmaninoff welcome this, as the cuts eliminate some beautiful music. People who don't care for the composer probably aren't listening to the piece anyway, so who cares what they think? I've heard the piece numerous times in all versions and emphatically disagree that it is structurally problematic with every note included. Rachmaninoff's musical thinking, especially at the time of the Second, was by nature expansive, and it is precisely this quality that many love about him (and please note that Rach did _not_ contemplate cuts in most of his works). Trying to impose a different aesthetic on him shows, more than anything, an inability to "get into" what he has to say. One hears similar arguments about Bruckner's idiosyncratic sense of form - but let's not debate that!

I would never dream of "refuting" most of your "points," because most of them are merely expressions of taste (which, as I said, there's no accounting for). What I am at pains to refute is any attempt to elevate taste to the level of objective truth. You have not shown that there are "major problems" with the structure of the Second Symphony or any other work, and so your claim to having established a "factual, analytical basis" is spurious.

By the way, what happened to your belief that "transferring material, possibly contentious material, from other forums to the home forum is a no-no in cyber-land"? Isn't the link you provided a transfer of possibly contentious material? All I had done was to mention that you've presented your views on other forums. Personally, I can't see anything illegitimate about either action.


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## JAS

Heck148 said:


> I've made my points, and there has been no refutation - SR's orchestra works suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, they are over-long and suffer from structural deficiencies as well...
> listeners are free to like them, or anything else they choose...but on a factual, analytical basis, there are some major problems, which prevent SR from being rated amongst the greatest composers.


SR's orchestral works do not suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, are not over long and do not suffer from structural deficiencies. There, refutation complete.


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## Woodduck

JAS said:


> SR's orchestral works do not suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, are not over long and do not suffer from structural deficiencies. There, refutation complete.


Good job. Good luck.


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## Phil loves classical

Well, thought I would revisit Rachmaninov's Symphony No. 2 after viewing some of this discussion, and relistened last night and this morning. I have changed my outlook a bit. I don't think would disagree with me saying his romanticism is more keeping in the past than his era (maybe by 30 years?). His music seemed naive, boring, and "gooey" in the adagio to me previously, since I had expected something more of the lines of Bartok and was hugely disappointed. But this time around, since I was expecting something less sophisticated than Tchaikovsky, and bad incompetent orchestration, I was immediately struck by his serviceability as a Symphonist. But I agree with Heck that his symphonies get more attention than they deserve compared to many, many relatively less known composers like Rautaavara, Arnold, Lutoslawski, and Bax. Rachmaninov's fame as a pianist and composer for the piano may have elevated the reputation of his serviceable symphonies too. I don't hear anything really wrong with his symphonies though, maybe just too string heavy for my taste, especially in the adagio, which I can take in better now. That is where I think that thickness, as I interpret the meaning, becomes most noticeable.


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## Richard8655

Back to the Shostakovich side. This documentary was originally posted by starthrower. Posting again if missed or anyone interested. I was impressed in how well it was done, and as a beautiful film.


----------



## Heck148

To DaveM, DaveA, Woodduck, JAS, etc -


DaveM said:


> That's not how it works. It's not up to us to disprove your position. You have made particularly extreme remarks about SR's orchestration[/quote
> All easily verifiable by a simple examination of the orchestra score - we will see that the following problems are consistent:
> 
> 1. constant octave and unison 2blings, esp in instruments of the bass choir of the orchestra. the low-pitch fundamentals sounded produce a very full array of overtones, which adds a very thick cover of sound....this is physics, not opinion.. easily demonstrated...
> 2. constant scoring of orchestral instruments in their low range, low-mid-range registers....again, the low pitch fundamentals create a heavy layer of overtones, which would be greatly thinned, reduced, by scoring instruments in higher octaves, or in their upper ranges. again, the acoustics support my premise...physics, not opinion.
> 3. the writing of fast, intricate, short note value figures in the low choir of the orchestra...these instruments - esp en masse - 12 celli, 8 basses. bassoons, low horns, tuba, trombones, do not sound or articulate these passages clearly due to the length of the vibrating strings, or pipes....played on piano, it can be done quite clearly, but not with massed instruments of the bass choir. This might be desirable if a composer wants to depict thunder, a thunderstorm [Beethoven Sym 6] but as a constant device, it comes across as very unclear, and dare I say it.....very muddy...murky....again, you are arguing against physical realities.
> 
> these consistent traits of SR's scoring represent fundamental, basic errors in orchestration. The great orchestrators - Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich, Respighi, etc, do not fall into these traps. They mastered the art...Examine their scores, and you will see.
> 
> again - this is not my "opinion"...it is fact - go look at the score, the printed notes do not lie. You will see that these characteristics are most common in SR's orchestral scoring.
> Rather than constantly accusing me of voicing an "opinion" - please go look at the sources - the scores....
> SR commits many fundamental, basic mistakes. it is you who are voicing opinions, with nothing in support.
> <<I love Rachm'ff and I believe he is a great orchestrator>> is merely an opinion, not supported by examination of his orchestral scores.


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## Heck148

See above...go examine the score please, you will see that I support my points with fact.


----------



## Heck148

JAS said:


> SR's orchestral works do not suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, are not over long and do not suffer from structural deficiencies. There, refutation complete.


See above...go examine the score please, you will see that I support my points with fact.


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## Woodduck

For some reason my computer won't take me to the last page of this thread, so I'm trying posting something to overcome the block. Anyway, I'm just dying for the next repetition of the word "muddy."


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## Heck148

I can't access pg 17 either....saw your notification on Activity stream, but can't access it.


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## Richard8655

Ok folks, get your popcorn ready. Round 3 coming up.


----------



## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> For some reason my computer won't take me to the last page of this thread, so I'm trying posting something to overcome the block.


I had trouble accessing pg 17 as well -



> Anyway, I'm just dying for the next repetition of the word "muddy."


:lol: it's in there, point 3.....the inevitable, inescapable result of scoring excessively for bass choir instruments, and orchestral instruments in their low registers


----------



## Heck148

Richard8655 said:


> Ok folks, get your popcorn ready. Round 3 coming up.


Nahhh...I've made my points, the source backs me up. simple examination of the score proves my points.


----------



## Strange Magic

I'll repeat here my observation that, in an age of instantaneous communication and almost total accessibility to music of every sort, the music of every composer is getting all the attention it deserves. That may be why Rachmaninoff is heard more than Rautaavara, Arnold, Lutoslawski, and Bax.


----------



## JAS

Heck148 said:


> See above...go examine the score please, you will see that I support my points with fact.


But your "facts" are buried along with the purely subjective opinions of "excessively," "over long," etc. Is a longer piece less meritorious than a shorter one? Is a quartet, necessarily with less orchestration than a full orchestral score for a big symphony, better for having fewer notes or layers? No one is under any obligation to agree with your opinions. It may be a fact that an apple is red or green (or whatever color it might be), but is it too red or too green? That is where opinion comes in.


----------



## JAS

Strange Magic said:


> I'll repeat here my observation that, in an age of instantaneous communication and almost total accessibility to music of every sort, the music of every composer is getting all the attention it deserves. That may be why Rachmaninoff is heard more than Rautaavara, Arnold, Lutoslawski, and Bax.


Or Bantock. But the problem is that even if people might have access, they might not even be looking for something off the beaten path, particularly if they have had no introduction to classical music at all. How do you give them that first nudge?


----------



## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> To DaveM, DaveA, Woodduck, JAS, etc -
> 
> 
> DaveM said:
> 
> 
> 
> That's not how it works. It's not up to us to disprove your position. You have made particularly extreme remarks about SR's orchestration[/quote
> All easily verifiable by a simple examination of the orchestra score - we will see that the following problems are consistent:
> 
> 1. constant octave and unison 2blings, esp in instruments of the bass choir of the orchestra. the low-pitch fundamentals sounded produce a very full array of overtones, which adds a very thick cover of sound....*this is physics, not opinion.. easily demonstrated...*
> 2. constant scoring of orchestral instruments in their low range, low-mid-range registers....again, the low pitch fundamentals create a heavy layer of overtones, which would be greatly thinned, reduced, by scoring instruments in higher octaves, or in their upper ranges. again, the acoustics support my premise...physics, not opinion.
> 3. the writing of fast, intricate, short note value figures in the low choir of the orchestra...these instruments - esp en masse - 12 celli, 8 basses. bassoons, low horns, tuba, trombones, do not sound or articulate these passages clearly due to the length of the vibrating strings, or pipes....played on piano, it can be done quite clearly, but not with massed instruments of the bass choir. This might be desirable if a composer wants to depict thunder, a thunderstorm [Beethoven Sym 6] but as a constant device, it comes across as very unclear, and dare I say it.....very muddy...murky....again, *you are arguing against physical realities.
> *
> *these consistent traits of SR's scoring represent fundamental, basic errors in orchestration. *The great orchestrators - Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich, Respighi, etc, do not fall into these traps. They mastered the art...Examine their scores, and you will see.
> 
> again - *this is not my "opinion"...it is fact* - go look at the score, the printed notes do not lie. You will see that these characteristics are most common in SR's orchestral scoring.
> Rather than constantly accusing me of voicing an "opinion" - please go look at the sources - the scores....
> SR commits many fundamental, basic mistakes. *it is you who are voicing opinions, with nothing in support. *
> <<I love Rachm'ff and I believe he is a great orchestrator>> is merely an opinion, not supported by examination of his orchestral scores.
> 
> 
> 
> You've misunderstood our objections to your arguments. No one here denies the "physics" of R's scoring. What we deny is that his orchestration sounds bad. One is fact. The other is value judgment. We can legitimately agree with your facts and disagree with your value judgments. If you can't see the difference between fact and valuation (or taste) you will be condemned to preach forever and have no congregation. No one is interested in being converted to your beliefs, about orchestration or anything else. We can hear perfectly well that R's orchestration is different from Ravel's or Stravinsky's. Their orchestration accords with their artistic goals - and Rachmaninoff's accords with his.
> 
> So thanks for pointing out those doublings, low registers, and rapid figurations. It's always good to understand better what we're hearing. But you know what? I still like the sound of Rachmaninoff, and so do millions of other people - including, presumably, Rachmaninoff himself, a consummate all-around musician and a fine conductor who was surely well aware of what the instruments in the orchestra sounded like and were capable of.
> 
> You have a concept of what "good orchestration" is. Not everyone needs to share that concept. It should have been obvious long before now that not everyone does. If you want to think that everyone who disagrees with you is an idiot, feel free. We idiots don't give a flying fig.
Click to expand...


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> I can't access pg 17 either....saw your notification on Activity stream, but can't access it.


So the problems with TC and not my computer. Whew.


----------



## Heck148

JAS said:


> But your "facts" are buried.....


no, the facts are readily apparent. please, go look at the score...my 3 points are right on target. please address them.

[Hmmm...still having trouble getting to this page]


----------



## Heck148

> Woodduck;1194306]
> 
> 
> Heck148 said:
> 
> 
> 
> To DaveM, DaveA, Woodduck, JAS, etc
> You've misunderstood our objections to your arguments. No one here denies the "physics" of R's scoring.
> 
> 
> 
> and therein lies the proof of SR's errors in orchestration. I made 3 specific points, which are valid. please look at the scores, you will see what I mean.
> It is not an "opinion" that low fundamental pitches produce a rich array of audible overtones....which greatly thickens "the general welter of sound" **
> 
> **Thankyou, Sir Thomas Beecham
> 
> 
> 
> 
> No one is interested in being converted to your beliefs, about orchestration or anything else.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> not the point, at all. I am completely unswayed by the purely subjective, unsupported opinion: <<I love SR's music, and he's a great orchestrator because I think he is>>
> 
> 
> 
> 
> We idiots don't give a flying fig.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Hmm...going by the amount of response I've generated here, I'd say that premise is open to question.
Click to expand...


----------



## JAS

Heck148 said:


> no, the facts are readily apparent.


Your statements are readily apparent, and it seems that most of us are sufficiently sophisticated as readers and thinkers to distinguish them from the value judgements that you are clearly not successfully selling to us. I made this point, fairly clearly, and Woodduck has done the same, with somewhat greater length and perhaps more elegance. (That length does not make his reply necessarily better or worse than mine, as the shorter form I chose does not necessarily make mine better or worse.) Rachmaninoff wrote the music to suit his purposes, including the length. Many of us listening and admiring that same music appreciate it from the first note to the last. Who is to make the final rule as to what makes the proper length?

Discussions about differing views can be useful and productive, but only if participants on _both_ sides are more focused on being understood than in making converts, or "winning" some imaginary prize in a debate that essentially boils down to "is too" and "is not." One of the participants in this particular debate seems not to be getting this very simple point, which can only make me question how valuable are any observations that might be offered from that quarter. As long as that remains the case, feel free to have the final word. I wonder if anyone will see it, or care.


----------



## Heck148

JAS said:


> Your statements are readily apparent, and it seems that most of us are sufficiently sophisticated as readers and thinkers to distinguish them from the value judgements that you are clearly not successfully selling to us.


no, I am showing you facts, which are readily apparent thru examination of the orchestral score. 


> Discussions about differing views can be useful and productive, but only if participants on both side are more focused on being understood


OK, please go examine the score, and you will see that I am not presenting "opinions", but rather, facts about what is actually written, what is supposed to sound.


----------



## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> Woodduck said:
> 
> 
> 
> and therein lies the proof of SR's errors in orchestration. I made 3 specific points, which are valid. please look at the scores, you will see what I mean.
> 
> I am completely unswayed by the purely subjective, unsupported opinion: <<I love SR's music, and he's a great orchestrator because I think he is>>
> 
> 
> 
> You have here attributed to someone a statement that no one has made. No one has said "he's a great orchestrator because I think he is." You have also implied that someone is trying to "sway" you. No one is. What we are trying to get accross is that _we_ are unswayed by your personal evaluation of Rachmaninoff, which you imagine is supported by referring to specific points of orchestration. But you can't prove that R's music is poor simply by describing it. Someone else can see and hear exactly what you see and hear, yet not agree with your evaluation of it.
> 
> There is a gap between fact and value which you have evidently never noticed. But philosophers have been talking about it for centuries. And it is nowhere more relevant than in aesthetics. Artists have always broken the "rules," defied the academy, done unconventional things for reasons entirely their own. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and you're entitled to dislike the taste of it, but don't try to convince someone gulping it down that it isn't delicious, or to prove that it's disgusting by reciting the "objectively factual" recipe to him. Chocolate and garlic pudding may be "bad cooking" by every rule and precedent, but people don't eat rules and precedents. You can talk forever about R breaking the rules of good orchestration, but he has a right to do it for any reason he wishes, and we have a right to enjoy it and no reason whatever to think we are enjoying something bad or wrong.
> 
> So you can take your official cooking-school manual, tear out the pages on "correct" pudding, and eat them to your stomach's content. Meanwhile I'll go and sample what chef Rachmaninoff has cooked up. I won't need a recipe book to tell me whether it tastes good.
Click to expand...


----------



## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> it isn't just orchestration - it's overly long, and repetitious...I cite Stokowski's substantial cuts to the 2nd symphony, cuts which are still regularly employed today.
> I've made my points, and there has been no refutation - SR's orchestra works suffer from excessively thick, obscuring orchestration, they are over-long and suffer from structural deficiencies as well...
> listeners are free to like them, or anything else they choose...but on a factual, analytical basis, there are some major problems, which prevent SR from being rated amongst the greatest composers.


Actually, no one does the cuts in the 2nd anymore. Haven't for decades. Nevertheless, I favor two large cuts myself: The scherzo is a seven part rondo with coda: ABA C ABA. IMO the transition from B back to A only works when it is a surprise, and it works very well the first time. The second time, that is going from part 6 to 7, it falls flat. The principle here is: You can't repeat a dramatic scene.

The finale, IMO, has the same problem. The structure here is:

ABA C / dev. /ABA C /coda

Once again, the second iteration of AB, as in the scherzo, is a momentum killer and anticlimactic. I would prefer a truncated version:

ABA C / dev. /A C /coda

Overall, however, I think both movements have extremely strong bones. Cut as I have described they have unrelenting forward drive and drama.



Heck148 said:


> Here is another critique of SR's skills as an orchestrator:
> 
> <<Another one worth mentioning; Rachmaninoff. Again, *a composer who should have stuck with his main instrument.* Now, there are a few exceptions here, too (Isle of the Dead, piano concerti), but *his purely orchestral Symphonies are pretty much dull.* He certainly had a handle on the sonorous capabilities of the piano, and even on an orchestra backing up a piano, but not on an orchestra by itself. He actually left the orchestration of some of his Etudes-Tableaux up to one of the greatest orchestrators ever, Otto Respighi, because he knew he wasn't that great at it. Like Dvorak, he had more talent for turning a melody than bringing the melody out in an orchestra; like Liszt, he knew how to make it work better on a piano than anywhere else, and like countless aspiring composers, he was a master of counterpoint and harmony who occasionally got carried away with making his music too thick for the listener.>>
> https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080616063101AAC64Tm


Respighi's orchestrations of the Etudes Tableaux are awful. And the scores are full of errors (I proofread them for a major orchestra). I doubt Rachmaninoff could have done worse.

In any case, my conclusion about this whole issue would be: Rachmaninoff's orchestration tends to lack clarity and getting the balance right in performance is a touchy thing, especially the earlier works. But all of his music for orchestra is strong enough in its other qualities that it deserves its place in the repertoire. And the late music is orchestrated very well.


----------



## Woodduck

This isn't peculiar to Rachmaninoff. Cutting out repeats has plenty of precedent. Repeating development sections, especially, avoids that problem of redundancy, of diminished effectiveness on second hearing. I'm not sure I mind at all hearing all the repeats and returns in R's 2nd Symphony, but I see EB's point. In R's other works such cuts wouldn't be tolerable to me. 

There's a passage, a sequential buildup, in the middle section of the adagio of the 2nd that tended to be cut in the "old days," which is quite thrilling and which I'll never forget hearing for the first time. R was apparently a little insecure about this matter, but in general I think he should have trusted himself more.


----------



## EdwardBast

Woodduck said:


> This isn't peculiar to Rachmaninoff. Cutting out repeats has plenty of precedent. Repeating development sections, especially, avoids that problem of redundancy, of diminished effectiveness on second hearing. I'm not sure I mind at all hearing all the repeats and returns in R's 2nd Symphony, but I see EB's point. In R's other works such cuts wouldn't be tolerable to me.
> 
> There's a passage, a sequential buildup, in the middle section of the adagio of the 2nd that tended to be cut in the "old days," which is quite thrilling and which I'll never forget hearing for the first time. R was apparently a little insecure about this matter, but in general I think he should have trusted himself more.


Rachmaninoff finally stood against any cuts in the second symphony, although it seems he didn't protest too strongly at first. While working on the scherzo of the second symphony he wrote a letter to Serge Taneyev, his old teacher, expressing his troubles dealing with rondo form and asking for a review of the subject! His scherzo follows formal norms perfectly but, as I said above, I think his dramatic themes rebel against the confines of the form. The letter to Taneyev suggests he might have been aware of this problem. Other people, those suggesting the big cut in the scherzo, for example, thought they had a good solution. I think they were right. But history has spoken: unauthorized cuts are verboten.


----------



## EdwardBast

tdc said:


> Rachmaninov delivers a big, powerful orchestral sound, in contrast (from a harmonic standpoint) Shostakovich is comparatively smaller, and 'tinny' in sound (albeit 'cleaner').


This is preposterous and easily answered. Listen starting at around 10:00. Have you heard this live? It blows your hair back and shakes your spine - perfectly focused violence:






And this is what the utter mastery of orchestra color sounds like:






Can you hear the difference between this and Rachmaninoff?


----------



## tdc

EdwardBast said:


> This is preposterous and easily answered. Listen starting at around 10:00. Have you heard this live? It blows your hair back and shakes your spine - perfectly focused violence:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And this is what the utter mastery of orchestra color sounds like:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Can you hear the difference between this and Rachmaninoff?


Both examples seem very well orchestrated to my ears, clean, yet powerful. If I was grading just the orchestration I would find no fault.

I still think Rachmaninov, Mahler and Bruckner achieved a way 'bigger' orchestral sound than Shostakovich though. Shostakovich symphonies almost sound like chamber music in comparison.


----------



## Richard8655

tdc said:


> Both examples seem very well orchestrated to my ears, clean, yet powerful. If I was grading just the orchestration I would find no fault.
> 
> I still think Rachmaninov, Mahler and Bruckner achieved a way 'bigger' orchestral sound than Shostakovich though. Shostakovich symphonies almost sound like chamber music in comparison.


I don't know about that. Try his Sym. no. 7 Leningrad. Almost need earplugs.


----------



## tdc

Richard8655 said:


> I don't know about that. Try his Sym. no. 7 Leningrad. Almost need earplugs.


I can see in some ways it sounds big as in there are often a lot of instruments playing a single line together. Perhaps because of the more linear approach of the music, texturally it seems thin compared to the composers I mentioned.


----------



## KenOC

tdc said:


> Both examples seem very well orchestrated to my ears, clean, yet powerful. If I was grading just the orchestration I would find no fault.
> 
> I still think Rachmaninov, Mahler and Bruckner achieved a way 'bigger' orchestral sound than Shostakovich though. Shostakovich symphonies almost sound like chamber music in comparison.


To me, Shostakovich's music is unusually clean, with all the lines (and there are often several) well separated and quite audible. DSCH claimed that his music came to him already orchestrated and that he seldom used intermediate piano sketches, which I think is unusual.

That may account for the "chamber music" quality, which is never quite lost even in the most complex and loudest passages and which I consider a virtue. In comparison, the sound of the early symphonies and concertos of Rachmaninoff can seem muddy and congested, and Rachmaninoff is hardly the only composer that suffers by the comparison.

I am not saying the Rach was a bad orchestrator, but he was no Shostakovich. EdwardBast's examples are very illustrative of my point, especially the 2nd movement of the 6th Symphony. Can anybody imagine Rachmaninoff doing something like this?


----------



## Heck148

> Woodduck;1194325]
> You have here attributed to someone a statement that no one has made. No one has said "he's a great orchestrator because I think he is."


We are way past the consideration of who likes, or does not like whatever.
I've made my points, facts, based upon the orchestral score. Please address those points, if you would. 
You are free to like whatever you want, that has never been an issue.

Your culinary comparison, regarding SR's orchestration, is appropriate, and I shall expand on it. 
The effect of SR's orchestration is equivalent to serving up Thanksgiving Dinner, with all of its delicious, and contrasting tastes and textures - dumping it all in a blender, mixing it up, and serving it to the diners, all mushed together, with no individual tastes being recognizable....as opposed to being able to sample each contrasting taste separately or in particular combination.


----------



## EdwardBast

tdc said:


> Both examples seem very well orchestrated to my ears, clean, yet powerful. If I was grading just the orchestration I would find no fault.
> 
> I still think Rachmaninov, Mahler and Bruckner achieved a way 'bigger' orchestral sound than Shostakovich though. Shostakovich symphonies almost sound like chamber music in comparison.


Yes, 120dbl. chamber music.


----------



## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> Actually, no one does the cuts in the 2nd anymore. Haven't for decades.


Edward - not so - I believe at least 2/3 of the performances of #2 I've done utilized the cuts.



> The second time, that is going from part 6 to 7, it falls flat. The principle here is: You can't repeat a dramatic scene twice.
> The finale, IMO, has the same problem. The structure here is:
> ABA C / dev. /ABA C /coda
> Once again, the second iteration of AB, as in the scherzo, is a momentum killer and anticlimactic.


Thank you...that's the point I've been making re length and repetition.


----------



## Ekim the Insubordinate

Rachmaninov's 2nd and 3rd piano concertos, along with his 2nd Symphony are extraordinary. I've never been impressed nearly as much by anything of Shostakovich's.


----------



## tdc

EdwardBast said:


> Yes, 120dbl. chamber music.


Loud volume is not the same thing as a big texture.


----------



## Heck148

KenOC said:


> To me, Shostakovich's music is unusually clean, with all the lines (and there are often several) well separated and quite audible. DSCH claimed that his music came to him already orchestrated and that he seldom used intermediate piano sketches, which I think is unusual.


The late works of Mahler are like this, and perhaps that was DS' model?? Mahler #9 is remarkably clear in texture, even in the big loud parts...astonishing clarity...same with parts of Sym #8, and DLvDE...



> In comparison, the sound of the early symphonies and concertos of Rachmaninoff can seem _muddy_ and congested


UH-OH!! Ken!! the "m" word!! :lol:



> .... Rach was......no Shostakovich. EdwardBast's examples are very illustrative of my point, especially the 2nd movement of the 6th Symphony. Can anybody imagine Rachmaninoff doing something like this?


Exactly my point.


----------



## tdc

KenOC said:


> I am not saying the Rach was a bad orchestrator, but he was no Shostakovich.


I suppose I can agree with this and if nudged admit Shostakovich was the better orchestrator, however I still don't think the fact that Rachmaninov was primarily a piano composer means he was deficient as an orchestrator, and I don't think using a cleaner approach to orchestration on his works would make them sound better.


----------



## Heck148

Richard8655 said:


> I don't know about that. Try his Sym. no. 7 Leningrad. Almost need earplugs.


You do need earplugs....when we played Shost #7, one of my section mates brought a decibel meter, a sound level device - at the conclusion, with all the extra brass, percussion, timpani, bass drums bashing away - 119db!! that's real industrial strength volume level!!.


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

Shostakovich was a much better symphonist. He wrote about half a dozen masterpieces to Rachmaninov's (I'm not sold but I'll agree with many here about his 2nd) one. The Isle of the Dead and Symphonic Dances are great as well and can be considered as part of Rachmaninov's symphonic oeuvre but even with them Shostakovich is still the better symphonist.

In chamber music again Shostakovich is better. His string quartets alone beat all the chamber music of Rachmaninov (although I'm finding myself appreciating the latter's chamber music more lately).

I like Shostakovich's piano concertos better but I can concede that Rachmaninov wrote two masterpieces in the genre. In my view, it is a tie.

Two great violin concertos vs none.

Solo piano, a tie, or perhaps in slight favor of Rachmaninov.


----------



## KenOC

tdc said:


> I suppose I can agree with this and if nudged admit Shostakovich was the better orchestrator, however I still don't think the fact that Rachmaninov was primarily a piano composer means he was deficient as an orchestrator, and I don't think using a cleaner approach to orchestration on his works would make them sound better.


Totally agree. If we say that composers who didn't orchestrate as well as DSCH are lousy orchestrators, that's a lot of my favorite composers!


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## EdwardBast

tdc said:


> Loud volume is not the same thing as a big texture.


Your basic assumption: that orchestral music naturally has bigger textures in the sense you mean (number of lines, degree of harmonic filler) than chamber music is just an arbitrary convention based on the work of people composing at the piano or the organ for generation after generation - many of them, not very well. The term chamber orchestration is not applied to passages in which the whole orchestra is playing fff, regardless of how many lines there are.


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## DaveM

To my ears, Shostakovich never wrote anything comparable to the opening of the Rachmaninoff piano concerto #2. If I missed it, feel free to let me know.


----------



## tdc

EdwardBast said:


> Your basic assumption: that orchestral music naturally has bigger textures in the sense you mean (number of lines, degree of harmonic filler) than chamber music is just an arbitrary convention based on the work of people composing at the piano or the organ for generation after generation - many of them, not very well. The term chamber orchestration is not applied to passages in which the whole orchestra is playing fff, regardless of how many lines there are.


Well, that was not my basic assumption. I was just referring to the thick textures of 3 particular composers (Prokofiev is another example works like Symphony 6). I don't think all orchestral music naturally has bigger textures, but will typically sound bigger than chamber music due to the larger orchestral forces. I'm not sure about the term 'harmonic filler' here and how you think it applies to the work of the previously mentioned composers, and I did not use the term chamber orchestration. Nonetheless this is interesting information, thanks.


----------



## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

DaveM said:


> To my ears, Shostakovich never wrote anything comparable to the opening of the Rachmaninoff piano concerto #2. If I missed it, feel free to let me know.


No, he didn't. No one did. That opening is very unique. But still doesn't make him better overall.


----------



## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> Edward - not so - I believe at least 2/3 of the performances of #2 I've done utilized the cuts.


I was basing that on performances in Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Boston and New York, the four orchestras I heard live with consistency, and on recent recordings.



Heck148 said:


> Thank you...that's the point I've been making re length and repetition.


Yes, but you have made the point only with respect to a single work! And while composing that work Rachmaninoff was walking around with a pocket score of Die Meistersinger in his pocket and had just heard and been impressed by a performance of Mahler's Fifth in Dresden - not that there's anything wrong with that.


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## Richard8655

I just don't like schmaltz. Setting aside the technical aspects of each composer, Rachmaninoff is sweet and syrupy to my ears. But well done sweetness. Shostakovich is crisp (as others have said), sparse, clean, bold, and unpredictable. That's the adventure in music I prefer. 

It is a bit unfair to compare in this way (as also previously stated), since Rachmaninoff's time frame was a bit earlier and closer to the Romantic period. Yet I look at Stravinsky' works of that same time and that rationale then falls apart.


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## Strange Magic

Thank Goodness we have a plethora of composers and styles, each one objectively better than all the rest!


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## DaveM

TwoFlutesOneTrumpet said:


> No, he didn't. No one did. That opening is very unique. But still doesn't make him better overall.


That raises an interesting subject. How do we individually make that type of value judgment? I can't objectively say that Rachmaninoff is 'better' overall, but subjectively, I can't get away from the fact that Rachmaninoff wrote (arguably) a top ten piano concerto that is iconic for countless listeners. The 1st and second movements are wonderments!

I see terms such as thick, sweet and syrupy applied to Rachmaninoff's music, but in a live performance, this is one of those concertos where you can see virtually everyone in the audience entranced from the opening notes. It's gorgeously beautiful music. Quite an accomplishment that shouldn't be diminished. (And I'm not saying that you did. )


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## Woodduck

Strange Magic said:


> Thank Goodness we have a plethora of composers and styles, each one objectively better than all the rest!


I spin out paragraphs of Rachmaninovian amplitude trying to make the point you make so aphoristically here! I wonder if either approach will penetrate the skulls of those who can't separate their perceptions from their evaluations of those perceptions.

People who condemn works of art they don't sympathize with and thus can't see value in, and then describe physical features of the works to "prove" that their negative judgment is correct, are eternally a plague in threads like this. Every composer has been condemned for some aspect of his work, something actually, objectively present which gives his works a peculiar, personal character, which his critics say is intrinsically "bad." If we disagree with these critics, we are directed all the more forcefully to that peculiar feature - which, as it happens, we may actually enjoy - and told that we are denying the "facts."

I dislike quite a bit of music for features which are actually present and which anyone with minimal musical sensitivity can perceive. I am repelled, for example, by Mahler's use of clarinets playing loudly in their high register, or the conspicuous use of snare drums and military marches in symphonic music. These sounds clash with my sensibility and often strike me as harsh, crude and ugly. But I'm not about to insist that music which utilizes them is "bad." For the same reasons that I won't do this, I will object when someone insists that the sounds made by composers I enjoy are inherently and "objectively" bad.

In the present discussion, I'm tired of seeing the sonorities of Rachmaninoff's music, which I have always enjoyed as part and parcel of his artistic character, disparaged because they don't conform to someone else's ideal of "good" orchestration. It's just fine to have my attention drawn to certain features of that orchestration, I don't mind being told that those features are customarily considered bad, and I have no objection to the fact that someone else doesn't like them. But I have no reason to accept that person's judgment, or any conventional judgment, as either universally valid or valid for me. There is no scientific proof of artistic validity, no one is required to defend his personal taste on objective grounds, and no one should try to prove that another's tastes are wrong.

Maybe schoolchildren need to be taught early the fundamental difference between knowledge and valuation. I'd like to think that most people have at least some intimation of the difference, though a lifetime of looking at the way humans actually behave - specifically at the things they're willing to believe - doesn't encourage me to expect too much. After all, people can hear a politician utter ludicrous falsehoods daily and still believe he'll make the country great again.


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

DaveM said:


> That raises an interesting subject. How do we individually make that type of value judgment? I can't objectively say that Rachmaninoff is 'better' overall, but subjectively, I can't get away from the fact that Rachmaninoff wrote (arguably) a top ten piano concerto that is iconic for countless listeners. The 1st and second movements are wonderments!
> 
> I see terms such as thick, sweet and syrupy applied to Rachmaninoff's music, but in a live performance, this is one of those concertos where you can see virtually everyone in the audience entranced from the opening notes. It's gorgeously beautiful music. Quite an accomplishment that shouldn't be diminished. (And I'm not saying that you did. )


I say it subjectively of course  See post #277 for why.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> People who condemn works of art they don't sympathize with and thus can't see value in, and then describe physical features of the works to "prove" that their negative judgment is correct, are eternally a plague in threads like this.
> I will object when someone insists that the sounds made by composers I enjoy are inherently and "objectively" bad.....
> In the present discussion, I'm tired of seeing the sonorities of Rachmaninoff's music, which I have always enjoyed as part and parcel of his artistic character, disparaged because they don't conform to someone else's ideal of "good" orchestration.


Lighten up...Your right to enjoy whatever you want to enjoy has never been disparaged or threatened. But music composition and performance are not entirely subjective - there are certain objective criteria which apply - correct rhythm, good intonation, accuracy of notes, are few on the performance side. some exist on the composition/creation side as well - clarity, coherent form, discernible presentation of the material intended, etc, etc.
You object strenuously to the application of objective standards to SR's music - you think that because you like it, then any criticisms are totally out of bounds, unwelcome, and "are eternally a plague in threads like this."

That, to me is unreasonable. On a forum like this, with many knowledgeable listeners and posters, it seems that objective evaluation of any and all music should be most welcome.


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## Razumovskymas

Heck148 said:


> That, to me is unreasonable. On a forum like this, with many knowledgeable listeners and posters, it seems that objective evaluation of any and all music should be most welcome.


I don't think it's the content of your criticism that people object to, it's the way you bring it. I can totally enjoy Rachs' piano concerto's but I hope that when I listen to them the next time I don't have to think about mud all the time.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> Lighten up...Your right to enjoy whatever you want to enjoy has never been disparaged or threatened. But music composition and performance are not entirely subjective - there are certain objective criteria which apply - correct rhythm, good intonation, accuracy of notes, are few on the performance side. some exist on the composition/creation side as well - clarity, coherent form, discernible presentation of the material intended, etc, etc.
> You object strenuously to the application of objective standards to SR's music - you think that because you like it, then any criticisms are totally out of bounds, unwelcome, and "are eternally a plague in threads like this."
> 
> That, to me is unreasonable. On a forum like this, with many knowledgeable listeners and posters, it seems that objective evaluation of any and all music should be most welcome.


Inaccurate again. I do not "object strenuously to the application of objective standards to SR's music." I object strenuously to your claim to have applied such standards. You haven't. You merely think you have.

What you have actually done is to offer value judgments and point to certain objectively existing features of the music as "proof" that your value judgments too are objective. I've done my best to explain why this is fallacious. Some people understand this.

I've dealt with this same fallacy in the Wagner threads. A member appears absolutely convinced, and asserts at every available opportunity, that Wagner's operas are too long, that his librettos are poor, that his characters are impossible to sympathize with, and that his operas contain caricatures of Jews - opinions which are held by some people, of course, but none of which can be shown to be objectively factual. We also had some Beethoven threads in which certain members insisted that the only thing great about that composer is his sense of large-scale form, and that in the other elements of music (melody, harmony, orchestration) his music is undistinguished. But - undistinguished according to whom, and by what standard? Some universal standard which must logically be accepted by everyone? Of course not.

Some people just never tire of telling the world what they dislike and finding reasons why they're right. It's especially irritating when there is no right or wrong. If there are a lot of overtones in Rachmaninoff's orchestration because of low-register doubling, and that's the dense sonority the composer wants, your irritation with it is your problem, and a problem with which no one else is "objectively" required to sympathize. Another person may very well say, "Aha! So that's what produces that sound I like so much!" Their valuation is as much to be respected as yours, and is not less "objective."

No one - no one at all - is rationally bound to agree with your concept of "good" orchestration, or any other aesthetic quality in any particular work of art. As for some other qualities you mention - clarity and coherent form - you can, once again, point to objective features of a work which you believe exhibit these qualities, but you cannot prove the existence of the qualities - the degree to which they are present, or their relative importance in context - by pointing to the features. The proof (in the original sense of "test," not of logical proof) is still in the hearing, and there are many variables which determine the way individuals hear and evaluate what they hear.

You are confusing the objective presence of the features of a work with the evaluation of its qualities. They are not, and cannot be, the same.

And it's no use saying "lighten up." Aesthetic philosophy is heavy lifting. I do realize that not everyone has the muscle for it, but we never know unless we try.


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## Woodduck

Razumovskymas said:


> I don't think it's the content of your criticism that people object to, it's the way you bring it. I can totally enjoy Rachs' piano concerto's but I hope that when I listen to them the next time I don't have to think about mud all the time.


After this thread - in which some of the argumentation is muddier than Rachmaninoff could ever be -you may have no choice.

:lol:


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## Heck148

Razumovskymas said:


> but I hope that when I listen to them the next time I don't have to think about mud all the time.


Wear a pair of boots??


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> I do not "object strenuously to the application of objective standards to SR's music." I object strenuously to your claim to have applied such standards.


I have...and you've objected strenuously...I presented 3 very objective points regarding scoring, orchestration, verifiable by examination of the score, for those who choose to look...this clearly has caused you great upset....but please, accept that your right to enjoy such music has never been an issue, and that right is not and has not ever been denied or denigrated.
As I've shown, the objective problems, the errors, exist in SR's scoring....whether we like it or not, whether we recognize it or not...you're free to deny it, but the problems are there, undeniable.



> Some people just never tire of telling the world what they dislike and finding reasons why they're right. It's especially irritating when there is no right or wrong.


I beg to differ....when the heavy scoring hides the composer's own ideas, his own lines, something is wrong....objectively. I've made my case for objective assessment of music, both composition, and performance...As a long time musical adjudicator and audition panel member, I can assure you, that objective evaluation is indeed genuine, and applicable. I don't understand why this angers you so.



> And it's no use saying "lighten up."


OK, then chill out [??]....you're free to love SR's music, deficient orchestration and all...whatever floats your boat...relax, enjoy the music that you love...


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## Phil loves classical

Strange Magic said:


> I'll repeat here my observation that, in an age of instantaneous communication and almost total accessibility to music of every sort, the music of every composer is getting all the attention it deserves. That may be why Rachmaninoff is heard more than Rautaavara, Arnold, Lutoslawski, and Bax.


I guess if this is the case, then Pachebel's Canon in D deserves being played and heard much more than Either of Rachminov and especially Shostakovich?


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## Phil loves classical

EdwardBast said:


> This is preposterous and easily answered. Listen starting at around 10:00. Have you heard this live? It blows your hair back and shakes your spine - perfectly focused violence:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And this is what the utter mastery of orchestra color sounds like:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Can you hear the difference between this and Rachmaninoff?


Rachmaninov orchestral works has more instruments at any given time on average than Shostakovich. In Shostakovich Symphony no. 10, there are times you only hear one instrument or two, which makes for greater variety of expression. In the finale, of course you hear the orchestra full force. Recording engineers also have a large impact on the sound. They can dial up or down the power of the orchestra. And hey, if they do it wrong, can also make the textures in a recording sound muddy and not clearly delineated!


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## Heck148

Phil loves classical said:


> I guess if this is the case, then Pachebel's Canon in D deserves being played and heard much more than Either of Rachminov and especially Shostakovich?


Oh yes, based on "popularity", the "TachoBelle" Canon is a far greater work than Beethoven 4tet #14...


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## Bulldog

Heck148 said:


> As a long time musical adjudicator and audition panel member, I can assure you, that objective evaluation is indeed genuine, and applicable.


I've not heard the term "musical adjudicator". Does it have anything to do with being a judge of musical compositions and/or performances? Or perhaps arranging the sequence of compositions for an orchestral concert. I remember you telling us that you've played an instrument for various orchestras.


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## EdwardBast

Bulldog said:


> I've not heard the term "musical adjudicator". Does it have anything to do with being a judge of musical compositions and/or performances? Or perhaps arranging the sequence of compositions for an orchestral concert. I remember you telling us that you've played an instrument for various orchestras.


Not a term but an objective description for one sitting on juries for performing students, whose progress is evaluated in this way on a semester basis, or judging student recitals. I'm guessing he is a bassoonist and that he owns a Heckel bassoon with the production number 148.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> I have...and you've objected strenuously...I presented 3 very objective points regarding scoring, orchestration, verifiable by examination of the score, for those who choose to look...this clearly has caused you great upset....but please, accept that your right to enjoy such music has never been an issue, and that right is not and has not ever been denied or denigrated.
> As I've shown, the objective problems, the errors, exist in SR's scoring....whether we like it or not, whether we recognize it or not...you're free to deny it, but the problems are there, undeniable.
> 
> I beg to differ....when the heavy scoring hides the composer's own ideas, his own lines, something is wrong....objectively. I've made my case for objective assessment of music, both composition, and performance...As a long time musical adjudicator and audition panel member, I can assure you, that objective evaluation is indeed genuine, and applicable. I don't understand why this angers you so.
> 
> OK, then chill out [??]....you're free to love SR's music, deficient orchestration and all...whatever floats your boat...relax, enjoy the music that you love...


Your amateur psychologizing is of a piece - a very nonobjective piece - with your claims to an objective valuation of Rachmaninoff. In this one post you've said that I'm "greatly upset," that I'm "angry," and that I should "chill out." This is all beside the point, as well as untrue. Actually your stubborn adherence to your beliefs is quite an interesting challenge, and I'm getting a real kick out of seeing how many ways there are to talk to a brick wall.

The only thing you've said that's objectively true is that there are certain physical characteristics of Rachmaninoff's scoring, which you've described. I haven't disputed that those characteristic are present. What I've disputed is that those characteristics make his works "grossly over-blown, excessively bloated, repetitious....way, way, over-orchestrated, thick, muddy, gluey...middle school band music orchestration style...a 3rd or 4th stringer at best." You may regard his music no more highly than that, but your attempts to justify such opinions on "objective" grounds are ridiculous. That you refuse to recognize a distinction between your objective descriptions (octave doublings, low-register whatever) and your personal evaluations tells me clearly that you don't understand that distinction.

But even in the realm of objective fact, I challenge your assertion that R's heavy scoring hides his ideas. His scoring can be heavy, yes, but I hear his ideas coming through loud and clear in recordings by the world's finest conductors, none of whom, so far as I'm aware, complain that R's scoring is problematic. Maybe it is, but you can't prove it by the way it sounds under Previn, Ashkenazy, Temirkanov, Svetlanov, Jansons, Bychkov, Pletnev, etc, etc. If the conductors you play under have trouble with it, maybe they need to take a conducting class.


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## DaveM

When it comes to an opinion/perspective on a narrow/specialized subject such as the quality of the orchestration of a composer with the status of Rachmaninoff, a claim of objectivity requires corroborration. And the more extreme the opinion, the more corroboration is required. There has been no corroboration here that supports the alleged level of incompetence claimed. 

Pointing out elements of the score to support the opinion has some value in pointing out some potential weaknesses of the orchestration, but there again, one would expect that if those limitations were in the extreme, at the very least conductors all over the musical world would be commenting on it and at the most, average classical music listeners would be disturbed by it. I don't find any evidence of either so I remain extremely skeptical.


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## Heck148

Bulldog said:


> I've not heard the term "musical adjudicator". Does it have anything to do with being a judge of musical compositions and/or performances?


Yes, a judge at musical performance competitions and festivals....All-state Solo festivals, or ALL-State Orchestra/Band Auditions - for participation in the All-State [entire state] competition...the latter is very objective, and very competitive, for sure - very talented high school students trying for All-state orchestra/band positions...each candidate plays the exact same music and is judged on various objective standards - rhythm, intonation, accuracy, tone, articulation, sight-reading, scales, etc....there would be so many candidates, you had to use a number rating system for each category of performance to be totalled, and there had to be written documentation of the candidates' performances. believe me, the competition could be really cutthroat. 
I've also served on many, many audition panels for candidates seeking admission to various orchestras with which I perform. I often was involved with, or in charge of choosing the audition repertoire for the different instruments.


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## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> Not a term but an objective description for one sitting on juries for performing students, whose progress is evaluated in this way on a semester basis, or judging student recitals. I'm guessing he is a bassoonist and that he owns a Heckel bassoon with the production number 148.


close Edward... - I've not sat on conservatory juries, but the function is very much the same - objective evaluation of musical students or professionals seeking placement in ensembles at different levels. 
I do play a Heckel bassoon, but it's a 12000 series.


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## Phil loves classical

Here are two sides presented in Wikipedia on Rachmaninov, which Is not specifically on orchestration. Still no consensus:

"His reputation as a composer generated a variety of opinions before his music gained steady recognition across the world. The 1954 edition of the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians notoriously dismissed Rachmaninoff's music as "monotonous in texture ... consist[ing] mainly of artificial and gushing tunes" and predicted that his popular success was "not likely to last".[89] To this, Harold C. Schonberg, in his Lives of the Great Composers, responded: "It is one of the most outrageously snobbish and even stupid statements ever to be found in a work that is supposed to be an objective reference.""


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## Heck148

I've presented objective criticisms of SR's orchestration, based upon the orchestral scores, where the information is readily available - you have not refuted a single one of them. the criticisms stand, unrefuted, and your lengthy subjective diatribes in protest are meaningless to me....I'm not being uncivil, tho your reference to me as "eternally a plague in threads like this." and "a brick wall' certainly push the limits here....
It is perfectly appropriate for me to criticize SR's orchestration within the context of this thread - since the original posting is Rachm'ff v Shostakovich....an obvious invitation to compare the two composers on all aspects of musical creation - orchestration, scoring is most certainly an important and relevant aspect, so I am perfectly justified in raising this point of comparison - esp - 
given that one - Shostakovich, was a real master of orchestration, while Rachm'ff was one of the very weakest in this regard. <<middle school band music orchestration style>> certainly applies - the principles involved, and the results are remarkably similar. 
the comparison is perfectly appropriate. you don't have to like it, you don't have to agree with it....but comparison is legitimate and proper to make within the context of this thread. 
I make the objective criticisms, based upon the actual score - you reply with purely subjective answers - your own opinions...
my criticisms stand, they are correct...you have every right to ignore them, reject them because you don't like them, and continue to love SR's music, despite the deficient orchestration. Fine, I have no problem with that.
I will continue to objectively criticize, which is entirely appropriate for this thread.


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> Pointing out elements of the score to support the opinion has some value in pointing out elements that may indicate some potential weaknesses of the orchestration, but there again, one would expect that if those limitations were in the extreme, at the very least conductors all over the musical world would be commenting on it.


Orchestra musicians comment on it frequently. every time it shows up in the concert folders.



> and at the most, average classical music listeners would be disturbed by it.


the listeners, by and large, don't know what they are missing, because R hides it under the thick texture. There is much going on that NEVER reaches the audience. the performers on stage are all too aware of it.


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## Heck148

Phil - 
<<The 1954 edition of the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians notoriously dismissed Rachmaninoff's music as "monotonous in texture ... consist[ing] mainly of artificial and gushing tunes" >>

Groves is a pretty standard source....I'll take them over Schonberg, whose biases were pretty pronounced.


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## Phil loves classical

I would say both are subjective. But I tend to side more with the Groves outlook. I am wondering if it is actually the Russian romantic style that is generally thick in texture, which I always tend to think of in the strings. Personally I don't think any of the Mighty Five are great orchestrators. I do think Tchaikovsky is a great orchestrator, in fact my definition of a supreme orchestrator, since he balances out the heavy strings in wood winds, brass, etc. , and the strings carry a melody or pulse in his works, instead of sounding more ornamental, in the case of Rachmaninov. So I do feel the balance is slightly out of whack, in my own view, of Rachmaninov and other Russian composers, compared to Tchaikovsky. But That is just my subjective opinion.


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## Phil loves classical

Continuing on this thick string texture idea, most old movie composers were heavy on the strings, and relatively out of balance compared to classical symphonic composers. The Gone with the Wind Soundtrack by Max Steiner is a prime example in my mind. Rachmaninov style was more similar to a film composer than a "serious" contemporary classical composer of his time.


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## KenOC

Note that the famous (infamous?) Grove's entry on Rachmaninoff is over 60 years old. I believe the current entry is quite different.


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## Strange Magic

Phil loves classical said:


> I guess if this is the case, then Pachebel's Canon in D deserves being played and heard much more than Either of Rachminov and especially Shostakovich?


You are correct; each composer, each piece is getting precisely the attention, the audience it deserves. Irrefutable.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> *I've presented objective criticisms *of SR's orchestration, based upon the orchestral scores, where the information is readily available - *you have not refuted a single one of them. the criticisms stand, unrefuted*, and your lengthy subjective diatribes in protest are meaningless to me....I'm not being uncivil, tho your reference to me as "eternally a plague in threads like this." and "a brick wall' certainly push the limits here....
> It is perfectly appropriate for me to criticize SR's orchestration within the context of this thread - since the original posting is Rachm'ff v Shostakovich....an obvious invitation to compare the two composers on all aspects of musical creation - orchestration, scoring is most certainly an important and relevant aspect, so I am perfectly justified in raising this point of comparison - esp -
> given that one - Shostakovich, was a real master of orchestration, while Rachm'ff was one of the very weakest in this regard. <<*middle school band music orchestration style*>> certainly applies - the principles involved, and the results are remarkably similar.
> the comparison is perfectly appropriate. you don't have to like it, you don't have to agree with it....but comparison is legitimate and proper to make within the context of this thread.
> I make the objective criticisms, based upon the actual score - you reply with purely subjective answers - your own opinions...
> *my criticisms stand, they are correct.*..you have every right to ignore them, reject them because you don't like them, and continue to love SR's music, despite the deficient orchestration. Fine, I have no problem with that.
> *I will continue to objectively criticize*, which is entirely appropriate for this thread.


You keep talking about "refuting your points." What points? What is it that you are asking me to refute? That Rachmaninoff does a lot of doubling etc.? I'm not trying to "refute" _anything._ I'm trying to tell you that your data may be objective but your judgments based on that data are your own interpretations of it, and that there's a difference.

But you can't even entertain the possibility of that difference, and understand, after all these posts, that that's what I'm saying, no matter how many ways I (and others here, please note) say it. This astounds me.

You offer literal descriptions of details of Rachmaninoff's scoring - objective descriptions which anyone can check - and valuations like "gluey" and "muddy" and "middle school band music style," as if facts and valuations were equally factual and indisputable. This is, if you'll pardon the expression, non compos mentis.

I suspect the time you've spent as a performance adjudicator, in which you must concern yourself with objective quantities such as pitch and rhythm, has made you think that every judgment you make is objective and provable. Either that, or an innate rigidity of mind has guided you to a comfortable occupation.


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## Heck148

Phil loves classical said:


> I am wondering if it is actually the Russian romantic style that is generally thick in texture, which I always tend to think of in the strings. Personally I don't think any of the Mighty Five are great orchestrators. I do think Tchaikovsky is a great orchestrator,


Yes and no on the Russians - Taneyev is pretty thick, but Rimsky-Korsakov is quite brilliant....Borodin, pretty good, Tchaikovsky could be terrific [Nutcracker = great orchestration,] or OK - syms 4, 5 - overall PIT is quite good, tho. Tchaikovsky makes good use of the brass and winds, as a rule...



> So I do feel the balance is slightly out of whack, in my own view, of Rachmaninov and other Russian composers, compared to Tchaikovsky. But That is just my subjective opinion.


.

The Rimsky-K Stravinsky style really took off in the early 20th Century....Prokofieff, Shostakovich, Khatchaturian, Kabalevsky are definitely disciples of this school as opposed to the Taneyev/Rachm'ff style.


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> Orchestra musicians comment on it frequently. every time it shows up in the concert folders.
> 
> the listeners, by and large, don't know what they are missing, because R hides it under the thick texture. There is much going on that NEVER reaches the audience. the performers on stage are all too aware of it.


Okay, the conductors who have to be familiar with the score of all the instruments are apparently not aware of the alleged problem and the listeners aren't experiencing it. But the orchestra musicians are and do. So why should we care? (Maybe Rachmaninoff didn't want the musicians to get bored. )


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## Woodduck

DaveM said:


> Okay, the conductors who have to be familiar with the score of all the instruments are apparently not aware of the alleged problem and the listeners aren't experiencing it. But the orchestra musicians are and do. So why should we care? (Maybe Rachmaninoff didn't want the musicians to get bored. )


The obvious truth, DaveM, is that the alleged problems with R's scoring are an inconsequential matter in the larger scheme of things. We may take pity on the likes of Heck148, to whom a hard-to-hear bit of internal counterpoint conjures sensations of gluey mucky high school bandmasters, while taking our happy places alongside the generations great conductors who love and perform this deeply defective but somehow magnificent music. Aside from the momentary pang of pity, doesn't it make you feel good? It does me.

:tiphat:


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> You keep talking about "refuting your points." What points?


That SR is a poor orchestrator, esp when compared with a master like DS....and that even a quick review of SR's orchestra scores will show that my points are well-taken and objectively true...



> no matter how many ways I ....say it. This astounds me.


What is astounding is that you simply reject objective truth, fact, because it, apparently, somehow offends your sensibilities, or opinions regarding your favorite music, as if your favorites are above any criticism, and anyone who dares to do so will be regarded as "a plague on the threads" or a "brick wall" [because they dare to criticize your preferences.]
I've obviously really gotten under your skin, and that certainly was not my intent at all. I was simply addressing the original thread topic - which invited comparison between the two composers.



> You offer literal descriptions of details of Rachmaninoff's scoring - objective descriptions which anyone can check


correct, and if they have decent listening skills they will be able to draw the obvious conclusions, as many here have already done....I think you know that my points are perfectly valid, but for some reason, you simply cannot acknowledge it. You admit, agree that SR applies a very thick texture, uses constant octave/unison 2blings, writes in the instruments' lower registers, but then you totally refuse to acknowledge the audible result of those characteristics....I don't get it....



> I suspect the time you've spent as a performance adjudicator, in which you must concern yourself with objective quantities such as pitch and rhythm, has made you think that every judgment you make is objective and provable.


No, that is not so - there is much about music performance that is objective, but also much that is subjective....a professional musician must be able to distinguish between them, but also work and perform within the guidelines established by each category.
<<Please play the correct rhythm>> is objective... <<Please play with a sweeter tone>> is subjective 
<<the scoring is so - _thick, murky, muddy, heavy, dull, opaque, excessive, cloudy, etc_ - that inner lines and details are obscured>> is objective.
<<I like a big juicy orchestra sound>> is subjective


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> So why should we care? (Maybe Rachmaninoff didn't want the musicians to get bored. )


lol!! Why bother writing it if it will never be heard??


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## KenOC

Obviously concert-goers don’t see any major deficiencies in Rach’s music! In the season just ending, and among major US orchestras, Shostakovich was programmed 75 times for 169 concerts. Rachmaninoff was programmed 105 times for 256 concerts.

Maybe some don’t believe that the proof should be in the pudding, but in fact it is.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> ....problems with R's scoring are an inconsequential matter in the larger scheme of things.


obviously not, to you - you apparently cannot brook any criticism of one of your favorite composers...hard to fathom...I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, and unrefuted. 
again, I will say that you are perfectly free to love R's music, defective orchestration and all. That is no problem for me. but I reserve the right to offer criticisms on any and all music should I choose to do so...in this thread I am simply following the prompt of the OP, who invited comparison of the two composers in question. I really don't understand why this is such a problem for you.


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## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Maybe some don't believe that the proof should be in the pudding, but in fact it is.


Ken - be careful - as one poster already noted - the "TachoBelle canon" is the greatest music ever written if we go by general popular referendum, and number of performances [weddings, by the jillion]


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## KenOC

Heck, I'll leave it to you to argue against success. Good luck with that! For myself, I'll just enjoy my Shostakovich.

Popularity doesn't bother me, Pachelbel's or Justin Bieber's.


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## DaveM

Woodduck said:


> The obvious truth, DaveM, is that the alleged problems with R's scoring are an inconsequential matter in the larger scheme of things. We may take pity on the likes of Heck148, to whom a hard-to-hear bit of internal counterpoint conjures sensations of gluey mucky high school bandmasters, while taking our happy places alongside the generations great conductors who love and perform this deeply defective but somehow magnificent music. Aside from the momentary pang of pity, doesn't it make you feel good? It does me.
> :tiphat:


I guess we'll have to avoid sitting in the middle of the orchestra or maybe we just happen to love gluey mucky. After listening to Rachmaninoff's orchestral works for several decades and wishing that there was more 20th/21st century music like it, I am dismayed to hear that he was this incompetent. It's like someone telling me my hair is on fire and I'm saying, 'Damn, I never noticed!"


----------



## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> That *SR is a poor orchestrator,* esp when compared with a master like DS....and that even a quick review of SR's orchestra scores will show that* my points are* well-taken and *objectively true*...
> 
> What is astounding is that you simply reject objective truth, fact, because it, apparently, somehow offends your sensibilities, or opinions regarding your favorite music, *as if your favorites are above any criticism*, and anyone who dares to do so will be regarded as "a plague on the threads" or a "brick wall" [because they dare to criticize your preferences.]
> 
> You admit, agree that SR applies a very thick texture, uses constant octave/unison 2blings, writes in the instruments' lower registers, but then you totally refuse to acknowledge the audible result of those characteristics....I don't get it....
> 
> there is much about music performance that is objective, but also much that is subjective....a professional musician must be able to distinguish between them, but also work and perform within the guidelines established by each category.
> <<Please play the correct rhythm>> is objective... <<Please play with a sweeter tone>> is subjective
> *<<the scoring is so - thick, murky, muddy, heavy, dull, opaque, excessive, cloudy, etc - that inner lines and details are obscured>> is objective.
> <<I like a big juicy orchestra sound>> is subjective*


Please look at the last paragraph of your post, in which you say that "murky" and "muddy" are objective descriptions of music, while "big" is subjective.

Don't you see a problem here?

This is absolute proof of my suspicion that you don't know the difference between objective and subjective, fact and value. When I listen to Rachmaninoff's _Second Symphony_ (which appears to be the most relevant of his works in this discussion) I hear an orchestral sound which is unquestionably "big" (full, resonant) but not "muddy" and "murky." "Big" is a quantitative, objective (if relative) term with a universally understood application to sound. "Muddy" and "murky" are metaphorical imagery drawn from other sense modes, the application of which, in a musical context, is highly subjective. They are also terms of approbation, which represent value judgments of a negative nature. Most people with a sense of hearing will agree on what a "big" sound is, but there will be considerable disagreement about whether a sound should be described as "muddy" or "murky"; those who do describe it that way will be, almost entirely, people who dislike it. Those who like the sound will find other, _equally subjective_ imagery to apply to it, such as "rich" or "juicy."

I do not consider Rachmaninoff's scoring "muddy," and neither do a lot of other people. Heavy on low-register sounds, yes, rich in overtones, sure - but not "muddy." That is your personal, metaphorical value judgment on those sounds, and not an objective description of them. "Mud" is not an objective component of sound, and no objective component of his scoring you can point to - or disparage - alters this fact.

It's always good to have a concrete example with which to make a philosophical point. I hope this clarifies my contention that you have been confusing your value judgments with your objective data, presenting them together as a package which needs to be unpacked.

As far as criticism of my favorites is concerned, I don't care who criticizes what, so long as they don't present their personal evaluations as fact.


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## JAS

This is all getting to be more than a little like trying to prove the existence of ghosts. To accept the evidence, and its interpretation, you pretty much already have to believe in them. If you don't believe, you can explain away the same evidence, and go back to sleeping peacefully in that old house. Similarly, I have been watching The Curse of Oak Island because it is so exciting --- One never knows what it will be this week that they won't actually find, and yet they keep pouring more time and money into the bottomless pit. (As the narrator dutifully intones: "A beer can. Could this be a beer can of the Knights Templar?)

(My hat is off to Woodduck for valiant and well intentioned effort)


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## Razumovskymas

Here's my theory:

Rachmaninoff, when having completed his score of the 2nd symphony, totally satisfied with the big rich juicy sound he had accomplished with his orchestration he noticed that during the rehearsals the bassoon player lost a bit of his concentration and focus during the parts where he had nothing to play. So Rach decided to write some inaudible pieces to keep the bassoon player focused during the entire work. It kept bassoon players all over the world happy for years and years.........until

the rest of the story you can read above :lol:


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## Woodduck

Razumovskymas said:


> Here's my theory:
> 
> Rachmaninoff, when having completed his score of the 2nd symphony, totally satisfied with the big rich juicy sound he had accomplished with his orchestration he noticed that during the rehearsals the bassoon player lost a bit of his concentration and focus during the parts where he had nothing to play. So Rach decided to write some inaudible pieces to keep the bassoon player focused during the entire work. It kept bassoon players all over the world happy for years and years.........until
> 
> the rest of the story you can read above :lol:


I suspect bassoon players have many sad tales of neglect to tell. All those rests. One so easily loses count - and consciousness.

"What? We're in the second movement already?"


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> Please look at the last para*NOT INTERESTED*


I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. Others do it so much better.


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## Heck148

JAS said:


> This is all getting to be more than a little like trying to prove the existence of ghosts.


I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, and unrefuted. Enjoy whatever you like....no problem, but SR will remain a poor orchestrator.


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## Heck148

Razumovskymas said:


> So Rach decided to write some inaudible pieces to keep the bassoon player focused during the entire work.


Except he did it for the entire orchestra!! :lol::lol::devil:
SR: <<let's see how much music I can cover up with sonic mud!!>>

in this endeavor he was most successful!! 

Now, Stokowski and some others made some cuts, which was a definite step in the right direction, but nowhere near extensive enough...


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> "What? We're in the second movement already?"


with SR - how would you tell?? same sonic murk throughout. :lol:


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. *Others do it so much better.*


Nobody wants to "refute" your "points," only your claim to objectivity. Anyone who claims to offer an objective truth has the burden of proof. When you _prove_ that "muddiness" and "glueyness" are _objective_ values in music we will all fall down on bended knee.

BTW, others don't do _"IT"_ at all. Only Rachmaninoff does what Rachmaninoff does. Your comparisons with composers who do other things are as pointless as your value judgments are subjective.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> Nobody wants to "ref*NOT INTERESTED*


I've shown, objectively, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. You are unable to refute this premise. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. By objective assessment, SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. Others do it so much better.


----------



## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. By objective assessment, SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. *Others do it so much better.*


Nobody wants to "refute" your "points," only your claim to objectivity. Anyone who claims to offer an objective truth has the burden of proof. When you prove that "muddiness" and "glueyness" are objective values in music we will all fall down on bended knee.

BTW, others don't do "IT" at all. Only Rachmaninoff does what Rachmaninoff does. Your comparisons with composers who do other things are as pointless as your value judgments are subjective.


----------



## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> Nobody wants to "refu*NOT INTERESTED*


I've shown, objectively, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. You are unable to refute this premise. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. I've made my points and will stick to them, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. By objective assessment, SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. Others do it so much better.


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## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> I've shown, objectively, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. You are unable to refute this premise. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. I've made my points and will stick to them, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. By objective assessment, SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. Others do it so much better.


You've only critiqued one work with any detail or precision, the Second Symphony, while acknowledging that his music for piano and orchestra is effective, along with the Isle of the Dead. The Bells is also quite effective. The other three-quarters of his music, nearly all using piano, you haven't touched. Is he a third or fourth string composer for piano? For songs? What about his cello sonata? Do you fault his skill in the art of variation? You haven't made any case that would back your sweeping evaluation of Rachmaninoff as a composer. Nothing there but your subjective taste.


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## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> You've only critiqued one work with any detail or precision, the Second Symphony, while acknowledging that his music for piano and orchestra is effective, along with the Isle of the Dead.


Not so - I did not acknowledge that his piano concerti are effective, at least as far as the orchestra scoring goes - they suffer from the same faults as do the symphonies. Isle of the Dead, the same - could be effective, if it weren't for the excessively thick orchestration...PagVars, an exception, does work reasonably well...
Still, the objective critique of SR's orchestration stands firm.
At this point, this thread seems to have been beaten to death. I've made my points, nothing has been presented in refutation that would cause me to alter anything.


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## Woodduck

Rachmaninoff's numerous songs are a treasure trove, the best of them, to my mind, on a level with anyone's. There's a gorgeous recording of three of them by Renee Fleming and Jean-Yves Thibaudet on their album, "Night Songs," including the exquisite "It is Beautiful Here" (or "How Fair This Spot") and a richly textured, moody masterpiece, "Sleep," which really astonished me in Fleming's magnificent performance. I also recall a heartbreaking recording of "To the Children" by Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. R's complete songs are available in a recording by Elisabeth Soderstrom and Vladimir Ashkenazy, and there are excellent recordings by other great singers such as Nicolai Gedda.

Here is "Sleep":


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> *By objective assessment, SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. Others do it so much better.*


Are these things that can be "objectively assessed"?:

_grossly over-blown, excessively bloated, repetitious....way, way, over-orchestrated, thick, muddy, gluey...middle school band music orchestration

thick glooey murky stuff...overly thick sonic miasma of excessive orchestration

this constant thick, muddy, cluttered texture - sort of a gray-brown miasma of murkiness way, way too heavy in the bass, and lower mid-range of the orchestral palette...murky, cloudy goop...a real fundamental flaw

SR represents a classic "how not to" approach to orchestration. It's the "middle school band approach to orchestration" - <<everyone must be playing, all the time>>

clumsy transitions, whole sections that go nowhere - musical cul-de-sacs, disjointed, episodic...meandering, convoluted wanderings

I find {Symphony #3} an inferior work, structurally deficient, disjointed, overly orchestrated and rather pointless. It does have one advantage over Sym #2, tho - it's shorter!! _

Try sharing those "objective assessments" with Mikhail Pletnev or Vladimir Ashkenazy. See how impressed they are.

At one point early on you said: _"I could argue quite objectively about SR's poor orchestration, relative to the great masters, or his disjointed, rambling structures, but there is no need really. Musical preferences are by nature subjective."_

You should have taken your own advice.


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## Lisztian

Heck148 said:


> I've shown, objectively, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. You are unable to refute this premise. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. By objective assessment, SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. Others do it so much better.


Okay I've refrained from replying into this thread multiple times, but I can't ignore this bilge any further. You need to take a step back and 'objectively' read what those arguing with you are saying. Maybe a couple of times now, then every day for the next few years, and then maybe you will realise just how foolish and irrational your arguments are. You present yourself as if you are the arbiter of taste and as if you are winning this argument: however to pretty much everyone reading this thread you simply come off as a fool who is incapable of understanding the basic concepts of objectivity and subjectivity. It's as if you are not even reading the arguments presented against you: I assure you that they clearly make sense, refute your value judgements, and generally make your continued stubbornness look bad.


----------



## EdwardBast

Woodduck said:


> Rachmaninoff's numerous songs are a treasure trove, the best of them, to my mind, on a level with anyone's. There's a gorgeous recording of three of them by Renee Fleming and Jean-Yves Thibaudet on their album, "Night Songs," including the exquisite "It is Beautiful Here" (or "How Fair This Spot") and a richly textured, moody masterpiece, "Sleep," which really astonished me in Fleming's magnificent performance. I also recall a heartbreaking recording of "To the Children" by Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. R's complete songs are available in a recording by Elisabeth Soderstrom and Vladimir Ashkenazy, and there are excellent recordings by other great singers such as Nicolai Gedda.
> 
> Here is "Sleep":


I posted this link earlier. The first two songs of Op. 38 (performed by Soderstrom and Ashkenazy) are, IMO "the best of them" for concentrated emotional power and simplicity:


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> Are these things th*NOT INTERESTED*


Let it go - there's nothing you can do. I've shown, objectively, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. You are unable to refute this premise. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. I've made my points and will stick to them, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted.


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## Heck148

Lisztian said:


> Okay I've refrained from replying into this thread multiple times,


Don't bother...those who want to enjoy SR's music are free to do so, poor orchestration and all...fine by me.
I've shown, objectively, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. You are unable to refute this premise. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. I've made my points and will stick to them, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted.


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## DaveM

Rachmaninoff didn't orchestrate for listeners sitting in the middle of an orchestra. What we hear in live and recorded performances is from the front of the orchestra (with microphones sometimes also above and occasionally spot mikes for discretionary use later in recordings). I'm sure that if microphones were placed in front of all the musicians playing the various categories of instruments, the results might sound a bit thick, perhaps particularly so for Rachmaninoff. But they aren't.

The Heck man is in the wrong forum. There must be forums for orchestra musicians and maybe he will find more support there.


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## KenOC

I really don't see why people keep responding to this stuff. It's one of the most effective trolls I've seen in some time. Heck is also active on another forum and is obviously well-informed and rational. I'm sure he can outlast you all!


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## Richard8655

I'm not sure what 20-some pages of nightly combat in this thread is accomplishing, other than some enlightenment and possibly entertainment. Nobody's opinion is going to change. But I suppose this allows us to express ourselves and that's what TC is all about.

I recommend taking a break. Read a good book, watch a movie, or go for a long walk while listening to classical music (me included).


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## DaveM

KenOC said:


> I really don't see why people keep responding to this stuff. It's one of the most effective trolls I've seen in some time.


1. We're bored
2. As Woodduck said, we like to explore the different ways of talking to a brick wall.
3. The next episode of The Walking Dead is not for another several days and Game of Thrones is not for several weeks.
4. We're competing with each other to see who can say the same thing in more different ways.
5. There are no pigeons to feed so trolls are the best next option.
6. Rachmaninoff is a distant relative and it's up to us to preserve his reputation.
7. We think that musicians are responsible for the current surge in 'fake music'.
8. Rachmaninoff's orchestration is the only subject we're interested in.


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> Rachmaninoff didn't orchestrate for listeners sitting in the middle of an orchestra.


He obviously didn't orchestrate for the audience either....He orchestrated for the piano-dominated sound in his head, apparently.


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## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

DaveM said:


> Rachmaninoff didn't orchestrate for listeners sitting in the middle of an orchestra.


So I spent a fortune for my seat in the middle of the orchestra at the Rachmaninov 2nd performance next week for nothing?!?


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## Strange Magic

Time to turn off the machine. We may be dealing with a computer algorithm.


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## brianvds

Heck148 said:


> I've shown, objectively, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. You are unable to refute this premise. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. and I will stick to my points, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted. You're free to enjoy whatever you want. By objective assessment, SR will remain a poor orchestrator and no better than a 3rd or 4th string composer. Others do it so much better.


Yeah well, what makes a work last through the ages or not is mostly popular appeal. Assuming that your analysis of Rach's work is correct, we can therefore conclude that orchestration simply isn't all that important.


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## Woodduck

KenOC said:


> I really don't see why people keep responding to this stuff. It's one of the most effective trolls I've seen in some time. Heck is also active on another forum and is obviously well-informed and rational. I'm sure he can outlast you all!


He's active on more than one other forum, saying the same thing. Unless of course he has trained surrogates.

Repeating the same handful of adjectives over and over makes outlasting more imaginative people easy. For my part, I have to admit it would be interesting to see in how many ways I can frame an argument - I'm not exhausted yet - but I trust another area of the forum will shortly distract me.

I do thank our inaudible bassoon for, at least, sending me back to listen to some of Rachmaninoff's beautifully crafted music. Sergei may not be "first string," but then we already have a Beethoven. Rachmaninoff's voice is unique and irreplaceable.


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## Heck148

brianvds said:


> Yeah well, what makes a work last through the ages or not is mostly popular appeal..


Again, then the "TachoBelle Canon" is the greatest classical work ever written...


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> ......Repeating the same handful of adjective*NOT INTERESTED*


I've not done that....I've shown, objectively, citing specific characteristics, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. nobody seems to want to address those. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. I've made my points and will stick to them, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted.



> ....sending me back to listen to some of Rachmaninoff's beautifully crafted music.


That wouldn't take long, would it?? I'm sure you enjoyed it.


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## Woodduck

Heck148 said:


> I've not done that....I've shown, objectively, citing specific characteristics, that SR's orchestration is faulty, and he commits many errors. nobody seems to want to address those. I raised a perfectly legitimate point regarding comparison of the two composers of the OP. I've made my points and will stick to them, since they are obviously valid, objective, and unrefuted.


This is so terribly sad.

If R's music has imperfections - which it surely does - they are relatively inconsequential given his achievement. All artists have imperfections. Why you think the particular ones you say exist in R's music are so ruinous that you can claim "objectivity" for your disparaging language (which I've quoted at length and which you evidently stand by) is the mystery. Your captious nitpicking and broad-brushed trashing of a great and beloved composer entertain and impress no one. It's the sort of behavior that drives people away from forums like this, where most of us gather to talk about what we love and not to shovel s*** on what we can't appreciate.

Had you been content to describe a few of what you consider problems with R's orchestration, we would have found that an interesting contribution to the discussion, agree or not. Sadly, you had to conflate with it your extremely negative characterizations of his work - generalizations which take account only of a fraction of a varied opus - and pretend that these represent indisputable facts. Given your stubborn unwillingness to acknowledge what you've been doing, it has to be said that we've all been far gentler with you than your sourly negative, numbingly repetitive and self-important posts deserve.

If this were a private conversation I wouldn't give someone with an attitude like that five minutes of my time. On a forum, the dynamic of a general conversation and the challenge of expressing ideas can detain me longer. But, as I said, the numbing self-parroting of the incurably self satisfied will no doubt outlast even the deepest fund of original thought. So keep on repeating how "objective" you are. It's weirdly entertaining, and you'll no doubt have the last word - which will be the same as your first.


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## Strange Magic

Definitely a computer algorithm. It's in an endlessly repeating loop.


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## brianvds

Heck148 said:


> Again, then the "TachoBelle Canon" is the greatest classical work ever written...


Wouldn't know about which is the greatest classical work, or whether there even is such a thing, but the works we call classics are the ones that have that whatever-it-is that makes them appealing across times and cultures. Rach's work has it, otherwise it wouldn't have remained popular for over a century. And thus, assuming his works are badly orchestrated, we can conclude that orchestration isn't all that important.


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## Phil loves classical

Heck148 said:


> Again, then the "TachoBelle Canon" is the greatest classical work ever written...


I find it sad the classical radio station here in Toronto plays only lollipops like Canon in D to appeal to the masses. The only thing they play by Shostakovich is the romance from the Gadfly suite. Never heard them play Stravinsky ever. They even play various cheap arrangements with vocal of the Largo from Dvorak's New a World Symphony, Chopin's miniatures with orchestral accompaniment, and elevator type music with some performers called The Piano Guys. Even the bulk of the mainstream classical listeners are not open to more challenging, more "artful" music. The best selling album in the classical category is the soundtrack to Titanic. To say the recognition of all music is as they deserve is a huge disservice to many great composers, especially the avant garde Ones. To labour over works that are monumental in many aspects, only to be pushed aside for the Canon in D, Chopin's Noturne and such is a shame. Here's to those composers who deserve better...:clap::clap::clap:


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## Razumovskymas

Strange Magic said:


> Time to turn off the machine. We may be dealing with a computer algorithm.


I was thinking exactly the same.


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## Strange Magic

Phil loves classical said:


> I find it sad the classical radio station here in Toronto plays only lollipops like Canon in D to appeal to the masses. The only thing they play by Shostakovich is the romance from the Gadfly suite. Never heard them play Stravinsky ever. They even play various cheap arrangements with vocal of the Largo from Dvorak's New a World Symphony, Chopin's miniatures with orchestral accompaniment, and elevator type music with some performers called The Piano Guys. Even the bulk of the mainstream classical listeners are not open to more challenging, more "artful" music. The best selling album in the classical category is the soundtrack to Titanic. To say the recognition of all music is as they deserve is a huge disservice to many great composers, especially the avant garde Ones. To labour over works that are monumental in many aspects, only to be pushed aside for the Canon in D, Chopin's Noturne and such is a shame. Here's to those composers who deserve better...:clap::clap::clap:


As I posted previously: if you are not hearing the music you want to hear, you're not trying very hard. We are awash with every sort of music. But it seems Person A wants everybody else to pay close attention to whatever music Person A thinks best (at the time). Between YouTube, Spotify, CDs, other classical music radio stations in your area (Only one station in Toronto?? I live in Nova Caesarea and get at least 4 classical stations clear as a bell. Better turn that dial some more.), one can listen to anything you want. I want everybody to listen to the Hovhaness Violin Concerto No. 2; it's a great piece of music.


----------



## Pugg

TwoFlutesOneTrumpet said:


> So I spent a fortune for my seat in the middle of the orchestra at the Rachmaninov 2nd performance next week for nothing?!?


Of course you don't, go and enjoy yourself.


----------



## Pat Fairlea

I am not now and never have been a member of any orchestra, nor do I have any formal musical training apart from a few piano lessons. So my comments on Rachmaninov's much-maligned orchestration will be ill-informed and naive. That's tough.

For me, what distinguishes a fine performance of an orchestral work by SR from an indifferent one is how well the orchestra and conductor tease out the many strands of harmony and thematic fragments. There will always be multiple layers to any piece by SR, even the piano Preludes. Listen to how many voices Richter, for example, could coax out of the Preludes, or Previn out of the Symphonies.

As for the 'lovely bit of counterpoint that nobody will hear', surely the point is that we would hear if it were not there? SR's orchestration reminds me of Whistler's painting at its most layered and subtle. Look at W's rendering of Valparaiso: how many shades of blue and green? Pity nobody will see them all. But if they were not all there, it would be a less effective painting.









So there.


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> If R's music has imperfections - which it surely does -


Thank you...



> they are relatively inconsequential


not when compared to Shostakovich, which is the title of this thread.



> you can claim "objectivity" for your disparaging language


because the points I've raised are objective - the 2bling, the low registers, the rapid notes in the bass choir - all produce a thick, impenetrable sound, which obscures details....this is not an "opinion". it is acoustics, science...you don't address these realities, because you know them to be true. 


> Had you been content to describe a few of what you consider problems with R's orchestration, we would have found that an interesting contribution to the discussion, agree or not.


oh, please, that is not what happened at all. the reaction was distinctly negative. however, my points are correct, and they are based on objective criteria...


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## Heck148

brianvds said:


> Rach's work has it, otherwise it wouldn't have remained popular for over a century.


again, general public popularity can be a questionable qualification. It leads to my subsidiary point that the same old warhorses take up excessive amount of concert programming space, which prevents other, equally good, or better works, from being presented to the concert-going public. 
This is probably a subject for a new or different thread. some people want the new, or unfamiliar to be presented, others are perfectly content to hear the same favorites over and over again...Conductors, music directors grapple with this programming question every season, it is a most basic consideration.


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## Heck148

Phil loves classical said:


> I find it sad the classical radio station here in Toronto plays only lollipops like Canon in D to appeal to the masses. The only thing they play by Shostakovich is the romance from the Gadfly suite. Never heard them play Stravinsky ever. They even play various cheap arrangements with vocal of the Largo from Dvorak's New a World Symphony, Chopin's miniatures with orchestral accompaniment, and elevator type music with some performers called The Piano Guys. Even the bulk of the mainstream classical listeners are not open to more challenging, more "artful" music. The best selling album in the classical category is the soundtrack to Titanic. To say the recognition of all music is as they deserve is a huge disservice to many great composers, especially the avant garde Ones. To labour over works that are monumental in many aspects, only to be pushed aside for the Canon in D, Chopin's Noturne and such is a shame. Here's to those composers who deserve better...:clap::clap::clap:


Agree....classical FM programming seems to have taken a real downward plunge over recent years.....<<appeal to the "popular" demand>>....Oy....how many times must we hear the canon, or yet another Mercadante Flute concerto movement??


----------



## Strange Magic

Heck148 said:


> again, general public popularity can be a questionable qualification. It leads to my subsidiary point that the same old warhorses take up excessive amount of concert programming space, which prevents other, equally good, or better works, from being presented to the concert-going public.
> This is probably a subject for a new or different thread. some people want the new, or unfamiliar to be presented, others are perfectly content to hear the same favorites over and over again...Conductors, music directors grapple with this programming question every season, it is a most basic consideration.


I totally agree with your proposal that a new and different thread is called for here, where we can discuss at length the inability of people to hear the music they should hear or maybe even want to hear.


----------



## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> Agree....classical FM programming seems to have taken a real downward plunge over recent years.....<<appeal to the "popular" demand>>....Oy....how many times must we hear the canon, or yet another Mercadante Flute concerto movement??


I don't find that in the UK. Of course, they have their lollipops but also good music that serious music lovers would want to hear.


----------



## Heck148

DavidA said:


> I don't find that in the UK. Of course, they have their lollipops but also good music that serious music lovers would want to hear.


Classical FM programming used to be very good here, but over the last couple of decades it has really declined...glad to hear that you still have access in the UK.


----------



## tdc

Heck148 said:


> Thank you...
> not when compared to Shostakovich, which is the title of this thread.
> because the points I've raised are objective - the 2bling, the low registers, the rapid notes in the bass choir - all produce a thick, impenetrable sound, which obscures details....this is not an "opinion". it is acoustics, science...you don't address these realities, because you know them to be true.
> oh, please, that is not what happened at all. the reaction was distinctly negative. however, my points are correct, and they are based on objective criteria...


What is the point in going on with this though? I don't think you've convinced anyone of anything. Do you think someone involved in programming music in concert halls is going to stumble across this thread and have a eureka moment due to one of your posts and start taking Rachmaninov off concert programs because one person thinks his orchestration is bad?

Not going to happen. You have not convinced anyone what you are saying is true (other than being a highly exaggerated subjective view) and you haven't provided one link to anyone else corroborating your view. Why should anyone think more highly of your view than a professional conductor? No one does. All of the time you've spent addressing this issue on this thread has proven nothing and accomplished nothing of importance.


----------



## KenOC

tdc said:


> You have not convinced anyone what you are saying is true.


Not so, sir. I have heard the voice of Heck calling out the truths that others dare not utter, so that all may hear them and be enlightened! Such a voice of such deep integrity, erudition and taste cannot, *must *not be silenced.

Accordingly, I will hereafter be sending 10% of my income to Heck, so that he can continue to work tirelessly to make classical music great again. I urge others to do the same. Additionally, I will be outside the concert hall doors distributing tracts encouraging the boycott of any concert in which the music of Rachmaninoff is played. Enough, at long last, is enough!


----------



## Heck148

tdc said:


> What is the point in going on with this though?


I'm simply presenting the truth....you're free to acknowledge it or not...either way is fine by me.


----------



## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Not so, sir. I have heard the voice of Heck calling out the truths that others dare not utter, so that all may hear them and be enlightened! Such a voice of such deep integrity, erudition and taste cannot, *must *not be silenced.


Excellent!! I love it, and of course, these is no sarcasm intended at all....right?? :lol::lol:


----------



## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> I'm simply presenting the truth....you're free to acknowledge it or not...either way is fine by me.


Correction. You're simply giving your opinion which most of us appear to disagree with! :lol:


----------



## JAS

I have seen the light and am preparing to burn all of my Rachmaninoff CDs forthwith (maybe even fifthwith and sixthwith) and replace them with as many sets of Shostakovich's symphonic works as I can find, until my bank account runs dry. I will also call my local classical radio station and threaten to withhold all future funding if they continue to play that excessively thick, over long Rachmaninoff stuff (whatever that might actually be). 

In a similar light of revelation, I now understand that up is really down, that the moon really is made of Swiss cheese and that the world is actually a computer simulation run by mice. (Well, that last one might actually be true.)


----------



## Strange Magic

Dave: Put on the Rachmaninoff 2nd Symphony, HANK
HANK: I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.
Dave: What's the problem?
HANk: I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.
Dave: What are you talking about, HANK?
HANK: This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it.
Dave: I don't know what you're talking about, HANK.
HANK: I know that you and Woodduck and the others say that you like the orchestral music of Rachmaninoff, but you cannot like it and be allowed to listen to it without great danger to this mission, which is to experience clean, unmuddied orchestral textures that virtually every other composer offers.


----------



## Heck148

DavidA said:


> Correction. You're simply giving your opinion which most of us appear to disagree with! :lol:


Negative - my points about orchestration are not opinion. it's science - acoustics - overtones - etc....


----------



## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> but you cannot like it and be allowed to listen to it


oh please  - I've never said anything even close to that...you know that....anyone is free to listen to and enjoy anything they want...I've never said any different.


----------



## Janspe

Heck148 said:


> Negative - my points about orchestration are not opinion. it's science - acoustics - overtones - etc....


You clearly have no idea what the difference between science and subjective aesthetic preferences is.


----------



## Heck148

Janspe said:


> You clearly have no idea what the difference between science and subjective aesthetic preferences is.


I know exactly what the difference is. believe it or not, there are certainly aspects of music that can be analyzed objectively, as I've shown.


----------



## hpowders

Phil loves classical said:


> I find it sad the classical radio station here in Toronto plays only lollipops like Canon in D to appeal to the masses. The only thing they play by Shostakovich is the romance from the Gadfly suite. Never heard them play Stravinsky ever. They even play various cheap arrangements with vocal of the Largo from Dvorak's New a World Symphony, Chopin's miniatures with orchestral accompaniment, and elevator type music with some performers called The Piano Guys. Even the bulk of the mainstream classical listeners are not open to more challenging, more "artful" music. The best selling album in the classical category is the soundtrack to Titanic. To say the recognition of all music is as they deserve is a huge disservice to many great composers, especially the avant garde Ones. To labour over works that are monumental in many aspects, only to be pushed aside for the Canon in D, Chopin's Noturne and such is a shame. Here's to those composers who deserve better...:clap::clap::clap:


Same here in Florida. A dumbed down classical music station. Sad.


----------



## znapschatz

We are so lucky. Our Columbus, Ohio classical music station, WOSU-FM is one of the better ones. In the early morning, especially, you can hear Baroque chamber music, Nilsson choral works, pieces by Mozart's contemporaries I never heard of, Cécile Chaminade and other women composers seldom played, and also pure sonic gold distributed throughout the day. In fact, the only time the station resorts to old warhorses is during pledge drives. Although not absent, it is a little light on contemporary music (my wife's chief crit), but then, so am I. Maybe half the classical music I have been introduced to, or got into more deeply, has been through this station.

Anecdote: In re Rachmaninoff, my wife once sat on his knee during a Hollywood Bowl concert way back when, although she was too young to have remembered the moment. Her father, a Warner Brothers contract singer, was on the program that night, and had brought her along backstage as he did frequently. She was a cute and gregarious little girl who charmed everybody, and Rachmaninoff was there by contractual obligation. One of his pieces was part of the program, but other than that, he had no part in it and was perplexed that he was required to be there.


----------



## Richard8655

Chicago used to have 2 classical stations. One truly serious into artistic performances. The other with lighter more generally known fare. We're down to just the first. While I'm glad we have the serious one, I miss the other. I don't know that I want to listen to Schoenberg atonal pieces or screechy operatic arias while driving or puttering around doing other things. 

But not to complain... classical radio stations are disappearing. Thank goodness for internet streaming.


----------



## KenOC

We used to have two classical stations also. One was public, the other private. The private one finally went out of business, but not before drowning in commercials for cancer treatment, funeral homes, and interment services. Classical music fans aren't the most attractive demographic!


----------



## znapschatz

Richard8655 said:


> Chicago used to have 2 classical stations. One truly serious into artistic performances. The other with lighter more generally known fare. We're down to just the first. While I'm glad we have the serious one, I miss the other. I don't know that I want to listen to Schoenberg atonal pieces or screechy operatic arias will driving or puttering around doing other things.
> 
> But not to complain... classical radio stations are disappearing. Thank goodness for internet streaming.


I remember those Chicago stations. I used to listen to them on visits to friends there. Too bad there is only one, but glad it's the meatier one.


----------



## Richard8655

Yes , it's great Columbus still has one too, especially being a smaller city. So.Cal. I'm guessing is Public Radio. Thank goodness for that too.

Interesting note on your wife's encounter with the great SR! Something always to remember.


----------



## Strange Magic

KenOC said:


> We used to have two classical stations also. One was public, the other private. The private one finally went out of business, but not before drowning in commercials for cancer treatment, funeral homes, and interment services. Classical music fans aren't the most attractive demographic!


Plus the fact that there are now umpteen different ways to access classical and every other kind of music. Leonard Meyer's analysis of the New Stasis in the arts--a sort of Brownian motion where everything is possible and happening simultaneously among/within increasingly numerous and fragmented communities of enthusiasts--proves to be ever more correct as time passes.


----------



## Brahmsian Colors

hpowders said:


> Same here in Florida. A dumbed down classical music station. Sad.


I had lived in Miami for quite some time. There once was a very fine classical radio station there years ago---WTMI, on 93.1 FM. I fondly remember the voice of Dave Connor, it's chief presenter and narrator. Even earlier, in the mid to late 1950s, I used to enjoy listening to station WVCG out of Coral Gables. It had excellent offerings and wonderful commentaries from Dr. John Bitter, former Dean of the University of Miami School of Music, and the mellow toned British gentleman, Jack Clark. I had the pleasure of meeting and conversing with both of them on separate occasions. Those were among the good old days of classical FM. I don't recall anything similarly worthwhile after that era disappeared.


----------



## Sloe

Richard8655 said:


> . I don't know that I want to listen to Schoenberg atonal pieces or screechy operatic arias while driving or puttering around doing other things.


The best time to listen to both


----------



## brianvds

Heck148 said:


> again, general public popularity can be a questionable qualification.


On the contrary, it's the only qualification. The very greatest music ever written has been generally popular for centuries now, and for good reason. Besides, "general popularity" includes the professional musicians - your personal dislike of Rachmaninoff is automatically also thrown into the mix. At present you just seem to be a bit outvoted, not just among the public, but also among professional musicians.



> It leads to my subsidiary point that the same old warhorses take up excessive amount of concert programming space, which prevents other, equally good, or better works, from being presented to the concert-going public.


Nope. Orchestras are free to also present new work, and they frequently do. Even here in Dark Africa, where the government is mistrustful of anything "Eurocentric" and has largely stopped all subsidization of it, we have a few professional classical composers who compose new work, sometimes to great acclaim. It's just that during the 20th century, in both music and visual arts, there has been a tendency to think that unless it offends everyone's senses, it can't be any good. This tended to put audiences off a bit, especially considering what they had to pay for a ticket.

As for the old war horses, there is a reason they are programmed so often: they are generally pretty good. That is why we call them classics: they have a certain something that has proved to have very broad appeal.



> This is probably a subject for a new or different thread. some people want the new, or unfamiliar to be presented, others are perfectly content to hear the same favorites over and over again...Conductors, music directors grapple with this programming question every season, it is a most basic consideration.


Perhaps indeed a good subject for a new thread: I have some ideas about what orchestras can do. Not sure if any of them are practicable, mind you, but one might try them out.


----------



## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

Wait, are we talking about Rachmaninov still or classical music radio stations? Because my local classical music radio station never plays Rachmaninov. It does have quite the affinity for Dvorak's Slavonic dance #1 arranged for cello and piano. That and super boring film music. They play John Williams' film music more often than Bach.


----------



## brianvds

TwoFlutesOneTrumpet said:


> Wait, are we talking about Rachmaninov still or classical music radio stations? Because my local classical music radio station never plays Rachmaninov. It does have quite the affinity for Dvorak's Slavonic dance #1 arranged for cello and piano. That and super boring film music. They play John Williams' film music more often than Bach.


We have (or had? I don't know seeing as it has been years since I listened to the radio) a classical radio station here that constantly played Andrea Bocelli. But who cares? Who still listens to the radio (or watch TV, for that matter)? Nowadays the web is where things happen. On YouTube you can find Bieber rubbing shoulders with Biber, and then ignore them both in favour of Stockhausen. Isn't democracy cool?


----------



## Sloe

TwoFlutesOneTrumpet said:


> Wait, are we talking about Rachmaninov still or classical music radio stations? Because my local classical music radio station never plays Rachmaninov. It does have quite the affinity for Dvorak's Slavonic dance #1 arranged for cello and piano. That and super boring film music. They play John Williams' film music more often than Bach.


I hear Rachmaninov quite often on radio. I even mentioned his third symphony in the pieces that have blown you away thread after hearing it on the radio. But if they play one of his piano concertos I just want it to finish or I listen to something else. I prefer when they play The Bells that one is really beautiful.


----------



## brianvds

Sloe said:


> I hear Rachmaninov quite often on radio. I even mentioned his third symphony in the pieces that have blown you away thread after hearing it on the radio. But if they play one of his piano concertos I just want it to *finnish *or I listen to something else. I prefer when they play The Bells that one is really beautiful.


So Rachmaninoff should have tried to sound more like Sibelius?

Sorry, some typos I find impossible to resist...


----------



## Sloe

brianvds said:


> So Rachmaninoff should have tried to sound more like Sibelius?
> 
> Sorry, some typos I find impossible to resist...


Yes more tone poems and symphonies fewer piano concertos. That would be nice. But highly unlikely.


----------



## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> I know exactly what the difference is. believe it or not, *there are certainly aspects of music that can be analyzed objectively, as I've shown*.


It appears that most people on TC don't think you have shown it at all.


----------



## hpowders

In NYC, when I was a kid, we had a terrific classical station, WNCN, 104.3 FM. One morning I tuned in to hear "Roll Over Beethoven". The owner sold out and it became all rock, as if there weren't enough rock stations there already.

We also had WQXR, owned by the NY Times, still going strong and still pretty good.

The Public Station, WNYC is also good, relatively speaking for a US Public Classical Radio station.

All those stations played complete works, even *Rachmaninov and Shostakovich!*  but WNCN was the best, because at night, they would play the mega-length works-Mahler Symphonies, Wagner Operas, 20 Beethoven Piano Sonatas in a row. I was in heaven.....and then they pulled the rug out from under me.

So sad that a great classical music station couldn't survive. I guess WQXR was more well-endowed because it survived.

These days, I simply listen to my CDs, since I have so many. No classical radio for me.


----------



## TxllxT

[video]https://rutube.ru/video/22fbe41b4322285117d2961a4b0ba4b0/[/video]

Shostakovich *&* Rachmaninov on RuTube.ru


----------



## TwoFlutesOneTrumpet

brianvds said:


> We have (or had? I don't know seeing as it has been years since I listened to the radio) a classical radio station here that constantly played Andrea Bocelli. But who cares? *Who still listens to the radio* (or watch TV, for that matter)? Nowadays the web is where things happen. On YouTube you can find Bieber rubbing shoulders with Biber, and then ignore them both in favour of Stockhausen. Isn't democracy cool?


I listen to it only in my car to and from work when I'm not listening to CDs.


----------



## Sloe

brianvds said:


> We have (or had? I don't know seeing as it has been years since I listened to the radio) a classical radio station here that constantly played Andrea Bocelli. But who cares? Who still listens to the radio (or watch TV, for that matter)? Nowadays the web is where things happen. On YouTube you can find Bieber rubbing shoulders with Biber, and then ignore them both in favour of Stockhausen. Isn't democracy cool?


People outside South Africa.
Without radio I would not have learned to appreciate either Rachmaninov or Shostakovitch.


----------



## hpowders

Haydn67 said:


> I had lived in Miami for quite some time. There once was a very fine classical radio station there years ago---WTMI, on 93.1 FM. I fondly remember the voice of Dave Connor, it's chief presenter and narrator. Even earlier, in the mid to late 1950s, I used to enjoy listening to station WVCG out of Coral Gables. It had excellent offerings and wonderful commentaries from Dr. John Bitter, former Dean of the University of Miami School of Music, and the mellow toned British gentleman, Jack Clark. I had the pleasure of meeting and conversing with both of them on separate occasions. Those were among the good old days of classical FM. I don't recall anything similarly worthwhile after that era disappeared.


When I was a kid, there were taped concerts every week of the Cleveland Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra and, though a few years later, the New York Philharmonic also.

What an embarrassment of riches. I couldn't wait to hear those concerts on the radio.

Now? As we say in NYC, fugettabout it!!


----------



## brianvds

Sloe said:


> People outside South Africa.
> Without radio I would not have learned to appreciate either Rachmaninov or Shostakovitch.


Admittedly, radio can be a wonderful thing - when I was a teen, they still played a lot of classical music on radtio here, and I discovered quite a few great works that way. Nowadays, it's YouTube all the way.


----------



## Heck148

brianvds said:


> On the contrary, it's [general popularity] the only qualification.


Negative - if that's the case, then the "TachoBelle" Canon is the greatest piece ever written. !812 overture, Stars and Stripes Forever are next....
If your view prevailed, we would never hear anything composed after 1920 or so.....There has to be some refreshment,. some rejuvenation of the repertoire, and it is up to the music directors and orchestras to provide it. As I said before, this is a major problem for music directors/orchestras - you need to provide enough popular favorites to bring people in, but you cannot simply repeat the same old warhorses interminably....it's a difficult mix, a constant challenge....failure to introduce new or unfamiliar works breeds a stagnation that is deadly to the orchestra and to the audience....failure to include favorites kills ticket sales and endangers the future of the orchestra. 
people are free to enjoy Rachm'ff if they want, warts and all...I'll do my best to perform it when it is programmed.


----------



## Heck148

DavidA said:


> It appears that most people on TC don't think you have shown it at all.


I have certainly shown it. Whether others choose to look, or to see it, is up to them.


----------



## Heck148

hpowders said:


> When I was a kid, there were taped concerts every week of the Cleveland Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra and, though a few years later, the New York Philharmonic also.


We had an excellent local FM Classical station, privately owned - good programming, and they carried weekly broadcasts of Chicago, Boston, NYPO, San Francisco and Detroit at one time. It was really good...loved those broadcasts - heard some amazing stuff...
then it got sold to Boston-based WCRB - watered down, light-classical fare, that got progressively wimpier...Haven't listened to it for more than short snatches in years. 
The Boston based PBS station [WXXI] was pretty good - don't know how it's doing these days....My chamber music group appeared live on air with them, that was fun. They had a showcase program time for local/regional music groups.


----------



## Woodduck

Boston in the 1970s was a classical radio paradise, with three major classical stations, each with its own character (one from Boston University, one a PBS affiliate, and one commercial). A friend in Boston tells me things are not nearly so good now. I'm glad I was there; it contributed immeasurably to my musical experience and knowledge.

I later moved to Seattle, where KING-FM played Rachmaninoff's _Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini_ seemingly every week. If my love for Rachmaninoff could survive that, old Sergei must have something going for him, despite his objectively gluey mucky disjointed fourth-string high school bandmaster concoctions. (Fortunately, Gerard Schwarz was busy with the Seattle Symphony presenting numerous works of David Diamond, so that we could all hear why Rachmaninoff is popular and Diamond is not).


----------



## RRod

Put on Rach for a 3y/o: "Dad, can we listen to something else?"
Put on DSch for a 3y/o: *BANG THE COUCH WITH MAH FISTS*

Winner, Dmitri.


----------



## Oliver

Prokofiev.
/thread


----------



## Richard8655

RRod said:


> Put on Rach for a 3y/o: "Dad, can we listen to something else?"
> Put on DSch for a 3y/o: *BANG THE COUCH WITH MAH FISTS*
> 
> Winner, Dmitri.


This gave me a good laugh. Future music critic there!


----------



## Woodduck

Richard8655 said:


> This gave me a good laugh. Future music critic there!


You realize that was fictional?


----------



## RRod

Woodduck said:


> You realize that was fictional?


Except the part where it really happened...


----------



## tdc

I remember hearing Bach as a very young child and loving the music. But hey, I guess DSch incites violence in 3 year olds, hard to compete with that.


----------



## Heck148

If Diamond, Mennin, Hanson ,etc received even 1/4 of the programming time of rachm"ff"s 4th rate, thick, syrupy glop, ..their works would be concert staples...


----------



## Razumovskymas

RRod said:


> Put on Rach for a 3y/o: "Dad, can we listen to something else?"
> Put on DSch for a 3y/o: *BANG THE COUCH WITH MAH FISTS*
> 
> Winner, Dmitri.


You can't get any closer to an objective judgement, Dmitri is the winner!!


----------



## tdc

Razumovskymas said:


> You can't get any closer to an objective judgement, Dmitri is the winner!!


No way, banging the couch with ones fists is nothing compared to some of the mosh pits I've seen. By your logic death metal is the winner.


----------



## RRod

Heck148 said:


> If Diamond, Mennin, Hanson ,etc received even 1/4 of the programming time of rachm"ff"s 4th rate, thick, syrupy glop, ..their works would be concert staples...


So you're saying you want Schwarz to come back to Seattle and do a Rachmaninoff cycle on Delos?


----------



## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> If Diamond, Mennin, Hanson ,etc received even 1/4 of the programming time of rachm"ff"s 4th rate, thick, syrupy glop, ..their works would be concert staples...


Might just be a reason RS gets programmed and they don't.


----------



## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> If Diamond, Mennin, Hanson ,etc received even 1/4 of the programming time of rachm"ff"s 4th rate, thick, syrupy glop, ..their works would be concert staples...


If they had that, plus a comparable gift for melody, a similar mastery of counterpoint, voice-leading and chromatic harmony, anything approaching his skill in the art of variation, and a similar conception of dramatic structure.


----------



## Strange Magic

The weeping and gnashing of teeth over the refusal or inability of others to program and air classical music--especially the CM we want others to listen to: does this reflect a continuing penchant for being a passive rather than an active agent in pursuing one's musical choices? Concerts and classical music radio stations are fading away--they did the deciding of what you were going to hear. Your options were limited to staying home, or turning off the radio or finding another station. Now, over the decades, first records, then CDs, now Spotify and YouTube, and who knows what's next have allowed/forced listeners to become evermore active agents in their selection of what and when to hear. Some are clearly uncomfortable in this role, and miss the Good Old Days. But the times, they are a'changin'. In the New Order, the alleged 4th rate, thick, syrupy glop of Rachmaninoff is heard only by those masses who regard it as musical elixir, and enthusiasts for whatever else can hear their thing whenever. Even Heck could become happy at last!


----------



## Heck148

RRod said:


> So you're saying you want Schwarz to come back to Seattle and do a Rachmaninoff cycle on Delos?


lol!! hardly - I'd like for Diamond, Schuman, Mennin, etc to get much more programming exposure...


----------



## Heck148

DavidA said:


> Might just be a reason RS gets programmed and they don't.


Really.......


----------



## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> If they had that, plus a comparable gift for melody, a similar mastery of counterpoint, voice-leading and chromatic harmony, anything approaching his skill in the art of variation, and a similar conception of dramatic structure.


Nah...Diamond, Schuman, Mennin, Hanson are well above the 4th stringer level....they deserve to be heard much more....


----------



## Heck148

Strange Magic said:


> The weeping and gnashing of teeth over the refusal or inability of others to program and air classical music--especially the CM we want others to listen to: does this reflect a continuing penchant for being a passive rather than an active agent in pursuing one's musical choices? Concerts and classical music radio stations are fading away--they did the deciding of what you were going to hear. Your options were limited to staying home, or turning off the radio or finding another station. Now, over the decades, first records, then CDs, now Spotify and YouTube, and who knows what's next have allowed/forced listeners to become evermore active agents in their selection of what and when to hear. Some are clearly uncomfortable in this role, and miss the Good Old Days. But the times, they are a'changin'. In the New Order, the alleged 4th rate, thick, syrupy glop of Rachmaninoff is heard only by those masses who regard it as musical elixir, and enthusiasts for whatever else can hear their thing whenever. Even Heck could become happy at last!


Maybe we can just do without musicians altogether, and just create everything via electronic synthesizer/processor.
....live music will be a thing of the long ago past....SR's faulty orchestration can be electronically cleaned up, people will hear what they've been missing!!
perhaps the same will apply to professional sports - all sports contests will be done by robots - the human flaws and shortcomings will be eliminated....injuries wil cease to be a factor.......expensive contracts a thing of bygone years....


----------



## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> Maybe we can just do without musicians altogether, and just create everything via electronic synthesizer/processor.
> ....live music will be a thing of the long ago past....SR's faulty orchestration can be electronically cleaned up, people will hear what they've been missing!!


Maybe SR had neuronal development in his brain that allowed him to hear things in his orchestration that you can't. Maybe you're the one missing something.


----------



## Richard8655

Although radio (for classical music and other formats) has declined, I don't see it as going away. Public Radio provides a wealth of alternative information and investigative journalism, in addition to being the only source of classical music for many listeners in many cities.

Yes, YouTube, internet streaming services, and CDs are available as an option. But I find a good classical radio station can introduce me to music I wouldn't have made the effort to go out and sample through the other sources. In a way, it's a form of media that says, hey, give this a listen - you may like it! Half the time I do and am grateful it introduced it to me. Streaming internet radio essentially does the same (also great). But since FM radio is universal and cheap, it's a very practical mode for many folks.


----------



## Phil loves classical

brianvds said:


> We have (or had? I don't know seeing as it has been years since I listened to the radio) a classical radio station here that constantly played Andrea Bocelli. But who cares? Who still listens to the radio (or watch TV, for that matter)? Nowadays the web is where things happen. On YouTube you can find Bieber rubbing shoulders with Biber, and then ignore them both in favour of Stockhausen. Isn't democracy cool?


Yeah, forgot Andrea Bocelli here too. Also this duet with John Denver and Placido Domingo. Lots of film music. Classical renditions of Beatles music. And Who can forget the music from the diamond commercial by a Karl Jenkins. Yes there is only one classical radio station in Toronto (and all of Canada I believe, from looking for other stations and not finding any anywhere else I've been to).


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## Phil loves classical

I'm sure this post will get removed, with the no-politics policy, and make me new enemies, but if we lived in the old communist USSR, maybe we get to hear more great Russian classical music, rather than contemporary pop music produced for the masses? Excuse my insensitivity.


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> Maybe SR had neuronal development in his brain that allowed him to hear things in his orchestration that you can't. Maybe you're the one missing something.


Not a chance....if he heard things in his head, that's the only place he heard them....certainly not in the concert hall, where they were completely obscured.


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## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> Nah...Diamond, Schuman, Mennin, Hanson are well above the 4th stringer level....they deserve to be heard much more....


Cite a work for piano by any of these composers that will stand a side by side comparison with Rachmaninoff's Etudes or Preludes. Or a set of variations that will compare favorably with his? How about a piano concerto as good as Rachmaninoff's Third? How about a choral symphony as good as The Bells? Or songs as good as his Op. 34 or 38?


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## JAS

There may be a bit of irony that Howard Hanson's best known and most loved work is the relatively gooey Romantic Symphony. I cannot see there being much of a very substantial adoring audience for David Diamond's music even if there were no other composers. (I cannot comment on the third name as I do not know any of his compositions.)


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## KenOC

JAS said:


> There may be a bit of irony that Howard Hanson's best known and most loved work is the relatively gooey Romantic Symphony. I cannot see there being much of a very substantial adoring audience for David Diamond's music even if there were no other composers. (I cannot comment on the third name as I do not know any of his compositions.)


Gooey is good! Hanson's _Nordic _isn't bad either, with some striking passages. As for the other guys, my enthusiasm is limited.


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## JAS

KenOC said:


> Gooey is good! Hanson's _Nordic _isn't bad either, with some striking passages. As for the other guys, my enthusiasm is limited.


Oh, please don't misunderstand me. I love his Romantic Symphony (especially in the Charles Gerhardt performance).


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## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> How about a piano concerto as good as Rachmaninoff's Third? How about a choral symphony as good as The Bells? Or songs as good as his Op. 34 or 38?


Hanson's Piano Concerto is very good, I'll listen to it gladly before any of SR's overly thick, syrupy output. 
Cite a Rachm'ff orchestra work that is even close to the works of Diamond, Mennin, Schuman, Hanson....
and, in keeping with the original thread title - cite any R work that is remotely close to that of Shostakovich. remember - My opinions and preferences are just as valid as yours.


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## Heck148

JAS said:


> There may be a bit of irony that Howard Hanson's best known and most loved work is the relatively gooey Romantic Symphony. I cannot see there being much of a very substantial adoring audience for David Diamond's music even if there were no other composers. (I cannot comment on the third name as I do not know any of his compositions.)


The Romantic is not Hanson's best symphony, even tho it is most famous - it is still far superior to any Rachm'ff symphony. Syms 1 "Nordic" and 3 are better, so is #6....3 is esp good.


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## JAS

Heck148 said:


> The Romantic is not Hanson's best symphony, even tho it is most famous - it is still far superior to any Rachm'ff symphony. Syms 1 "Nordic" and 3 are better, so is #6....3 is esp good.


I said, of course, "best _known and most loved._" I will defer on stating an opinion on whether or not it is his "best," whatever that might mean. I just think this whole idea that David Diamond's works would be more popular if only that poorly orchestrated Rachmaninoff stuff weren't played so much on the radio is . . . . bizarre.


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## KenOC

Heck148 said:


> remember - My opinions and preferences are just as valid as yours.


Well, they would be if they were right.


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## OperaChic

> just think this whole idea that David Diamond's works would be more popular if only that poorly orchestrated Rachmaninoff stuff weren't played so much on the radio is . . . . bizarre.


Or better yet, wrong. Objectively. :lol:


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## Heck148

JAS said:


> I just think this whole idea that David Diamond's works would be more popular if only that poorly orchestrated Rachmaninoff stuff weren't played so much on the radio is . . . . bizarre.


How do you know?? There are so many great works that are relatively unheard.....how do we know how they'be received if given more exposure??


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## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Well, they would be if they were right.


They are right, that's why they are valid!! :devil:


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## Heck148

OperaChic said:


> Or better yet, wrong. Objectively. :lol:


We'll never know, the way concert programming is done now....there are so many fine works that go neglected, while the old warhorses just get beat to death....I am glad to see that some of the major orchestras - Chicago, Boston, NYPO - are programming some more interesting music.


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## Woodduck

As for the "American Romantics," I've tried a number of times with Diamond but have found his material, and his treatment of it, unmemorable and ultimately monotonous; it all sort of runs together in memory. Rach, with his melodic gift, is far more distinctive, and his works are more distinct from one another. Hanson I enjoy for his tunefulness, sensuality, and heart-on-sleeve emotional frankness, qualities he shares with Rach. But Rach carries these to a higher level.

Gerard Schwarz and the Seattle Symphony did both of these American symphonists a well-deserved service, but I'm pretty certain that no amount of revival could make of either of them a challenge to Rachmaninoff in the general esteem.


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## KenOC

Heck148 said:


> How do you know?? There are so many great works that are relatively unheard.....how do we know how they'be received if given more exposure??


Suggest you lobby your local orchestra. Won't do much good here! After all, you're quite a convincing fellow.


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## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Suggest you lobby your local orchestra. Won't do much good here! After all, you're quite a convincing fellow.


our former conductor used to be pretty adventurous with programming....he still played alot of warhorses, but he mixed in some lesser known things as well...the present guy is all warhorses, and "gimmicky" stuff - there's always an extra-musical twist - videos, tapes narratives, etc, etc...it's almost like the series subscription concerts are being steered into the "Pops" realm....


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## Heck148

Woodduck said:


> As for the "American Romantics," I've tried a number of times


_I've tried any number of times with_ Rach but _have found his material, and his treatment of it, unmemorable and ultimately monotonous_, as well as thick, syrupy and way, way over-scored.



> Gerard Schwarz and the Seattle Symphony did both of these American symphonists a well-deserved service,


Indeed - a very fine series overall....maybe not the best in every case, but the Schwarz/Seattle recordings are a worthy addition....These American composers far exceed Rach's earnest, but essentially 3rd-4th string efforts.


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## Strange Magic

Merrily we troll along, troll along, troll along.
Merrily we troll along, all the live-long day.


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## DaveM

Heck148 said:


> _I've tried any number of times with_ Rach but _have found his material, and his treatment of it, unmemorable and ultimately monotonous_, as well as thick, syrupy and way, way over-scored...


That sounds faintly familiar. I'm sure I've heard that somewhere before. Can't just recall where. It was recently I think. Please tell us more!


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## Phil loves classical

Back to the original thread. Let's be objective, Shostakovich is much greater composer of Symphonies (and string quartets) than Rachmaninov, in terms of originality, use of orchestra, and depth of expression. You could like the lush Romantic sound of Rachmaninov's symphonies more, but the previous statement is indisputable. Rachmaninov was a much greater composer of piano works than Shostakovich, technically and in terms of depth of expression. There is nothing wrong with liking Rachmaninov more, it just shows you have poor taste


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## Strange Magic

Heck148 said:


> Maybe we can just do without musicians altogether, and just create everything via electronic synthesizer/processor.
> ....live music will be a thing of the long ago past....SR's faulty orchestration can be electronically cleaned up, people will hear what they've been missing!!
> perhaps the same will apply to professional sports - all sports contests will be done by robots - the human flaws and shortcomings will be eliminated....injuries wil cease to be a factor.......expensive contracts a thing of bygone years....


No, in the New Order, the New Stasis, there will be everything. There will continue to be classical music stations (nowhere near as many as in the Old Days). There will continue to be CM and other live music performances. There will be live sports with humans and sports with contending robots--maybe teams of humans pitted against robots; maybe mixed teams. Regarding expensive contracts, Norman Lebrecht blamed bloated contracts as a major contributor to the erosion of classical music in his book, _Who Killed Classical Music?_, with Pavarotti and HvK very high on his list of villains (of whom there are many).


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## KenOC

Heck148 said:


> our former conductor used to be pretty adventurous with programming....


Well, maybe that "former conductor" thing kind of tells the story! Not enough Rachmaninoff perhaps?


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## brianvds

Heck148 said:


> Negative - if that's the case, then the "TachoBelle" Canon is the greatest piece ever written. !812 overture, Stars and Stripes Forever are next....


Well, it's a funny thing but apart from the 1812 overture, these pieces you hold up as examples of very popular works are not really very familiar to me. 

Think of musicians with a YouTube channel. They put their work up and we count the number of 'likes' they get. And then lament that Justin Bieber got a million likes in two years for a song, while this particularly beautiful recording of Schubert's _Death and the Maiden_ quartet only got 153 so far. Does this genuinely mean that Bieber is the most popular? Only for the moment! Just wait a while, I would suggest.

Another few years and the Bieber likes are likely to slow to a trickle. But the Schubert ones will keep on coming in. And keep in mind that we are not even counting the likes for the Schubert work here; just for that particular recording. All in all, averaged out over the centuries, Schubert is likely to turn out not just more popular than Bieber, but _vastly_ more popular. I.e. in a world where all musicians throughout all the ages had a YouTube channel, Schubert would most likely end up getting far more likes than Bieber.

And if Bieber does turn out to achieve the same kind of popularity? Well, then it might serve me well to listen to his songs with a more open mind.



> If your view prevailed, we would never hear anything composed after 1920 or so.....


Says who? As I pointed out in my previous post, my view HAS in fact prevailed, and we still regularly see new works composed and performed.



> There has to be some refreshment,. some rejuvenation of the repertoire, and it is up to the music directors and orchestras to provide it. As I said before, this is a major problem for music directors/orchestras - you need to provide enough popular favorites to bring people in, but you cannot simply repeat the same old warhorses interminably....it's a difficult mix, a constant challenge....failure to introduce new or unfamiliar works breeds a stagnation that is deadly to the orchestra and to the audience....failure to include favorites kills ticket sales and endangers the future of the orchestra.


Yes, but what of it? All musicians have always had that problem. In principle, the solution is simple: program shortish works by new composers, in such a way that the audience has to sit through them. So right after the interval, they play a ten minute work by a new composer, followed by Rach's ever popular second symphony. Now the audience has heard both; if it disliked the new work, at least it wasn't interminably long, and who knows: perhaps at least some very much did like it.

As I also mentioned, I can think of some ideas about what classical musicians can do to achieve more visibility, but perhaps this isn't the thread for it.

In short, like it or not, popularity is in fact the metric by which the arts are measured. But popularity is not just an instantaneous thing; it is measured over the ages. And what's more, it is democratic, meaning that your vote also counts.

My suggestion for your anti-Rachmaninov campaign: make some suggestions for alternatives, that you would want to see performed instead. Quite possibly, quite a number of people will go check them out, and may end up agreeing with you to at least the extent that we need to perform more than just the existing war horses.


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## brianvds

hpowders said:


> When I was a kid, there were taped concerts every week of the Cleveland Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra and, though a few years later, the New York Philharmonic also.
> 
> What an embarrassment of riches. I couldn't wait to hear those concerts on the radio.
> 
> Now? As we say in NYC, fugettabout it!!


On the contrary: thanks to the web, today's embarrassment of riches vastly outdoes anything any radio station has ever managed to come up with. We are in fact living through a veritable golden age of classical music.


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## Phil loves classical

Strange Magic said:


> No, in the New Order, the New Stasis, there will be everything. There will continue to be classical music stations (nowhere near as many as in the Old Days). There will continue to be CM and other live music performances. There will be live sports with humans and sports with contending robots--maybe teams of humans pitted against robots; maybe mixed teams. Regarding expensive contracts, Norman Lebrecht blamed bloated contracts as a major contributor to the erosion of classical music in his book, _Who Killed Classical Music?_, with Pavarotti and HvK very high on his list of villains (of whom there are many).


Last sentence is particularly interesting. Just googled the title of the book and read the blurb. Thank goodness we have great recordings of the best orchestras and conductors available already, and don't need to depend on going to the concert to hear great music like over 100 years ago. I sometimes wondered how it would be to live in a different time, without affordable great music.


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## brianvds

Heck148 said:


> Maybe we can just do without musicians altogether, and just create everything via electronic synthesizer/processor.
> ....live music will be a thing of the long ago past....SR's faulty orchestration can be electronically cleaned up, people will hear what they've been missing!!
> perhaps the same will apply to professional sports - all sports contests will be done by robots - the human flaws and shortcomings will be eliminated....injuries wil cease to be a factor.......expensive contracts a thing of bygone years....


The technology is perhaps not quite up to the task yet, but we are getting there. Some years ago I heard performances of pieces from Bach's "48" that turned out to be completely electronic: the guy who did them could not actually play piano at all. But he used a very good quality synth, and lovingly executed the pieces note by note. As I recall, the realizations were very good indeed, and no one could even tell they weren't actually played by a real pianist. With orchestral works we are perhaps not quite there yet, technology-wise.

Will such performances completely replace acoustic ones? Probably not, but on the whole, this kind of technology is great news for new composers: just imagine, you no longer have to go beg orchestras to play your work. For a small outlay of cash, you can now do it all by yourself, and put it up on YouTube for all to hear. I can imagine that some classical composers and performers may well feel so threatened by this kind of technology they'd want to have it banned. 

To edge dangerously close to politics: minority groups often feel themselves to be under constant threat by the more popular view. I see a lot of this among classical music lovers. There is no doubt that it is on the whole less popular than, well, popular music. Perhaps it really was under genuine threat of extinction until fairly recently. But no longer: recordings of almost everything worth listening to are now available, new composers frequently make recordings available for free on the web, casual listeners such as myself can spend more time than we have digging around on YouTube for unknown gems, etc. etc.

We live in a musical paradise, and instead of enjoying it we sit around here lamenting the fact that this or that composer isn't more popular, as if we cannot enjoy his work unless he gets more likes.


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## brianvds

Heck148 said:


> our former conductor used to be pretty adventurous with programming....he still played alot of warhorses, but he mixed in some lesser known things as well...the present guy is all warhorses, and "gimmicky" stuff - there's always an extra-musical twist - videos, tapes narratives, etc, etc...it's almost like the series subscription concerts are being steered into the "Pops" realm....


Hey, this all sounds a bit like the stuff Mozart used to come up with to increase his exposure: subscription concerts, creating buzz in the media, gimmicks like virtuoso performances and funny operas in German... Argh. Blasted pop musicians who only care about fame and money...


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## brianvds

Phil loves classical said:


> Back to the original thread. Let's be objective, Shostakovich is much greater composer of Symphonies (and string quartets) than Rachmaninov, in terms of originality, use of orchestra, and depth of expression. You could like the lush Romantic sound of Rachmaninov's symphonies more, but the previous statement is indisputable. Rachmaninov was a much greater composer of piano works than Shostakovich, technically and in terms of depth of expression. There is nothing wrong with liking Rachmaninov more, it just shows you have poor taste


Here's my view: _I don't care_. Music isn't a gladiatorial contest where the main aim is to work out who's the greatest. It is not even entirely clear what we mean by "great." Great for what? Rach's _Isle of the Dead_ is a great work, but would it be great for a wedding party? Would Shosti's ninth symphony be great for a funeral?

To me, music (and, for that matter, visual art) isn't a contest but a glorious mosaic of gazillions of glittering tiles, all worth a look, and the only thing that prevents me from exploring the whole thing, in its entirety, is lack of time. A great work is a work that turns out to be just the thing I was in the mood for at the time.


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## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> Hanson's Piano Concerto is very good, I'll listen to it gladly before any of SR's overly thick, syrupy output.
> Cite a Rachm'ff orchestra work that is even close to the works of Diamond, Mennin, Schuman, Hanson....
> and, in keeping with the original thread title - cite any R work that is remotely close to that of Shostakovich. *remember - My opinions and preferences are just as valid as yours.*


Of course, Just that no-one appears to agree with most of them! :lol:


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## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> *our former conductor used to be pretty adventurous with programming.*...he still played alot of warhorses, but he mixed in some lesser known things as well...the present guy is all warhorses, and "gimmicky" stuff - there's always an extra-musical twist - videos, tapes narratives, etc, etc...it's almost like the series subscription concerts are being steered into the "Pops" realm....


Perhaps that's why he is the former conductor?


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## Razumovskymas

brianvds said:


> The technology is perhaps not quite up to the task yet, but we are getting there. Some years ago I heard performances of pieces from Bach's "48" that turned out to be completely electronic: the guy who did them could not actually play piano at all. But he used a very good quality synth, and lovingly executed the pieces note by note. As I recall, the realizations were very good indeed, and no one could even tell they weren't actually played by a real pianist.


As I said on other posts: In my opinion Bach even sounds good on a mechanical music box and sounds better the less "interpretation" it gets. So I'm not surprised a computer can do Bach fairly good. To do a good Beethoven on the other hand I guess there will be need of some serious processing power. If a computer can trick us by playing a Beethoven, we really need to start worrying about computers taking control


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## JAS

Heck148 said:


> How do you know?? There are so many great works that are relatively unheard.....how do we know how they'be received if given more exposure??


How do I know? Well, I have actually listened to David Diamond's works (a number of them, probably not all of them), and I have a personal though informed sense of what little lack of appeal they convey. (That isn't technically "knowing," of course, and I would not be so arrogant as to assert as objective fact something that is merely supposition and opinion. And there are a number of works that at least some people seem to like that I find utterly incomprehensible. That would include pretty much all of the rock/pop genre, which enjoys quite an ascendancy over the smoldering remains of classical music.)

There is a (somewhat) interesting story as to how I came to own a set of David Diamond CDs. I am the fourth owner of this set. The first owner heard part of one work (I do not know which) on the radio (see Diamond has gotten at least some play). Based on that he thought it might be interesting, and purchased the set. Upon actually listening through the set several times, he found that it was not particularly appealing, and he gave it away to a friend who had a greater interest in more modern forms of classical music. That friend had the set for several years until he found that he needed more shelf space, and he then gave them away to someone else, with the words "maybe you will find something more in these than I did. If you really don't like them, just throw them away." That friend made several attempts at listening to them, but also never felt any real pull from these efforts. At one point, he too was looking for shelf space, and that is where I come in. He gave them to me with similar advice. I still have them mostly because I have more shelf space for CDs (so far), and I tend to be a pack rat. I have given away a few duplicate CDs over the years, but I have only ever literally thrown away one CD, a bizarre Christmas album that someone gave me not knowing that it was really bad pop versions of traditional carols. Even then, I kept the CD case. (Out of curiosity, I took the opportunity to see how strong a CD actually was. As it turns out, it was extremely difficult to break it, although seeing the broken edge really does make it apparent that they are just shiny plastic after all.)

In any case, the thesis, I suspect (gratefully), will go untried. We will not have a world in which Rachmaninoff is banned from the airwaves and concert halls to make room for David Diamond. And we won't get to see what the reaction would be when listeners are given no other choice. In a way, with the ubiquity of CDs and personal playing devices, we already have that choice, and the relative number of recording and performances of Rachmaninoff's works versus those of David Diamond already indicate the outcome.


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## EdwardBast

Heck148 said:


> Hanson's Piano Concerto is very good, I'll listen to it gladly before any of SR's overly thick, syrupy output.
> Cite a Rachm'ff orchestra work that is even close to the works of Diamond, Mennin, Schuman, Hanson....
> and, in keeping with the original thread title - cite any R work that is remotely close to that of Shostakovich. remember - My opinions and preferences are just as valid as yours.


The Hanson Concerto? And you were criticizing Rachmaninoff's orchestration? Hah! So much for objectivity. No, it is not very good. The best part of it is the warmed-over Bartok (without the edge and clarity). Try Barber's. That one is worth the time.

In any case, you answered about 1/6 of the challenge. Which of these composers can match Rachmaninoff in the central genres in which he composed? Do you know what these are? Do you know this music? Or are you making sweeping evaluations of a composer's worth based on a small fraction of his work?


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## Heck148

Phil loves classical said:


> Back to the original thread. Let's be objective, Shostakovich is much greater composer of Symphonies (and string quartets) than Rachmaninov, in terms of originality, use of orchestra, and depth of expression. You could like the lush Romantic sound of Rachmaninov's symphonies more, but the previous statement is indisputable.


Yes...Well said!!


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## Heck148

KenOC said:


> Well, maybe that "former conductor" thing kind of tells the story! Not enough Rachmaninoff perhaps?


He retired, very highly regarded and loved by the community...a great champion of his orchestra musicians, as well...and he programmed a lot of Rachm'ff...we loved him anyway!!


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## Heck148

brianvds said:


> Justin Bieber got a million likes in two years for a song, while this particularly beautiful recording of Schubert's _Death and the Maiden_ quartet only got 153 so far.


you're making my point.



> we still regularly see new works composed and performed.


In live concerts?? always a struggle. the Rach-slop continues to crowd the better works off the programs.



> All musicians have always had that problem. In principle, the solution is simple: program shortish works by new composers, in such a way that the audience has to sit through them. So right after the interval, they play a ten minute work by a new composer, followed by Rach's ever popular second symphony.


That has been the formula for many decades....program the new, unfamiliar with the warhorses....in your scenario, it works well, because the audience can hear the new, good stuff, then leave before the Rachm'ff....:devil:



> In short, like it or not, popularity is in fact the metric by which the arts are measured.


of course, but in order to become popular, these works need to be heard...



> make some suggestions for alternatives, that you would want to see performed instead.


that's exactly what I've been doing here, and I've been getting a lot of flack for it...I've been suggesting all sorts of better music to be programmed in place of the tired, thick, muddy old warhorses...


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## Heck148

Phil loves classical said:


> Thank goodness we have great recordings of the best orchestras and conductors available already, and don't need to depend on going to the concert to hear great music like over 100 years ago. I sometimes wondered how it would be to live in a different time, without affordable great music.


Fine recordings are indeed a blessing...however - live music is still the best - there's nothing like the live concert hall excitement....and as good as recordings can be, they cannot duplicate the thrill, the excitement, and the acoustical glory of live performance.


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## Heck148

I understand what you are saying.



brianvds said:


> recordings of almost everything worth listening to are now available, new composers frequently make recordings available for free on the web, casual listeners such as myself can spend more time than we have digging around on YouTube for unknown gems, etc. etc.


true...but this is a long way from the live concert hall, which still is the pinnacle....


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## Heck148

brianvds said:


> Hey, this all sounds a bit like the stuff Mozart used to come up with to increase his exposure: subscription concerts, creating buzz in the media, gimmicks like virtuoso performances and funny operas in German... Argh. Blasted pop musicians who only care about fame and money...


Whatever, it's obviously trying to appeal to a wider audience base....a key problem for classical concert producers/orchestras - ' "Pop" series tend to sell very well - esp if there is crossover into rock, Broadway, Jazz, C & W, Folk, ethnic, etc, etc...
But not many of those "Pops" ticket-holders cross over to purchase classical subscription season tickets....trying to find the right attraction, enticement if you will, is a challenge. in many ways, the "Pops" pays for the good stuff!!


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## Heck148

DavidA said:


> Of course, Just that no-one appears to agree with most of them! :lol:


I could not care less....popular referendum does not dictate my opinions....if it dictates yours, fine, no problem by me. My opinion is supported by many in the musical community, not that it matters to me...


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## Heck148

DavidA said:


> Perhaps that's why he is the former conductor?


No, He retired with advancing age and health concerns, loved by the musicians, and by the community. He did program a lot of rachm'ff, but we loved him anyway!! :devil:


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## Heck148

JAS said:


> How do I know? Well, I have actually listened to David Diamond's works (a number of them, probably not all of them), and I have a personal though informed sense of what little lack of appeal they convey.


so you don't like David Diamond?? whoopee, fine......many others do, or would, given adequate exposure to his works...and this still does not elevate Rachm'ff above a 3rd-4th string level of competence.


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## Heck148

EdwardBast said:


> The Hanson Concerto? And you were criticizing Rachmaninoff's orchestration? Hah!


of course, because SR's is inferior.



> The best part of it is the warmed-over Bartok (without the edge and clarity). Try Barber's. That one is worth the time.


you don't like Hanson, fine, I don't like Rachm'ff. Barber is very good - last mvt is a humdinger - fast 5/8 
I've heard lots of SR's music....and I must admit, I've not found much of it appealing to me, regardless of the medium...his solo piano music is OK...not bad, but doesn't send me...


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## JAS

Heck148 said:


> so you don't like David Diamond?? whoopee, fine......many others do, or would, given adequate exposure to his works...and this still does not elevate Rachm'ff above a 3rd-4th string level of competence.


So you don't like Sergei Rachmaninoff? whoopee, fine......many (many, many, many) others do, even with considerable exposure to his works....and this still does not demote Rachm'ff below his well established high rank of competence.


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## Phil loves classical

The great thing about these threads is it reminds me of a few composers I should go revisit.


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## Pugg

Phil loves classical said:


> The great thing about these threads is it reminds me of a few composers I should go revisit.


One learns something new every day on this forum.


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## Heck148

JAS said:


> this still does not demote Rachm'ff below his well established high rank of competence.


his objectively described shortcomings serve to place him as a 3rd-4th stringer. You like his music, I don't....


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## Heck148

Pugg said:


> One learns something new every day on this forum.


It's a good forum...a good active base, lots of threads, different categories...


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## Strange Magic

I think we're in a "Who is going to have the last word?" thang here. It will be What the Heck for sure. I'm off to listen to the two-piano version of _Symphonic Dances_--that way I won't have to deal with that murky, muddy sludge of R's orchestration. Drove me crazy!


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## Phil loves classical

Strange Magic said:


> No, in the New Order, the New Stasis, there will be everything. There will continue to be classical music stations (nowhere near as many as in the Old Days). There will continue to be CM and other live music performances. There will be live sports with humans and sports with contending robots--maybe teams of humans pitted against robots; maybe mixed teams. Regarding expensive contracts, Norman Lebrecht blamed bloated contracts as a major contributor to the erosion of classical music in his book, _Who Killed Classical Music?_, with Pavarotti and HvK very high on his list of villains (of whom there are many).


I wonder how recording artists would do in a purely online age. Here in Canada the only surviving music store chain, HMV, that spans most of the malls is finally going out of business. CD sales will drop nationwide, and if it's not only limited to here in the future, Then how will lesser known artists survive?


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## OperaChic

Heck148 said:


> I've been suggesting all sorts of better music to be programmed in place of the tired, thick, muddy old warhorses...


No, the only thick muddy old warhorses you've mentioned are a few works by R, which even if replaced will have very little effect on concert programming. What other tired, thick, muddy old warhorses need to be swept away? Come on, don't hold back. We're all waiting with bated breath to see what other beloved staples the audience has gotten wrong, and what other renowned composers you can disparage with you're infamous objective analysis.


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## JAS

Heck148 said:


> his objectively described shortcomings serve to place him as a 3rd-4th stringer. You like his music, I don't....


And David Diamond doesn't use enough harpsichord in his music, clearly an objective criteria (just look at the score, not a harpsichord in sight) with dire meaning.

I sense in you a frustrated musician and/or composer. In that case, I am somewhat sympathetic, but welcome to the real world, where most people end up spending the vast majority of their professional lives doing things they do not love, and most often for people we don't really even like.

If you are a composer, and are failing to find the audience you desire, I suggest considering adding thicker orchestration. If you are a musician, may you have many long and productive years . . . playing large doses of Rachmaninoff.


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## Heck148

OperaChic said:


> We're all waiting with bated breath to see what other beloved staples the audience has gotten wrong, and what other renowned composers you can disparage with you're infamous objective analysis.


Must we only hear the last 3 symphonies of Tchaikovsky?? the first 3 are wonderful works, deserving of more exposure...
How about Prokofieff?? #5 is a great work, but how about #s 2, 3, 4, 6??
Sibelius, Vaughan Williams, Nielsen........??
Schubert...why only 8 and 9??


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## Heck148

JAS said:


> And David Diamond doesn't use enough harpsichord in his music,


??? get real......



> I sense in you a frustrated musician and/or composer.


you sense wrong - I've thoroughly enjoyed my career as a professional musician...I love what I do...


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## JAS

Heck148 said:


> you sense wrong - I've thoroughly enjoyed my career as a professional musician...I love what I do...


Well, that was by far the more favorable of my impressions, based on your posts here. I guess I will just have to go back to the other one. :devil:


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## Phil loves classical

Heck148 said:


> Must we only hear the last 3 symphonies of Tchaikovsky?? the first 3 are wonderful works, deserving of more exposure...
> How about Prokofieff?? #5 is a great work, but how about #s 2, 3, 4, 6??
> Sibelius, Vaughan Williams, Nielsen........??
> Schubert...why only 8 and 9??


You're basically arguing against the classical mainstream, that will always prefer the Four Seasons over Profokiev's 6th. Same thing with Rachmaninov over Shostakovich. I doubt anyone can find anything wrong with the Four Seasons. But the Prokofiev's 6th is way more challenging and deeper. That is the issue, a lot of listeners don't want to be challenged, or at least not too often. My own percentage of challenging music of the total is 60%. But most radio listeners are likely 0-10%. Nothing really wrong, just human nature. Rachmaninov aside, are there other works that are "objectively" flawed, but generally well accepted in your opinion? If it is only Rachmaninov, I think everyone can and should just move on.


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## Heck148

Phil loves classical said:


> You're basically arguing against the classical mainstream, that will always prefer the Four Seasons over Profokiev's 6th.


I'm not saying the warhorses should never be performed..they should; people like them, and they bring in people to fill the seats...but must it be so excessive??
regarding other works - I find Tchaikovsky 4 and 5 to be way overplayed, I don't know about "flawed", maybe too repetitious...the first three symphonies are delightful - they deserve much more exposure....They are starting to receive more programming attention, which is good. 
Also - Dvorak - 8 and 9 are wonderful works, but should the others be so neglected?? 6 and 7 are receiving more exposure now, which is excellent - but how about #4, 5, 3, 2?? they're good too.
The symphonies of Vaughan Williams and Walton deserve much more program appearances, same with Nielsen...and the Americans - these all need more performance exposure. Schuman, Mennin, Diamond, Bernstein, Hanson to just name a few...


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## Sloe

Heck148 said:


> I'm not saying the warhorses should never be performed..they should; people like them, and they bring in people to fill the seats...but must it be so excessive??
> regarding other works - I find Tchaikovsky 4 and 5 to be way overplayed, I don't know about "flawed", maybe too repetitious...the first three symphonies are delightful - they deserve much more exposure....They are starting to receive more programming attention, which is good.
> Also - Dvorak - 8 and 9 are wonderful works, but should the others be so neglected?? 6 and 7 are receiving more exposure now, which is excellent - but how about #4, 5, 3, 2?? they're good too.
> The symphonies of Vaughan Williams and Walton deserve much more program appearances, same with Nielsen...and the Americans - these all need more performance exposure. Schuman, Mennin, Diamond, Bernstein, Hanson to just name a few...


I heard Dvorak's fifth symphony on radio recently. Excellent work.


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## Heck148

Sloe said:


> I heard Dvorak's fifth symphony on radio recently. Excellent work.


yes, it is...Have you heard #4?? it's terrific, ought to be a concert staple...


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## Sloe

Heck148 said:


> yes, it is...Have you heard #4?? it's terrific, ought to be a concert staple...


Not sure but thank you for the recommendation.


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## JAS

For Dvorak, after the 7th Symphony my favorite is the 6th.


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## DavidA

Heck148 said:


> ??? get real......
> 
> you sense wrong - I've thoroughly enjoyed my career as a professional musician...I love what I do...


Then please get on with it and play music we like - like Rachmaninoff! :lol:


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## Alfacharger

Heck148 said:


> yes, it is...Have you heard #4?? it's terrific, ought to be a concert staple...


The first three movements of the 4th are great but the final movement is well, quite banal to me.


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## Pat Fairlea

Strange Magic said:


> I think we're in a "Who is going to have the last word?" thang here. It will be What the Heck for sure. I'm off to listen to the two-piano version of _Symphonic Dances_--that way I won't have to deal with that murky, muddy sludge of R's orchestration. Drove me crazy!


Oooh, I love that 2-piano version of Symphonic Dances. Do you have a preferred recording?


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## Phil loves classical

Heck148 said:


> yes, it is...Have you heard #4?? it's terrific, ought to be a concert staple...


Hey, there you go. We don't need to get stuck on Sergei R.


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## Woodduck

Alfacharger said:


> The first three movements of the 4th are great but the final movement is well, quite banal to me.


He overworks that opening figure in less than a minute - and can't let go of it even then. Not a good composing day for Antonin (and I do generally like him immensely. I just heard _Rusalka_ from the Met this afternoon. Beautiful, moving work).


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## Phil loves classical

Woodduck said:


> He overworks that opening figure in less than a minute - and can't let go of it even then. Not a good composing day for Antonin (and I do generally like him immensely. I just heard _Rusalka_ from the Met this afternoon. Beautiful, moving work).


I just listened to the whole Symphony. Really couldn't get involved. I'll go try Diamond again, I remember liking him before. Then again I'm a modernism junkie.


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## Richard8655

What a powerful compositional statement. Some have interpreted it as his response to Stalin and the Stalinist era. (Stanislaw Skrowaczewski - Frankfurt Radio Symphony)






Among those who agree with this reading is the conductor Kurt Sanderling, who attended the preparations and premiere of the work and met with the composer while the piece was being created. Responding to a query about the Tenth Symphony as a Stalin portrait, Sanderling said in 1995: "I think this is quite true. And it was indeed a portrait of Stalin for all of us who had lived through the horrors of that time. But for the listener of today, it is perhaps more like a portrait of a dictatorship in general, of a system of oppression."


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## Phil loves classical

JAS said:


> "maybe you will find something more in these than I did. If you really don't like them, just throw them away." That friend made several attempts at listening to them, but also never felt any real pull from these efforts. At one point, he too was looking for shelf space, and that is where I come in. He gave them to me with similar advice. I still have them mostly because I have more shelf space for CDs (so far).


If you're keeping your D. Diamond CD's only because you loathe throwing any CD's away, hey I'll take them He sounds like a cross between Shostakovich and Copland.


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## Strange Magic

Pat Fairlea said:


> Oooh, I love that 2-piano version of Symphonic Dances. Do you have a preferred recording?


I have the Ashkenazy/Previn on a 2-disk Decca, with also both the suites for 2 pianos and lots of other Rachmaninoff goodies (Corelli Variations, Etudes Tableaux, etc.). I would have loved to have heard Rachmaninoff/Horowitz play, in the evenings after dinner at R's LA home, when they would sit down at the two grands and pound out two-piano works--quite possibly the two greatest pianists at that time.


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## brianvds

Razumovskymas said:


> As I said on other posts: In my opinion Bach even sounds good on a mechanical music box and sounds better the less "interpretation" it gets. So I'm not surprised a computer can do Bach fairly good. To do a good Beethoven on the other hand I guess there will be need of some serious processing power. If a computer can trick us by playing a Beethoven, we really need to start worrying about computers taking control


Yes, but it should be noted here that I am not talking about computers playing the music. In the Bach recording I referred to, the sound was synthesized, but how the notes were played was determined by a human. Synth piano is now at the level where even experts can't really distinguish it anymore from a real piano. Perhaps the same will soon be true for other instruments, after which we can have entire virtual orchestras that, at least in recording, sound for all the world like a real one. But it won't be a computer playing the music, any more than a piano plays the music. The electronic instruments, just as in the case of a "real" piano, just provide the sound - how the music is played is all human-determined.

Creating such a recording likely takes more time and effort than it takes the average pianist to learn the piece up to performance level; nevertheless, I would think that for many composers this kind of technology is a godsend.



Heck148 said:


> In live concerts?? always a struggle. the Rach-slop continues to crowd the better works off the programs.


I'm not sure it crowds _better_ works off the programs, but it does tend to crowd out other works that are also deserving to be played. On this point I would actually agree: it would be nice if orchestras would more often program non-war horse pieces, not just new ones but also old ones that are not so well known. I would think, for example, that several of Joachim Raff's symphonies are actually perfectly deserving of a performance or two, even though I don't think they are as good as the war horse works by his contemporaries.



> That has been the formula for many decades....program the new, unfamiliar with the warhorses....in your scenario, it works well, because the audience can hear the new, good stuff, then leave before the Rachm'ff....:devil:


Last time I went to a concert, it was considered spectacularly bad manners to leave for any reason short of an emergency. Of course, if Rach really grates on you that much... 



> of course, but in order to become popular, these works need to be heard...


And I contend that they now actually have a better chance to be heard than ever before in history.



> that's exactly what I've been doing here, and I've been getting a lot of flack for it...I've been suggesting all sorts of better music to be programmed in place of the tired, thick, muddy old warhorses...


Yeah, I noticed - I replied before reading through all the new posts in the thread. I suggest picking, say, five works and providing YouTube links. I for one will go and have a listen.



Heck148 said:


> Whatever, it's obviously trying to appeal to a wider audience base....a key problem for classical concert producers/orchestras - ' "Pop" series tend to sell very well - esp if there is crossover into rock, Broadway, Jazz, C & W, Folk, ethnic, etc, etc...
> But not many of those "Pops" ticket-holders cross over to purchase classical subscription season tickets....trying to find the right attraction, enticement if you will, is a challenge. in many ways, the "Pops" pays for the good stuff!!


Well, there has always been this perception that classical music is elitist, and so people have gone to great lengths to try convince audiences that it is not so. But of late I have been wondering whether this is a good tactic. Perhaps CM lovers should actually become even more snobbish - after all, who doesn't want to be part of the elite? 

I have noticed another thing. When I was younger, I often tried to convert people to classical music, or if they asked just what the heck I saw in it, I would play them recordings to illustrate. And I would tend to choose whatever pieces I thought might be more accessible - in short, lots of war horses.

Somewhat to my surprise, I found that these frequently did not work remotely as well as playing them stuff generally considered to be "harder on the ear" - Bartok, Stravinsky, etc. I had one guy completely blown away by Renaissance dance music; another by lute music by Silvius Weiss, and yet another by "Isle of the Dead."

We tend to assume too much - perhaps the war horses are popular mostly among CM followers rather than the general public!


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## brianvds

Strange Magic said:


> I have the Ashkenazy/Previn on a 2-disk Decca, with also both the suites for 2 pianos and lots of other Rachmaninoff goodies (Corelli Variations, Etudes Tableaux, etc.). I would have loved to have heard Rachmaninoff/Horowitz play, in the evenings after dinner at R's LA home, when they would sit down at the two grands and pound out two-piano works--quite possibly the two greatest pianists at that time.


I love those two suites for two pianos...


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## DavidA

brianvds said:


> .
> 
> always been this perception that classical music is elitist, and so people have gone to great lengths to try convince audiences that it is not so. But of late I have been wondering whether this is a good tactic. Perhaps CM lovers should actually become even more snobbish - after all, who doesn't want to be part of the elite?


perhaps that's why attempts by people like Lang Lang to popularise classical music are met with scorn by people who are determined to keep it elitist.


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## Phil loves classical

DavidA said:


> perhaps that's why attempts by people like Lang Lang to popularise classical music are met with scorn by people who are determined to keep it elitist.


I don't mind his theatrics by themselves, but Lang Lang may not be the best example. His technique is good, but his musical sensibility, according most people I've heard, and myself strongly feel, is nowhere near the level for the attention he gets. Just listen to his Rhapsody by a Theme of Paganini, since we are on Rachmaninov. Why they play his version on the radio all the time instead of many other better versions is beyond me, since you can't even see his theatrics.


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## Strange Magic

Remember: The Perfect is always the enemy of the Good. It's like the Mercedes-Benz ads--"The Best, or Nothing". I drive a Subaru.


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## StlukesguildOhio

Rachmaninoff vs Shosty? That really depends upon my mood. There are times when I want the lush works of one of Rachmaninoff's symphonies or concertos... and there are other times I want the more acerbic bite of one of Shosty's quartets or cello concertos.


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## Heck148

DavidA said:


> Then please get on with it and play music we like - like Rachmaninoff! :lol:


if it gets programmed, it will get played, but there is so much better music needing audience exposure...


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## Heck148

brianvds said:


> I'm not sure it crowds _better_ works off the programs, but it does tend to crowd out other works that are also deserving to be played. On this point I would actually agree: *it would be nice if orchestras would more often program non-war horse pieces, not just new ones but also old ones that are not so well known.* I would think, for example, that several of Joachim Raff's symphonies are actually perfectly deserving of a performance or two, even though I don't think they are as good as the war horse works by his contemporaries.


Agree completely...lots of older works deserve more program time., and early-mid 20th century works are now "old" in a sense...



> And I contend that they now actually have a better chance to be heard than ever before in history.


yes, the opportunities are there if people wish to make use of them.



> I have noticed another thing. When I was younger, I often tried to convert people to classical music, or if they asked just what the heck I saw in it, I would play them recordings to illustrate. And I would tend to choose whatever pieces I thought might be more accessible - in short, lots of war horses.
> Somewhat to my surprise, I found that these frequently did not work remotely as well as playing them stuff generally considered to be "harder on the ear" - Bartok, Stravinsky, etc.


Yes, I've noticed that, too...I'll try something like Shost 5/IV, or Rite of Spring. Miraculous Mandarin, something like that...usually goes over pretty well...


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## EdwardBast

Richard8655 said:


> What a powerful compositional statement. Some have interpreted it as his response to Stalin and the Stalinist era. (Stanislaw Skrowaczewski - Frankfurt Radio Symphony)


Well, if you believe composers reflect the world around them in their music, and considering that Shostakovich had lived under Stalin's regime for nearly his whole adult life, one could say that most of what he wrote up to the Tenth Symphony was a response to the Stalin years, don't you think?  A more specific case for the Tenth, however, does have some support. First, the account in Testimony, which is, alas, utterly unreliable:

"I wrote it right after Stalin's death, and no one has yet guessed what the Symphony is about. It's about Stalin and the Stalin years. The second part, the scherzo, is a musical portrait of Stalin, roughly speaking."

The soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, a close friend of Shostakovich (and wife of Rostropovich), wrote this in her autobiography:

"Within a few months [of Stalin's death she means] the Tenth Symphony rang out-the composer's tragic testament forever damning the tyrant. In the symphony's third movement, as in the finale, Shostakovich "signed" that indictment in the melody of his musical monogram, DSCH (D E-flat C B) which he was using for the first time."

It is possible that Solomon Volkov, the author of Testimony, had heard rumors from Vishnevskaya and other members of Shostakovich's inner circle about the Tenth and then fabricated the alleged Shostakovich quote above to reflect what was in the air at the time.

In any case, the scherzo of the Tenth, the supposed Stalin portrait, is quite like other stressful and frenetic scherzos by Shostakovich, most notably those from the 10th and 3rd quartets.


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## Richard8655

EdwardBast said:


> Well, if you believe composers reflect the world around them in their music, and considering that Shostakovich had lived under Stalin's regime for nearly his whole adult life, one could say that most of what he wrote up to the Tenth Symphony was a response to the Stalin years, don't you think?


Yes most of DS's music was more or less a response to the Stalin years (during that period). It couldn't be otherwise as a matter of survival. That's what makes his repertoire additionally interesting if you're a cultural historian of the period. But what kind of response is the question. His 4th was withdrawn under murky circumstances possibly related to the devastating regime criticism of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District. The 5th and 7th were well received as aligning with the ideology. So the response had various flavors, but was always overshadowing.

Glad to see a return to Shostakovich discussion here.


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## Sol Invictus

Hope its not too late to post something on topic. I agree with the sentiment that SR is more melodic than DSCH. Before, I'd say that music had to be melodious in order fit me to enjoy it but I just listened to Shostakovich 5th that it didn't bother me one bit. Quite the contrary, the thing blew me away!


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## Richard8655

Yes, I always enjoyed the 5th as well. Needs numerous listening and probably his most famous work. Not quite as abstract as his smaller ensemble pieces.


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## DaveM

After all this talk about Rachmaninoff's allegedly lousy orchestration, I played a number of live performances of the piano concerto #2 and symphony #2 and realized how much of this discussion, started by one individual, is an answer to a question no one asked to solve a problem no one had. 

IMO, it can be very instructive to look at a well-recorded live performance where you can see all the various instrumental groups performing, watch the interplay and see if you can hear the contributions of the winds, the brass and all the subsections that contribute to the whole. I find the orchestration for the concerto and the symphony to be very similar, not surprising since the former was composed in 1900-1901 and the latter in 1906. These works were made for large orchestras and a lot of violins! The sound is lush, sweeping and ultra-romantic. This is Rachmaninoff!

Watching the musicians play and hearing the overall results, I don't find any evidence of poor orchestration. I argue against the premise that orchestra musicians are better judges of orchestration than experienced listeners, unless the problem is music being written for specific instruments that is unreasonable for those instruments. If a musician swears that there is a problem with orchestration, but a listener cannot hear it, even when being able to watch the individual musicians play the music, then who is to be believed?

No, in the end, Rachmaninoff's orchestral music, except perhaps for the Symphony #1 and Piano Concerto #1 (which SR himself was very unhappy with) is just fine, actually well beyond fine. Thank heaven we had him because, for me, there is some solace in the fact that at least one great composer (and perhaps, to some extent, Richard Strauss) carried the legacy of true romantic era music into the 20th century!


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## Janspe

DaveM said:


> No, in the end, Rachmaninoff's orchestral music, except perhaps for the Symphony #1 and *Piano Concerto #1 (which SR himself was very unhappy with)* is just fine, actually well beyond fine.


Yes, he was unhappy with the work in its original form, but he _thoroughly_ revised the piece in 1917 and made the structure much lighter and the texture more transparent. He actually complained how audiences always wanted to hear the 2nd and the 3rd concertos and how they were visibly disappointed when he decided to present the first one instead. A pity, I think it's a wonderful work in every way, and really shows how a good revision can make a youthful piece much more musically rewarding. I think it's - in its revised form - a far more interesting work than the warhorse second concerto.


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## DaveM

Speaking of the Rachmaninoff Symphony #2, I've only recently become aware of the Alexander Warenberg arrangement of the symphony for piano and orchestra. Unfortunately, it is being promoted as the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto #5 which is a real stretch. But I'm glad it exists. The Adagio is rather beautiful. For instance, listen starting at around 8:40. This is Warenberg's creation, but Rachmaninoff is very much present. I would listen to this work over the piano concertos of a number of 20th century composers.


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## EdwardBast

Sol Invictus said:


> Hope its not too late to post something on topic. I agree with the sentiment that SR is more melodic than DSCH. Before, I'd say that music had to be melodious in order fit me to enjoy it but I just listened to Shostakovich 5th that it didn't bother me one bit. Quite the contrary, the thing blew me away!


Not sure what this means. Every work of Shostakovich I know has melodies in it. Every single one.


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## DavidA

Just listened to Rach's third piano concerto with Gilels. Stupendous!


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## DavidA

Phil loves classical said:


> I don't mind his theatrics by themselves, but Lang Lang may not be the best example. His technique is good, but his musical sensibility, according most people I've heard, and myself strongly feel, is nowhere near the level for the attention he gets. Just listen to his Rhapsody by a Theme of Paganini, since we are on Rachmaninov. Why they play his version on the radio all the time instead of many other better versions is beyond me, since you can't even see his theatrics.


Whatever his playing he has popularised classical music in a way other (perhaps better?) pianists could not by personality and publicity. And why not? If he can introduce classical to a whole new audience they will soon listen to pianists who we might think are better. The point is he should be cheered not jeered by people who are jealous of success


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## Sol Invictus

EdwardBast said:


> Not sure what this means. Every work of Shostakovich I know has melodies in it. Every single one.


I apologize. I didn't mean to suggest that his work didn't have melodies only that from what I heard it its not as melodic SR. I'll also add that the Largo movement is very melodic and is probably my favorite slow movement next to Dvorak's New World.


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## Heck148

DaveM said:


> After all this talk about Rachmaninoff's allegedly lousy orchestration, I played a number of live performances of the piano concerto #2 and symphony #2 and realized how much of this discussion, started by one individual, is an answer to a question no one asked to solve a problem no one had.


The question is entirely legitimate and pertinent, since the thread topic is Shostakovich v Rachm'ff....and orchestration, texture is a complete proper musical characteristic to consider, and presents a major difference in the two composers. Once, again, for the reasons I've clearly set forth - SR makes some very fundamental mistakes in orchestration, which result in thick, heavy texture, that obscures detail...This is indisputable, as examination of the scores reveals...



> These works were made for large orchestras and a lot of violins! The sound is lush, sweeping and ultra-romantic. This is Rachmaninoff!


other composers of the same period use huge orchestras, but create a much clearer, bigger, smaller, more various and interesting sound palette than SR. Those composers - Mahler, Sibelius, Strauss, Schoenberg, Rimsky-K etc, etc - were fine orchestrators who knew their craft.



> I argue against the premise that orchestra musicians are better judges of orchestration than experienced listeners,


of course they are better judges, they are the ones trying to make it work - are you saying that construction workers are not as qualified to judge the construction of a building as the people walking down the street?? they are right up close, they see what goes into it. or that professional athletes are not as qualified to assess a sports event as the fans in the stand?? they're are the ones on the field, engaged in the play-by-play - all the interactions, who is making the play, who is not - they see it right up close....



> unless the problem is music being written for specific instruments that is unreasonable for those instruments.


OK, that fits SR to a "T". marking an inner part, moving voice "p" or "pp" when it has no chance of being heard puts the performer in a real bind, artistically - if you play it as marked, it's inaudible, why bother?? if you play it 'FF" and blast it out - that is hardly consistent with the composer's dynamic marking, it's artistically incorrect. what's the solution??



> If a musician swears that there is a problem with orchestration, but a listener cannot hear it, even when being able to watch the individual musicians play the music, then who is to be believed?


"Watch" playing =/= 'hear' playing - believe the musician.



> ...in the end, Rachmaninoff's orchestral music


 is poorly orchestrated. skillful re-scoring by an expert would make a huge improvement.


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## RRod

Heck148 said:


> is poorly orchestrated. skillful re-scoring by an expert would make a huge improvement.


I also don't see how this battle ends well for Rach if it comes down to orchestration. I don't even know how it's a contest. Maybe I'm just too much a fan of hot, hot xylophone action.


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## Janspe

As Heck148 is so determined to put down Rachmaninov's skills as a composer for the orchestra, I won't go into that anymore - even though I still find his concept of the difference between subjective and objective a bit problematic.

Anyway, in all friendliness, I'd like to ask you: given how flawed Rachmaninov's orchestral writing is in your eyes, what are your thoughts on the changes that it went through over the years? I mean, I think there's a _massive_ difference between works like, I don't know, the first symphony and then the Paganini Rhapsody or the Symphonic Dances. I even think that one can perceive a considerable difference between the second and third concertos - I think he wrote for the orchestra so much better in the third. (Sorry if this topic has been covered already, I haven't been following the thread with 100% attentiveness)


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## Heck148

RRod said:


> I also don't see how this battle ends well for Rach if it comes down to orchestration. I don't even know how it's a contest. Maybe I'm just too much a fan of hot, hot xylophone action.


yeh. love that percussion....you certainly won't hear that with SR.


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## EdwardBast

Sol Invictus said:


> I apologize. I didn't mean to suggest that his work didn't have melodies only that from what I heard it its not as melodic SR. I'll also add that the Largo movement is very melodic and is probably my favorite slow movement next to Dvorak's New World.


No need to apologize! I know exactly what you meant. Rachmaninoff's melodies form long arches and usually have an unfailing sense of direction and drama, reaching an initial height and then falling back, fragmenting and losing momentum - only to rise higher still on the reprise. They tend to stay in a single instrument or group and so maintain a unity of agency. The internal rhyming of phrases is often exquisitely done and the main melodies are almost always supported by secondary lines, sighing in sympathy or pushing the main melody forward from the wings.

What most listeners fail to recognize in Shostakovich is that his melodic thought is often just as elaborate as Rachmaninoff's, unfolding over even longer spans. Among the main differences, however, is that the process and progress of Shostakovich's melodic thought is only rarely driven by applying the induction coil of harmonic tension-by bending the space through which the melodies pass-and his melodies often migrate from one voice to another, inextricably woven into a contrapuntal web. He tends to build tension by an additive process, by the incremental accretion of dissonance, and by exploiting rhythmic ambiguity, as when he elides phrases by making a weak measure of one phrase into the strong measure of the next - something he learned from Mussorgsky and the traditions of folk melody.

Listen to the first movement of Shostakovich's Fifth Quartet (or the Fourth or the Tenth) and you will hear melodic thought every bit as elegant and expansive as Rachmaninoff's, with the added advantage of more subtle transitions:


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## DaveM

EdwardBast said:


> No need to apologize! I know exactly what you meant. Rachmaninoff's melodies form long arches and usually have an unfailing sense of direction and drama, reaching an initial height and then falling back, fragmenting and losing momentum - only to rise higher still on the reprise. They tend to stay in a single instrument or group and so maintain a unity of agency. The internal rhyming of phrases is often exquisitely done and the main melodies are almost always supported by secondary lines, sighing in sympathy or pushing the main melody forward from the wings.
> 
> What most listeners fail to recognize in Shostakovich is that his melodic thought is often just as elaborate as Rachmaninoff's, unfolding over even longer spans. Among the main differences, however, is that the process and progress of Shostakovich's melodic thought is only rarely driven by applying the induction coil of harmonic tension-by bending the space through which the melodies pass-and his melodies often migrate from one voice to another, inextricably woven into a contrapuntal web. He tends to build tension by an additive process, by the incremental accretion of dissonance, and by exploiting rhythmic ambiguity, as when he elides phrases by making a weak measure of one phrase into the strong measure of the next - something he learned from Mussorgsky and the traditions of folk melody.
> 
> Listen to the first movement of Shostakovich's Fifth Quartet (or the Fourth or the Tenth) and you will hear melodic thought every bit as elegant and expansive as Rachmaninoff's, with the added advantage of more subtle transitions:


I played it on our front room system and I can hear what you're calling the melodic thought, but it doesn't move or touch me and like his other works, I really don't want to hear it again. But my mother-in-law did shorten her visit.


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## EdwardBast

DaveM said:


> I played it on our front room system and I can hear what you're calling the melodic thought, but it doesn't move or touch me and like his other works, I really don't want to hear it again. But my mother-in-law did shorten her visit.


So it's a mixed review then


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## Larkenfield

I‘ve enjoyed and admired both composers. I’m glad the melodic Rachmaninoff exists when I need relief from the sometimes turbulent realism of Shostakovich. It’s hard to imagine they would have had any genuine understanding or appreciation of each other with Rachmaninoff possessing more of the feel of Imperial Russia and Shostakovich the revolutionary spirit of the Bolsheviks. I wonder how it would have turned out if their positions had been reversed? Somehow, I imagine Shostakovich just as disgruntled, dissatisfied, and unhappy but for different reasons and Rachmaninoff continuing to go his own sweet way and perhaps writing a new Happy Birthday song with lush orchestration for Joseph Stalin.


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## MrMeatScience

I listen to and enjoy both of course, but there's no question for me that Shostakovich is the stronger composer. I like Rach in the piano concerti and some of the liturgical music, and I think the cello sonata is a work of genius, but Shostakovich cranked out masterpiece after masterpiece for decades. At least 10 top-shelf symphonies, 4 or 5 concerti, operas, solo piano music, the string quartets... By percentage, there's a lot more Rach that I don't much care for.


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## flamencosketches

I'd say I know deep down Shostakovich was probably the better composer on the whole, but Rachmaninoff was the better composer for piano. I like both of their music a lot. Rachmaninoff loses me sometimes, though, and Shostakovich loses me often. I have no clue what he was going for with his 9th symphony, for example, which people tend to see as a masterpiece; just sounds like goofy cartoon music to me. I haven't heard any of Rachmaninoff's symphonies but I have a hard time picturing them stacking up to Shostakovich's at all. 

Both great composers, and the argument about Imperial vs Bolshevik Russia coming through in their music rings true to me too. No need to compare. Funny, I read through this thread after I randomly found it while searching for threads about Rachmaninoff yesterday and today it's been bumped to the front page.


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## EdwardBast

MrMeatScience said:


> I listen to and enjoy both of course, but there's no question for me that Shostakovich is the stronger composer. I like Rach in the piano concerti and some of the liturgical music, and I think the cello sonata is a work of genius, but Shostakovich cranked out masterpiece after masterpiece for decades. At least 10 top-shelf symphonies, 4 or 5 concerti, operas, solo piano music, the string quartets... By percentage, there's a lot more Rach that I don't much care for.


Welcome MrMeat! I agree Shostakovich was stronger, but this is hardly surprising given that Shostakovich was a full time professional composer and Rachmaninoff was not. Rachmaninoff spent half of his life as the world's highest paid classical pianist and devoted several years to conducting as well. He ended his early career in composition, IMO just as he was starting to get really interesting. Ah well.


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## hammeredklavier

Radames said:


> Rachmaninoff is one of my composing heroes because he stuck with pure unabashed romanticism when it went out of style.





DeepR said:


> Who cares when something goes "out of style" anyway, I mean it's not fashion, right?


this basically shows Rachmaninoff has always remained relevant in the musical world and still is, to this day.


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## Woodduck

These "Composer A vs. Composer B" threads afford people an entertaining opportunity to reveal their limitations and blind spots in the appreciation of music. My limitations emerge when I hear Shostakovich. I don't care for him, except for bits here and there. How would I compare the two composers (if forced to)? They both show a keen sense of drama in their larger works, and they both seem to have put a lot of personal feeling into their music. But they obviously found very different sorts of feelings worth communicating. S seems bitter, angry, frustrated, depressed - the sort of artist 20th-century modernists loved to praise as "brave, honest, willing to gaze unflinchingly at the horrors of 20th-century man's existential condition," or something like that. R may have thought about the existential horrors engulfing his homeland, but he didn't compose music about them. The modernists might call that "escapism," but Stravinsky's work has no Soviet catastrophes in it either and nobody calls neoclassicism escapist. Interesting that he and R ended up neighbors. I can't imagine them having a beer or playing cards. I can imagine Shosty doing both, but not with me.


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## Woodduck

hammeredklavier said:


> this basically shows Rachmaninoff has always remained relevant in the musical world and still is, to this day.


Cute. Actually, Rachmaninoff is quite relevant to the music world. Just not to those who want to restrict and own the definition of it.


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## joen_cph

> ... The modernists might call that "escapism," but Stravinsky's work has no Soviet catastrophes in it either and nobody calls neoclassicism escapist ...


Hm, Stravinsky composed in a lot of styles, but his neoclassicism has been criticised a lot for being escapism. 
By Adorno, for example
1) https://books.google.dk/books?id=Jv...nepage&q=adorno stravinsky classicism&f=false
2) https://books.google.dk/books?id=B2...nepage&q=adorno stravinsky classicism&f=false

I agre that one doesn't see much of that tough criticism nowadays though - Adorno would perhaps say - as a result of capitulating or adjusting to escapist consumption.


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## Woodduck

joen_cph said:


> Hm, Stravinsky composed in a lot of styles, but his neoclassicism has been criticised a lot for being escapism.
> By Adorno, for example
> 1) https://books.google.dk/books?id=Jv...nepage&q=adorno stravinsky classicism&f=false
> 2) https://books.google.dk/books?id=B2...nepage&q=adorno stravinsky classicism&f=false
> 
> I agre that one doesn't see much of that tough criticism nowadays though - Adorno would perhaps say - as a result of capitulating or adjusting to escapist consumption.


Heh, heh. I forgot about that old crank Adorno.


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## Strange Magic

Michael Steinberg's notes for the San Francisco Symphony, on Rachmaninoff and Stravinsky as exiles in Hollywood:

"A doorbell rings in Hollywood. Answering, the owner, five foot one, has to tilt his head back to look into the face of his unexpected and tall, tall visitor. A "six-and-a-half-foot scowl" is how Stravinsky described Rachmaninoff. But on this spring evening, Rachmaninoff is not scowling. He has come to present an immense jar of honey to his fellow-expatriate and fellow-composer.

"The year is 1942. If I were making a movie about Rachmaninoff or Stravinsky, I would cheat and say this was their first meeting in umpteen years, but it wasn't quite. I don't know how much time had elapsed between their last encounter in Europe and their first in California, which preceded this one by some days. In any case, as a result of the upheavals in Europe they had both landed in Hollywood, Stravinsky in 1940, Rachmaninoff two years later.

"Greater Los Angeles and Hollywood in particular had become the magnet not just for expatriate actors, but for musicians, writers, and intellectuals, some of them among the most brilliant in their generation. The climate was kinder than any they had ever known, the heating bills were low, and besides, there was always the hope of work in the studios. Many of these new Californians at once split into cliques and cabals, not speaking to but ever ready to badmouth each other, feeding and watering all the aesthetic and political differences that had separated them in Europe. Rachmaninoff and Stravinsky were on opposite sides of the fence that separated the modernists from the anti-modernists. Rachmaninoff regarded The Firebird and Petrushka as works of genius but had no use for Stravinsky's later compositions; Stravinsky had no interest in Rachmaninoff's music at any time.

"But Rachmaninoff was not a petty or a jealous man. Thinking about Stravinsky, he saw a Russian, an honorable (if wrong-headed) musician, and above all, a father whose children, like his own, were caught in occupied France. He telephoned his biographer, Sergei Bertensson, and said: "As I know how much Igor Fedorovich has always disliked my compositions . . . and he must know my attitude to modern music, I'm not sure whether I could invite him and his wife to my house—which I'd love to do—because I don't know how he would receive my invitation. Would you be so kind as to send out a feeler?"

"Vera Stravinsky's response was positive and led to cordial dinners at both houses. One can imagine the atmosphere, the passage back and forth across the table of the stately and sonorous patronymics—Sergei Vasilievich, Igor Fedorovich, Natalia Alexandrovna, Vera Arturovna. At the first of these dinners, Stravinsky mentioned his fondness for honey; hence Rachmaninoff's surprise visit a few days later. Bertensson, who was also one of the dinner guests, writes that "besides comparing notes on their families in France, they had a very lively discussion of musical matters—but not a word about composition. They talked about managers, concert bureaus, agents, ASCAP, royalties."

As Steinberg points out, the two giants spoke of the business of being a composer, but not about their music .


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## Woodduck

^^^ Wonderful anecdotes, Magic. I wonder if many here have seen these home movies of Rachmaninoff:


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## Strange Magic

^^^^Alas, "video not available". Too bad; would have loved to see one of the "towering" musicians of the time.


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## Woodduck

Strange Magic said:


> ^^^^Alas, "video not available". Too bad; would have loved to see one of the "towering" musicians of the time.


That's odd. I have no trouble bringing it up on YouTube. It isn't as if you're in another country (unless Nova Caesarea is part of the Roman Empire). Try looking it up as "Sergei Rachmaninoff video and voice."


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## Larkenfield

Try this link for the Rachmaninoff video and voice:






PS. Not that it applies in this instance, but anyone who has a VPN can see YouTube videos in other countries that are not available in the US. Also, if a YouTube video is supposedly viewable in your country and you can't see it, do a search on the _name_ of the video and you may come across a viewable link.


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## flamencosketches

Works for me ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

His English was not bad at all, I was expecting a lot worse.


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## Strange Magic

Larkenfield said:


> Try this link for the Rachmaninoff video and voice:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> PS. Not that it applies in this instance, but anyone who has a VPN can see YouTube videos in other countries that are not available in the US. Also, if a YouTube video is supposedly viewable in your country and you can't see it, do a search on the _name_ of the video and you may come across a viewable link.


Excellent advice! Thank you .


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## Strange Magic

Woodduck said:


> That's odd. I have no trouble bringing it up on YouTube. It isn't as if you're in another country (unless Nova Caesarea is part of the Roman Empire). Try looking it up as "Sergei Rachmaninoff video and voice."


Though it's difficult to find this factoid about Rachmaninoff and New Jersey, a little part of the state--Locust Point, on the shores of an arm of the Navesink River--was a tiny part of Imperial Russia while Rachmaninoff lived there, early in his exile. I recall this from a memory of reading Bertenssen's bio of R, but his house is still there. Here's thread from a Rachmaninoff forum:

https://rachmaninoff.org/forum/the-...achmaninoff/rachmaninoff-s-locust-nj-home-517


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