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Posted on 04/18/2014 5:59:26 PM PDT by AZamericonnie
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My sound is still messed up but... 75 minutes is more than a ‘piece’! lol
I’ll have to listen laters...:(
Good Evening, Publius!
May you have a Blessed holy Week and Easter.
Thank you for The meditation by Haydn. I will be looking forward to a quiet time when i can listen to it in its entirety!
((((HUGS))))
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Richard Wagner (pronounced REE-kard VAAG-ner) is not for vussies. He totally reformed the art of opera, influencing Verdi, Saint-Saens and Puccini, among others. He was the cultural godfather of Hitler, which is why there are always problems performing his music in Israel. While he was a terrible person, there is no doubt that he changed opera forever.
The opera ”Parsifal” is based on the Arthurian legends of the Holy Grail, which in this story is an actual cup, not the bloodline of Jesus via his wife Mary of Bethany. This is long before Baigent and Dan Brown. Luciano Pavarotti’s manager once said of “Parsifal”, “The opera began at eight. Around midnight, I checked my watch and discovered it was only eight thirty.”
Wagner’s operas move slowly and are rather static. The voice, which is primary in Italian and French opera, takes second position to the orchestra in Wagner. When listening or watching a Wagner opera, the best thing to do is just kick back and wallow in the sound. Listen passively, and you’ll find it rewarding.
This particular number from “Parsifal” is connected with Good Friday, and Toscanini liked to conduct an instrumental version of this on that religious holiday.
Note of caution:
The John Lennon song has the F-Bomb in it (NSFW). or at least it did back in 1970!
Not being critical...just letting the folks know.
Hi Drumbo!
(((((((BIG HUGS))))))))
I am SO glad to see you tonight!
A Blessed Easter to You!
Thanks M/L!
Well....we’ve never hear that before! :)
How’s Lynn-dah doing? And you as well! *Hugs*
Thanks my FRiend and back at’cha. I made it to Palm Sunday service last week although my wound was still draining a bit. I’m looking forward to wearing something besides a sweat suit to church this week.
And to you also! Thank you Mucho...
Good evening Kathy! *Hugs*
All is well Alaska way?
Looks like some good wallerin’ music goin’ on tonight!
Happy Easter! :)
Not exactly sure what that is but it kinda sounds fun! lol
So glad your on the mend!
Olivier Messiaen lived a very long life (1908-1992). He was a French Catholic mystic, which put him a bit at odds with the church whose organ he played for his entire adulthood (1931-92). In addition to being a church organist at Holy Trinity and a composer, he was an ornithologist, and birdcalls make up a significant part of the music he composed.
There are interesting parallels between Messiaen and Cesar Franck in that both were career church organists. Franck married poorly. Messiaen married well, but his wife lost her memory after an operation and spent the rest of her life in mental institutions. Both wrote a great deal of chamber music and a symphony. Messiaen’s symphony, “Turangalila”, was the source of jokes on the animated series “Futurama” where it was used as the full name of its female cyclops character voiced by Kate Sagal.
In 1940, Messiaen heeded the call of his country and volunteered to become a medical officer in the war with Hitler. He was captured almost immediately at Verdun and spent the next year in a German prisoner-of-war camp before being released. Upon his return, he spent the rest of his professional life teaching, in addition to composing and organ playing at church.
At the POW camp, he wrote a quartet for piano, violin, cello and clarinet that has become one of the monuments of 20th Century composition. The “Quartet for the End of Time” features all the hallmarks of a Messiaen piece, to include birdcalls, Asian scales, mystical religion, all wrapped up in a mixture of dissonance, occasional atonality, and late romantic visions of the Christ figure. In an era when people pore over the book of “Revelation”, this piece fits in quite well.
I’ll be honest here. This is not for everybody. Some of the eight short movements of this piece are hard on the ear. But some of them will move you to tears. This is an astonishing work of art written by a master.
The first movement features birdcalls (violin and clarinet), and to be honest, it’s one of the toughest movements to listen to. But it lays out his music vocabulary clearly. It’s marked “somewhat moderately”, uses a 3/4 time signature and a key signature of two flats. The piece peters out very quietly in no key at all. Go with it, because it only lasts a few minutes.
Messiaen: “Quartet for the End of Time”, (“Crystal Liturgy”)
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