# Hard To Get Past The Start (But Worth It)



## Guest (Apr 9, 2014)

I can think of three well-known works where the start is so famous and overplayed it might act as a barrier to the rest of the piece. But once you get past the opening, there is a wealth of lovely music which is quite different from the start.

The ones I can think of are:
1) Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra
2) Orff's Carmina Burana
3) Beethoven's Symphony #5 

Any others?

Edited: 
changed "distinctive" to "famous and overplayed"
changed "acts" to "might act"


----------



## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

Are you saying you don't like the beginnings of those pieces? I don't see any need to "get past" any of these beginnings. 

For Beethoven, the starting theme is integrated into the whole first movement.


----------



## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

GreenMamba said:


> Are you saying you don't like the beginnings of those pieces? I don't see any need to "get past" any of these beginnings.
> 
> For Beethoven, the starting theme is integrated into the whole first movement.


I agree.


----------



## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1
Schubert's 9th symphony

These are works where the beginning is so amazing and beautiful, that I almost keep missing it throughout the piece.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Kind of the opposite -- Britten's Cello Symphony is hard to get past the start because it is beyond the esthetic pain threshold. But that's just to keep out the riff-raff I guess. Once into it, it's very fine indeed.


----------



## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

Speaking of Britten, I'm reminded of this masterclass led by Julian Bream:






Must be annoying for a student who's devoted months to learning a piece to not be able to get past the first note of it!


----------



## csacks (Dec 5, 2013)

I can not find an obstacle in any of these pieces. Sorry, probably I am missing your point


----------



## Guest (Apr 9, 2014)

Perhaps my premise is muddled, but let me attempt to clarify. In all three cases listed in the OP, the start is very famous, arguably too famous -- appearing in lots of classical "greatest hits" collections, etc. It's easy to avoid listening to those pieces on the basis of the over-exposure suffered by the opening movements. All you wise folks know that that would be a mistake - and I agree. I'm wondering if there are other examples of works whose opening movements suffer from too much exposure in the same sense.


----------



## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

BPS said:


> Perhaps my premise is muddled, but let me attempt to clarify. In all three cases listed in the OP, the start is very famous, arguably too famous -- appearing in lots of classical "greatest hits" collections, etc. It's easy to avoid listening to those pieces on the basis of the over-exposure suffered by the opening movements. All you wise folks know that that would be a mistake - and I agree. I'm wondering if there are other examples of works whose opening movements suffer from too much exposure in the same sense.


Rossini's operas, for example.


----------



## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

In the era of recorded music, "overplayed" is the listener's mistake, not the composer's. I listen to enough different music, I don't burn out on any of it... especially truly great music like Beethoven 5 and Schubert 9.


----------



## Guest (Apr 9, 2014)

I fear to say I love the 2nd movement of the "Surprise" symphony because people will think I'm just enthralled by the surprise...it's that middle melody around 2 and a half or 3 minutes that gets me every time though


----------



## Guest (Apr 9, 2014)

bigshot said:


> In the era of recorded music, "overplayed" is the listener's mistake, not the composer's. I listen to enough different music, I don't burn out on any of it... especially truly great music like Beethoven 5 and Schubert 9.


I don't think BPS is referring to overplaying on the listener's part as much as the little bits of music you can only avoid if you never turn on a television. Of course, I don't watch TV any more, but what's done is done


----------



## GioCar (Oct 30, 2013)

GreenMamba said:


> Are you saying you don't like the beginnings of those pieces? I don't see any need to "get past" any of these beginnings.
> 
> For Beethoven, the starting theme is integrated into the whole first movement.


Into the whole symphony, I'd say...


----------



## GioCar (Oct 30, 2013)

BPS said:


> I can think of three well-known works where the start is so famous and overplayed it might act as a barrier to the rest of the piece. But once you get past the opening, *there is a wealth of lovely music *which is quite different from the start.
> 
> The ones I can think of are:
> 1) Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra
> ...


Sorry, where is the wealth of lovely music in Orff's work?


----------



## Cheyenne (Aug 6, 2012)

Blancrocher said:


> Speaking of Britten, I'm reminded of this masterclass led by Julian Bream:
> 
> Must be annoying for a student who's devoted months to learning a piece to not be able to get past the first note of it!


"The quality of sound was rather... Not particularly good." Gotta love his politeness :tiphat:


----------



## GioCar (Oct 30, 2013)

shangoyal said:


> Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1
> Schubert's 9th symphony
> 
> These are works where the beginning is so amazing and beautiful, that I almost keep missing it throughout the piece.


Yes, definitely true for Tchaikovsky's piano concerto. 
And this is also one big weakness of that work, the fact that the beautiful initial theme is not exploited any longer in the concerto.


----------



## maestro267 (Jul 25, 2009)

I sometimes struggle to connect the introduction of Also Sprach to the rest of the piece. It's been played so often on its own, that it's difficult to not think of it as a separate piece.

Also, a certain commerical station here has been known to play just the intro! Just 2 minutes! That's like playing the first movt. of Beethoven 5 and stopping after the first 8 notes! Ridiculous!


----------



## GioCar (Oct 30, 2013)

The beginning of the Coriolan Overture, also because it was unfortunately so exploited by an old Italian tv commercial of an "amaro" (a bitter liqueur).

Same destiny to the beginning of the Peer Gynt Morning Mood, this time for an olive oil....

look at this


----------



## GGluek (Dec 11, 2011)

Long ago, when I was the classical music director of a college radio station, I had to lock away our copies of Zarathustra just to keep the non-classical jocks from over-playing it on spots, promos, or just for the heck of it on late night Rock shows.


----------



## Dustin (Mar 30, 2012)

I'll amend my statement to one of the most "overplayed" intros, and that is Grieg's Piano Concerto. I wouldn't say it's hard to get past but the rest of the piece is much fresher compared to that intro.


----------



## GraemeG (Jun 30, 2009)

GioCar said:


> Yes, definitely true for Tchaikovsky's piano concerto.
> And this is also one big weakness of that work, the fact that the beautiful initial theme is not exploited any longer in the concerto.


Ah, well, this is both Tchaikovsky's strength and weakness at the same time. Some melodies might be wonderful on their own, but simply don't lend themselves to symphonic development. I just don't think you can do much with that tune except to keep repeating it. Which is why he plays it twice and moves on.
GG


----------



## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

I only skip the sunrise of Also Sprach Zarathustra, probably the most overplayed and banalized of all. Curiously I find that the sunrise in his brother Eine Alpensinfonie induces in me a sort of ambivalent nervous laughter.


----------



## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

GioCar said:


> Into the whole symphony, I'd say...


Exactly. The opening theme is most definitely in every movement of Beethoven's 5th.



BPS said:


> I can think of three well-known works where the start is so famous and overplayed it might
> 
> act as a barrier to the rest of the piece. But once you get past the opening, there is a wealth of lovely
> 
> ...


Well, I for one knew exactly what you were getting at. It just doesn't happen for me with these particular pieces, fortunately.

In Zarathustra I have the opposite reaction and often think the remainder of the work is horribly 
anticlimactic compared to that famous opening. But I don't get where people have trouble connecting them. The three note opening fanfare is woven throughout this work too. It's just wonderfully fragmented. I wish Strauss' muse had tapped him on the shoulder and suggested "Hey! This makes a good ending, not a beginning."

Where it does happen to me is with Beethoven, but not his 5th Symphony. I have a little trouble with the opening of Beethoven's "Emperor" Concerto. What a pretentious swaggering pile of chords and gaudy arpeggios! But then the music gets utterly fantastic after Elvis takes off his cape as it were.

But what often happens to me in a similar vein is having trouble with an entire composer's output based on overused pieces. I think Eine kleine Nachtmusik, the Sonata Semplice No 16 in C and the Alla Turca Rondo for too many years reminded me of mustard and pretense. Only in my encroaching old age have I been able to start appreciating Mozart - some of it.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

I suppose there might be a few of the very most naive who first hear these extracts, then buy a CD say, of the Strauss piece, and are then surprised the disc is not filled with one short track after the other of Television commercial length bits of music ???

I don't really think those who are that naive must be of a kind in any great number. It is sometimes a little surprising to some that that cool bit they liked is part of a twenty minute piece in sections or movements, but is that really any sort of 'barrier' to a listener's investigating the entire work? Maybe, but then, they are not then ready, no? If not, they are ready. 

I wonder why the OP then, is much of a topic


----------



## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

arcaneholocaust said:


> I don't think BPS is referring to overplaying on the listener's part as much as the little bits of music you can only avoid if you never turn on a television.


That doesn't matter to me, because after the little bit in the commercial is over, I'm playing the rest of it back in my head.


----------



## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

Rachmaninov's second piano concerto, perhaps? And then, with his Paganini rhapsody, everyone just sits around waiting for the 18th variation.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

GioCar said:


> Sorry, where is the wealth of lovely music in Orff's work?


Well, in Carmina Burana, anyway, after the introductory _O Fortuna_ it is one hit tune after another all the way through its remaining 24 segments! -- those are simple, folk or folk-ish, if you will, but they are hit tune after hit tune at least as much as Verdi's La Traviata is hit tune after hit tune.

For the rest of Orff, I have found little of interest or charm


----------

