Classical Music

Messiaen composed some bizarre music, and here is a classic example. Certainly not for everybody, but equally worth a listen.

PK, Turangalila is one of my favourites of his. Another composer I have always loved is Debussy. There is something dreamlike about the music. Listening to it feels like being caressed by a gentle summer breeze.

Debussy is wonderful. He rejected the appellation "impressionist," but I think it fits his music. It's soft, ethereal and diffuse.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

Debussy is wonderful. He rejected the appellation "impressionist," but I think it fits his music. It's soft, ethereal and diffuse.

Exactly, his music has much in common with impressionist painters from the same era and earlier. It is music that uplifts the soul. Just check out the face on the conductor, he feels it.

https://classicalmusiconly.com/

Found this site during my time away "on assignment abroad" during April and made a note to pass it along.

They hawk signup on that front page but you can still use the site otherwise. For someone like myself who remains on the outside of classical music looking for a route in, I have found the filtering system useful.

Phantom Commander wrote:

Perilagu Khan wrote:

Debussy is wonderful. He rejected the appellation "impressionist," but I think it fits his music. It's soft, ethereal and diffuse.

Exactly, his music has much in common with impressionist painters from the same era and earlier. It is music that uplifts the soul. Just check out the face on the conductor, he feels it.

Now having praised Debussy, I must report that I heard an orchestral version of Claire de Lune in concert this past Saturday and it was lame. I do not understand the appeal of that particular piece.

Clair de Lune is not my favourite, either.

Another I enjoy is Vivaldi.

I'm convinced Vivaldi, improbably enough, has influenced modern serialistic composers such as Philip Glass.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I'm convinced Vivaldi, improbably enough, has influenced modern serialistic composers such as Philip Glass.

I have never thought of that, but I think you are right.

A fellow student at the University claimed there had only ever lived two genuine geniuses: Shakespeare and Mozart.

That's quite a statement! I'll grant that the term "genius" is used far too promiscuously--to describe basketball players, for instance--but I would argue there have been thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of true geniuses throughout history. And if Plato and Einstein weren't geniuses, nobody is.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

That's quite a statement! I'll grant that the term "genius" is used far too promiscuously--to describe basketball players, for instance--but I would argue there have been thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of true geniuses throughout history. And if Plato and Einstein weren't geniuses, nobody is.

Agreed. He was no genius for saying that. The number could be much higher than that as well. Not everyone catches the attention of all of humanity and posterity.

Here is a little classical guitar:

I'm taking my little cousins aged 5 and 9 to see Beethoven's 5th performed next month.

Wunderschon, Sarai. Who is performing it?

I will post a link to it when I get a chance but it's just a local group in Kingston Ontario. I was taken to the Grande Theater when I was about the age and heard his 5th and 9th. It blew my mind and I am hoping it does the same for them. I'm taking them to the ROM this summer too.
anything I can think of to throw a little bit of higher culture at them even if it's just watching a fairly faithful Dickens movie

You're doing a good thing, Sarai. I wish far more people would follow your example.

I've never known why all parents don't aim that way as all kids are sponges. So it's only a matter of making it fun which is easy.
even just name dropping throws seeds

Have you seen the quality of parents these days?

Never liked Verdi much as a kid, but have come to appreciate his music now.

I'm not exactly nuts about any of the great Italian opera composers--Verdi, Rossini, Puccini, Donizetti. But I do like several non-operatic Italian composers: D. Scarlatti, Rota, Corelli, Vivaldi, Busoni.

Unfortunately not a lovely girl with the cello, but all the same:

Another Norwegian dance

Bohemian greatness.