# Performance/interpretation impact



## Omicron9 (Oct 13, 2016)

Greetings.

Here's a couple of examples of my experiences of how an interpretation and performance can have such an impact on a composition or set of compositions that it practically determines if I like that piece or not.

Example 1: Previously, my only recording of the LVB cello sonatas was by a well-known cellist coupled with a pianist playing pianoforte. I like the cellist in question, and have several of his other recordings. However, I didn't like this recording, but assumed that I just didn't like the LVB cello works. Odd because LVB is one of my favorites. Then one day listening to the local classical station, they played a different performance of one of the LVB cello sonatas, and it was so different (modern piano) that it took me a long time to identify it. It sounded like an entirely different composition. I found that I was really digging it. I purchased the ECM recording of the LVB cello works with Schiff/Perenyi, and absolutely love it. The recording and performance both are superb, and I find that I now love the LVB cello works. Opinion/impact of compositions entirely changed by the performance, and the lack of pianoforte.

Example 2: I've liked the Debussy solo piano works for many years. Recently I heard the Benedetti recordings of them, and I completely heard them in a new way. I went from liking them to loving them. As if Benedetti uncovered new layers of the music that I'd not previously heard. In fact, I now hear my other recordings of these works differently, due to the Benedetti impact.

A fascinating (to me, anyway) process and phenomena.

Has this kind of thing happened to any of you?


Best regards,

-09


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Great topic. Yes happens sometimes to me too. The interpretation/performance can radically change how you perceive the work. Like I posted on a few occasions, Haitink recordings of Brahms' symphonies changed how I viewed those works. Britten changed how I viewed Mozart's Symphony #40, never liked it much before. William Kapell is the only one with which I can listen to Chopin and Rachmaninov.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

I've had it happen a few times...while still in high school I discovered Mahler...#2, specifically...fell in love with it (heard it first played in memoriam for JFK in '63)...branched out to try #5...got Scherchen/VSOO version on Westminster. Gawd...awful, scruffy orchestra playing, poor sound, sounded like a rehearsal...i couldn't believe that a composer who produced the sublime #2 could crank out such a dog as this #5. Then I acquired the famous Walter/NYPO version of M5...wonderful, suddenly it all made sense...everything clicked..loved it...now one of my very favorite works....Solti/CSO live concert Carnegie Hall 3/70 still the greatest live concert I've ever heard. Amazing.


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

It does go without saying that a performance can make all the difference in the world in our assessment, understanding, and appreciation of a particular musical work. A certain kind can either break or make (or elevate) the music, esp. if it's complex, garish or dense, elusive like, say, that of Myaskovsky, Bax, Bruckner, Glazunov, Reger, Medtner, you name him or her. 

A good case in point is Bruckner's Ninth. Back in 1988/1989, I listened to a very good performance of Dohnanyi and the Cleveland Orchestra and remembered how much more I liked Bruckner (at that time, I was beginning to discover the great Austrian and was already familiar with his first three symphonies plus his Seventh). Then came Carlo Maria Giulini and the Vienna Philharmonic months later and I was floored. The power, the eloquence, the transcendental qualities of that performance was like no others, and the rest was history. There is another instance of that sort in Rachmaninoff's First Symphony performed by Ashkenazy and the Royal Concertgebouw (after hearing previous recordings before then). And after listening Serebrier's innate rendition of Glazunov's Third Symphony when it first came out (after years of listening to Butt's, Svetlanov's, Khaikin's recordings), my view of the work changed in ways the least expected. 

I could go on, but I'll stop here. Cool, thought-provoking topic.
Thank you.
:tiphat:


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## bharbeke (Mar 4, 2013)

It definitely happened to me with the Beethoven string quartets. I did not like or was lukewarm on them, and the performances by the Amadeus Quartet brought me around to liking most of them.


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

There are lots of great performances of Schubert's best piano sonatas, but they wouldn't be my favorite pieces in the piano repertoire if it wasn't for Sviatoslav Richter.


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## jegreenwood (Dec 25, 2015)

I mentioned two albums in a similar context in another thread - the Quartetto Italiano playing Schubert's Quartet in G Major and Paul Paray conducting the Symphonie Fantastique - two works I didn't "get" until I heard those recordings.

By the way I heard Perenyi/Schiiff play the Beethoven cycle in concert. They are wonderful.


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## Selby (Nov 17, 2012)

^ I feel the same about Alfred Brendel  Which really drives home the OP's point. If, say, Sir András Schiff had been my only exposure to Schubert, despite his soft and poetic touch, despite his knowledge and research, I would never have fallen in love with the pieces. Brendel made them come alive for me.


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## Omicron9 (Oct 13, 2016)

Fascinating and thought-provoking responses; thanks, all. 

To further expound upon the LVB cello thing: I think the performances were fine; the cellist is one whom I like. It's just that the pianoforte in that setting seemed so alien (to me). I have nothing against pianofortes, so it wasn't just that I don't care for that instrument. It just didn't fit to the extent that it made me think that I didn't like LVB's cello sonatas. Replace with a modern piano, and they instantly transmogrified into entirely other pieces. Odd.

Perhaps I should have titled the thread "Performance/interpretation/instrument choice impact."

-09


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Heard a few performances of Copland's Appalachian Spring Suite when I was a kid, but it was the Leonard Bernstein/New York Philharmonic performance that won me over with his heartfelt emotion.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

bharbeke said:


> It definitely happened to me with the Beethoven string quartets. I did not like or was lukewarm on them, and the performances by the Amadeus Quartet brought me around to liking most of them.


I had the same experience with the Alban Berg Quartet.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Sometimes a different performance can affect not your fundamental appreciation of a work, but how you listen to it. For years my reference performance of Petrushka was Stravinsky's own with the Columbia Symphony -- a perfectly fine representation. Then I heard Boulez with the NYPO, and it was like he took Windex to the score! I still like both, but the contrast was amazing.


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## Jacred (Jan 14, 2017)

Aside from the actual execution of the piece, never underestimate how much of a role sound quality can play. Especially with chamber music for me--it loses a lot of its intimacy when the sounds aren't recorded well.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

I have an example from many years ago. I was having no luck appreciating Bach's organ works, but then I acquired the Lionel Rogg set on Harmonia Mundi. Not only did the set click perfectly for me, the many other Bach organ recordings I had accumulated also sounded wonderful. You never know when the light will turn on.


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## senza sordino (Oct 20, 2013)

I was not impressed with the Berg Violin Concerto. I had a recording of Gidon Kremer. But when I heard Isabelle Faust play the piece I was suddenly a Berg convert, I now think this piece is amazing. 

I was never a big fan of Beethoven's violin concerto, until I heard Zino Fracescatti play it. Thoroughly enjoyable. 

I always thought the Elgar Violin Concerto to be an over blown and overly long concerto until I heard Tamsin Little perform it with Andrew Davis conducting. Now while still long it holds my interest, they keep the suspense and tension of the piece through to the end. Superb. 

I thought all the life had been sucked out of the Planets by Holst because I had heard it so often since I was a kid. It is my mother's favourite piece and she had recordings of it. Then I heard Dutoit's version with Montreal and it has breathed fresh life into the piece for me. Fantastic.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

Omicron9 said:


> Fascinating and thought-provoking responses; thanks, all.
> 
> To further expound upon the LVB cello thing: I think the performances were fine; the cellist is one whom I like. It's just that the pianoforte in that setting seemed so alien (to me). I have nothing against pianofortes, so it wasn't just that I don't care for that instrument. It just didn't fit to the extent that it made me think that I didn't like LVB's cello sonatas. Replace with a modern piano, and they instantly transmogrified into entirely other pieces. Odd.


Do you remember the names of the performers? The reason I ask is that those sonatas really opened up for me upon hearing the Coin/Cohen HIP recordings on Harmonia Mundi.


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## Omicron9 (Oct 13, 2016)

Bulldog said:


> Do you remember the names of the performers? The reason I ask is that those sonatas really opened up for me upon hearing the Coin/Cohen HIP recordings on Harmonia Mundi.


I can't recall the pianist's name, but the cellist was Peter Wispelway.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

I wasn't into Bach's organ works until I heard Helmut Walcha play them. Converted me completely.


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