Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo 2017 BBC Proms

Prom 54 brought the Orchestra of La Scala from Milan to play the Brahms Violin Concerto in the first part of the program.

After intermission Respighi's musical tributes to his home city, the colorful Fountains of Rome and Pines of Rome concluded the concert.

For Prom 60 the Oslo Philharmonic traveled to London to perform a concert comprised entirely of colorful/dramatic Russian music. To open, the suite from Stravinsky's "Firebird" was played. Rachmaninoff's 4th Piano Concerto(with an encore)closed the first half.

Following intermission the massive Shostakovich Symphony No. 12 was performed. After thunderous applause at its conclusion the quietly beautiful Rachmaninoff Vocalise in its orchestral version served as an encore.

JohnK thanks for that post.
I'll take some time to listen to it asap.

Blair, hope that you'll be able to listen to some of this great music.

For Prom 63
the concert began with the little-known(my first hearing)overture by Taneyev which proved to have a considerable amount of musical interest. The first half then concluded with the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No.1 to complete the Proms cycle of all four Rachmaninoff piano concertos.

Following intermission an excellent performance of Tchaikovsky's excitingly dramatic Manfred Symphony closed this overall fine concert.

I used to have quite the collection. Not sure what happened to it just seemed to disappear about the time we moved into this house.

Prom 68 brought the Mariinsky Orchestra from St. Petersburg for a concert of Russian music. The opening work was a Prokofiev Cantata which featured much energetic choral singing. The relatively brief one movement Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 3 followed, with two encores added by the pianist to close the first half.

The second half featured the monumental Shostakovich Symphony No. 5 in a fine performance, with an encore work of Lyadov to end the concert.

The superb Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra arrived for Prom 72 and performed a single work, but it was the huge Mahler Symphony No. 6, which was enough to supply plenty of listening enjoyment.

Ever try to imagine the story in the music?

The Proms are over, but I'll bring to your attention a gigantic BBC concert with the top-rank London Symphony Orchestra performing all three of the great musical scores composed for The Firebird, Petrushka, and The Rite of Spring by Stravinsky . Each of these is often performed as the major work in a concert, and this is to my knowledge a unique event with all three performed and separated by two intermissions.

Blair, much classical music is without a story underlying it and is to be enjoyed for its inherent beauty or excitement. The British composer Vaughan Williams, annoyed by questions as to the "meaning" of certain of his pieces, is often quoted as responding "It never seems to occur to people that a man might simply want to write a piece of music".

This doesn't apply to the three Stravinsky works in the concert, which were composed for ballets which had themes of an often sinister nature. Most notably, The Rite of Spring(which caused a riot at its 1913 Paris premier), told of an ancient pagan sacrificial rite involving a young girl dancing herself to death. So sure, sometimes your mind imagines the composer elaborating the events with his music.

Yep, I can totally understand the composers point of view.
My question was more in line with allowing your own imagination to try and piece it all together or at least wander from idea to idea, scene to scene, as the music plays.
The songs are too long for a single extended "day dream" for lack of a better term.
Music and emotion...